Bullying Among Young Children: Strategies for Prevention

Bullying is an increasing problem within childcare facilities, preschool programs, and public schools. As a result, many districts are instituting anti-bullying intervention programs. This article defines bullying and explains the direct and indirect forms it can take. First, it examines research on bullying during the beginning years of school. Next, it explains how relational aggression occurs and the importance of positive peer support systems within their schools. The article concludes by examining the effects of consistent anti-bullying initiatives (e.g. conflict resolution strategies, daily check-ins, journals, and peacemaking activities) that address bullying behaviors among young children. Through consistent and clear interventions, students can build positive peer relationships that promote a safe and healthy school climate and culture.     

Curricular decision-making among public sex educators

The content of sex education in government-funded schools in the USA varies dramatically and reflects its contested nature and goals. Drawing from 50 interviews with sex educators working in the public, government-funded school system in a Midwestern US state, this study explores the processes through which sex educators decide what and how to teach. Working from the theoretical framework of argument sphere theory, and, specifically, socio-scientific controversy, we find that sex educators often resolve the competing arguments they face through processes that we call deliberative conflation and deliberative co-optation. Deliberative conflation involves the use of criteria from one or more argumentative spheres to judge evidence appropriate to a different sphere. Deliberative co-optation involves the use of discourse practices from one sphere to make arguments actually grounded in another. Both of these processes enable the reconciliation of otherwise incommensurate arguments, but they do so in ways that foster unstable and ambiguous curricular decisions. Our findings provide guidance towards improving sex education and its attendant outcomes.     

One-to-one laptops in K-12 classrooms: voices of students

In planning educational technology initiatives, the concerns of many stakeholders are typically taken into account, including the concerns of administrators, teachers, parents, and employers. The perspective of students are recognized as valuable, but not often queried or considered. This paper explores the opinions of K-12 students about a one-to-one laptop programme implementation through content analysis of 362 blog postings made by these students expressing their thoughts on the topic at three time points in two years. Employing a bottom-up coding strategy, this paper identified seven themes that represented students’ opinion of technology use in schools: more efficient and productive learning, tools for better writing, access to information, engagement with new media, remaining relevant in a technological world, share and learn from peers, and individualized and differentiated instruction. This study suggested that, when new technology tools are used in schools, students should not only be viewed as learners but also be considered as real writers with valuable opinions. Students also should be provided the opportunity to write for an authentic purpose and audience using diverse forms of digital media.     

The state of evidence for social and emotional learning: A contemporary meta-analysis of universal school-based SEL interventions

This article provides a systematic review and meta-analysis of the current evidence for universal school-based (USB) social and emotional learning (SEL) interventions for students in kindergarten through 12th grade available from 2008 through 2020. The sample includes 424 studies from 53 countries, reflecting 252 discrete USB SEL interventions, involving 575,361 students. Results endorsed that, compared to control conditions, students who participate in USB SEL interventions experienced significantly improved skills, attitudes, behaviors, school climate and safety, peer relationships, school functioning, and academic achievement. Significant heterogeneity in USB SEL content, intervention features, context, and implementation quality moderated student experiences and outcomes. Strengths and limitations of this evidence and implications for future USB SEL research, policy, and practice are discussed.     

The glue that makes it “hang together”: A framework for identifying how metadiscourse facilitates uncertainty navigation during knowledge building discussions

Classroom discussions have become a centerpiece of reform efforts in science education because talk mediates the joint co-constructing of knowledge in science classrooms. Although decades of research underscore the importance of talk in supporting science learning, the science education community continues to grapple with how to support teachers and students in navigating the uncertainty that is associated with doing knowledge building work. To address these challenges, we must examine not just what gets constructed (the scientific ideas), but how knowledge is co-constructed by teachers and students (the process of building those ideas) amidst uncertainty. In this study, we propose a conceptual tool for identifying organizational, epistemic, and interpretive metadiscourse markers (MDMs) in science talk. We highlight how teachers and students use these three types of MDMs as they navigate uncertainty while connecting ideas within and across multiple turns of talk, leveraging resources for knowledge building, and making interpretations about one another's ideas. We conclude with a set of suggestions for how researchers and teachers can utilize this framework to attend to the ways that MDMs index the organizational, epistemic, and interpretive dimensions of uncertainty in the knowledge building process.     

Recombinant search and breakthrough idea generation: An analysis of high impact papers in the social sciences

Some ideas have dramatically more impact than others – they may overturn existing paradigms or launch new areas of scientific inquiry. Where do such high impact ideas come from? Are some search processes significantly more likely to lead to breakthrough idea generation than others? In this research, we compare “high impact” papers from the social sciences with random-but-matched articles published in the same journals in the same years. We find that search scope, search depth, and atypical connections between different research domains significantly increase a paper's impact, even when controlling for the experience and prior publishing success of the author(s).     

The role of sport as a social status determinant for children: thirty years later

The purpose of this study was to examine the role of sport as a social status determinant among racially diverse children. Participants were 1,233 fourth- to seventh-grade children. Results indicated there were gender, grade, and racial differences for the selection of social status determinants. Boys placed more importance than girls on being good at sports and wealth. Girls placed more importance than boys on getting good grades and being attractive. Fourth- and fifth-grade students ranked getting good grades as most important, while sixth- and seventh-grade students ranked being attractive as most important. Non-Hispanic Caucasian students ranked being good at sports and being attractive as most important, while African American students ranked getting good grades and wealth as most important     

Proposed modifications to the conceptual model of coaching efficacy and additional validity evidence for the Coaching Efficacy Scale II-High School Teams

The purpose of this study was to determine whether theoretically relevant sources of coaching efficacy could predict the measures derived from the Coaching Efficacy Scale II-High School Teams (CES II-HST). Data were collected from head coaches of high school teams in the United States (N=799). The analytic framework was a multiple-group confirmatory factor analysis with ordered-categorical indicators and observed covariates. Applying this framework to the conceptual model of coaching efficacy (CMCE) resulted in a statistical model equivalent to a multiple-group multivariate regression with latent outcomes. Results provided evidence for the ability of measures derived from the CES II-HST to be predicted by theoretically relevant sources of coaching efficacy and suggested modifications to the CMCE.     

Direct and indirect aggression during childhood and adolescence: a meta-analytic review of gender differences, intercorrelations, and relations to maladjustment

This meta-analytic review of 148 studies on child and adolescent direct and indirect aggression examined the magnitude of gender differences, intercorrelations between forms, and associations with maladjustment. Results confirmed prior findings of gender differences (favoring boys) in direct aggression and trivial gender differences in indirect aggression. Results also indicated a substantial intercorrelation (r = .76) between these forms. Despite this high intercorrelation, the 2 forms showed unique associations with maladjustment: Direct aggression is more strongly related to externalizing problems, poor peer relations, and low prosocial behavior, and indirect aggression is related to internalizing problems and higher prosocial behavior. Moderation of these effect sizes by method of assessment, age, gender, and several additional variables were systematically investigated.     

Studying construction work: Connecting classroom centers

Johnny has one hammer, one hammer, one hammer; Johnny has one hammer, Johnny has two, sings a small group of children in the woodworking center as they pound small cuts of wood with hammer and nails. Hey, Ronnie, put that block here. We're making a chimney for our house, directs one youngster in the block center. We can move in when we're finished, he tells his two companions.Laverne Warner is Professor of Early Childhood Education within the Division of Teacher Education at Sam Houston State University in Huntsville, Texas. Melissa Sepulveda is a kindergarten teacher at Lowery Elementary School in the Cy-Fair Independent School District in Houston, Texas.