| dc.description.abstract | There is growing concern about the mental health and resilience of today’s students (McCain,
Mustard, and Shanker, 2007) and difficulties with self-regulation as part of human development
are implicated in educational outcomes, cognitive problems, internalizing problems such as
depression and anxiety, externalizing problems such as aggression, and physical health
problems (McCain et al, 2007; Shanker, 2010). Self-regulation is a growing topic of interest in a
variety of disciplines including education. With over 42 961 peer reviewed journal articles which
use the term “self-regulation”, it is not surprising that there are 447 different interpretations of
what self-regulation means in the literature (Burman et al., 2015), which makes it difficult for
educators to interpret and apply it in their respective classrooms. Due to recent advances in
neuroscience, the Ontario Ministry of Education shifted towards a neurophysiological framework
on the Self-Regulation and Well-Being Frame of the Kindergarten Program. The current study
examined which frameworks kindergarten educators were using by analyzing the ways they
described and facilitated self-regulation in the classroom within a school board in northern
Ontario through surveys, interviews, progress reports, and classroom observations. Findings
revealed that educators: have little experience and training with resources aligned with the
Kindergarten Program’s approach to self-regulation, describe self-regulation as self-control, and
facilitate self-regulation using a learning strategies approach. Educators were observed using
fewer than a third of ministry self-regulation recommendations in the classroom. Implications
and recommendations for aligning educator practices with the Kindergarten Program’s
framework are discussed, including the limitations of pre-packaged programs currently in use
and the advantages of adopting a neurophysiological approach to understanding self-regulation. | en_US |
