This study examined teachers’ attributions and emotions for their subjectively perceived interpersonal relationships with their students as positive or negative, and whether hope (pathways thinking, agency thinking) influences the perceived positive or negative interpersonal relationships, the subsequent attributions and emotions, and the impact of attributions on emotions. Fifty teachers, of both genders, completed the questionnaire for each of their five students who were randomly selected from their teaching classes. The results revealed that the positive interpersonal relationships were predominately attributed to stable, personally controllable and self-student controllable factors, whereas the negative interpersonal relationships were primarily attributed to external, external controllable, unstable, and self-student controllable factors. Also, teachers reported positive emotions of high intensity (sympathy, cheerfulness, exciting, love, not anger, calmness) for the positive relationships, and negative emotions of moderate intensity (no enthusiasm, shame, anxiety, no excitement) for the negative relationships. Yet, the high hope teachers made adaptive attributional and emotional appraisals for the positive and, mainly, negative interpersonal relationships. Agency thinking, as compared to pathway thinking, was a better and worse formulator of the appraisals in negative and positive interpersonal relationships, respectively. Hope, additionally, had direct effect on the emotions, beyond that afforded by attributions, particularly in negative interpersonal relationships.

Previous research suggests that learning basic neuroscience constructs, especially about the malleability of the brain, impacts middle school and older students’ academic mindset, response to failure and academic persistence.  This research targets teacher beliefs using a similar model.  Teachers were taught introductory neuroscience concepts related to how the brain learns.  Session topics included: basic neurodevelopment, neuroplasticity, sleep and the brain, stress and the brain, exercise and the brain, growth mindset, growth mindset feedback, self- control and grit.   Results of this school level intervention suggest significant impacts on teachers’ mindset, teaching efficacy, teachers’ approach to learning and grit.  In particular, teacher mindset beliefs significantly increased after the teachers were taught the concepts.  Implications for schools and teacher preparation are discussed.

The purpose of this study was to analyze the work situations that education professionals perceived as stressful during the first wave of COVID-19 infections, and their possible variation according to demographic characteristics and working conditions. Empirical, quantitative, ex-post-facto, cross-sectional study was carried out, in which participated 9,058 teachers (86.9% women; M age = 41.08; SD = 8.82) who completed a semi-structured questionnaire of demographic and labor information and a scale of teacher stressors in the context of a pandemic. It was used Multivariate Analysis of Variance (MANOVA) with post hoc Bonferroni contrasts to study the variations in the perception of stress according to demographic and work variables. The MANOVAs indicated significant variations in the perception of stress according to the teachers' gender, age, marital status, having dependents (children and parents), the level of education of the teacher, the employment situation (permanent vs. transitory), teaching seniority, the type of educational management, the number of students in charge and the number of weekly working hours (for all cases, Hotelling's F with p <.001).  

In recent years, children and adolescents have spent more time sitting and engaging in less physical activity than recommended by health authorities. Despite widespread efforts to promote physical activity through school-based programs, the impact of specific intervention programs often remains untested. Therefore, in this pilot study, the effects of a national school-based physical activity program were assessed. A sample of 80 first- and second-grade primary school students aged between 7 and 9 years (M = 7.95, SD = 0.44) of eight classes was cluster randomly assigned to either the experimental group (EG; classroom-based physical activity breaks) or the control group (CG; conventional school lessons). Primary outcomes included objective measurements of sedentary behaviour, step counts, and moderate-to-vigorous physical activity (MVPA) during the intervention. Secondary outcomes encompassed assessments of aerobic fitness performance, executive functions, academic achievement, and scholastic well-being before and after the 20-week intervention. The results indicate that students of the EG spent less time sedentary and took more steps during school mornings than their counterparts of the CG. The physical activity program resulted in a 630-step increase and a 10-minute reduction in sitting time daily. However, there were no effects on MVPA level, aerobic fitness performance, or cognitive functions (including executive functions and academic achievement). The implications of these findings are discussed in light of comprehensive school physical activity approaches.