The mediating role of socio-motivational support in the association between individual school self-concept and achievement motivation amongst adolescent students

It is now well known that adolescence is frequently marked by a decline in students' achievement motivation, which in turn is often associated with a decline in individual school self-concept. Less is known about the mediating role of socio-motivational support in the association between individual school self-concept and achievement motivation. The current study examined the interplay of individual school self-concept, socio-motivational support and achievement motivation in a large sample of seventh and eighth grade students (N?=?1,088; M _Age?=?13.7) in secondary schools in Brandenburg, Germany. Structural equation modeling was used to test the associations between individual school self-concept, socio-motivational support, and achievement motivation. The results showed that the teacher–student relationship as well as “teachers as positive motivators” mediated the association between individual school self-concept and achievement motivation. In contrast, neither “peers as positive motivators” nor the student–student relationship mediated this association. These results support the notion that maintaining a positive teacher–student relationship as well as encouraging teachers in the role of positive motivators could be an effective starting point for prevention and intervention programs aimed at offsetting the decline in individual school self-concept and achievement motivation during adolescence.     

Who intends to learn and who intends to leave? The intention to leave education early among students from inclusive and regular classes in primary and secondary schools

ABSTRACT

Early school leaving is a serious problem for individual students, especially for students with special educational needs (SEN). This study tests predictors of early school leaving, using data collected among 1,047 students from 60 inclusive and regular classes in primary and secondary schools in Austria with 4th- and 7th-grade students aged 9–11 and 12–14 years. Multilevel regression analyses show that higher school wellbeing and a more positive student–teacher relationship reduce the intention of both 4th and 7th graders to leave school early. Additionally, for 7th graders, having a migrant background and more individualised instruction are predictors of a greater intention to leave school early. School grade, gender, socioeconomic background, SEN, social integration, class climate, school setting (regular class vs. inclusive class), and the heterogeneity of the class composition had no impact on the intention to leave school early.     

Child effortful control,teacher–student relationships,and achievement in academically at-risk children: Additive and interactive effects

The joint contributions of child effortful control (using inhibitory control and task accuracy as behavioral indices) and positive teacher–student relationships at first grade on reading and mathematics achievement at second grade were examined in 761 children who were predominantly from low-income and ethnic minority backgrounds and assessed to be academically at-risk at entry to first grade. Analyses accounted for clustering effects, covariates, baselines of effortful control measures, and prior levels of achievement. Even with such conservative statistical controls, interactive effects were found for task accuracy and positive teacher–student relationships on future achievement. Results suggest that task accuracy served as a protective factor so that children with high task accuracy performed well academically despite not having positive teacher–student relationships. Further, positive teacher–student relationships served as a compensatory factor so that children with low task accuracy performed just as well as those with high task accuracy if they were paired with a positive and supportive teacher. Importantly, results indicate that the influence of positive teacher–student relationships on future achievement was most pronounced for students with low effortful control on tasks that require fine motor skills, accuracy, and attention-related skills. Study results have implications for narrowing achievement disparities for academically at-risk children.     

Laptop initiative: Impact on instructional technology integration and student learning

The purpose of this study was to examine how 1:1 laptop initiative affected student learning at a selected rural Midwestern high school. A total of 105 high school students enrolled in 10th–12th grades during the 2008–2009 school year participated in the study. A survey instrument created by the Mitchell Institute was modified and used to collect data on student perceptions and faculty perceptions of the impact of 1:1 laptop computing on student learning and instructional integration of technology in education. Study findings suggest that integration of 1:1 laptop computing positively impacts student academic engagement and student learning. Therefore, there is need for teachers to implement appropriate computing practices to enhance student learning. Additionally, teachers need to collaborate with their students to learn and understand various instructional technology applications beyond basic Internet browsing and word processing.     

Right from the Start: Critical Classroom Practices for Building Teacher–Student Trust in the First 10 Weeks of Ninth Grade

Teacher–student trust is associated with the social and emotional development of students, their school connectedness and engagement, and their academic achievement. However, few studies have examined how trust develops between teachers and students in ninth grade, a critical year in high school for students to start off on-track. Even less research has examined how teacher–student trust develops from the perspective of students to help identify specific teacher classroom practices that are effective at doing so, particularly at the start of the school year when students’ relationships and connections to high school are just beginning to take shape. Drawing on data from a longitudinal, qualitative study of ninth-grade teacher–student relationships in one neighborhood public high school in Chicago, this study highlights three critical classroom practices that appear particularly effective for helping to build trusting teacher–student relationships during the first 10 weeks of high school. Highlighting the perspectives and insights of ninth grade students, this analysis finds that (1) the priority that teachers place on specific classroom practices, and (2) the timing of when these practices are used by teachers, are both critical in establishing teacher–student trust—an essential ingredient in helping ninth grade students gain important social and school connections during their transition to high school. By highlighting the voices of ninth grade youth, this study provides valuable insights for educators aiming to use specific classroom-based practices that are essential for helping ninth grade students make valuable school connections and get on-track right from the start of the year.

     

Making desegregation work: Extracurricular activities

Southern desegregated high schools with high levels of black or white student extracurricular participation have students who report more interracial contact, higher self-esteem, more positive attitudes toward school, more parent visits to schools, and more personal contact with teachers. The results are derived from regression equations based on responses from 10,000 students in 200 schools, controlling on student and school background factors. The author recommends that secondary schools place high priority on encouraging extracurricular participation and argues that this enhances the school's ability to teach because it increases student attachment to the school, reduces student alienation, provides alternative channels for students to develop self-esteem, and increases the opportunity for positive interracial contact.     

Skilled Students and Effective Schools: Reading Achievement in Denmark,Sweden, and France

This study investigates how reading achievement relates to student and school characteristics in countries with different reading scores at the fourth grade level. Data comes from the Progress in International Reading Literacy Study (PIRLS) 2011 for Denmark, Sweden, and France and the multilevel analysis includes two levels: student/home and schools. The school effectiveness and the home literacy models informed the selection of the independent variables. Results show that students’ early literacy skills, home literacy practices and resources, and reading behavior are associated with reading scores in all countries. Furthermore, across different countries there are student/home universals and school particulars that explain variation in reading achievement. Educational policies should address home and school literacy skills and practices, school climate, and school composition to improve students’ reading ability.     

Off-task behavior in elementary school children

This paper reports results from a large-scale observational study investigating attention allocation during instructional activities in elementary school students (kindergarten through fourth-grade). In Study 1, 22 classrooms participated while a more diverse sample of 30 classrooms participated in Study 2. This work investigated temporal patterns in children's attention allocation by collecting observational data on children's on- and off-task behaviors at three different time points (i.e., beginning, middle, and end of the school year) [Study 1]. We also investigated whether patterns of attention allocation changed as a function of student characteristics (gender, grade-level, SES), teachers' instructional design choices (instructional format and duration of an instructional activity), and school type (private, parochial, public charter schools) [Studies 1 & 2]. Children's patterns of attention allocation fluctuated over the course of the school year. Female students were found to be more on-task compared to male students. On-task behavior tended to decline as the instructional duration increased. The lowest rates of on-task behavior were observed while children were engaged in whole-group instructional formats. An effect of school type was found with higher proportions of on-task behavior observed in parochial schools. However, the effect of grade-level was equivocal across studies. These findings can begin to form a foundation for the development of research-based guidelines for instructional design aimed to support engagement among students in elementary classrooms.     

An Analysis of High School Students' Performance on Five Integrated Science Process Skills

This study determined Jamaican high school students' level of performance on five integrated science process skills and if there were statistically significant differences in their performance linked to their gender, grade level, school location, school type, student type and socio-economic background (SEB). The 305 subjects comprised 133 males, 172 females, 146 ninth graders, 159 10th graders, 150 traditional and 155 comprehensive high school students, 164 students from the Reform of Secondary Education (ROSE) project and 141 non-ROSE students, 166 urban and 139 rural students and 110 students from a high SEB and 195 from a low SEB. Data were collected with the authors' constructed integrated science process skills test the results indicated that the subjects' mean score was low and unsatisfactory; their performance in decreasing order was: interpreting data, recording data, generalising, formulating hypotheses and identifying variables; there were statistically significant differences in their performance based on their grade level, school type, student type, and SEB in favour of the 10th graders, traditional high school students, ROSE students and students from a high SEB. There was a positive, statistically significant and fairly strong relationship between their performance and school type, but weak relationships among their student type, grade level and SEB and performance.     

The protective role of teacher–student relationships against peer victimization and psychosocial distress

This study examined whether teacher–student relationships protect against peer victimization and its negative psychosocial effects (i.e., depression, anxiety, and stress). Additionally, the influence of teacher–student relationships, peer relationships, and students’ perceptions of school order and discipline was investigated as these variables were expected to be negatively related to the former. Data were collected from high school‐aged adolescents (N = 539; 51% female) in the U.S. Southwest. Study results indicate that teacher–student relationships buffered against experiencing psychosocial distress associated with peer victimization. Although positive teacher–student relationships, peer relationships, and students’ perceptions of school order and discipline all were negatively associated with peer victimization and psychosocial distress, teacher–student relationships were robustly related to peer victimization and psychosocial distress over the influence of the previous variables. In other words, as a key study finding, teacher–student relationships may reduce the impact of peer victimization by mitigating its negative psychosocial effects in a robust yet relatively unexplored way. Therefore, although more research is needed, fostering positive teacher–student relationships might be an effective way to reduce peer victimization as well as its negative effects.     

Combination classes and educational achievement

Using the ECLS-K and considering first graders in single-grade and K–1 and 1–2 combination classes, I discuss the mechanisms underlying the combination-class effect and address the systematic school-, teacher-, and student-level differences that confound estimates of this effect. I find evidence for positive selection into 1–2 classes, but using a rich set of control variables, find no relationship between class type and student achievement in first grade within schools, and no difference in overall first-grade achievement between single-grade and combination schools in a matched school sample. The results I present suggest that first graders are not harmed by being in a combination class or by their schools offering combination classes. As long as other stakeholders such as parents, teachers, and students in other grades are not made worse off, these results suggest that offering combination classes may be a Pareto-improving option for school administrators.     

Peer Victimization and Social Alienation: Predicting Deviant Peer Affiliation in Middle School

Two prospective studies examined a theoretical model wherein exposure to victimization, resulting from early behavioral risk, heightens children's social alienation and subsequent deviant peer affiliation (DPA). Across Study 1 (298 girls, 287 boys; K–7th grade; 5–12 years) and Study 2 (338 girls, 298 boys; 2nd–6th grade; 8–12 years), children, parents, peers, and teachers reported on children's externalizing behavior and internalizing symptoms, peer victimization, social alienation, and DPA. Path analyses supported the proposed pathway: Peer victimization predicted social alienation, which then predicted DPA. Early externalizing behavior set this path in motion and made an independent contribution to DPA. This research identifies an important pathway through which externalizing behavior and consequent peer victimization launch children onto a risky social trajectory.     

The Impact of Charter Schools on Promoting High Levels of Mathematics Achievement

Abstract

This study compares achievement levels for high ability students attending charter schools and students in traditional public schools in Georgia. Researchers examined student achievement (as assessed by the state's Criterion-Referenced Competency Tests) using three comparison groups: students in the closest traditional schools with similar grade levels, schools with similar demographics, and comprehensive school reform schools. Hierarchical loglinear analysis was used to determine the impact of school type and student demographic variables on student achievement mobility (i.e., the degree to which students, from 2004 to 2005, moved into or out of the top 10% of each grade level on the CRT mathematics subtest). Results for the first comparison did not provide evidence of a significant relationship between school type and achievement mobility, but results for the second and third comparisons suggest that Black students generally experienced positive or neutral achievement mobility in traditional schools and negative mobility in charter schools; White students generally saw negative achievement mobility in traditional schools and neutral to positive mobility in charter schools. Implications for the study of gifted education and gifted students within charter schools are discussed.     

The developmental trajectory of intrinsic reading motivation: Measurement invariance,group variations,and implications for reading proficiency

The goal of the present study is to extend previous research on the developmental trajectory of intrinsic reading motivation during early adolescence. Using large-scale panel data on secondary school students in Germany, we examined: (1) the longitudinal measurement invariance of intrinsic reading motivation, (2) the generalizability of the developmental trajectory of intrinsic reading motivation across students’ gender, parental socioeconomic status (SES), and school tracks (academic vs. vocational), and (3) the associations between the developmental trajectory of intrinsic reading motivation and the developmental trajectory of reading proficiency. The scale we used to measure intrinsic reading motivation showed the (strict) measurement invariance across six occasions of measurement from Grades 5 to 10, indicating the high structural similarity (e.g., factor loadings, intercepts) of intrinsic reading motivation during early adolescence. Our analyses of latent growth curve models also confirm previous findings that students tend to experience a steady and significant linear decline in intrinsic reading motivation from Grades 5 to 10. This developmental decline also seems to be more pronounced in size (Δ =  − 0.772, p < .001) than previously reported. The developmental decline in intrinsic reading motivation was observed irrespective of students’ gender, parental SES, and school tracks. Male students expressed lower mean-levels of intrinsic reading motivation across the waves and exhibited a steeper motivational decline compared to female students. Despite mean-level differences across the waves, students showed similar degrees of a motivational decline across parental SES and school tracks. Finally, the larger decline in students’ intrinsic reading motivation was associated with the smaller growth of their reading proficiency from Grades 5 to 10. Our study provides further support for the high prevalence of the developmental decline in intrinsic reading motivation during early adolescence, its generalizability across students’ demographic characteristics, and its implications for the development of reading proficiency.     

Does school context moderate longitudinal relations between teacher-reported self-efficacy and value for student engagement and teacher-student relationships from early until midcareer?

Teachers’ self-efficacy and value represent two central components of their motivation. However, there is a scarcity of knowledge regarding the relevance of value for teaching quality and student outcomes, as well as the extent to which interrelations depend on contextual resources and demands. Engaging students in their learning is an essential aspect of teachers’ work which should promote warm and positive relationships between them and their students. Not only teachers’ self-efficacy for student engagement, but also the value they attach to being able to engage students, should be important for teacher-student relationship quality. Using longitudinal structural equation models, we analyzed relations between self-efficacy and value for student engagement, reported teacher-student relationships, and the potential moderating roles of perceived excessive work demands and the resource of school belonging. Data from 395 Australian teachers in primary and secondary schools encompassed 3 timepoints from the end of teacher education, during teachers’ early career (average 3 years teaching), and midcareer (average 10 years teaching). Informed by social cognitive, expectancy-value and job demands-resources theories, key findings revealed that teachers’ reported relationships with their students at midcareer were predicted only at low levels of perceived excessive demands, by early career self-efficacy and early career value in interaction with self-efficacy. At midcareer, value associated with teacher-reported relationships with students only at low levels of excessive demands, and school belonging. Conversely, perceived teacher-student relationship in early career predicted teachers’ value for student engagement at midcareer. Implications for theory, teacher education and teachers’ professional practice are discussed.     

Grade Placement of High-School Biology

Abstract

Using 35 elementary schools (3,350 fourth and sixth grade students), 10 secondary schools (3,613 eight and eleventh grade students), and 1,145 teachers, this study presents data summarizing the relationships between student' perceptions of "verified" principal competencies and selected school climate indices and outcome variables. The results indicated that there is a general tendency for positive teacher attitudes towards various dimensions of the school and working environment and higher student standardized achievement test performance to be associated with students' reports of a low frequency of interaction with die principal. A student "independence factor" was hypothesized to account for these results, with the implication being that principal/student interaction is minimized in schools where teacher and student attitudes are positive and student achievement is high. In addition, effective principal performance in dealing with student misbehavior was highly and positively associated with school average daily attendance at the secondary level. Supplementary analyses indicated that teacher and student attitudes "mediating" the school environment were relatively independent for both elementary and secondary samples. General support was found for higher correlations between student assessments of principal competencies and school environment measures than with student performance measures.     

The socioemotional adjustment of adolescents with LD in the kibbutz during high school transition periods

This study examined several aspects of the socioemotional experiences (i.e., loneliness, social skills, reciprocal friendship, reciprocal rejection, and social status) of adolescents with and without learning disabilities in an Israeli kibbutz environment during school transition periods. The sample consisted of 106 students with learning disabilities (LD; 74 boys and 32 girls) and 101 students without learning disabilities (NLD; 62 boys and 39 girls) drawn from seventh grade (i.e., early adolescence) and ninth grade (i.e., middle adolescence). The results revealed that seventh- and ninth-grade adolescents with LD received more social peer rejection than did NLD group adolescents, and students with LD were judged by their teachers to exhibit lower social skills and higher behavioral problems than their classmates. No significant group differences were found on loneliness, but an age-related increase in loneliness feelings was noted, which was independent from group membership and gender. Gender differences on self-report, peer ratings, and teachers' ratings on social measures in favor of girls were demonstrated. The discussion focuses on the potential impact of school transitions and of the developmental environment provided in the kibbutz on adolescents' socioemotional functioning and adjustment.     

Declining trends in student performance in lower secondary education

Student performance is related to motivation to learn. As motivation generally declines during lower secondary education, one might expect performance to decline as well during this period. Though, until now, it has been unclear whether this pattern exists. In the present study, we examined student performance during the early years of secondary education from a developmental perspective. Participants were 1544 Dutch secondary school students across three grades (grades 7 to 9). To investigate student performance trends, we analysed report card grades by using hierarchical linear modelling with two levels (level 1, time point; level 2, student). Potential moderators to be examined were (1) gender, (2) school type and (3) initial level. A linear decline in report card grades from grade 7 to 9 was found for boys and girls, in all school types, and regardless of initial level. Two variables moderated the steepness of the decline: school type and initial level. Gender and school type had a main effect on performance level. The same pattern was observed for the subset of ‘core subjects’—Dutch, English and mathematics. Motivational and cognitive factors that may explain the performance decline are discussed.     

The relations between the student–teacher trust relationship and school success in the case of Korean middle schools

This study examined relations between the student–teacher trust relationship and school success, including school adjustment, academic motivation and performance. Data were collected from 318 7th‐grade Korean middle school students (170 males, 148 females). All intercorrelations were positively correlated and correlation coefficients were statistically significant (p < 0.01). Structural Equation Modeling (SEM) analysis revealed that the student–teacher trust relationship uniquely contributed to students’ performance through school adjustment and academic motivation. This discussion examines theoretical, empirical and practical implications of the trust relationship as a key predictor of adolescents’ school adjustment, academic motivation and performance.