Associations between teacher–child relationships and children's writing in kindergarten and first grade

When children experience conflict in relationships with their teachers during early education, they perform more poorly on measures of language development and overall academic competence. Whereas children who have close relationships with teachers, often perform better on these measures. A close teacher–child relationship may be important for children learning to write, given the complex and personal nature of writing. Yet, scholars have not examined associations between teacher–child relationship quality and children's early success in writing. The current study examined associations between quality of the teacher–child relationship (defined as teachers’ perceptions of closeness and conflict and children's feelings about teachers) and children's writing quality in kindergarten and first grade. Children's receptive language was also investigated as a moderator of these associations. Results indicated teacher–child conflict was significantly associated with children's writing quality, after accounting for grade level, initial reading status, and type of instruction. Findings of the study have important implications for future research and practice. Attention to the importance of conflict in teacher–child relationships and its’ influence on children's literacy learning and development should be included in future research studies.     

Metalearning and conceptual change

Conceptual change means the commitment to a new belief about a principle or a phenomenon, and the abandoning of an old one. Promotion of a new belief is relatively easy, but it is difficult to get students to abandon their former beliefs. Conflicting beliefs can be held by a learner. This article argues that the resolution of conflicting beliefs requires elements of metalearning (conscious control over one's learning).

The work of the Project to Enhance Effective Learning (the peel project), which attempts to promote metalearning in a secondary school is described and some general principles derived from the experience of the project are outlined. It is suggested that the key to the acceptance of metalearning strategies by students parallels the conditions for promoting conceptual change specified by Posner et al. (1982) and in particular in the acceptance of the fruitfulness of the new approaches. It is argued that this requires changes in the organization of schooling, particularly adoption of methods of assessment that reward understanding.     

Cultural clash and educational diversity: Immigrant teachers' efforts to rescue the education of immigrant children in Israel

Thousands of immigrants who arrived from the former USSR during the past decade have drastically changed the Israeli educational system. However, constituting about 12% of the potential labour force of educators, immigrant teachers represent less than 5% of the actual teaching staff; 69% of immigrant students in the 17-year-old age cohort do not possess a matriculation certificate. This article presents the results of research that studied probably the most prominent effort to rescue the education of immigrant children, namely the Mofet system, which was founded by a group of immigrant teachers in 1991. Today's Mofet runs more than 20 supplementary evening schools around the country and five day-schools. The development of the Mofet group for the advancement of education is one of the most significant examples of the consolidation trends among the Russian-speaking intelligentsia in Israel. However, the authors argue that though Mofet's success is directly linked to the general education system's failure to meet immigrants' needs, it does not express Russian immigrants' desire for socio-cultural segregation.     

Assessing wellbeing at school entry using the Strengths and Difficulties Questionnaire: professional perspectives

Emotional and behavioural disorders in early childhood are related to poorer academic attainment and school engagement, and difficulties already evident at the point of starting school can affect a child’s later social and academic development. Successful transfer from pre-school settings to primary education is helped by communication between pre-school staff and primary school teachers. Typically, in Scotland, pre-school establishments prepare individual profiles of children before they start school around the age of five years, highlighting their strengths and development needs, for transfer to primary schools. There is, however, no consistent approach to the identification of potential social, emotional and behavioural problems. In 2010, in one local authority area in Scotland, the Strengths and Difficulties Questionnaire (SDQ) was introduced for children about to start school as a routine, structured, component of the transition process to help teachers plan support arrangements for classes and individual children. The SDQ assesses emotional, conduct, hyperactivity/ inattention and peer-relationship problems as well as pro-social behaviour. In order to be an effective means of communicating social and emotional functioning, the use of instruments such as the SDQ needs to be practicable. Finding out the views of pre-school education staff with experience of assessing children using the SDQ was, therefore, essential to establish its future utility.

Aim

The purpose of this study was to explore the views of pre-school education staff about assessing social and emotional wellbeing of children at school entry using the SDQ. The objectives were to examine the opinions of pre-school workers about completing the SDQ and to elicit their thoughts on the value of doing this and their perceptions of the usefulness of the information collected.

Method

Pre-school establishments were approached using a purposive sampling strategy in order to achieve a mix of local authority (n=14) and ‘partnership’ establishments (n=8) as well as different socio-economic areas. Semi-structured interviews (n=25) were conducted with pre-school head teachers (n=14) and child development officers (n=11) in order to explore the process of completing the SDQ along with perceptions of its value. The interviews were transcribed verbatim and analysed thematically.

Results

In general, staff in pre-school establishments viewed the use of the SDQ positively. It was seen as a chance to highlight the social and emotional development of children rather than just their academic or educational ability. Most felt that the SDQ had not identified anything they did not already know about a child. A minority, nevertheless, suggested that a previously unrecognised potential difficulty was brought to light, most commonly emotional problems. Completing the SDQ was felt to be relatively straightforward even though the staff felt under pressure from competing priorities. Concerns were, however, raised about the potential of labelling a child at an early stage of formal education.

Conclusion

The findings from this small scale study suggest that, from the point of view of pre-school education staff, it is feasible to assess children systematically for social and behavioural problems as part of the routine transition process at school entry.     

Making the right connections: Differential effects of reading intervention for subgroups of comprehenders

The purpose of this study was to compare the effects of different types of questioning interventions on students' reading comprehension. Fourth-grade students (n = 246) were identified as struggling, average, or good readers and assigned randomly within school to one of three questioning interventions: two inferential conditions (Causal or General) or one literal condition (“Who, What, Where, When” or W-questioning). Teachers delivered the interventions for 20–30 min, 2–4 times per week, for 8–10 weeks. All readers made reliable pre- to posttest comprehension gains as measured by story recall (ps < .001 to .04). Differential effects for intervention were found between two subgroups of struggling comprehenders—elaborators and paraphrasers. Elaborators benefited more than paraphrasers from Causal questioning (d = .86) whereas paraphrasers benefited more than elaborators from General questioning (d = 1.46). These findings suggest that identifying subgroups is important in developing and evaluating the effectiveness of reading comprehension interventions.     

Formative evaluation applied to a learning hierarchy

A formative evaluation method applicable to learning hierarchies is described which simplifies data collection by employing results from a posttest. Relations among pairs of lower and higher elements of a portion of a previously formulated hierarchy for graphic skills in kinematics were tested by means of data obtained from a posttest given to 148 secondary-school students. Results were compared with those previously obtained for the same hierarchy by a rigorous validation method. Correspondence of the two sets of results was high. Examination of test responses for discrepant instances yielded further information of value. Results additionally indicate hierarchical relationships to be the same in retention as they were for learning.