Terrible Knowledge and Tertiary Trauma,Part I: Japanese Nuclear Trauma and Resistance to the Atomic Bomb in the Classroom

This article discusses twelve reasons that we must teach about the 1945 American atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. As with Holocaust studies, we must teach this material even though it is both emotionally and intellectually difficult—in spite of our feelings of repugnance and/or grief, and our concerns regarding students' potential distress (“tertiary trauma”). To handle such material effectively, we should keep in mind ten objectives: (1) to expand students' knowledge about the subject along with the victims' experience of it; (2) to develop teachers' awareness of and comfort with it; (3) to help students cope with this knowledge so they are not traumatized themselves; (4) to make sure students don't take refuge in callousness, inappropriate humor, blaming the victim, or despair; (5) to enable students to teach others about the event(s); (6) to enable students to use their increased knowledge and self-reflection individually and as part of the national dialogue; (7) to deepen and “complexify” the conversation on the bombings; (8) to develop supports for teachers and students throughout this process;” (9) to reintegrate the objective with the subjective, recognizing that emotion may be appropriate to some learning; (10) to instigate a dialogue allowing teachers and students to continue to investigate this and related topics.     

Engaging Intelligence

Intelligence should not be considered merely a trait of individuals. Rather, intelligence is best conceived of as the product of a dynamic process involving individual competences and the values and opportunities afforded by society. In America today, the conception of intelligence, and concomitant forms of schooling and assessment, ought to be modified to enable young individuals to assume meaningful adult roles in society. Formal schooling ought to be complemented by apprenticeships in the community, and assessment should be refashioned to take into account a far wider range of competences. Finally, assessment vehicles ought to provide information that helps individuals to enhance their cognitive competences in authentic domains of knowledge.     

Creating a Culture of Student Success: The SEEK Scholars Peer Mentoring Program

The authors provide an overview of the peer mentor training program at City College of New York, CUNY.     

The Spatialization of Racial Inequity and Educational Opportunity:Rethinking the Rural/Urban Divide

This analysis recounts and examines the history of American public education, focusing on the experiences of poor urban and rural students of color. Using the lens of critical race theory, it suggests that educational inequity is not just raced and classed but also spatialized—that is, embedded in and maintained through geography. The mechanisms of this spatialization similarly disadvantage rural and urban schools serving poor children of color, and educational reforms have failed to dismantle the relationship between inequity and geography. Offering a clearer understanding of today's inequities, this analysis shows that these schools should be seen less as opposites than as allies with a shared interest in expanding educational opportunity across geographies.     

A Two-Level Analysis of Classroom Climate in Relation to Social Context,Group Composition,and Organization of Special Support

This study investigated classroom climate in relation to social context, heterogeneity (disability, multiculturalism) in class composition, and the occurrence of differentiated learning environments for children who need special support. Pupils aged 8–12 (679 from 39 classes in Swedish compulsory schools) responded to a questionnaire about classroom climate. Eighty of these students receive special support at school using various modalities. Multilevel factor analysis was applied to data to estimate differences within and between groups. Three significant climate factors were found. They pertained to the level of friction, satisfaction, and cohesiveness in the classroom. Social context was related to these three factors and to the occurrence of differentiated learning environments. The inclusion of pupils with disabilities appears to be related to less friction and higher cohesiveness among children. The article proposes increased interventions aimed at improving the school climate in disadvantaged neighborhoods. It also suggests that aspects of the placement of pupils with disabilities and of the organization of special support should be considered as indicators in studies of school effectiveness. This revised version was published online in July 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.     

Concurrent and longitudinal links between children's and their friends’ antisocial and prosocial behavior in preschool

Concurrent and longitudinal links between children's own and their nominated best friends’ antisocial and prosocial behavior were studied in a normative sample of 3-5-year-olds (N = 203). Moderating effects of age and gender were also explored. Subscales of the Strength and Difficulties Questionnaire (SDQ) were used to obtain teacher ratings of behavior for each target child and his/her nominated best friends. Nomination of best friends with higher levels of antisocial behavior and lower levels of prosocial behavior was concurrently linked to more antisocial behavior in boys. Nomination of highly prosocial best friends was concurrently linked to more prosocial behavior in both boys and girls. However, the study found no longitudinal effects of best friends’ behavior on target child's behavior over a one-year period. A group of children who nominated no best friends at T1 were generally perceived as less prosocial, but not more antisocial, than other children.     

Friendship similarities in internalizing problems in early childhood

A key factor identified in friendship formation and stability is similarity. Homophily of externalizing problems has been reported frequently, but less attention has been directed at homophily of internalizing problems. Whether young children who are friends resemble each other in their internalizing problems is thus largely unknown. In order to increase understanding of the social risk factors implicated in the etiology of internalizing problems, it is important to establish whether internalizing problems cluster in friendships. The present study examines homophily of internalizing problems while controlling for externalizing problems in a sample of children aged 4–8.     

The development and validation of the emotion labor in families scale: Associations with emotion regulation,feeling caught,and relational satisfaction in parent-child relationships

In this study, we developed and validated a new inventory that assesses emotion labor in parent-child relationships. Participants included 230 young adults who reported on the frequency with which they engaged in emotion labor with both parents. Results produced a 24-item inventory that assesses young adults’ surface acting, deep acting, and emotional effort when having conversations with their mother and father, labeled the Emotion Labor in Families (ELF) scale. Tests of concurrent and discriminant validity supported the construct validity of the ELF scale, although the dimension of emotional effort was largely unassociated with the validity measures included in this report.