Earth Day is celebrated annually on April 22. Teachers often commemorate Earth Day with their classes by planting trees, discussing important conservation topics (such as recycling or preventing pollution), and encouraging students to take care of planet Earth. To promote observance of Earth Day in an intermediate elementary school classroom, this…

Children's reading skill development is influenced by availability of reading materials, reading habits and opportunity to read. Save the Children's Literacy Boost data have replicated this finding across numerous developing contexts. Meanwhile international large-scale reading assessments do not capture detail on current home literacy. The…

Based on the analysis of 312 children's neighbourhood drawings and narratives, this article discusses children's socialization in six public housing neighbourhoods in Portugal, through children's personal accounts of their lives. It then examines their perspectives on disorder and violence. Most complained about living in their neighbourhoods,…

The purpose of this study was to examine a first grade teacher's instruction during interactive and independent writing times as she taught and prompted her students how to go about spelling unfamiliar words and employ various writing strategies while they were composing. I used a qualitative approach to data collection and analysis. Results of…

The purpose of this study was to determine whether the Fight-Free Schools violence prevention process had an effect on the frequency of aggressive acts of elementary school students. Participants included approximately 600 students ranging from Kindergarten to 5th grade in a suburban school in the Midwestern United States. Data were collected over…

Research has revealed that the academic performances of learners in South Africa are below the required level. The Western Cape Education Department (WCED) launched the literacy and numeracy strategy 2006-2016 in response to the low literacy and numeracy levels. In addition, the WCED introduced the Grade 1 baseline assessment in 2006, as part of…

The concept of "Home Learning Environment" (HLE) covers activities in a family providing intellectual stimulation for a child, such as reading to him or her or visiting libraries. Numerous studies have shown an association between HLE and children's cognitive development. In this longitudinal study, we focus on HLE as a predictor for…

This study examined the extent to which first grade teachers adapt their reading instruction to the literacy skills of particular children in their classroom, and investigated whether teacher and classroom characteristics influence such adaptation. Three hundred seven Finnish children were tested with regard to their literacy skills at the end of…

The positive effect of competent behaviors on academic functioning may outweigh the negative effect of externalizing problems. The current study examined this premise among children with externalizing problems in the early elementary years. Participants were 207 kindergarten through third-grade children and their parents and teachers. Results…

This study was an examination of the possible influence of a child's pre-identified disability on parent and teacher behavior ratings and whether a child's disability status affected parent ratings, when controlling for parenting stress. The sample included 206 kindergarten through third grade students and their teachers and parents from a…

Prevalence rates for bullying victimization among children with disabilities have varied greatly in the research literature. Two reasons for such variability were the focus of this study: (a) rates vary as a function of disability type, and (b) rates vary based on the bullying measure and criteria used to classify students as bullying victims. The…

Policy research highlights educational disparity between Blacks and Whites, thereby, emphasizing the need to determine malleable ecological factors that support the positive development and learning of Black children during the early schooling years. The purpose of this study was to examine whether change in home environment and neighborhood were…

Social-emotional learning (SEL) programs have demonstrated positive effects on children's social-emotional, behavioral, and academic outcomes, as well as classroom climate. Some programs also theorize that program impacts on children's outcomes will be partially explained by improvements in classroom social processes, namely classroom emotional…

Empowering settings are important places for people to develop leadership skills in order to enact social change. Yet, due to socio-cultural constructions of childhood in the US, especially constructions around working class and working poor children of Color, they are often not seen as capable or competent change agents, or in need of being in…

Background: Evidence suggests that the KiVa anti-bullying programme may contribute to a reduction in bullying and victimisation, especially in primary school level. What is more, the level of implementation moderates the programme effects: the more the programme was implemented, the more bullying was reduced. Purpose: Consequently, it is of…