School-based Research Research Articles

“Navigating Uncharted Waters”: New Teacher Mentoring and Induction

Teacher attrition, a startling problem internationally, can be fruitfully disrupted with comprehensive mentoring/ induction in place. The purpose of this study was to describe a division-wide, systems-embedded mentoring/ induction program in three US elementary schools that determined key features/practices influencing experience during a crisis. Research questions were: How do elementary practitioners involved in a mentoring/induction program describe it? What was the perceived effect of COVID-19 on this program? Support–Accessibility–Collaboration (SAC) provided leverage as program features for new teacher professional development and retention. A theoretical framework, SAC adds to school-based mentoring research by offering an integration of key elements in the literature. In 2021, mentor teachers, principals, and new teachers in northeast Virginia completed a demographics survey and participated in interviews. The analyzed data produced seven specific findings and three program features influencing mentoring quality and stakeholders’ experience. The issue of equity in mentoring contexts is raised. As concluded, mentoring proved problematic, with variability in quality. Even in an emergency, there was movement toward comprehensive approaches that support novices.

The experiences and views of autistic children participating in multimodal view-seeking research

ABSTRACT Autistic children face significant barriers to having their views listened to in research. Inaccessible research encounters and inflexible communication strategies on the part of a research team can prevent opportunities for children to engage meaningfully in the research. Researchers must strive to offer opportunities for meaningful self-expression, and improve the way they seek autistic children’s points of view. This article explores ways to engage with, and listen to, the views of autistic children in school-based research contexts. Twelve autistic children took part in view-seeking research about their school and playground environment, and reflected on their experience of taking part in the research. The children contributed their ideas through walking tours, photography, LEGO® models, and interviews with the researcher and their peers. The multimodal qualitative data were analysed iteratively and thematically, with findings highlighting issues of perceptions of audience, creativity, control and enjoyment. The different research activities stimulated diverse modes of expression and generated different kinds of insights. Implications are considered for how researchers can seek to creatively co-develop engagement and opportunities for self-expression with children who participate in research. This research emphasizes the importance of creating accessible and meaningful opportunities to engage with and foreground autistic children’s perspectives.

Effect of Green School-Based Inquiry Learning Model on Students' Ability of Scientific Literacy

A Green School is an environmentally friendly educational program designed in such a way as to create a meaningful learning experience. learning environment contributes to the development of students' scientific literacy skills. The involvement of students in nature or environmental-based learning can increase students' sensitivity to the relationship between humans and the environment. Therefore, Green School was chosen as a way to teach environmental material. Using the Pre-post Experimental Group Design research design that was applied to SMPN students on the interaction of living things, the results showed that students who learned to use the Green School-based inquiry model experienced a significant increase in their scientific literacy skills. It is hoped that there will be further research on environmental learning using Green School-based inquiry, so that references can be obtained in developing students' scientific literacy skills in the future.

Universal Social, Emotional, and Behavioral Screeners for Preschool Students: A Systematic Review

Social, emotional, and behavioral (SEB) screening is an essential component of multi-tiered systems for supporting students’ social-emotional development. SEB screening facilitates early identification and intervention for individual students and may be used to evaluate population-level response to universal positive behavior supports and social-emotional learning programs. Although school-based SEB screening research is common, the majority of studies have focused on screening tools for use with students in K-12 settings. The current study expands upon prior research to systematically review research on school-based teacher-report SEB screening tools for students in preschool. Results indicated 17 studies published in peer-reviewed journals between 2008-2019, which evaluated 6 teacher-report SEB screening tools with preschool populations. All 17 (100%) research studies evaluated the technical adequacy of the screening tools and 1 (5.9%) research study explicitly evaluated aspects of usability and provided novel data to support usability. Results indicate a need to continue to evaluate the technical adequacy of preschool SEB screening tools and to place more explicit focus on evaluating the usability of the tools.

Incomplete reporting of activity behaviour interventions in school-based research: a systematic review of randomised controlled trials published 2015-2020

Introduction: To date, systematic reviews including research published up until 2015, which describe staff training delivered in school-based interventions targeting changes in students’ activity behaviour, have consistently reported insufficient information about staff training. Complete descriptions of the behaviour change techniques that target teachers (and other actors) involved in implementation are crucial to interpret student outcomes and replicate effective interventions. Given relevant guidelines to promote complete reporting of interventions were published in 2014, the quality may have improved in recent years.

The ‘Impact’ of YPAR: In their own words

ABSTRACT The purpose of this paper is to present a conversation about how impact has been seen and felt by youth and adult co-researchers in a long-term, school-based youth participatory action research (YPAR) project, Courageous Conversations. To stay true to the epistemological commitments of YPAR, and in an effort to speak back to neocolonial and neoliberal definitions of impact, we have intentionally chosen to center the words of the school-based co-researchers (Emily, Katelyn, Mrwa, Ashleigh, and LeAnne) as they have conceptualized, identified, and discussed the impact of YPAR. Through non-traditional formatting, we seek to disrupt conventional, academic modes of conveying knowledge, which often have the result of silencing many voices and amplifying only a select few. We use various devices like text boxes and tables to reflect the messiness and fluidity of participatory knowledge creation and to connect the reflective conversation of members of our YPAR collective to broader and ongoing debates around the impact of YPAR.

Some Applications of Graph Theory in Middle School Mathematics Teaching

In-service teachers need continuous learning and training, but their education and teaching tasks are very heavy. Can teachers not be separated from the classroom and work to learn, to improve the efficiency of both work and learning, so as to achieve a "win-win" situation? The concept of learning organization and knowledge management emphasizes the integration of work and learning, which provides the possibility for this kind of learning. For teachers, if they want to combine work and learning, action research is a good intermediary. Studying in work, learning in studying, thus teachers can achieve professional development. Organizational learning is the most fundamental feature of a learning organization. So it is suggested to apply cooperative action research among teachers. Practice is the carrier of action research and the source of the generation and development of teachers' personal education knowledge. It is suggested to change the formula for teacher growth: experience + reflection + peer mutual assistance = growth. Or it can be said as: teacher's professional growth = practice + action research + organizational learning. Cooperative research based on practice is an ideal model for in-service teacher training based on teachers' personal education knowledge from the perspective of knowledge management. School-based research is one of the important forms of this training model.

Peer support in sub-Saharan Africa: A critical interpretive synthesis of school-based research

This paper concerns an aspect of schooling in sub-Saharan Africa which receives limited attention in official education discourse – namely, that students themselves often bear educational responsibilities for the access and learning of their peers. Informed by postcolonial and decolonial scholarship, this critical interpretive synthesis (CIS) of school-based research from the region provides a taxonomy of students’ roles and responsibilities with respect to the education of their peers. The study reveals positive and negative aspects of such support. The expectation of mutual support amongst students reflects a collectivist orientation in the region, and the material realities of teaching and learning in historically under-resourced environments. Where peer support focuses on improving learning then evidence is largely positive, both for those giving and receiving support; however, where students’ access to education is reliant on peers (which is the case for many disadvantaged learners, including children with disabilities and those from linguistic minorities) then the adequacy of these arrangements is questionable. Peer support cannot compensate for exclusionary policies and underinvestment in necessary professional support and infrastructure. This study finds that peer support is a key and neglected aspect of education quality in the region. The implications of this for progress towards global and regional policy priorities are considered, alongside lessons for research and practice.

Nature-based instruction for science learning: insights and interpretive considerations for research and practice

In school-based research, isolating the potential effects of a single variable while attempting to maintain typical classroom routines is always a challenge. Unfortunately, the challenges and methodological approaches to overcoming them are often only shallowly reported, perhaps due to word limits or assumptions that those details are irrelevant to the findings. Thus, future research is unnecessarily impeded, destined to repeat the same mistakes. In this article, we reflect on the design and methodological strengths of our study of nature-based instruction (NBI) and how some strengths also created challenges with implications for interpreting the findings of our study (published in a companion paper, Faber Taylor, Butts-Wilmsmeyer, and Jordan 2022). In that study, we attempted to isolate the potential effects of NBI compared to classroom-based instruction on science learning and to test for potential mechanisms and moderating variables. We share insights in hopes of supporting others’ research design and nature-based educational practice.

Teachers and Students' Readiness in Conducting School-Based Research

Teachers and Students' Readiness in Conducting School-Based Research

Moderators of pre-post changes in school-based mental health promotion: Psychological stress symptom decrease for adolescents with mental health problems, knowledge increase for all.

BackgroundSchool-based mental health promotion aims to strengthen mental health and reduce stress. Results on the effectiveness of such programs are heterogeneous. This study realized a school-based mental health promotion program (StresSOS) for all students and aimed to identify moderators (mental health status, gender, grade level) of pre- to post-changes in stress symptoms and knowledge.MethodsParticipants were N = 510 adolescents (from 29 classes; 46.7% female) aged 12–18 years (M = 13.88, SD = 1.00; grade levels 7–10). They were without mental health problems (65.9%), at risk for mental health problems (21.6%), or with mental health problems (12.5%) and participated in a 90 min per week face-to-face training with 8 sessions in class at school. Demographic variables, mental health status, stress symptoms, and knowledge about stress and mental health were collected at baseline. Program acceptance, stress symptoms, and knowledge were collected post-intervention. Multilevel mixed effects models were conducted with the fixed effects time (within factor), mental health status, gender, and grade level (between factors). Random effects for students within classes were included.ResultsIn the pre-post comparison, mental health status moderated the changes on psychological stress symptoms (p < 0.05). In adolescents with mental health problems the largest reduction in stress symptoms was observed between pre- and post-assessment. Gender and grade level were less relevant. For all adolescents knowledge gains were revealed (p < 0.001). Program acceptance was moderated by mental health status and grade level (p < 0.01). Mentally healthy adolescents and within the group of adolescents at-risk or with mental health problems, especially younger students (7th/8th grade), rated program acceptance higher.ConclusionPsychological stress symptoms decreased among adolescents with mental health problems and not among adolescents at risk for or without mental health problems. Mental health-related knowledge increased for all adolescents. The results add to knowledge on school-based mental health intervention research and practice. Its implications for different prevention strategies (universal, selective or a combination of both) are discussed.

Advancing health equity in pediatric eye care: the role of school-based vision programs, community engagement, advocacy, research, and medical education

Disparities in access to pediatric vision care remain a pressing issue in the United States. School-based vision programs are regarded as a way to advance health equity, especially for disadvantaged students. While they can be beneficial, especially by providing glasses to students who need them, these programs are only part of the solution. This workshop will frame the role of school-based vision programs as part of a larger conversation about strengthening the pediatric eye care delivery system through advocacy, community engagement, research, and medical education.

What Is Not in the Methods Section: Challenges, Successes, and Lessons Learned From Conducting School-Based Interpersonal Violence Prevention Research.

Interpersonal violence (IV)-which includes sexual assault, sexual harassment, teen dating violence, bullying, and other forms of violence-among youth (i.e., individuals 18 years of age or younger) is a public health crisis in the United States. As such, preventing IV among youth is a public health priority. Schools are natural settings for IV prevention among youth. However, conducting school-based IV prevention research with youth in school settings is riddled with challenges, and there is little systematic discussion of lessons learned from doing this work. As such, the purpose of this paper is to outline challenges, successes, and lessons learned from conducting school-based IV prevention research, as ascertained by four researchers with over 75 years of collective experience conducting school-based IV prevention research. Specifically, we focus on the importance of researchers (1) doing research on the school/school district prior to reaching out about potential partnerships; (2) establishing relationships with school partners that are characterized by being present, trustworthiness, and respect as well as the prioritization of school partners' ideas over one's research agenda; (3) working collaboratively with school partners to conceptualize and fund school-driven ideas; (4) preparing for pushback, often from parents/caregivers; and (5) embracing reciprocity (i.e., do things to support your school partners that may not directly benefit you). Additional considerations for recruitment, enrollment, and retention; program implementation and data collection; and dissemination are discussed.

Effectiveness of structured interventional strategy for middle-aged adolescence (SISMA-PA) for preventing atherosclerotic risk factors-A study protocol.

Atherosclerotic risk starts at an early stage in adolescents and interventions on adolescents' lifestyles are most important. The pandemic of obesity-related morbidities like atherosclerosis among young adults and atherosclerotic risk factors for middle-aged adolescents in India is known. Yet, there is a lack of cost-effective and integrated intervention programs to treat this important health problem. The main objective of this study is to evaluate the effect of a 12-week structured interventional strategy program, containing integrated education and supervised physical activity interventions for middle-aged adolescents. This will be a school-based pre-experimental one-group pre-post time-series research design. The sample size is estimated to include 154 adolescents of 10th to 12th grade; aged 15-17 years will be grouped as a single arm. Data will be collected from July 2021 to January 2022. The intervention duration will be 3 months. The following measures will be evaluated before, during, and after intervention: knowledge, body mass index, level of physical activity, dietary habits, and sedentary activity. We believe that the structured interventional strategy approach which includes education related to atherosclerosis, physical activity, dietary habits, and sedentary activity, and cost-effective physical activity training will be more effective in preventing atherosclerotic-related changes among middle-aged adolescents. Further, this kind of approach may be applied in similar study areas elsewhere in India. Clinical Trials Registry-India (Registered Number: CTRI/2021/03/032271).

Misguided and Modest: Reflections of Our Youth Voice Research.

In recent years, Physical Education (PE) has seen a growth in the commitment to youth voice research. This approach foregrounds the practice of researching with young people, rather than conducting research on or about them. Whilst we are cognisant of the many possibilities youth voice research offers, we are also concerned that there is a tendency to overlook the challenges of supporting youth voice activities. This paper draws on our collective reflections to bring to the fore some of the complexities we have encountered when attempting to engage in school-based youth voice research. We explore the following questions: How can youth voice research engage with different young people to capture a diversity of voices? What are the challenges of undertaking youth voice research? What are the possibilities of change through youth voice research? We consider these questions by drawing upon four principles of student voice work including communication as dialogue, participation and democratic inclusivity, unequal power relations, and change and transformation. We use these principles to critique our own research and, in doing so, draw on entries from our research diaries. The paper questions whether young people need help to share their insights and experiences about PE, or whether it is us - researchers, teachers and schools - who need help to more readily recognize and be attentive to young people's voices. We also point to the importance of recognizing modest change through youth voice research and the need to secure adult allies to support activities and potential outcomes. Engaging in youth voice research is an immersive and messy encounter that involves navigating a journey that is anything but straightforward. Even though this is the case, our moral and ethical compass continues to point us in this direction and we remain firm advocates of youth voice work. This paper offers a starting point for others to begin to grapple with the pitfalls and possibilities when supporting youth voice research.

Association between screen time exposure, anxiety, and sleep quality in adolescents

Introduction. The increase in sedentary screen time can negatively affect the quality of sleep, impacting the performance of daily activities. Objective. To analyze the association between sedentary screen time and sleep quality, regardless of the symptoms of anxiety in adolescents of both genders. Method. Cross-sectional study integrating school-based epidemiological research with a representative sample (n = 666) of high school students (14 to 19 years old) in public schools in the municipality of Caruaru-PE. The translated versions into Portuguese of the Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index (PSQI) and the Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale (HAD) were applied to analyze sleep quality and anxiety, respectively. Binary logistic regression was used to analyze the association, considering sleep quality as an outcome. Results. There was a positive, statistically significant (p #abr# .001) correlation between sleep quality and symptoms of anxiety (r = .393). A significant association regarding the association between screen time and sleep quality was noted only in those adolescents classified as being possible or probable anxiety cases and only in exposure to the computer (OR = 2.337; 95% CI [1.01, 5.43]) and video games (OR = 8.083; 95% CI [2.0, 32.8]) after adjusting for gender, age, and school shift. Discussion and conclusion. Increased interaction with the screen and higher levels of anxiety can be more harmful to sleep in adolescents. Exposure to screen time, specifically those which have a greater interaction such as video games and computers, can have a negative impact on sleep quality, but only in adolescents with a higher risk of anxiety.

Conducting Nursing Research in the School Setting: Lessons Learned.

Conducting original research in the school setting advances our understanding of diverse, vulnerable youth with the objective of improving future outcomes through evidence-based health initiatives. School-based research may involve formal collaboration and partnership with school personnel or may be conducted through use of school facilities, site location, or access to participant recruitment. Despite the recognized benefits of school-based research, the school setting presents many unique challenges to the nurse researcher, including obtaining site access and facilitating the implementation of the research study. Traditional nursing research textbooks and training describe research methods, ethics, and applications well. However, these resources provide little information on gaining access to research settings including community settings such as schools. The purpose of this article is to describe researcher experiences in the school setting and identify lessons learned for conducting school-based research. We provide guidance with examples illustrating real-world experiences with access to and completion of research in the elementary and high-school setting. Five lessons learned that support school-based research are identified: 1) do your homework, 2) cultivate relationships, 3) be well prepared and remain flexible, 4) follow the rules, and 5) find ways to give back.

Factors Affecting eHealth Literacy of Early Adolescents: School-based Research

ABSTRACT The purpose of the research were to describe eHealth literacy and identify factors affecting the eHealth literacy of early adolescents. This descriptive and correlational study was conducted in a government secondary school in the west of Turkey. The research sample consisted of 1347 adolescents in the sixth, seventh, and eighth grades in the academic year 2016–2017. An adolescents’ description form and the eHealth Literacy Scale (eHEALS) were used to collect the data. The mean score on eHEALS was 23.81 ± 6.94. Multiple regression analysis showed that being in the 11–12 year age group (β = 0.528, p < 0.001), having a father with a high school or university level education (β = 0.055, p = 0.038), and carrying out research in the internet on health related topics (β = 0.118, p < 0.001) were determinant at 32% (F = 56.901, p < 0.001, R2 = 0.32) on the adolescents’ eHealth literacy. The mean eHEALS score in the study demonstrated that the e-health literacy of the adolescents was rather low and inadequate, and that there were gaps in the adolescents’ knowledge and skills about how and where to find quality eHealth information. Nurses are expected to provide eHealth literacy training that will help to find information on the internet and interpret and assess it, and this will develop eHealth literacy of adolescents. Integrating online health information sources into the school health education curriculum in line with developed strategies can be suggested because it is an attempt to improve the eHealth literacy of adolescents.

Using the Experience Sampling Method to Examine the Details of Dosage in School-Based Speech Sound Therapy

The purpose of this project was to collect practice-based evidence regarding dosage in speech sound therapy sessions in school-based settings. Dosage is the number of trials within a therapy session for any one particular child. School-based speech-language pathologists (SLPs) face a variety of obstacles to service delivery, often making the implementation of evidence-based practices difficult. To that end, we were interested in exploring how therapy parameters, such as group size and session frequency were associated with dosage. Using the experience sampling method, we queried school-based SLPs (n = 90) across the United States. SLPs participated via a phone application, which randomly alerted them to participate 3 times per day for 5 days. SLPs also completed a demographic questionnaire that included information regarding caseload size and job satisfaction. We report results from 670 therapy sessions. Results revealed that the therapy parameter of group size was negatively related to dosage. The SLP parameter of caseload size was positively related to dosage, but this was a small association. The child parameter of comorbidity was negatively related to dosage. Our results support that as group size increases, children receive smaller doses of speech sound practice. Similarly, children who have a reported comorbidity received smaller doses compared to children who have an isolated speech sound disorder. We discuss implications for school-based practitioners and researchers.

The Relationship Between School-Based Research and Preschool Teachers' Teaching Ability: The Mediating Role of Constructivist Beliefs in Teaching.

To understand the relationship between kindergarten school-based research (SBR) and preschool teachers’ teaching ability and identify the mechanism by which SBR affects teachers’ teaching ability, a survey of randomly sampled preschool teachers in Sichuan Province (N = 625, Mage = 26.61) was conducted online using three scales assessing community learning, teaching ability and teaching philosophy. The survey results showed that the level of SBR reached the upper-middle level. The level of SBR positively predicted the teaching beliefs and teaching ability of preschool teachers. SBR influenced teaching ability through direct and indirect effects, with indirect effects accounting for 23.5% of the total effect; however, only constructivist teaching beliefs played a mediating role in the relationship between SBR and teaching ability via an indirect effect. SBR focused on improvement in teaching ability should not only examine the connection between SBR and practical problems to promote improvement in teachers’ teaching ability but also should examine the role of teachers’ beliefs and influence teachers’ teaching abilities by changing teachers’ teaching beliefs.