Top tips for supporting your homesick student

Homesickness is the sadness and melancholy exchange students may experience when they are away from their family and friends. It can manifest in students in different ways. You may notice some of these patterns while others may not be so obvious. Either way, it would be best to speak with your student about these behaviours and emotions to understand how they feel.

Notice the signs

At first, many students may not even realise they are homesick. Some common symptoms of homesickness include behaviour patterns like:

Decreased family engagement
Increased contact with friends and family back home
Lack of appetite
Limited interest in making or spending time with friends here
Increased time spent in their bedroom
Changes in their sleep schedule
Strong opinions about how “everything is better back home”
Being emotional, irritable, anxious

Communicate

Sometimes a simple conversation can ease a situation. With this conversation you will want to help your student express their thoughts and feelings to help identify if they are truly homesick or if there is some other cause to the behaviours.

We encourage you to use open-ended questions when addressing changes in their behaviour or attitude, especially if you believe they are homesick. For example:

"I noticed you're spending more time in your room. What’s been keeping you from spending time with us?"
"I noticed you looked upset earlier. Is there something or someone making you upset?"
“What can we do to make you feel more at home?”

Case study: Homesickness

At first, many students may not even realize they are homesick. Here are some suggestions to help your student through homesickness.

Plan activities

Plan a weekly family game night or ask your student to help cook a meal. Schedule family time, events, volunteering or short trips a few days in advance to give your student something to look forward to.

You could even try being a tourist in your own community. A few ideas include:

Brush up on your town’s history and origin by checking out local museums, exhibits or landmarks
Take a new mode of transportation to get around
Attend local sporting events, festivals or concerts
Try a new restaurant

Bring home comforts

Nothing says “comfort” like being surrounded by some of your favourite belongings, participating in your favourite activities or eating your favourite foods. Learn what your student likes and aim to incorporate those foods, activities or interests into your routine. It’s bound to make them feel more at home.

Keep your expectations realistic

You’ve spoken to your student and have tried to combat their homesickness with activities and outings, but you are still noticing signs. Be patient, it won’t be cured overnight.

Check in with your student regularly to ensure they are feeling better and continue to try these methods with them. Be sure to keep your Regional Manager looped in to how things are going with your student as they may have additional ideas to help the situation.

Student perspective

Yuto from Japan is spending his exchange in Cork. Since the beginning of his experience, he has been excited to try new things and has said yes to everything – family time, school activities, chores, playing with his little host siblings. Recently, the newness of these activities has worn off and Yuto is experiencing extreme homesickness. He is missing his own siblings, his favorite Japanese foods and being able to speak to everyone in Japanese. Yuto is losing interest in joining in on activities with his host family because he's missing the activities he does with his family back home.

Host family perspective

The Taylor family has hosted a few times. Yuto is their third boy from Japan. During his first few months here, the family had a really positive experience with Yuto; he immediately fit into their family and always had high energy. Recently, something is shifting in Yuto and the family doesn’t recognise his cold, unengaged behaviour. Of all the students they’ve hosted, they have never seen a behaviour shift like this.

How they handled it

Host mom Lynne reached out to her RM, Lisa, to share this immediate shift in Yuto’s behaviour. Lisa suspected that Yuto was struggling with homesickness. This surprised Lynne as she’s helped many students through homesickness, but to her, those signs seemed more obvious, like the student looking sad or always talking about how life “back home” was better. Lisa and Lynne got together with Yuto to speak with him about how they’ve noticed changes in his behaviour and how they want to help him. Then, Lynne and her partner Dave took Yuto to the Asian food market in their town where they could get a few Japanese staples. Yuto was delighted! That evening, Yuto used the foods to make dinner for his family and they spent the night talking about Japanese holidays and funny expressions. Lynne and Dave also planned a few weeks worth of family activities like going to football games, having friends over and going for a hike so that Yuto would have events to look forward to. With time, Yuto's mood improved and the family learned how to best support him through the ups and downs of homesickness.

Find your student now

Are you ready to experience a new culture at home? Talk with us and start your hosting journey now.

Tell us about yourself

Speak to an EF exchange advisor

Choose your exchange student

Information about you