Empowering Young Minds

Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs

Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs is a popular theory which focuses on a series of needs to be successful. Abraham Maslow was an American psychologist who in 1943 published his hierarchy of needs to explain human motivation. He considered there were five needs – physiological, safety, love, esteem and self-actualisation and he put them in the shape of a pyramid.

For a child to be successful in school and engage in academic learning we believe the foundations of Maslow’s Hierarchy of needs all need to be fulfilled. 

​

Maslow placed these needs in an order for one to be realised for the next to happen. Beginning with the foundational aspects of the basic needs – physiological and safety and eventually reaching the top of the pyramid to self-actualisation, which refers to a person reaching their fullest potential as a human being.

​

By exploring the details of the needs this may become clearer:

​

• Physiological needs include having the right nutrition and water, access to fresh air, enough rest and exercise.

• Safety needs include security and feeling safe – physically and emotionally, the need to have shelter/a home and to have stability in one’s life.

• Belonging and feeling loved, the social side of feeling that you belong, are connected, loved and included.

• Esteem needs focus around the inner self – having feelings of achievement, being recognised, having power and control over one’s life.

• Self-actualisation is achieving one’s full potential, being creative and finding that uniqueness of oneself.

​

From a purely child development stance, all child developmental needs are encompassed in Maslow’s theory – physical development, emotional development, social development, cognitive and language development and aesthetic development.