Elementary School Principals in Low-Socioeconomic-Status Schools: A University-Based Research Program Designed to Support Mandated Reform

This paper presents a reform initiative, the Supporting Montreal Schools Program (SMSP), created by the government of Quebec to assist 184 low socio-economic-status schools in Montreal implement seven reform strategies prescribed by the government. On a regular basis, the professional team of the SMSP engages in reflection and research with universities concerning one or more of the strategies they are charged with helping schools implement or the functioning of the SMSP more generally. The present research programme is part of the team’s ongoing reflection on a component of Strategy 4: professional development of school administrators and the school team. In this paper, we detail results from this initial and subsequent studies on the work of principals in low-performing schools. We also describe our collaborative relationship with the SMSP team, discuss the effectiveness of the SMSP in promoting the implementation of the seven governmentmandated strategies and critique the utility of our partnership with the SMSP and our use of that programme as a vehicle for linking research to practice.

Elementary School students' approaches to solving true-false number sentences. 'Métodos de alumnos de Educación Primaria para la resolución de sentencias numéricas verdaderas y falsas'.

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Prospective elementary school teachers' ways of making sense of mathematical problem posing. 'Modos en que futuros profesores de primaria dan sentido a la invención de problemas matemáticos'.

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Prospective Elementary School Teachers' Proportional Reasoning. 'Razonamiento proporcional de futuros maestros de educación primaria'.

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Parents??? conceptions of their homework involvement in elementary school

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The simple view of reading in elementary school : a systematic review

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Social training activities and resources for hearing impaired students in elementary school

This paper provides resources to help hearing impaired students in primary and elementary grades with personal and social competency training.

Mainstreaming, inclusion, and the elementary school age hearing impaired student

This paper presents materials for educators and students, grades K-6, about hearing and hearing impairment that will help prepare them for more successful mainstreaming and inclusion of hearing-impaired children.

Measuring students' emotions in the early years: the Achievement Emotions Questionnaire-Elementary School (AEQ-ES)

This article reports about the development and validation of a measurement instrument assessing elementary school students' achievement emotions (Achievement Emotions Questionnaire-Elementary School, AEQ-ES). Specifically, the instrument assesses students' enjoyment, anxiety, and boredom pertaining to three types of academic settings (i.e., attending class, doing homework, and taking tests and exams). Scale construction was based on Pekrun's (2006) control-value theory of achievement emotions. The instrument was tested using samples from German and American elementary school classrooms. The results of Study 1 (German sample) corroborate the reliability and structural validity of the new emotion measure. Moreover, they show that students' achievement emotions were linked with their control and value appraisals as well as their academic performance, thus supporting the external validity of the measure as well as propositions of Pekrun's (2006) control-value theory of achievement emotions. Study 2 (American sample) corroborated the cross-cultural equivalence of the measure and the generalizability of findings across the German and American samples. Implications for research on achievement emotions and educational practice are discussed. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2013 APA, all rights reserved)(journal abstract)

En enkätundersökning om lärares syn på hur de arbetar med mål i grundskolan : A survey of teacher´s views on how they work with the goal in elementary school

Detta är en uppsats om lärares syn på målstyrningen vid två skolor samt hur de uppfattar att eleverna uppnår de uppsatta målen. Undersökningen utfördes som en kvalitativ enkätstudie. Resultatet visar att många lärare uppfattar att målen är otydliga vilket resulterar i att de tolkas olika. Angående hur man mäter att eleverna uppnår målen blev resultatet att det finns en mängd olika metoder att tillgå som till exempel loggbok och observation. En tydlig skillnad fanns i svaren bland dem som hade lång arbetslivserfarenhet gentemot den som hade minst arbetslivserfarenhet. Skillnaderna kan bland annat bottna i osäkerhet på sin yrkesroll samt bristande kunskaper i och med kort arbetslivserfarenhet.

English as a Second Language and Children’s literature : An empirical study on Swedish elementary school teachers’ methods and attitudes towards the use of children’s literature in the English classroom

Previous research has shown multiple benefits and challenges with the incorporation of children’s literature in the English as a Second language (ESL) classroom. In addition, the use of children’s literature in the lower elementary English classroom is recommended by the Swedish National Agency for Education. Consequently, the current study explores how teachers in Swedish elementary school teach ESL through children’s literature. This empirical study involves English teachers from seven schools in a small municipality in Sweden. The data has been collected through an Internet survey. The study also connects the results to previous international research, comparing Swedish and international research. The results suggest that even though there are many benefits of using children’s literature in the ESL classroom, the respondents seldom use these authentic texts, due to limited time and a narrow supply of literature, among other factors. However, despite these challenges, all of the teachers claim to use children’s literature by reading aloud in the classroom. Based on the results, further research exploring pupils’ thoughts in contrast to teachers would be beneficial. In addition, the majority of the participants expressed that they wanted more information on how to use children’s literature. Therefore, additional research relating to beneficial methods of teaching English through children’s literature, especially in Sweden, is recommended.

BlueFriends: measuring, analyzing and preventing social exclusion between elementary school students

Social exclusion is a relatively recent term, whose creation is attributed to René Lenoir(Lenoir, 1974). Its concept covers a remarkably wide range of social and economic problems, and can be triggered for various reasons: mentally and physically handicapped, abused children, delinquents, multi-problem households, asocial people, and other social “misfits” (Silver, 1995, pp. 63; Foucault, 1992). With an increasingly multi-cultural population, cultural and social inequalities rapidly ascend, bringing with them the need for educational restructuring. We are living in an evermore diverse world, and children need to be educated to be receptive to the different types of people around them, especially considering social and cultural aspects. It is with these goals that inclusive education has seen an increased trend in today’s academic environment, reminding us that even though children may be taught under the same roof, discriminatory practices might still happen. There are, however, a number of developed tools to assess the various dimensions of social networks. These are mostly based on questionnaires and interviews, which tend to be fastidious and don’t allow for longitudinal, large scale measurement. This thesis introduces BlueFriends, a Bluetooth-based measurement tool for social inclusion/exclusion on elementary school classes. The main goals behind the development of this tool were a) understanding how exclusion manifests in students’ behaviors, and b) motivating pro-social behaviors on children through the use of a persuasive technology. BlueFriends is a distributed application, comprised by an application running on several smartphones, a web-hosted database and a computer providing a visual representation of the data collected on a TV screen, attempting to influence children behaviors. The application makes use of the Bluetooth device present on each phone to continuously sample the RSSI (Received Signal Strength Indication) from other phones, storing the data locally on each phone. All of the stored data is collected, processed and then inserted into the database at the end of each day. At the beginning of each recess, children are reminded of how their behaviors affect others with the help of a visual display, which consists of interactions between dogs. This display illustrates every child’s best friends, as well as which colleagues they don’t interact with as much. Several tips encouraging social interaction and inclusiveness are displayed, inspiring children to change their behaviors towards the colleagues they spend less time with. This thesis documents the process of designing, deploying and analyzing the results of two field studies. On the first study, we assess how the current developed tools are inferior to our measuring tool by deploying a measurement only study, aimed at perceiving how much information can be obtained by the BlueFriends application and attempting to understand how exclusion manifests itself in the school environment. On the second study, we pile on the previous to try and motivate pro-social behaviors on students, with the use of visual cues and recommendations. Ultimately, we confirm that our measurement tool’s results were satisfying towards measuring and changing children’s behaviors, and conclude with our thoughts on possible future work, suggesting a number of possible extensions and improvements.

Construction and validation of an instrument to assess the reading comprehension of students from the third to the fifth grades of elementary school

Objetivo:Este estudo teve como objetivo construir e validar um instrumento de avaliação da compreensão de leitura a fim de caracterizar o perfil de leitura e detectar dificuldades de compreensão em escolares do terceiro ao quinto ano do Ensino Fundamental.Métodos:Participaram 378 escolares divididos em trés grupos para avaliação da compreensão de proposições literais e inferenciais de micro e macroestruturas de dois textos expositivos e dois textos narrativos por meio de questões de múltipla escolha.Resultados:Os dados analisados estatisticamente indicaram valores do teste alfa de Cronbach apresentando consisténcia interna nos quatros textos aplicados para os trés grupos.Conclusão:Foi possível constatar que os escolares apresentaram menor número de erros com o aumento da escolarização e que cada tipo de texto apresentou uma dificuldade específica para os escolares.

The modern math movement(s): an essay on how elementary school teachers in Brazil gave meaning to it

The main goal of this paper is to discuss the production of meaning of the Modern Math Movement. The main sources were data available in school archives and interviews with former teachers that we use in order to focus on the diversity of perspectives -that complement it or oppose it-, which comes up when teachers refer to the Movement. Using this process of signification, teachers whether accept it, invalidate it or adapt it to guidelines imposed to them in their teaching activities. We establish a methodology by following the premises of Oral History to gather oral testimonies. The theoretical foundations in which this article is written are the guidelines of Paul Ricoeur's Hermeneutics, John Thompson's Depth Hermeneutics and Bolivar's narrative analysis.