In the present study, perceptions of Turkish school administrators and teachers towards Syrian refugee children were examined through metaphors. 71 school administrators and 242 teachers from 27 different provinces of Turkey participated in the study. As a result of the study, the metaphors produced by school administrators were grouped into four categories: “child with cultural adaptation and belonging problems”, “fragile and needy child”, “child who is no different from other children” and “problematic child”. The metaphors produced by teachers were grouped into six categories: “child with cultural adaptation and belonging problems”, “child who is no different from other children”, “fragile and needy child”, “problematic child”, “child who can reveal her/his potential with interest” and “compatible child”. Participants' perceptions of refugee children were not related to gender but there was a significant relationship between professional seniority and the number of refugee children at school. Although school administrators and teachers have positive perceptions about refugee children, their negative perceptions are largely due to the lack of professional experience and the high number of students at school. Providing vocational support to teachers and administrators, planning the number of students in schools, and providing resources to schools will improve positive perceptions about refugee children.

The aim of this study is to analyze and explain the mathematical connection process for students with a high mathematical ability to solve problems in terms of gender. Explorative descriptive research with a qualitative approach was used in this study. Data was collected through written tests and interviews conducted to a male and female student of class X Mathematics and Natural Sciences with high mathematical abilities. Data credibility is obtained through triangulation of methods and time. Furthermore, the data are analyzed with a flowchart which includes data reduction, data presentation, and conclusion drawing. The results showed that there were similarities and differences in the mathematical connection processes of male and female students. Similarities in the process of mathematical connections occur when making mathematical connections with other sciences and with everyday life in each of Polya's stages. In addition, the similarity of the connection process also occurs when connecting in mathematics during the re-checking stage. While the difference in the connection process in mathematics between male and female students is done at the stage of understanding the problem, solving strategies and implementing problem solving.

In our current society, Digital Competence is an essential and basic competence for teachers. The students need trained teachers who know how to use Information and communication technologies (ICTs) and develop them into pedagogy. However, some of them do not know how. This phenomena is called “The generational digital divide”, which occurs when teachers do not have sufficient digital or technological skills or do not adapt to them. This article aims to determine whether the age of teachers has an influence on their knowledge about Information and Communication Technologies. The objective is to detect if there really exists a digital gap between generations, specifically in Dual Vocational Education Training, a kind of education which has been growing in the recent years. To do so, a study with a quantitative and descriptive method has been carried out, with the participation of 1.568 teachers of this training modality in the Autonomous Community of Andalusia. The data were extracted by means of a questionnaire to measure the level of digital teaching competence in Dual Vocational Education and Training schools. The results showed that the level of digital competence shown was medium to low across all dimensions. With regard to the age factor, only the problem-solving dimension was found to be age-dependent.

This longitudinal study focuses on evaluating grade 7-9 school students’ perceptions of intervention modules intended to be relevant, as well as promoting learning attributes to raise awareness of science-related careers. Students are taught through six purposely developed and designed career-related teaching–learning modules (C-TLMs). Each module is initiated by means of a career-related scenario, followed up by promoting conceptual science learning plus drawing attention to careers to which each module intends to relate. Student perceptions are obtained by means of a questionnaire after each module with respect to its relevance and also the mean by which the learning environment raise interest, enjoyment and motivation associated with career awareness. Outcomes show that, in general, students participating in this study agree that the developed C-TLMs are relevant and students value the learning experienced through the different module contexts. Nevertheless, student appreciation of the specific inclusion of career awareness components in the modules is mixed.

This research aimed at analyzing the influence of ‘Process Oriented Guided Inquiry Learning’ model assisted by realia media, in which it was to improve the scientific literacy and critical thinking skill of primary school students, especially for the material of energy. This quasi-experiment research used single factor independent groups design. The research sample of this research were fourth grade students of SD Inpres Oeba 2 Kupang City, East Nusa Tenggara Province, of which students were in the academic year of 2019/2020. The technique of sample collection was carried out purposive sampling for 2 classes. The IVA class was used as the experimental class (POGIL model assisted by the realia media), in which it consisted of 30 students and the IVB class was used as the control class (expository learning) that consisted of 28 students. The learning was carried out in four meetings. The data of scientific literacy and the results test of critical thinking were collected by means of objective test on the energy material. Multivariate Analysis of Variance (MANOVA) was used to analyze the data using significance level of 0.05. The results indicate that (1) There is a significant difference between the students’ scientific literacy who gain the POGIL learning assisted by the realia media and the students’ scientific literacy who get the expository learning; and (2) There is a significant difference between the critical thinking of students who get POGIL learning assisted by realia media and the students who get the expository learning. It can be concluded that there is a significant difference between the scientific literacy and the students’ critical thinking taught by the POGIL learning that assisted by realia media to the students who use expository learning. Since there is a significant difference, it means that the POGIL learning assisted by realia media has an influence on the students' scientific literacy and critical thinking.

This quantitative research aims to analyze the effects of the principal's decision-making, organizational commitment and school climate on teacher performance in vocational high school. The research sample was 160 vocational school teachers in North Minahasa Regency with simple random sampling method. The data were collected using a Likert scale questionnaire 25 with statements. The data analysis was performed using simple linear regression and multiple linear regression. The results showed that the principal's decision-making, organizational commitment and school climate had a positive and significant effect on the performance of vocational school teachers, both partially and simultaneously. The results of this research can be an important reference for educational administrators at vocational high school level to design school strategies and policies that can encourage increased teacher performance to achieve better school productivity.

Metacognition in science teaching involves processes that include self-awareness and self-regulation. Metacognition enables the teachers to facilitate student learning and to reflect on their teaching in order to enable themselves to improve or to make any changes to their teaching. In particular, teaching activities, especially in the 21st century, do not merely involve the transfer of knowledge and then applying that knowledge into daily life, but teachers need to reflect, plan and evaluate learning outcomes to enhance further in teaching. This study attempts to gain the perspective and implementation of metacognition skills in teaching science in the primary school classroom. The data was collected through a qualitative research method based on interviews with six science teachers in primary school using semi-structured interview protocol. The interview data were analysed for emerging themes, guided by the research questions. Teachers have a similar perspective of the understanding of metacognition in science teaching. Further discussion focuses on the implementation of metacognition in science teaching. This discussion is divided into three aspects, which are constraints faced, overcoming the constraints, and efforts made to implement metacognition in science teaching. Hence, the understanding of science teachers in regards to metacognition in science teaching is important and gives a positive impact towards teaching and learning in primary science teaching.

Shared leadership and employee empowerment develop positive feelings in employees towards the organization, the work they do and themselves. These positive emotions create confidence for employees to try new methods and techniques in their work. Employees who approach their work with an innovative mindset will be more beneficial to their organizations and increase their own satisfaction. In this study, the shared leadership, employee empowerment and innovativeness levels of schools, the relationship of these variables with each other and the predictive status were examined according to the perceptions of the teachers. This study is a research in relational survey model. The data of the research were collected in the province of Malatya in November during 2019-2020 academic year. The data were collected through "Shared Leadership", "Employee Empowerment" and "Innovativeness" scales. Correlation analysis and structural equation modeling were used to analyze the data. According to the results of the research, the levels of shared leadership, employee empowerment and innovativeness in primary schools are “partially high”. There is a positive, significant and moderate relationship between the school's shared leadership and employee empowerment and teachers' innovativeness. In addition, shared leadership and employee empowerment predict teachers' innovativeness. For this reason, it is considered important to create a school environment where leadership is shared in order to increase the innovativeness of teachers and to support teachers and include them in decision-making processes in order to empower them.

A Descriptive-correlational study was sought to investigate the influence of metacognition on the academic achievement and learning style of undergraduate students. Using the survey method, data was collected from a sample of 150 undergraduate students selected through a stratified random sampling technique which includes 50 students each from the three schools namely School of Humanities and Social sciences (HSS), School of Engineering (SOE), and School of Sciences (SOS) of Tezpur University. The tools used are five-point Likert-type Metacognitive skills scale and five-point Likert-type Learning Style Inventory. Academic Achievement of the students was measured based on the semester grade point average SGPA obtained in the semester examination. The data were analyzed using percentage, simple regression, multiple regression and one-way ANOVA. The result showed that only 34-36% of the undergraduate students have above-average metacognitive skills. The undergraduate students have equal preferences in all the five learning styles rather than focusing on one learning style. There is a significant difference between metacognition levels and academic achievement of the undergraduate students of SOS, HSS and SOE. The metacognitive skill explicates only 43% variability of academic achievement of the undergraduate students which implies that the undergraduate student’s metacognitive skills influence and determines their academic achievement to some extent. However, the undergraduate student’s learning style doesn’t account for variation in metacognitive skills. Thus, it is suggested that metacognitive skills should be integrated into curricular components and learning strategy which will help the students to monitor and regulate their own learning to meet the challenges of academic society.

This research aims to develop Indonesian Language textbooks with multiculturalism and character education for traditional poetry writing learning. This research uses a research and development approach until the discovery of a proper textbook. The subjects involved in this study were 101 elementary school fourth-graders, 33 teachers, and 2 Indonesian language and literature learning experts. Data analysis techniques at the need analysis stage through interactive models, and data analysis at the product testing stage using quantitative techniques with non-independent t-test statistics. Preliminary studies found that teachers and students needed creative writing skills textbooks developed by integrating the values of multiculturalism and character education. Textbook development referred to aspects of content, language, presentation, and graphics. Limited textbook product testing using t-test showed that t-obtained= -4,265 and t-table on α = 5 % is 2,064, so H0 is rejected. Broad testing also resulted in    t-obtained= -6,426 and t-table = 2,004, so it can be decided that H0 is rejected. Students' traditional poetry writing skills after learning using textbooks are better than before learning using textbooks. Thus it is concluded that the textbooks developed are inferred worthy of use by teachers and students to improve their writing skills in elementary school.

The article deals with mathematical literacy in relation to mathematical knowledge and mathematical problems, and presents the Slovenian project NA-MA POTI, which aims to develop mathematical literacy at the national level, from kindergarten to secondary education. All of the topics treated represent starting points for our research, in which we were interested in how sixth-grade primary school students solve non-contextual and contextual problems involving the same mathematical content (in the contextual problems this content still needs to be recognised, whereas in the non-contextual problems it is obvious). The main guideline in the research was to discover the relationship between mathematical knowledge, which is the starting point for solving problems from mathematical literacy (contextual problems), and mathematical literacy. The empirical study was based on the descriptive, causal and non-experimental methods of pedagogical research. We used both quantitative and qualitative research based on the grounded theory method to process the data gathered from how the participants solved the problems. The results were quantitatively analysed in order to compare the success at solving problems from different perspectives. Analysis of the students’ success in solving the contextual and non-contextual tasks, as well as the strategies used, showed that the relationship between mathematical knowledge and mathematical literacy is complex: in most cases, students solve non-contextual tasks more successfully; in solving contextual tasks, students can use completely different strategies from those used in solving non-contextual tasks; and students who recognise the mathematical content in contextual tasks and apply mathematical knowledge and procedures are more successful in solving such tasks. Our research opens up new issues that need to be considered when developing mathematical literacy competencies: which contexts to choose, how to empower students to identify mathematical content in contextual problems, and how to systematically ensure – including through projects such as NA-MA POTI – that changes to the mathematics curriculum are introduced thoughtfully, with regard to which appropriate teacher training is crucial.

Students' critical thinking ability requires improvement from schools as an educational institution. Besides, it is important to maximally integrate character education into mathematics learning. One of the attempts was implementing mathematics comic that contains Pancasila values as teaching material through contextual teaching and learning. Therefore, this study aims to analyze the effectiveness of mathematics comic teaching material with Pancasila values in improving students' critical thinking and character. This is a quasi-experimental study that involves non-equivalent control group design. The population was fourth-grade students of elementary schools in Gajahmungkur District, and data were collected using a critical thinking test and questionnaire. The results showed that using mathematics comic teaching material with Pancasila values was (1) effective in improving students' critical thinking ability; (2) effective in developing character, especially discipline and hard work trait. In the beginning, both character traits were categorized as good, and after treatment, there was an increase in the very good category. Therefore, it can be concluded that the use of mathematics comic teaching material with Pancasila values is effective in improving critical thinking ability and character traits.

The objective of this research is to analyze the twelfth graders' mathematics critical thinking skills using a mathematics learning model to stimulate fundamental critical thinking abilities of science courses in SMA Negeri, Pacitan Regency, East Java Province, Indonesia. This quasi-experimental research design was used in this study with one group posttest only design using multiple substantive posttests. The sample of 141 students from the total population of six public schools involving the twelfth graders of the natural sciences was selected through purposive sampling technique, data were taken through tests of students' critical thinking skills and interviews. The data analysis consists of five stages, namely an analysis of one sample t-test, an analysis of students' grades, an analysis of problem-solving stages, an analysis of critical thinking abilities indicators, and an analysis of mathematics critical thinking abilities indicators. The results showed (1) The results of the one sample t-test show that the mathematics learning model is effective to stimulate critical thinking, which means that the application of the mathematics learning model is effective to stimulate critical thinking; (2) the overall grades of students that met the minimum mastery criteria; (3) the data analysis of eleven problem-solving stages proves that the criteria for critical thinking abilities are categorized as good and very good. The highest score indicator considers the principle and definition of transformation, while the lowest grade indicator is mainly concerned with the questions on right and coherent steps; (4) the critical thinking skills have seven indicators that highlight the criteria of students' critical thinking abilities categorized as good and very good. The indicators that get the highest score determine the definitions of terms, while the indicators of the lowest score determine the action; (5) the results of the analysis show indicators of mathematics critical thinking skills that have eight indicators. The criteria of students' critical thinking abilities met good and very good categories along with indicators with the highest value score by considering the definitions of terms, while the indicators of the lowest score deal with the habit of caution.

The teaching and learning in Indonesian elementary schools focus both on students’ concept mastery and character development.  Teachers are encouraged to implement a learning model that integrates character values and yet promote learning interest.  This study was aimed at investigating the mathematics learning interest of grade three elementary school students through the integration of thematic learning with character education, referred to as the character-integrated thematic learning model. Using a quasi-experimental pretest-posttest control group design, this study involved 70 students and employed a questionnaire to obtain data, which were analyzed using descriptive and inferential statistical techniques. Descriptively, the average scores of students' learning interest before and after the implementation of the character-integrated thematic learning model are respectively 117.54 and 140.69 with the gain index of 0.44 in the fair category. While score obtained for thematic learning model are 116.11 and 120.23 with the gain index of 0.07 in the low category. The results of the statistical inference analysis using the independent sample t-test were obtained t-count of 4.98 > t-table of 1,667. This indicates that there has been a significant increase in students’ learning interest scores with the implementation of character-integrated thematic learning model. Thus, this learning model can be applied to pay attention to the development of student’s character which has an impact on increasing student’s learning interest.

Central to the creativity development in elementary schools are competent teachers. Enhancement of teachers’ competence could be done through the provision of guidance handbooks for the teachers. As based on the problem statements, this research was aimed at developing handbooks of guidance and counseling that could improve teachers’ competence in providing quality guidance and counseling services; the handbooks were expected to help teachers in cultivating the creativity of elementary school students. In this research and development study, the designed handbooks consisted of book 1 Guidance and Counseling Implementation Plan, Book 2 Service Materials, Book 3 Teachers’ Guideline, and Book 4 Evaluation Guideline. The effectiveness of the handbooks was examined using a quasi-experimental method with one group pre-test and posttest. According to the results of experimental data analysis, the tcount and ttable arrived at 7.665 (significance level of 0.05 (14)) and 1.76, respectively, meaning that tcount > ttable. This result signified that the handbooks were practical to build teachers’ competence in providing quality guidance and counseling services, which was helpful in assisting the teachers in instilling the creativity of elementary school students. In brief, the handbooks are recommended to be used by teachers in promoting the creativity of elementary school students.

Industrial revolution 4.0 is currently present in various countries, including Indonesia. Indonesia responded quickly through technological developments, especially education. The actions of the Indonesian government to deal with industrial 4.0 are contained in the 4C principle, one of which is Critical Thinking. The Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) learning approach has become an alternative in building critical thinking skills, especially in science learning. The purpose of this study is to quantitatively measure the impact of the STEM-inquiry model based on the K-13 Indonesian Curriculum towards critical thinking skills of 15-16 years old students. This study employed quasi-experimental with non-equivalent control group design at SMAN 1 (State Senior High School) Padang Cermin, Lampung, Indonesia. The research subjects consisted of 50 students. The critical thinking skill was measured through 10 items of an essay question on the momentum and impulse material. Based on the results of the non-parametric statistical hypothesis test Mann Whitney, the significance level of 0.004 was obtained (sig <0.05). The results of the hypothetical test showed that the student's critical thinking skills before and after using the STEM-based inquiry model were different. It can be concluded that the application of the STEM-based inquiry model was effective in increasing students' critical thinking skills.

The research investigated whether there is a correlation between participation in a course entitled "Diversity and multiculturalism in the global era" as perceived by Jewish and Arab students in Israel and a change in the students' attitudes and behaviors and their performance of activities in a multicultural context in the education field. The course was part of a master's degree program in Policy and Administration in Education in an academic college in central Israel. Pre-course and post-course questionnaires were administered to the course participants. Participants were 528 students; 177 responded to the pre-course questionnaire and 351 responded to the post-course questionnaire. The research findings indicated a direct association between participation in the course and activities conducted in the education field. In addition, students’ acquisition of knowledge on multiculturalism mediated the association between participation in the course and performance of multicultural activities in the education field. Differences were found between Jewish and Arab students' reports: Jews reported a multicultural academic atmosphere significantly more than Arabs. Contrastingly, Arab students gave significantly higher grades than Jewish students to reciprocal relations between the groups in the college and reported a more positive change in their attitudes towards the other group and towards multiculturalism and were more convinced that the course contributed to their multicultural thinking. These findings have theoretical and practical implications that can inform policymakers planning education for multiculturalism as a permanent component in academic programs, while responding to different sectors' cultural uniqueness to promote equality between them.

Professional teaching competence is significantly influenced by beliefs about teaching and learning. Prospective teachers start their teacher training with quite persistent beliefs about learning processes. These beliefs are mainly influenced by the way they experienced their own lessons as a student at school. Previous biology lessons at school might be linked to the imagined biology lessons of prospective teachers. We interpret these future lessons as a representation of their beliefs about teaching and learning. The present study investigated how prospective teachers remembered their previous biology lessons as well as how they imagine the lessons they will conduct in the future. The drawings of 181 prospective biology teachers in Germany (Mage = 22.1; SD = 3.6; 64.1 % female) were analyzed using the Draw-a-Science-Teacher-Test Checklist (DASTT-C). Results of the study indicate that the lessons they experienced were mainly teacher-centered, whereas the lessons they imagined were mainly student-centered. Results of a chi-square-test indicate that there is no connection between these two drawings of biology lessons. This suggests that experiences from one’s own schooling may have no connection with the way prospective teachers would like to teach in the future. The results of this study might be used as a basis for further studies examining the development of prospective biology teachers’ beliefs about teaching and learning.

This paper explores misconceptions and errors (M/Es) of eighth-grade students in Nepal with a quasi-experimental design with nonequivalent control and experimental groups. The treatment was implemented with teaching episodes based on different remedial strategies of addressing students' M/Es. Students of control groups were taught under conventional teaching-learning method, whereas experimental groups were treated with a guided method to treat with misconceptions and errors. The effectiveness of treatment was tested at the end of the intervention. The results showed that the new guided treatment approach was found to be significant to address students' M/Es. Consequently, the students of experimental groups made significant progress in dealing with M/Es in mathematical problem-solving at conceptual, procedural, and application levels.

The primary purpose of this research was to determine the effect of principal instructional leadership behavior on several determinants: organizational commitment, efficacy, and teacher satisfaction through school health. Five instruments that had been used are the principal instructional management rating scale (PIMRS); organizational health inventory for elementary schools (OHI-E); online course questionnaire (OCQ); teacher satisfaction scale (TSS); teacher efficacy scale (TES). All of these instruments had high validity and reliability; with Cronbach’s alpha values of each was PIMRS (.83), OHI-E (.81), OCQ (.80), TSS (.86), and TES (.79). A total of 350 public primary school teachers in Surakarta had been selected as respondents in this study with satisfied random sampling. AMOS software version 6.0 is used to analyze CFA and SEM. The results of SEM analysis to the structural model built by the researcher was good, with Probability = .001; RMSEA = .043; GFI = .941; AGFI = .907; CMIN/DF = 1.522), so the relationship between the variables in the constructs was interpreted; (1) The Principal instructional leadership behavior had a significant direct influence on the school health, (2) The school health parameter had a significant direct influence on organizational commitment, efficacy, and teacher satisfaction, (3) The principal instructional leadership behavior did not have a significant direct effect on organizational commitment, efficacy, and teacher satisfaction through the variables and school health.