Understanding the factors that encourage young people to become active agents in their own learning is critical. Positive psychology is one lens that can be used to investigate the factors that facilitate a student's sense of agency and active school engagement. In the second edition of this groundbreaking handbook, the editors draw together the…

Research suggests that young children with disabilities often fall victim to bullying because of a lack of social competence and social skills necessary for consistent engagement with peers. This article focuses on a comprehensive approach to classroom management and offers important strategies for a multi-level positive behavioral support plan.…

First year college students are challenged both socially and academically in their transition to college life. The literature suggests that social and emotional competence skills can help with this transition. This article describes the course content for a University freshman seminar that teaches skills in social and emotional competence in order…

Online learning is integrated into nearly every type of college, university or workplace. It is more difficult for online instructors to assess the social-emotional components of learning due to a lack of face-to-face interaction. The following concept paper explores the emotional awareness levels of faculty teaching online courses and discusses…

This study investigated different forms of pretend and physical play as predictors of preschool children's "affective social competence" (ASC). Data were collected from 122 preschool children (57 boys, 65 girls; 86 European American, 9 African American, 17 Hispanic, and 10 other ethnicity) over a 2-year period. Children participated in…

As this issue of the "Future of Children" makes clear, there is much yet to learn about military children and their families. A big part of the reason, write Anita Chandra and Andrew London, is the lack of sufficiently robust sources of data. Until more and better data are collected about military families, Chandra and London say, it…

The revised UK Early Years Foundation Stage (EYFS) now places a stronger emphasis on personal, social and emotional development (PSED) as one of its three prime areas. PSED has three characteristics of learning: active learning, creating and thinking critically, and playing and exploring. These aspects of the revised EYFS closely align with the…

This paper reports the theoretical conceptualisation, statistical development, and application of an Implementation Index to evaluate the quality of implementation of the KidsMatter Primary school mental health initiative in Australia. Questionnaires were received from the parents and teachers of almost 5000 students, and also from KidsMatter…

The main purpose of this study was to explore what Jordanian parents of children attending "traditional" kindergartens recognize as high-quality education programs. The sample consisted of 509 families ("N"?=?509) of kindergarten-age children. Data were collected using a three-part questionnaire: curriculum domains, teacher…

A substantial percentage of students come to school with a number of stress factors from life circumstances, personal clinical attributes, and typical adolescent challenges. As a result, some students become disengaged from school, are unsuccessful, or drop out of school. School structures are not always equipped to respond to such problems. A…

This article examines associations between observed quality in preschool center classrooms for approximately 6,250 three- to five-year-olds and their school readiness skills at kindergarten entry. Secondary analyses were conducted using data from four large-scale studies to estimate the effects of preschool center quality and interactions between…

According to No Child Left Behind, teachers must consider alternative teaching strategies to improve student achievement. The use of a facility dog as an instructional enhancement is an innovative teaching approach that deserves further research. The theoretical framework for the study was human-animal bond theory, which postulates that…

Increasingly, more and more areas of educational practice are being guided by sets of national standards for content, leadership, professional ethics, family-school partnerships, and school accreditation, among others. Similarly, there is growing appreciation that standards are needed to effectively measure improvement in school climate. The…

Studies focusing on mothers' own reports of their experience with intervention programmes are rare, so very little has been known about their evaluations of the programmes and what they have learned. The aim of the present study was to use interviews to evaluate these aspects of an intervention programme. The interviews were designed to capture…

This investigation analyzed the methods used over the past 35 years to study emotion regulation (ER) in children. Articles published from 1975 through 2010 were identified in 42 child clinical, developmental, and emotion psychology journals. Overall, 61.1% of published ER articles relied on one method and 23.6% used two methods. Analyses revealed…