In the face of adversity: four physical educator’s experiences of resilience in high-poverty schools

Background: Emotional resilience can be vital to longevity in high-poverty school settings. Equally important to staying the course is the ability to remain motivated despite the unique challenges presented by teaching in high-poverty schools. Students within these schools need teachers who are able to manage their emotions and remain positive and optimistic, persist, remain confident, and continually focus on learning and self-improvement no matter their work environment. This study explored four PE teachers’ perceptions of their resilience teaching in high-poverty schools through the lens of resilience theory.

Research design: This study utilized an exploratory multiple case study design (Yin 2003). The main premise of the case study method is to better understand complex educational and social phenomena, while retaining the holistic and meaningful particularities of real-life circumstances (Yin 2003). Teacher interviews and teacher shadowing were used to examine the experiences of PE teachers in high-poverty schools.

Findings: Results indicate that several psychological factors (relating to positive personality, motivation, focus, and perceived social and administrative support) protected the PE teachers in this inquiry from the potential negative effect of stressors by prompting their metacognitions and challenge appraisal. These processes promoted facilitative responses that proved to be key to developing and maintaining their capacities for resilience. The teachers demonstrated a sustained commitment to self-improvement and student success by implementing effective teaching practices.

Conclusion: The teachers in this study possessed strong individual dispositions and were able to demonstrate behaviors that facilitated an elevated level of resilience. School administrators must establish a strong culture of support to enable teacher resilience. Identifying ways to increase the resilience capacity of physical education teachers has the potential to decrease the concerns surrounding teacher attrition and increase job satisfaction for teachers working in high-poverty schools. Implications also indicate a need for physical education teacher education (PETE) programs to identify candidates with the individual dispositions that aid in resilience and provide them with experiences in high-poverty schools. This partnership may assist in minimizing the effects of reality shock oftentimes experienced by new teachers.     

Reading literacy in Compulsory Secondary Education: an exploration of the difficulties in the use of information to answer questions / La competencia lectora en la Educación Secundaria Obligatoria: descripción y dificultades del uso de información para responder preguntas

Abstract

This paper is a review of studies about processes and secondary school students’ difficulties with these processes when they use information to answer questions. The PISA program uses this kind of task-oriented reading situation to evaluate reading literacy, which is also a common reading situation in educational settings. Four key strategies are identified to successfully perform this kind of task: decide how to read the information, comprehend the task, decide when to search for information in order to solve the task, and self-regulate that search process. Moreover, this paper provides accurate information about the students’ difficulties in becoming skilled readers when they use information to answer questions. This information might help teachers and educational counselors in the design of interventions to improve reading literacy in schools.     

What did you do in school today? Using the school environment to foster communication between children and parents

Early Childhood Education Journal -     

University staff mental health literacy,stigma and their experience of students with mental health problems

Despite high rates of mental disorders in university students, very few seek professional help. University teaching staff are well placed to connect students with mental health care. However, little is known about university staff attitudes to and knowledge about mental health problems, or whether these factors influence their experience with and assistance of students with these problems. A total of 224 teaching staff members at the Australian National University, Canberra completed an anonymous online survey via an email link (16.4% response rate from N ~ 1370). Measures included demographic and professional information, experiences with student mental health, knowledge of depression (literacy) and attitudes to depression (stigma). Strength of stigmatising attitude did not predict whether a teaching staff member would approach a student to assist with mental health problems. Teaching staff with higher levels of depression literacy (OR = 1.14, p = 0.007) were more likely to feel sufficiently informed to help students with mental health problems. Ensuring staff complete mental health literacy training and have adequate skills to respond appropriately to students with mental health problems may help in connecting young people to appropriate care in a university context.     

An evaluation study of youth participation in youth work: a case study in Southern Italy

In this paper an evaluation study of a public programme financing a regional network of 157 youth centres in the South of Italy is presented. A theory-based evaluation model was adopted to explore the causal links between different types of participation experience. Evaluation questions focused on three main issues are: the perception of empowerment of the team during the management of the centres, the empowering effect of participation in the organization of the youth centres and the decision-making abilities of the young people involved. Following an exploratory study, an on-line structured questionnaire was administered to all centres. New youth centres appear as striving to become sustainable enterprises. However, there is widespread difficulty in terms of integrating day-to-day management with sustainability strategies. Such difficulty appears less pronounced when project leaders participated in the design of the centres together with young people. Results thus confirm participation in the design phase as an empowering experience. This study warns, however, against a number of unwanted effects arising from participation. Indeed, participation processes represented a form of decorative consultation in half of the cases. Empirical evidence therefore suggests further research to focus on the creation of stable participation frameworks inside centres, avoiding the risk of participation processes void of any real effect on decision-making.