Standards-based grading has been used in many Illinois public elementary schools for years, offering educators a different way of assessing and communicating to parents about their student achievement and performance on the grade level state standards. Educators faced many benefits and challenges using a standards-based grading system identified.…

The purpose of this study was to examine the efficacy of Imagine Learning's MyPath program on student mathematics and reading achievement growth. This study examined achievement growth trajectories of kindergarten students in one suburban Midwestern district in the 2022-23 school year. NWEA MAP mathematics and reading scores served as the main…

Despite growing research and the federal standard of providing students with education in the least restrictive environment, students with disabilities continue to be excluded inappropriately from the general education classroom. This quantitative study was designed to identify any relationship between collective teacher efficacy, teacher…

In the U.S., state guidance to schools in response to the COVID-19 pandemic was politicized. We used state-level political affiliation to explore whether access to curricular resources differed pre-pandemic or during pandemic remote teaching and teachers' reported control over curricular resources during pandemic teaching. We found that…

The purpose of this mixed method action research study was to examine the implementation of a trauma-informed approach at my elementary school, focused on staff and student perceptions of the approach, and on what appeared to work well and what emerged to not work well. Research questions included the following: How did students feel about school…

The purpose of this qualitative study is to explore the decision-making process of a group of core elementary teachers in Illinois Metro East districts around attending professional development. 10 teachers from two Metro East districts were interviewed about their motivations, choices, and factors when considering what professional development to…

This qualitative study aimed to understand how educators view aging and emphasized how educators' past experiences with older adults and personal comfort level with aging influenced their beliefs and desire to teach about aging topics. Ageism harms older adults by creating adverse physical, mental, emotional, and socioeconomic health risks.…

Teacher accountability and test scores currently drive many practices within the field of education. At the same time, student populations have become increasingly diverse, causing classroom teachers to feel pressured to teach to the test. Differentiated instruction has emerged as a best practice to help maximize learning for all students.…

This qualitative research study investigates teachers' perceptions of school safety and their adherence to specific safety procedures in a small, pre-K-eighth-grade school district in a small, suburban school district in Illinois. Data were collected through anonymous open-ended surveys distributed to teachers with varying experience levels. The…

The purpose of this article is to promote a deeper, more complex understanding of the challenge that "recess time" poses to elementary school educators and to thereby understand the practices in which they are currently engaging. Because teachers are expected to shepherd students through a vast array of learning standards while remaining…

Background: The Evidence-Based Practice Attitudes Scale (EBPAS) is widely used in implementation research, but it has not been adapted and validated for use among general education teachers, who are most likely to deliver evidence-based prevention programs in schools, the most common setting where youth access social, emotional, and behavioral…

This paper uses sensemaking theory and frame analysis to examine how a non-system actor's framing for advancing LGBT inclusion, what they called "code-switching," was taken up. Drawing on qualitative interview data generated as part of a larger mixed-methods study, this article examines the material and ideological affordances and…

This study proposal will provide a theoretical framework based on persuasive communication theories for educators seeking to make their curriculum more gender inclusive for contemporary school settings. The authors argue that too many U.S. public schools lack educational materials for young students in health classes about the value of…

Increasingly alarmed by instructional mandates more founded on journalistic rhetoric and popular opinion than on research findings or practitioner expertise, researchers gathered survey data from teachers to better understand the status of K-2 phonics instruction. Data demonstrate that the overwhelming majority of these K-2 teachers teach phonics,…

The problem addressed in this study was the high attrition rates of teachers in elementary school districts and the unknown role of human, social, structural, and psychological capital determinants needed to retain teachers. The purpose of this qualitative descriptive case study was to describe the experiences of veteran K-6 teachers in the South…