Adapting routines in schools when facing challenging situations: extending previous theories on routines by considering theories on self-regulated and collectively regulated learning

Routines play a major role in educational change in schools. But what happens if the routines performed by school staff fail to deal successfully with current challenges? What strategies aid adaptation of the routines in a specific situation? Up to now, there exists no comprehensive concept for understanding why and at what points the adapting of routines in schools in a specific situation takes a favorable or unfavorable direction. To address this gap, we propose extending theories on routines by considering theories on self-regulated and collectively regulated learning. We consider these theories to be a beneficial complement because of their broad theoretical, methodological, and empirical research base. We argue that these theories enhance the understanding of adapting routines to specific challenging situations in schools. We present a newly developed theoretical framework for dealing with specific challenging situations in schools as an interplay between routines and regulation processes. Finally, important research questions regarding the suggested approach are discussed

"Title does not dictate behavior": associations of formal, structural, and behavioral brokerage with school staff members' professional well-being

Individuals in brokerage positions are vital when further developing complex organizations with multiple subgroups only loosely coupled to each other. Network theorists have conceptualized an individual’s brokerage as the degree to which a person occupies a bridging position between disconnected others. Research outside the school context has indicated for quite some time that an individual’s social capital in the form of brokerage is positively associated with professional development—not only on a collective but also on an individual level. Schools are without any doubt complex organizations with multiple loosely connected stakeholders involved when further developing their educational practice. Thus, it is not surprising that in recent years, the concept of brokerage has gained interest in research on school improvement as well. Up to now, in school improvement research brokerage has been operationalized in different ways: as individuals’ formal entitlement to act as intermediaries (formal brokerage), their position within a social network (structural brokerage), or their behavior when linking disconnected groups of staff members (behavioral brokerage). As these perspectives have often been examined separately, this study, as a first step, aimed to simultaneously assess school staff members’ formal, structural, and behavioral brokerage, and examine their degree of interrelatedness. In a second step, associations of brokerage with professional well-being were analyzed. Even though there is evidence for the positive impact of brokerage on professional development, only little is known about its associations with professional well-being. In a third step, interaction effects were examined when formal brokerage is congruent or incongruent with other facets of brokerage. Based on a sample of 1,316 school staff members at 51 primary schools in the German-speaking part of Switzerland, we conducted both bivariate correlational and multiple-group structural equation modeling analyses. The findings revealed that formal, structural, and behavioral brokerage are interrelated facets. However, formal entitlement did not determine either structural position or behavior. Moreover, brokerage within schools was only partially related to professional well-being. In the discussion section, the study’s key contributions and practical implications are presented in detail

Bridging gaps: a systematic literature review of brokerage in educational change

Bridging gaps between educational stakeholders at the classroom, school, and system levels is essential to achieve sustainable change in primary and secondary education. However, transferring knowledge or building capacity within this network of loosely coupled stakeholders is demanding. The brokerage concept holds promise for studying these complex patterns of interaction, as it refers to how specific actors (brokers) link loosely coupled or disconnected individuals (brokering). However, different research traditions, in terms of theoretical frameworks and methodological approaches, and various stakeholders examined in their role as bridge builders make understanding the role of brokers, brokering, and brokerage in changing educational practice challenging. Therefore, the purpose of this study is to provide an overview of the current literature on these concepts in educational change research. In a systematic literature review based on 42 studies, we analyzed each study’s theoretical assumptions, methodological approach, scope in terms of stakeholders involved, and empirical findings. First, the literature review revealed that research on educational change refers to four different theoretical frameworks when focusing on brokers, brokering, or brokerage. Second, our results indicate that predominantly qualitative approaches have been applied. Third, using content network graphs, we identified teachers and principals as among the most frequently analyzed brokers. Fourth, four relevant aspects of the empirical findings are presented: brokers’ personal characteristics, conditions that enable brokering, successful brokering strategies, and outcomes of brokerage. Finally, we outline a future research agenda based on the empirical evidence base and shortcomings

Improving teaching, teamwork, and school organization: collaboration networks in school teams

Whereas previous studies on teacher collaboration have focused almost exclusively on improving teaching, this paper investigates collaboration in three highly important school improvement areas. Data for three collaboration networks were collected in four secondary schools in Switzerland in 2018 on teachers exploring new ideas on teaching (teaching improvement), teamwork (team improvement), and school organization (organizational improvement). Using social network analysis, we examined to what extent the collaboration networks overlap, how network structures differ, and what factors explain these differences. The results revealed substantial differences between collaboration in the three areas. This suggests that future research should examine collaboration from a multidimensional network perspective

School teams' regulation strategies for dealing with school-external expectations for school improvement

School-external expectations regarding implementation of reforms and innovations often do not lead to successful school improvement processes in schools. To better understand these processes in schools, this paper aims to investigate school improvement processes on a deep level by focusing on cognitive, metacognitive, and motivational regulation strategies used by school teams and by exploring what school-external and school-internal factors are related to this strategy use. Principals, teachers, and specialist teachers ( N = 1328) at 59 primary schools responded to an online questionnaire indicating their school’s use of regulation strategies on school improvement. Results from descriptive, variance, and hierarchical multiple regression analyses revealed that school teams use all forms of school-based regulation strategies but that schools differ significantly in their strategy use. These differences were mainly explained more by school-internal deeper structures (e.g., task cohesion) and less by school-internal surface structures (e.g., school size) and not at all by school-external factors (e.g., governance systems)

Preconditions of teachers' collaborative practice: new insights based on time-sampling data

Previous findings on the preconditions of teachers’ collaboration are inconsistent. This might be related to the research methods used to assess the teachers’ collaborative practice. Retrospective assessments by self-report on a relatively general level prevail. The validity of these self-reports is limited, however. In contrast, time-sampling methods have the potential to investigate collaborative practice specifically and longitudinally as a day-to-day process over time validly. But to date, no research on collaborative activities in schools based on time-sampling methods is available. In this study, we extended the current state of research by analysing the variability and preconditions of teachers’ collaboration at four secondary schools over three weeks based on time-sampling data collected by a newly developed online practice log. Recorded were collaborative activities outside of teaching with a focus on administrative and organisational tasks and on school subject-specific tasks. The results revealed that teachers’ collaborative activities varied significantly between weekdays, showing a linear decrease from Monday to Friday, regardless of the content of collaboration. Collaboration that focused on administrative-organisational tasks seemed to be quite stable over the weeks and was hardly influenced by teachers’ individual characteristics. Instead, collaborative activities that focused on school subject-specific tasks varied significantly between weeks; moreover, they were influenced by teachers’ leadership role and gender. The results indicate that rather stable routinised patterns of day-to-day collaboration over the weeks decrease the influence of teachers’ individual characteristics. Hence, by collecting data that is closer to content-specific day-to-day collaborative activities, time-sampling methods can be seen as a driver for new insights

Preconditions of teachers’ collaborative practice: New insights based on time-sampling data

Previous findings on the preconditions of teachers’ collaboration are inconsistent. This might be related to the research methods used to assess the teachers’ collaborative practice. Retrospective assessments by self-report on a relatively general level prevail. The validity of these self-reports is limited, however. In contrast, time-sampling methods have the potential to investigate collaborative practice specifically and longitudinally as a day-to-day process over time validly. But to date, no research on collaborative activities in schools based on time-sampling methods is available. In this study, we extended the current state of research by analysing the variability and preconditions of teachers’ collaboration at four secondary schools over three weeks based on time-sampling data collected by a newly developed online practice log. Recorded were collaborative activities outside of teaching with a focus on administrative and organisational tasks and on school subject-specific tasks. The results revealed that teachers’ collaborative activities varied significantly between weekdays, showing a linear decrease from Monday to Friday, regardless of the content of collaboration. Collaboration that focused on administrative-organisational tasks seemed to be quite stable over the weeks and was hardly influenced by teachers’ individual characteristics. Instead, collaborative activities that focused on school subject-specific tasks varied significantly between weeks; moreover, they were influenced by teachers’ leadership role and gender. The results indicate that rather stable routinised patterns of day-to-day collaboration over the weeks decrease the influence of teachers’ individual characteristics. Hence, by collecting data that is closer to content-specific day-to-day collaborative activities, time-sampling methods can be seen as a driver for new insights

No loss, no gain? COVID-19 school closures and Swiss fifth-graders' competencies and self-concept in mathematics

COVID-19-related school closures in spring 2020 interrupted learning routines and posed a great challenge for students' competencies acquisition and self-concepts. Concerns about possible learning losses due to school closures, especially for disadvantaged students, are justified, but the currently available empirical evidence is still scarce, varies greatly with regard to context, and neglects reciprocal effects of competencies and self-concept. To address these shortcomings, this paper first provides insights on the effect that the 8 weeks of school closures had on Swiss primary school students' math competencies. IRT-based math tests were used to cross-sectionally compare data from 1,299 students in Grade 5 in late spring 2020 shortly after the reopening of schools with data from a previous year's cohort (n = 11,314) using propensity score matching. The results revealed no significant differences in math competencies and no evidence of an increase in inequality when children with not German (vs German) as their first language were studied. Second, changes in math self-concepts in the school year 2019/20, when the pandemic first hit, as well as reciprocal effects of math competencies and math self-concept were assessed longitudinally (n = 1,299) using random intercept cross-lagged panel models based on three measurement points. Results showed that higher math self-concept and positive change in math self-concept over the time of school closures were related to higher learning gains. Different development trajectories for children with German (vs not German) first language emerged. The study therefore fosters a better understanding of the effect that pandemic-induced school closures had on learning and relativizes the feared negative effects on math competencies caused by short school closures

Positives Feedback erhöht die soziale Akzeptanz unter Kindern

Lehrpersonen beeinflussen mit ihrem Feedbackverhalten, wie die Schülerinnen und Schüler miteinander umgehen. Zwei Studien untersuchten die Situation in der Schweiz

Teachers involved in school improvement: Analyzing mediating mechanisms of teachers’ boundary-crossing activities between leadership perception and teacher involvement

Teachers are drivers for change in school improvement. However, not all teachers participate in further developing schools' educational practice. This study aimed to understand conditional factors in teachers' involvement. To this end, we analyzed teachers' leadership perception and boundary-crossing activities aimed at increasing professional capital. Structural equation modeling analyses based on a sample of N = 1232 teachers at N = 59 schools indicated partial mediations of cognitive and social boundary-crossing activities on the relationship between leadership perception and involvement. This study contributes to the literature by illuminating the potential of teachers’ activities to enhance professional capital for school improvement