Identifying the Self-Regulatory Classroom Environment in Early Elementary School

• In Event: What Really Matters in Early Education Classrooms? Probing Classroom-Level and Individual Supports for Child Development

Abstract

Research linking self-regulatory skills that develop in the early school years, to key adult outcomes is plentiful (Robson et al., 2020). What is not yet well understood, however, is how best to promote the development of early self-regulation skills in the “business as usual” classroom – rather than specialized intervention – context. Research measuring features of the self-regulatory classroom environment in “business as usual” classrooms has relied heavily on the CLASS (Pianta et al., 2008) Classroom Organization (CO) subscale. As a subscale of a global quality measure, the CLASS CO only cursorily captures key elements of the classroom environment thought to promote self-regulation (e.g., behavior management), and neglects others (e.g., emotional modeling and expression; peer scaffolding). Research is needed on new measures designed expressly to capture the self-regulatory environment. These include the Adapted Teaching Style Rating Scale (ATSRS; Morris et al., 2014; Raver et al., 2012), which includes teacher behaviors that boost children’s attentional, emotional, and behavioral self-control, and the COP/TOP (Farran et al., 2016; Peabody Research Institute, 2017) which taps aspects of teacher discipline believed to interrupt or exacerbate states of high arousal. The current study provides a first test of the predictive power of these new measures, above and beyond the CLASS CO subscale, for children’s kindergarten self-regulatory skills.

We draw data from the Tulsa SEED Study, a longitudinal (preschool-4th grade) study of diverse children in low-income families in Tulsa, OK. The current analysis uses data collected when children were in kindergarten (2018-2019; n = 821). Self-regulation was assessed fall and spring using three different methods: direct assessment using a combined score of the NIH Toolbox tests of inhibitory control and cognitive flexibility (Zelazo et al., 2013); teacher ratings using the BRIEF (LeJeune et al., 2010); and observer ratings using the PSRA attention and impulse control scale (Smith-Donald et al., 2007). Regression models predicted spring self-regulatory skills from four scales constructed based on theory and factor analysis that combined ATSRS and selected COP/TOP items: Classroom Structure and Management (CSM), Supporting Social and Emotional Skills (SSES), Positive Behavior Management (PBM), and Negative Behavior Management (NBM). Models controlled for children’s fall scores, CLASS CO subscale scores, and child demographics.

Preliminary results revealed that CSM positively predicted directly-assessed self-regulation, whereas PBM negatively predicted observer-reported self-regulation. These modest findings are surprising in light of past research suggesting the salience of other facets of the classroom environment, such as teachers’ assistance with emotional regulation and use of harsh discipline; however, much of that research was conducted in preschool, not kindergarten samples, or as part of an intervention evaluation. Further, the findings are consistent with past research showing little influence of the CLASS CO subscale on early self-regulation. It is possible that the kindergarten classroom environment is only weakly associated with growth in self-regulatory skills without the implementation of a specialized curriculum, or that child-environment interactions are obscuring main effects. Next steps will probe these explanations by replicating analyses with first grade data, and adding interactions between child baseline skills and classroom features.

Authors

• Sherri L Castle, University of Oklahoma
  Presenting Author

• Anna Marie Wright, Georgetown University

• Anne Martin, Georgetown University

• Deborah A Phillips, Georgetown University

• Anna D. Johnson, Georgetown University