Welcome to issue 27–1 of the journal. These are troubled times and let us hope that by the time the next issue is released, life will be less distressing.
In the first article, Sofia Kouvava, Katerina Antonopoulou, Constantinos Kokkinos, Assimina M. Ralli, and Katerina Maridaki-Kassotaki discuss research concerned with the quality of friendship and the understanding and regulation of emotions in children with and without Attention Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder or a Specific Learning Difficulty. Results show that ADHD children had fewer friends, worse friendship qualities, worse understanding of emotions and control of their impulsivity, and used fewer cognitive strategies to regulate emotions.
In paper 2, Andrew Malcolm explores the practices in alternative provision (AP) settings in England which made a difference to post-16 transition success into further education, training or employment. Findings suggest that practices which increased sustained transitions included: effective and ongoing tracking of ex-students; a high quality, core academic offer; and opportunities for students to increase their independence by taking well measured steps outside of their main placement.
In the next paper, thematic analysis of data from semi-structured interviews is used by Rick Murphy to explore how children make sense of their permanent exclusion from school in England. He argues that that the main findings from this study suggest that excluded children tend to experience schools as misreading symptoms of social injustice, bullying, and special educational needs as misbehaviour and non-compliance. Ways in which schools can implement these findings are discussed with key recommendations for employing these findings within schools and educational settings.
In paper 4, Vincent Bernier, Nancy Gaudreau, and Line Masse explore teachers’ attitudes in classroom management as perceived by pupils with social, emotional and behavioural difficulties. Again, using thematic analysis, emergent themes were then identified and categorised, resulting in seventeen teacher attitudes which then fell into four overarching dimensions: 1) Respect; 2) Authority; 3) Supportiveness; and 4) Differentiation. The connection between the teacher attitudes, as voiced by the pupils, and the pupils’ perception of their teachers’ classroom management skill and proficiency is described at length. In light of these findings, avenues for better classroom intervention outcomes and for further research are proposed.
In the next paper, Polly Waite, Amethyst Cunningham, and Kate Harvey discuss a qualitative study of school staffs’ experiences of supporting children with school attendance difficulties in primary school. They argue that given that children’s absence from primary school is associated with lower attainment and social difficulties, and persistent absence at this age often continues or worsens as children progress into secondary education, it is important to intervene early in order to interrupt this negative trajectory. Study participants believed prevention to be key and identified a range of different social/emotional and learning-focused interventions that they have used to support children to attend school regularly, with varying degrees of success. Participants emphasised how the success of any intervention relies strongly on collaboration between parents, school staff and other agencies involved. The findings from this study suggest that given sufficient resource, early intervention, the development of a school community, collaboration with families, the involvement of other professionals and targeted evidence-based strategies are all important in improving attendance in this age range.
In the sixth and final paper, Jaishree Devi and Ananta Kumar Jena explore animation based instructional approach for learning attainment and cognitive functioning of Indian children with ADHD during the COVID-19 crisis Overall, the animation based instructional approach was particularly effective in favouring development of memory and reasoning capacity in participants.