Disruptive Classroom Research Articles

The development and validation of a video tool for capturing teachers' noticing in salient and non-salient classroom disruptions

The development and validation of a video tool for capturing teachers' noticing in salient and non-salient classroom disruptions

Attribution to Classroom Disruptive Behavior: Insights from Secondary Teachers

Disruptive behavior in the classroom is a significant concern for teachers in schools across the globe. Extensive research has conclusively shown that effectively managing disruptive behavior in the classroom is a crucial factor that enhances the quality of instruction. The successful management of disruptive behavior in the classroom is influenced by various factors, including the causal attribution that a teacher assigns to the behavior. This study explored teachers’ perspectives on the factors contributing to disruptive behavior in the classroom. The study employed an interpretive paradigm and a qualitative approach with a case study research design. Data was generated via semi-structured interviews with six members of the School Management Team and a focus group interview with seven teachers from four purposively chosen Quintiles Three secondary schools. The findings showed that teachers attribute classroom disruptions to the characteristics and attributes of learners, contextual elements within schools, and external factors. The study concludes that these factors should be considered when developing classroom behavior strategies.

Constructive Mutualism: Teaching 21st Century Skills in 21st Century Classrooms

For more than fifty years education systems have been striving to go “beyond Behaviorism” without being able to reach a reliable way of mediating relationships in classrooms which assure full student engagement. ‘Constructive Mutualism’ is the name we are giving to a different paradigm, one which has been present in human societies from the moment we could call them human, and which provides the mechanism we are looking for. This paradigm is based on an explicit social dynamic which, once entered into by teacher and student, stimulates the student to willingly do their best work and to self- regulate to avoid classroom disruptions. For a student to enter such a relationship they must so value what it is that the teacher wants to provide them that full engagement becomes effortless. A key strength of this type of relationship is that once students have explicitly entered it, the teacher can direct their attention to other areas where the teacher wishes to impart their knowledge or otherwise facilitate learning. There are only a small number of teachers who have these relationships with all their students today, and we propose that the reason for this is a mismatch between what teachers are providing, which they believe is of high value, and how students are experiencing it, which many find not to be of such high value. The move towards the adoption of twenty-first century skills opens the door to a wider range of capacities that we believe are of intrinsic value to students and that could form the basis for a relationship of the type described. Our study shows that overwhelmingly students (and teachers) value psychological safety and although a large majority of teachers say they are providing this, a majority of students are not experiencing it to the required degree. We believe that this ‘gap’ can be explained though the realization that psychological safety cannot be provided consistently within the Behaviorist paradigm as this paradigm is always conditional. It is under Constructive Mutualism that students’ needs for psychological safety can be fully met. Thus, we can, finally, make a clean break from Behaviorism.

Classroom disruptions in digital teaching during the pandemic – an interview study

Classroom disruptions in digital teaching during the pandemic – an interview study

The detrimental effects of student-disordered behavior at school: evidence from using the cusp catastrophe.

The purpose of the present study is to examine the potentially complex relationship between disordered behavior at school and students' engagement with reading activities given that they enjoy reading. Of particular interest is the role of disordered behavior which we believe moderated the relationship between liking reading and reading engagement. Participants were 2,420 fourth graders who participated in the 2021 PIRLS study from Saudi Arabia and were selected using stratified random sampling from 117 schools in the Kingdom. Data were analyzed using linear and nonlinear means such as the linear model, the logistic model, and the cusp catastrophe. Results pointed to the superiority of the cusp catastrophe towards predicting student engagement in reading by highlighting the splitting role of students' disruptive classroom behavior. It was evident that exceeding a critical upward level in disruptive classroom behavior was associated with unpredictable and sudden changes in reading engagement. It is concluded that the application of non-linear means may be conducive to understanding complex educational phenomena.

ENHANCING CHILDREN’S SAFETY AND WELLBEING: EXPLORING THE ROLE OF A NEW SOCIAL SERVICE PROGRAMME IN FREE STATE TOWNSHIP SCHOOLS

In response to the pervasive violence affecting children's psychosocial wellbeing in South Africa, the Adopt-a-School Foundation introduced the Thari programme, targeting behavioural challenges that manifest in gangs, substance abuse and classroom disruptions. This article presents findings from a pilot project in Botshabelo, Free State, where gangsterism, academic struggles and social issues prevailed. The main study used an exploratory sequential mixed-methods design (qualitative/quantitative), but this article reports only on a part of the qualitative data from group and individual interviews that explored participants' perspectives. The study focused on children's behavioural challenges and observed school changes during implementation of the Thari programme. Results show a notable reduction in gangsterism and psychosocial issues, leading to decreased disruptive behaviour among children and highlighting improved behaviour after the introduction of psychosocial services. Keywords: child and youth care worker, psychosocial services, school safety, school social work, vulnerable children

Teachers’ Perspectives on Disruptive Student Behaviors: The Interconnectedness of Environment and Early Childhood Education in Pakistan

This study describes teachers’ perspectives on disruptive student behaviors in early childhood education classrooms in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Pakistan. Using an ecological model, this paper describes interviews with 26 teachers working in early childhood education. The findings show that home, school, and society do not play optimal roles in children’s education, which leads to disruption in classrooms. Illiteracy and socioeconomic problems at home prevent parents from playing their required roles, and schools are often overcrowded and have unattractive classrooms. Teachers are minimally qualified and have few teaching-learning materials at their disposal. Fear of violence is another factor. These factors do not support the behavioral development of young children. The three major circles (home, school, society) that comprise a child’s ecology are inadequate, which leads to classroom disruption, lack of motivation, and poor behavior that endangers the continuation of education.

Teachers' emotion regulation strategies and preschool expulsion risk: Suppression and reappraisal

Teacher stress has been implicated in decision-making related to preschool children's expulsion risk. The current study examines whether teachers' emotion regulation strategies moderate the relationship between child behavior and expulsion risk. In the study, 44 preschool teachers (68% lead and 32% assistant) completed surveys on their own emotion regulation strategies and child behavior (inhibitory control), student-teacher conflict, and expulsion risk for four randomly selected students in their classroom (n = 176). In multilevel models, higher inhibitory control was related to lower total expulsion risk and subscales of classroom disruption and stress in random slope models, controlling for student-teacher conflict and child gender. In conditional models, teachers' use of suppression moderated the link between inhibitory control and classroom disruption (p = .032) and reappraisal moderated the link between inhibitory control and child-related stress (p = −.016), supporting the exploration of teachers' emotion regulation as a critical aspect of expulsion prevention.

Assessment of noticing of classroom disruptions: a multi-methods approach

Teachers’ noticing as a basic precondition for effective teaching is characterized by focusing on relevant events in the classroom and ignoring the irrelevant. In recent years, many researchers have used eye-tracking methodology in classroom observations to gather information about the continuous attentional processes of teachers. Despite the general validity of the eye–mind assumption, methodological triangulation is necessary to draw conclusions about the where and why of the focus of attention. Although in previous studies, different data sources like gaze and verbal data have been used, the analyses were mostly conducted separately, instead of directly combining the data. In our study, we collected verbal data (retrospective think-aloud; RTA) and a reaction-based concurrent measure (keystroke) to assess the noticing process of novice and experienced teachers (N = 52) while they watched staged videos of classroom situations. For a direct triangulation, we combined these data with eye-tracking data. The aim of the study was to combine both measures with eye-tracking parameters that indicate attentional processes (fixation count, mean fixation duration, and revisits), and with expertise. We found that participants who were aware of the critical incidents in the videos (they gave a keystroke or mentioned the incident in the RTA), showed—as expected—a higher number of fixations and more revisits to the appropriate area, but a comparable mean fixation duration. However, expertise differences regarding accuracy in both measures could not be shown. We discuss methodological issues regarding the implementation of RTA and keystroke as measurements for the noticing process because—despite only partially significant results—both methods are promising as they allow complementation and possible correction of eye-movement-only data.

Should You Kill the Spider?

Abstract The appearance of a spider in the classroom can disrupt the flow of teaching, often prompting strong reactions that unsettle classroom norms. Minor classroom disruptions like this might not seem worth theorizing, but this essay reframes such disruptions as rich sites for understanding the role of affect in humanities pedagogy. Ultimately arguing against killing a spider in the classroom, this essay theorizes the moment of disruption as an opportunity to model humanistic attention to both human and nonhuman actors in the classroom space.

How controllable versus uncontrollable cognitions affect emotion processing during classroom disruptions: A video study with preservice teachers

We studied how preservice teachers explain and regulate their emotions when faced with classroom disruptions. Participants watched a video of a disrupted classroom and were either shown a subsequent video of the disruptive student explaining their behavior or not. Those preservice teachers who attributed the disruptions to controllable factors used functional emotion regulation to a greater extent (such as cognitive change, attentional deployment, and deep acting), while those who saw the disruptions as uncontrollable used venting more often. The study suggests that understanding the student's perspective and attributing disruptions to controllable factors can improve emotion regulation in teachers.

Body in motion, attention in focus: A virtual reality study on teachers' movement patterns and noticing

When people navigate a space to perform tasks, their body and eye movements are closely linked. Within the classroom context, characteristics of teachers' body movements may be related to the noticing of relevant classroom events, in particular, visual attention to student disruptions. In the current study, we investigated this relationship in an immersive virtual reality (IVR) classroom that offered a standardized environment for tracking teachers' body and eye movements. Based on time series data collected during a short teaching task with 21 preservice teachers, we conducted K-means clustering with body movement features. We identified three distinctive patterns, which we labeled as immobile, anchored, and dynamic (body) movement patterns. Teachers with dynamic movement patterns venture away from the teacher's desk to far corners of the room; they don't dwell in one location for long but rather move continuously to various parts of the classroom, creating a dispersed movement. Dynamic movement patterns were associated with the best visual attention performance, defined as the number, speed, and duration of fixations on a classroom disruption. Our findings demonstrate the existence of unique and differentiable movement patterns among preservice teachers that have implications for teacher noticing, teacher–student interaction, and instructional quality.

Classroom Management Document Research: What are Effective: Proactive and Workable Techniques for Maximizing Learning and Minimizing Disruption in the Classroom?

Background and Aim: This paper aims to investigate what are effective, proactive, and workable techniques for maximizing learning and minimizing disruption in the classroom. Methods: Through the literature analysis approach, this paper exposes the phenomenon. Results: The results show that classroom disruption, misbehavior, and disorderly conduct of students cause a loss of learning for students in classrooms across varied settings and years. This makes the educational mission a challenge for teachers, increases parental frustration, and hampers, or at times even prevents, the accomplishment of learning objectives. The study looks at what the literature says about these challenges and seeks to come up with research-based remedial practices for dealing with them effectively and efficaciously. Conclusion: principally, the study examines four key areas: a view of proactive classroom management, workable and effective techniques to manage a class well, maximizing learning, and the minimization of disruption.

Associations between stress, resources, and hair cortisol concentration in teachers

Challenging interactions are the main source of teacher’ stress in the classroom. We investigated the association of chronic stress and characteristics of teacher-student interactions with teachers’ Hair Cortisol Concentration (HCC). Forty-one teachers (27 women; Mage = 39.65 ± 12.14 years; Mlesson number = 23.15 ± 3.99 lessons per week; grade: elementary, secondary, high, and vocational school teachers) participated in the present study, with participation lasting over the length of one year. HCC was assessed from a 3 cm hair segment near the scalp. Self-reported chronic stress in the last three months was further assessed using the ‘Trier Inventory for Chronic Stress’ (TICS). Additionally, four consecutive, same-day lectures of each teacher were videotaped and coded offline in an event sampling procedure by trained external observers. The videos were analyzed for two stressors, i.e., classroom disruptions and total student aggression, as well as two resources, i.e., teacher-student relationship and classroom management. Overall, hair samples were collected M = 120.34 days (SD = 84.39) after the distribution of the questionnaires, and M = 67.63 days (SD = 18.40) prior to the observations. Lesson number, classroom disruptions, as well as total student aggression were all significantly positively correlated with HCC. In addition, both teacher-student relationship and classroom management were significantly negatively related to HCC. With regard to self-rated chronic stress, only the TICS subscale ‘Pressure to perform’ was positively related to HCC. Exploratory moderation analyses revealed that an increasingly good, observed teacher-student relationship buffered the positive association between lesson number and HCC. Our findings show significant associations between HCC and mainly objectively assessable stress, supporting HCC as a biological indicator of chronic stress. In this association, a good relationship between teachers and students acts as a buffer. While the findings underline the importance of examining objective and behavioral data for better understanding the psychobiology of stress, they also support the importance of boostering teachers’ (social) resources to increase their overall resilience.

Teacher Outcomes with a School-Based Mindfulness Intervention during COVID-19

Teacher burnout is one of the primary drivers of turnover. Skills such as improved classroom management have been shown to mitigate teacher burnout. COVID-19 created classroom disruption and an unprecedented youth mental health crisis. This study examined the effectiveness of a school-based mindfulness training at improving classroom management self-efficacy and reducing teacher burnout during COVID-19. Elementary school personnel were invited to participate in two versions of Kidding Around Yoga training and to implement with their students. Pre- and post-tests were conducted at 4-6 months (n = 49) to measure individual items related to classroom management, teacher self-efficacy, perceptions of student engagement, and professional quality of life. There were significant differences at post for items related to teacher skills, knowledge, and self-efficacy, and perceptions of the student experience (specifically, student emotional regulation). There were no significant differences between baseline and post in any of the professional quality of life measures. Findings suggest that Kidding Around Yoga is promising as a universal intervention to improve teachers’ self-efficacy and skills, and their experience of the classroom. More information is needed to understand if the intervention would have long-term impact on teacher burnout and turnover.

Producing Staged Videos for Teacher Education: Development and Content Validation of Video Scripts on the Topic of Handling Classroom Disruptions

Video-based teacher training has become an important component of teacher education. A special form of instructional videos is scripted videos, also known as staged videos. They can be used to accomplish several didactic objectives and visualise problematic situations, such as severe classroom disruptions caused by specific behavioural motives, which are very difficult to videotape in a real classroom. However, reservations exist due to limited authenticity, and thus content validity of staged videos. This paper describes the process of a theory-led script development as the key role for authentic and valid scripts. Therefore, we refine four crucial criteria, relevant, engaging, challenging, and realistic, for staged videos dealing with classroom disruptions. We show the content–validation process with reference to the applied theory-led criteria. A key output of this study is a manual for the development of scripted videos which will be perceived as authentic, and which reach the intended cognitive demands. An expert validation and two evaluative studies with data from 274 and 70 preservice teachers confirm the success of the final products.

From Segregation to Suspension: The Solidification of the Contemporary School-Prison Nexus in Boston, 1963-1985

Current scholarship emphasizes the adoption of “zero-tolerance” policies as the cause of the punitive turn in school discipline. The focus on “zero tolerance,” however, has obscured how and for what offenses schools most commonly issue suspensions, namely non-attendance and “classroom disruption.” Using Boston as case study, this article situates the formation of the contemporary school-prison nexus in the decades following the Supreme Court’s decision in Brown v. Board of Education and argues the preservation of educator discretion shaped its structure. Beginning in the decade prior to Boston’s court-ordered desegregation, it analyzes how white Bostonians racialized conceptions of safety and crime to sustain segregation and how that rhetoric shaped the city’s preparations for and implementation of desegregation. It examines how police conduct combined with educators’ disciplining power repurposed the racist logics undergirding segregation to make schools active institutions in spurring carceral expansion and later mass incarceration.

Relationships between emotions and disruptive behaviour in physical education - a systematic literature review

Classroom disruptions and disruptive behaviour occur frequently in physical education and can constitute important psychological stress factors. However, so far, the relationships between disruptive behaviour and emotions in physical education have not been studied in detail. Therefore, a systematic literature review was conducted, to explore these relationships. Studies were selected through a systematic literature search from the databases Pubmed, Web of Science, ERIC, BISp, and SCOPUS. Twelve articles met the specified inclusion criteria. Results show that anger is a well investigated emotion in this context, but psychological constructs such as boredom or low intrinsic motivation to participate in class also were described as leading to disruptions. In accordance with Lazarus's theory on emotions extended by the model of emotional contagion, a first conceptual model of relationships between teachers’ and students’ emotions regarding the identified typical disruptive behaviour in physical education is derived.

Caregivers of Black and Latino/a/x Students and School Personnel Perspectives on School-Based SARS-CoV-2 Testing: Implications for Testing and Test-to-Stay Programs inK-12 Schools.

"Test-to-stay" (TTS) is an effective approach for keeping students in school post-exposure to severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). To prepare for school-based SARS-CoV-2 testing, we implemented formative research to gather perspectives on school-based testing among school personnel, as well as caregivers of Black and Latino/a/x students given systemic racism, existing school inequalities, and the disproportionate effect of COVID-19 on Black and Latino/a/x populations. We conducted in-depth interviews with caregivers of K-12 grade Black and Latino/a/x students and focus group discussions with K-12 school personnel. We described the forthcoming school-based SARS-CoV-2 testing program and explored potential benefits and concerns, including concerns about testing-related stigma and discrimination, particularly toward Black and Latino/a/x students, and implementation recommendations. Perceived testing benefits included school community reassurance and preventing school outbreaks. Concerns included potential student anxiety, classroom disruption, inaccurate results, and limited information for caregivers. Some participants mentioned that testing-related stigma and discrimination could happen based on the testing selection process or results but not due to race or ethnicity. Participants provided numerous testing recommendations, including suggestions to prevent negative outcomes. Participants believed that stigma and discrimination from SARS-CoV-2 testing is possible, although differential treatment based on race or ethnicity was not anticipated. Participants' narratives provide support for school-based testing and the testing component of TTS.

Teachers’ changing practices for “disruption management” in the classroom

The purpose of this article is to present the main aspects of teachers’ responses to students’ disruptive behaviours during lessons, analysed in the context of changes that are taking place in the approach to institutional practices in this area. In the modern school, effective “disruption management” is a considerable challenge for the teacher, but also a priority. Teachers are under tremendous pressure as their responses to student misbehaviour are evaluated and are a marker of their competence. Two different ways of conceptualizing practices to correct disruptive student behaviour are compared. The changes offered by the new approach to methods of reducing undesirable classroom disruptions seem very promising, but also impose new responsibilities on the teacher. The review of the literature presented in this article aims to prepare a solid ground for research in this area. Increased knowledge on how to respond to disruptive student behaviour in everyday teaching situations can also be valuable for teacher training institutions and thus contribute to improving the quality of education.