ERIC Number: EJ1450364
Record Type: Journal
Publication Date: 2024-Dec
Pages: 18
Abstractor: As Provided
ISBN: N/A
ISSN: ISSN-0141-8211
EISSN: EISSN-1465-3435
Available Date: N/A
Navigating School Belonging in Qatari Schools: A Mixed-Methods Study of Student Perspectives
Kelly-Ann Allen; Shannon McCarthy; Rania Sawalhi; Emily Berger; Fiona May; Lefteris Patlamazoglou; Nicholas Gamble; Christine Grové; Gerald Wurf; Elisa Jones Arango; William Warton; Andrea Reupert
European Journal of Education, v59 n4 e12704 2024
A sense of school belonging is essential for adolescent development, though there is limited research investigating ways to improve students' sense of school belonging in Qatar. With 116 Qatari secondary school students, the current study explored student perspectives of ways teachers and schools could improve their sense of school belonging. Students responded to a survey including open-ended questions and a descriptive scale measuring the usefulness of established belonging strategies during remote learning, in-person, or all the time (both). Encouragement and support from teachers were found to be useful all the time, with school activities during breaks and opportunities to make friends only being useful during school-based learning. From the examination of open-ended responses using a hybrid qualitative approach with inductive and deductive coding, two overarching themes each at the teacher-level and school-level were found, defined by several subthemes. Belonging practices at the teacher-level included caring and supportive teachers and teachers treating students as people. Belonging practices at the school-level included student engagement and a positive and supportive school environment. For Qatari students practices such as prioritising supportive student-teacher relationships, introducing policies which promote a respectful, fair and safe environment, and offering school wide-extracurricular activities that encourage peer connections are important to develop their sense of school belonging.
Descriptors: Foreign Countries, Student School Relationship, Secondary School Students, Student Attitudes, Distance Education, In Person Learning, Teacher Role, School Role, Caring, Teacher Student Relationship, Learner Engagement, Educational Environment, School Policy, Peer Relationship
Wiley. Available from: John Wiley & Sons, Inc. 111 River Street, Hoboken, NJ 07030. Tel: 800-835-6770; e-mail: cs-journals@wiley.com; Web site: https://bibliotheek.ehb.be:2191/en-us
Publication Type: Journal Articles; Reports - Research
Education Level: Secondary Education
Audience: N/A
Language: English
Sponsor: N/A
Authoring Institution: N/A
Identifiers - Location: Qatar
Grant or Contract Numbers: N/A
Author Affiliations: N/A