The Role of Procrastination and Locus of Control in School Achievement

Numerous studies are focused on discovering the factors involved in achieving school success or failure. Among the recognized factors are certainly the locus of control and procrastination. Research has shown that procrastination and locus of control are important indicators of school behavior, attitudes toward obligations, and indicators of school success (Sakač 2008; Košanski 2004). Therefore, this paper sought to determine the extent to which they play an important role in school success. The increasing interest in examining school success lies in being assessed as a significant factor in a child’s life. Its significance influences the development of self-confidence, satisfaction, success, and motivation. Within the research framework, school success was determined by school achievement at the end of the school year. The survey was conducted on 100 respondents of elementary school students, a sample is appropriate. During this research, the relationships between these variables were analyzed, the Anova procedure was used to analyze the data. The obtained results showed that procrastination and locus of control within this sample did not prove to be significant factors of school success.

Research Insights: Can Low-Cost Communication Technologies Bridge Information Gaps between Schools and Parents?

We document large gaps between parents knowledge and school reports of students attendance and grades. Sending frequent text messages with information on attendance, grades and school behavior shrinks those gaps. Parents of at-risk students adjust their understanding of their children's performance to the greatest degree. High-frequency text messages had positive impacts on grades and attendance. Math GPA increased 0.08 of a standard deviation; the probability of earning a passing grade in math increased by 2.7 percentage points (relative to a mean of 90 percent). The intervention also reduced school absenteeism by 1 percentage point and increased the share of students who met attendance requirements for grade promotion by 4.5 percentage points.

Condiții pedagogice ale dezvoltării echilibrului emoțional la elevii claselor primare

The concept of pedagogical conditions, in the context of the development of emotional balance with primary school students, defines the set of affective, motivational, volitional-characteristic and cognitive factors that support students’ emotional balance within a formative triangle built on the necessary interpenetration between: a) student’s optimism as a psyhological state favorabile to healthy and successful school behavior, b) personal affective efficiency, established at a level of feeling superior to learning; c) self-esteem, acquired in a fomal and non-formal context, but also in an informal. All these have as a superior quality product the formation and development of the emotional intelligence of the students, which is in close functional and structural connection with the emotional culture of the teacher, in general and of the teacher from primary education, in particular.

A Case Study of the School Behavior of Abused Children with Behavior Modification Intervention

Child abuse has become prevalent in the society and has reached an alarming state. An experience of abuse creates a domino effect on a child’s learning and socialization in school, and consequently impacts their holistic development. Anchoring on B.F. Skinner’s Operant Conditioning Theory, this study investigates the undesirable school behaviour of abused children and formulates an intervention program for behaviour modification. This case study documented the school behaviour of three primary school children identified as psychologically, physically, and sexually abused by the local Department of Social Welfare and Development. These abused children were selected using purposive sampling. Data collection was conducted through pre, and post-observation using a validated research-made Student Behaviour Inventory, in-depth interview, triangulation, and validated Student Behaviour Intervention Program (SBIP) anchored on Cognitive Behavioural approaches. Data were analysed using recursive textual analysis using Lichtman’s framework: coding, categorizing, and conceptualizing. Results of the study revealed that abused children have opposition, refusal, and resistance to orders; sensitiveness; tendency towards social withdrawal, aloofness, and melancholy; feelings of inferiority; and non-compliance to school requirements. Administration of SBIP to abused children produced slight modification in their behaviour. This study implies a consideration of the SBIP and its administration to children who have experienced abuse as an intervention to modify their school behaviour.

Need-Supportive and Need-Thwarting Teacher Behavior: Their Importance to Boys’ and Girls’ Academic Engagement and Procrastination Behavior

Motivation plays an important role in students’ school behavior, and research has established that students’ learning environment experiences such as teachers’ behavior toward them contribute to their motivation and behavior at school. Self-determination theory (SDT) offers an interesting frame of reference in the study of the relationship between students’ learning experiences at school and their school behavior. Considering three basic psychological needs (the need for autonomy, competence, and relatedness), the SDT points to the importance of nutriments and support in the social environment in order to allow growth in motivation, engagement, and (psychological) well-functioning. In addition, thwarting these needs is supposed to contribute to maladaptive functioning. Teachers can play an important role in the fulfillment of students’ basic psychological needs by delivering support (autonomy support, structure, and involvement); however, controlling instructional behavior, chaos in the classroom, and teacher rejection and neglect are supposed to be a treat to the fulfillment of students’ basic psychological needs. In the current innovative longitudinal study, teachers’ need-supportive behavior as well as teachers’ thwarting of these needs are considered and their relationship with students’ academic engagement (adaptive functioning) and procrastination behavior (maladaptive functioning) is studied. In addition, attention is paid to differential effects of teachers’ behavior with regard to boys and girls. Participants were 566 students belonging to 20 mathematics/English grade 1 secondary education classes in the Netherlands. Multilevel analyses revealed evidence for the importance of both teachers’ need-supportive and need-thwarting behaviors in relation to students’ academic engagement and procrastination behavior. In addition, the findings revealed that teachers’ need-supportive behavior is more important for students’ academic engagement (adaptive functioning), while teachers’ need-thwarting behavior has larger effects on students’ procrastination behavior (maladaptive functioning). Furthermore, evidence was found that boys often seemed to be more sensitive to their teachers’ behavior than girls. The findings highlight the importance of both teachers’ need-supportive and need-thwarting behaviors in daily classrooms and contribute to deepen our insight into and understanding of factors leading to adaptive and maladaptive functioning of boys and girls in relation to learning tasks at school.

Not all Perfectionists Are as They Are Assessed: An Investigation of the Psychometric Properties of the Perfectionism Inventory in the Teaching Profession

Perfectionism has been studied for almost 30 years. In the present study, we investigated the internal validity of The Perfectionism Inventory (PI—Hill et al., 2004) in an occupation that encourages perfectionistic tendencies in own behavior or in students' behavior. We collected data from a large sample of schoolteachers (N = 633, 81.18% female, 63.02% from urban areas, 46.66% from secondary schools, mean age = 42.11 years) recruited using a snowball sampling approach, and we analyzed the factor structure of the PI using confirmatory factor analyses. We found that the 8-factor structure of PI provided a reasonable fit root mean square error of approximation [RMSEA = 0.055, 90% CI = (0.053–0.057); SRMR = 0.071]. However, additional analyses revealed problematic divergent validity only in the case of the scales associated with self-evaluative perfectionism, not in the case of the scales associated with conscientious perfectionism. We found that teachers displayed distinguishably different forms of perfectionism only when it referred to own person, not when it referred to perfectionism imposed to others. Based on these findings, we suggested that the PI could provide a useful framework for investigating the role of conscientious-related forms of perfectionism in the development of teacher beliefs regarding their school behavior.

GROUP COUNSELING AS SELF-ESTEEM AND MOTIVATION INTERVENTION FOR TRUANCY PROBLEMATIC STUDENTS: A MALAYSIAN CASE STUDY

The study aims to determine whether the students who presented group counseling for lower trigonometry differed from those in the comparison group. The experimental research plan was used. The number of participants who participated in the study selected several students. Study results indicated that individuals in the treatment group could reduce their worldly behavior; The number of students in the actual practice of basic self-management goals increases compared to students with self-capability goals triples among students during the counselling sessions. However, the recommendations made with this study included a greater need for additional counseling on how to change school behavior rather than using physical punishment.

Influence of Organized vs Non Organized Physical Activity on School Adaptation Behavior

It is now well-established that physical activity has positive effects on both physical and mental health. However, the influence of organized physical activity (i.e., programs controlled and supervised by a trainer) on school adaptive behavior of adolescents with disabilities and/or behavioral disorders remains unclear. School behavior adaptation involves the ability to learn, conform to school norms and manage school activities without major behavior conflicts. A cross-sectional study was conducted to test the differences between organized physical activity and non-organized physical activity in an after school program. Eighty Romanian adolescents were recruited and allocated to three groups: (a) with disabilities [Ds; N = 17, Mage = 14.55 years (SD = 1.16), 12 males and 5 females], (b) with conduct disorders [CDs, N = 21, Mage = 14.52 years (SD = 1.11) 16 males and 5 females], and (c) participants who had not shown signs of conduct disorders or disabilities [as a control group; N = 42, Mage = 14.2 years (SD = 0.46) 20 males and 22 females]. Personality traits, school behavior, and sensorimotor coordination were assessed by using the Eysenck personality questionnaire—junior scale, school in-adaptability questionnaire scale, and Vienna Test System Sport (SMK—sensorimotor coordination test) respectively. Multivariate analysis of variance MANOVA (3 × 3) and discriminant analysis were used to examine differences between the psychological and sensorimotor coordination outcomes across three groups and three types of physical activity context: (a) organized physical activity, (b) non-organized physical activity, and (c) no physical activity. The findings indicate that not participating in an organized physical activity program results in a reduced level of physical mobility and consequently is associated with maladaptive social and psychological outcomes. Thus, we argued that attending in an organized physical activity program is more beneficial for participants with disabilities and/or behavior disorders, due to an increase in the probability of school integration and development of their motor skills. Clearly more research is needed in order to investigate these effects in neurophysiological levels.