Volume 16, Number 1, 2022

EN:

During pandemic school closures, preservice teachers designed activity plans to support the at-home learning of children in early elementary grades and recognized parents as vital to supporting their children’s learning. This article uses data from a multiple case study of preservice teachers’ planning during an alternate practicum. Drawing on models of family vibrancy and parent engagement that arise from funds of knowledge and parent knowledge theories, we highlight how preservice teachers included parents in reciprocal and democratic ways that honoured diverse family’s contexts and their knowledge of their children. Results illustrate the importance of asset-oriented, flexible pedagogies that include meaningful parent partnerships both during and beyond the pandemic.

EN:

Teacher mental health continues to be of concern in elementary and secondary schools; however, supporting teacher wellbeing is understudied (Parker et al., 2012; Roffey, 2012), particularly from a gender perspective (Bourgeault et al., 2021). Among professionals, teachers exhibit one of the highest levels of job stress and burnout on the job. (Hakanen et al., 2006; Stoeber & Rennert, 2008). This scoping review investigates and consolidates the existing research on teacher mental health, leaves of absences, and return-to-work. Work context and personal factors/family context contribute to teacher stress and attrition and by extension may impact temporary leaves of absence (Pressley, 2021). Several articles report on interventions with moderate success to reduce teacher stress, but no studies evaluated return-to-work interventions (Ebert, 2014; Kwak et al., 2019). The amount of stress teachers are experiencing and the pressure that is causing them to burn out is the most common narrative present in the literature. The review highlights gaps in the literature surrounding teacher mental health, leaves of absence, and return-to-work and a notable gap regarding the role of gender.

EN:

Over the past several decades, teachers have been increasingly challenged with a greater diversity of learning profiles within their classrooms. Historically, within Ontario, Canada, students who did not learn effectively through traditional methods were labelled and separated into alternate learning environments. Legislation and policy transformation have resulted in greater inclusion and stigma reduction. Changes to formal and informal identification processes have also increased the number of students accessing special education services. This conceptual paper examines the challenges arising from students’ changing learning needs, with a specific focus on the French classroom. Issues related to the Individual Education Plan, the formal identification processes, and the inconsistency inherent to special education terminology and teachers’ preparation concerning differentiated learning and resources in special education are explored. Further, employing Katz and colleagues’ (Hymel & Katz, 2019; Katz, 2013; Katz & Sokal, 2016) three-block model of universal design for an inclusive classroom as a framework, a case study from a French-language secondary school in Ontario, Canada, is examined to determine systemic gaps that need to be addressed to achieve the goal of fully inclusive classrooms that promote successful learning experiences for all students.

EN:

This paper explores the relationship between the social context of schools, measured in terms of perceptions of teacher support and students’ openness to diversity, and the academic persistence of immigrant and refugee newcomer students. It investigates whether newcomer adolescents’ academic persistence varies by the perceived supportiveness of school environments. Based on data collected from newcomer students in a medium-sized city in Canada, results show that immigrant and refugee youth display higher academic persistence when they perceive that their teachers support them and when their fellow students are receptive to diversity. Specifically, newcomer youth’s educational success depends on a school environment that encourages diversity and inter-group relations and teachers who are supportive of students, encourage them, and believe in them. This study also shows that newcomer youth are more likely to academically persist in school when they perceive that their fellow schoolmates exhibit cultural humility or openness to diversity and thus are interested in knowing more about immigrants’ country of origin, respect them, and interact with them.

EN:

The Right to Read report highlights the fact that children who experience dyslexia are not being adequately supported in Ontario schools. The report’s call for the establishment of a more effective identification and intervention infrastructure within the school system is timely and persuasive. Unfortunately, the Right to Read report advances two unsubstantiated claims to explain the reading difficulties some children experience in the early grades. Specifically, it argues that Ontario schools are failing to teach reading skills effectively for all students, not just those with specific reading disabilities. Second, it attributes this general failure to the fact that most Ontario schools implement a balanced approach to reading instruction, which the report claims, pays insufficient attention to teaching sound/letter correspondences in a systematic, explicit, and intensive way. Neither of these claims is supported by the scientific data. Ontario students are consistently among the top performers in cross-Canada and international comparisons of reading performance. Furthermore, the empirical research is fully consistent with the implementation of a balanced or contextualized approach to literacy instruction that integrates the teaching of sound/symbol relationships with a more general commitment to immerse children into a literacy-rich instructional environment.