Awareness of how

School and Home

Environment affect
School Success
DEGAMO, JOHNDY V.
Reporter
What is a school environment?

School environment refers to relationships among

members of a school community that are determined
by structural, personal, and functional factors of the
educational institution.
The school environment can include material and
human resources, a learning place consisting of the
entire interactive setting like a classroom, workshop,
library, field, and offices. School environment can also
be the sum of human and material resources with
which the learners interact.
• The school climate theory was developed by
Gregory, Cornell and Fan (2011) to explain the various
elements of how students experience their school
environment.
• The theory assumes that the interaction of varied factors creates a school
learning environment, including the academic activities, safety,
community, and institutional environment that impact students' cognitive,
behavioral, and psychological development. Thus, school climate has
direct and indirect effects on students’ outcomes, including academic
performance ( Gregory, Cornell, & Fan, 2011).
 Dimensions of the school
environment
A. Physical

B. Academic

C. Social

These categories shape a conceptual framework that can be regarded as a

multidimensional construction of the components and conditions of a
positive or safe school environment (Kutsyuruba et al., 2015).
PHYSICAL
A conducive physical environment is an agent of
intellectual stimulation essential to strengthening
the child’s educational development. The factors
determining the educational process’s success
include the school’s nature, the teacher’s attitude,
and the pupils’ characteristics ( Ukeje, Akabogu
, & Ndu, 1992).
 CLASSROOM
Space for the delivery of materials that correspond to
the areas of basic knowledge where students and
teachers interact with furniture that enables individual
or group work. Recently, it has been mentioned that
specific characteristics of the classroom’s physical
environment are related to student satisfaction,
attitudes, and evaluation of the quality of the course (
Fraser, 2015; Han et al., 2019).
The Architecture of the
Classroom and How They
Influence Academic Performance

 Factors such as acoustics, light, color, temperature, and seating

arrangement may improve or hinder students’ academic performance in
classrooms ( Apter, 2014)
Acoustics in the Classroom as Part of
the School Learning Environment
 Noise, in general, is well known to have an impact on human
performance. Chiang & Lai (2008) investigated and identified the
adverse effects of working in a noisy room among young children.

 They guarantee that noise impacts not only learning results but also
the health of the occupants. Young children have not yet developed
enough executive skills in activities involving communication channels,
like speech comprehension, use of language, and written and oral skills
(Mills, 1975).
Chiang and Lai (2008) reviewed previous findings on noise’s
harmful effect on mental and physical well-being as part of
their study. From a plethora of demonstrable effects, the
following negative outcomes were reported specifically in the
context of a noisy room: getting tired easily, leading to lower
efficiency; increased heart rate; dyspepsia; poor appetite;
insomnia; headache; tinnitus; and facial pallor (p. 1621).
Light in the Classroom as a Component of the
School Learning Environment
 The quantity and quality of light (illumination) undoubtedly influences the
perception of comfort in a particular space. Lighting has reliable and well-
documented effects, but less evident in the case of the quality of light.

 In a study to evaluate how different types of lighting affect learning, Boray et

al. (1989) evaluated warm white, cold white, and full-spectrum fluorescent
and how they affect cognitive performance, room attractiveness, judged room
size, and pleasure of room. The findings from the study established that there
were no significant differences among all dependent variables concerning
lighting types used.
Color in the Classroom as an Aspect of
School Learning Environment
• Choosing the color palette for a space is important––
being exposed to certain colors influences different behaviors, mood, a
nd perceptions
(“Color Psychology: How Do Colors Affect Mood & Emotions?”,
2020). That being the case, choosing the color palette for learning
environments is particularly important, as
color is 1 of 6 design parameters that have a 25% impact on learning
(Barrett, Davies, Zhang & Barrett, 2015).
Classroom Temperature and How It
Affects the School Learning Environment
 In a literature review of thermal quality and students’ learning, Earthman
(2002) highlighted the existence of prime temperature ranges for optimal
learning outcomes. Generally, research shows that temperatures between
68 and 74˚F—20 and 24˚C—are most conducive to comfort and, by
extension, learning. Besides, 50% of relative humidity was found to be an
acceptable value for classrooms ( Earthman, 2002). There is an association
between classroom temperature and acoustics. Classroom air conditioning
systems may produce considerably uncomfortable noise.
Seating Arrangement
Classroom seating arrangements play an important role in student
learning, engagement levels, and the overall success of the class. Seating
can influence how comfortable students feel participating in activities as
well as how much they focus on their work.

Classroom seating arrangements affect student learning, motivation,

participation, and teacher-student and student-student relationships
(Fernandes, Huang & Rinaldo 2011).
SCHOOL YARD
Spaces in which students perform educational,
civic, recreational, and food-related activities.
In a recent study, Dilbil and Basaran (2017)
argue that playgrounds positively affected
cognitive development and levels of attachment
of children to school.
Exposure to outdoor green spaces may also improve students’
academic outcomes. Researchers who have investigated the potential
of green school grounds as outdoor classrooms have discovered that
students find an outdoor, nature-centered environment for education
much more meaningful than an indoor, book-centered environment
(Dyment, 2005).
 LIBRARIES
Space that is well-conditioned to read, learn, and
consult a bibliographic collection belonging to the
school community where students can interact and
work. Schultz-Jones (2011) conducted a study to
explain how an evaluation of the learning
environment of the school library can be used to
demonstrate a positive impact on student
performance.
ACADEMI
C
STUDENT-TEACHER
RELATIONSHIP
In the educational context, the teacher–student relationship
is one of the most outstanding academic interactions at the
core of the teaching-learning process. Even though this
interaction is composed by many other elements, this
relationship is the one that plays the most important role
when it comes to meeting educational objectives (Bertoglia
, 2008). Affective teacher–student communication and
interaction plays an important role in building a teacher–
student support relationship and a positive classroom
environment (Roorda et al., 2011; Poulou, 2014).
Positive student relationships (good rapport) are fundamental
to success. When students feel safe and supported, they’re
more likely to engage in learning and have better educational
outcomes. Plus, when students have positive interactions with
teachers, they have fewer behavioral problems.
TEACHING METHODS
The didactic methods are part of the methodological aptitudes
that a trainer must have. This means that these types of
methods will influence the degree of intervention of the trainer
on the student (Calvo, 2006).
Teachers’ classroom management practices have a direct
impact on the probability of success of their students (
Gage et al., 2018).
Effective teaching methods, including the different types of
teaching methods, are essential for ensuring that students can
learn and apply new concepts and skills. By utilizing a variety
of methods, educators can engage different learning styles and
accommodate the diverse needs and abilities of their students.
Recently, academic research on emotional health, especially
during the early years of childhood, has had a greater interest
in social and emotional learning and its relationship with the
improvement of student behavior (Caldarella et al., 2012).
EVALUATION
For Bordas and Cabrera (2001), an evaluation system within
the classroom will be convenient as long as the students feel like
active agents; learn to value their actions and learning, know
and understand the curricular objectives; as well as understand
the aspects of evaluation in certain tasks. Since the data that
teachers receive from their evaluation serve as references for
the future, it is necessary to think more deeply about the
content of these evaluations, in addition to how we can create
conditions for teachers to use this evaluation to inform their
instructional methods (Datnow and Hubbard, 2015).
TEACHING STRATEGIES
The term strategy implies reflexive planning to do
something by applying any general model used in the
classroom (Orlich et al., 2012). Previous studies have
concluded that teachers in primary education use
different teaching strategies as students gain knowledge
through experience, participation in education, express
their opinions, and solve problems (Hus and Grmek
, 2011).
SOCIAL
JUSTICE
Konow (2003) refers to justice as a virtue that is
attached to what is morally correct, concerning the
ethics, rationality, natural law, equity, or religion in
which they base their foundations.
SUSTAINABILITY
Regarding sustainability, it is important to mention that
there are two studies that have prioritized the analysis of
sustainable or environmental education. These are
“Literature on Environmental Education” (
De Castro, 2010) and “Education for Sustainability” by
Corral (2010) which required this component to focus
more on environmental protection behaviors, forgetting
the point that students can obtain various types of
benefits when practicing sustainable behaviors (
Corral-Verdugo et al., 2015).
SOCIAL COEXISTENCE
Refers to the way students relate with others and how those
relationships have significant consequences in his/her personal
development. Ponferrada-Arteaga and Carrasco-Pons (2010)
explain that the emotional expectations that students have
about their own school and the degree of recognition and
legitimization of the differences manifested by the practices of
the school institution influence how students deal with each
other at school. A study made by Tian et al. (2016) shows that
social support experienced in school is significantly related to
subjective well-being.
“School environment” had an effect on the “well-
being” variable (Ryff and Singer, 2008), which also
allowed to verify the relevance of the suggestions made
by Corral-Verdugo et al. (2015) in their review and
conceptualization of a “positive school.”
What is home environment?
The home environment means the family background
of the child, which includes all the human and material
resources present in the home, that affect child’s living
such as the parent’s level of education, occupation,
social-economic status and the socializing facilities
available in the house.
Factors that home
environment plays a
vital role in child
development
Family Emotional
Context and Parenting
Style
o Just as parental modeling of positive behaviors can rebound
to the benefit of adolescent development, a family context
characterized by cohesion and mutual support can
contribute to overall adaptive functioning (Sandstrom and
Huerta, 2013).
o By contrast, exposure to conflict within the home
environment often puts adolescents at risk for internalizing
and externalizing behavior problems, especially if the
conflict is not resolved. Family conflict can manifest in
many forms, including marital discord and negative
exchanges between parent and child.
Home Environment and Parenting
Parents are children's first educators and should be able to
provide them with experiences that promote intrinsic
motivation and start children on a path to positive intrinsic
motivation. In an initial study of parents' use of intrinsic (e.g.,
encouragement of enjoyment of learning) and extrinsic (e.g.,
provision of rewards) motivation practices, results showed that
task-intrinsic practices had positive paths, whereas task-
extrinsic practices evidenced negative paths to children's
academic intrinsic motivation at age 9-years which in turn had
positive paths to subsequent intrinsic motivation and
achievement at 10-years.
Emotional Ecology
Observing little expressivity in the home environment can result in
stunted emotional development. For example, children of depressed
parents are at risk for a host of suboptimal developmental outcomes
(see Grace et al., 2003). When interacting with their children, depressed
parents typically display less positive affect (Cohn et al., 1990) and more
sadness and anger (Pickens and Field, 1993), demonstrate atypical
emotion interaction patterns (Goodman and Gotlib, 1999), are less
responsive (Weinberg and Tronick, 1998), and provide less emotion
coaching (e.g., Garber et al., 1991). The decreased emotional scaffolding
provided by depressed parents results in poorer emotion recognition,
understanding, and regulation (e.g., Goodman et al., 1993; Silk et al.,
2006) and poorer social relations (Field et al., 1988; Zahn-Waxler et al.,
1984).
Conversely, growing up in overly expressive
environments also influences how children
perceive and respond to emotions. Research by
Pollak et al. (e.g., Pollak et al., 2009; Pollak and
Sinha, 2002) has found that children from
abusive homes more readily recognize facial and
vocal cues of anger, but such sensitivity does not
generalize to other emotions (e.g., disgust, joy).
Additionally, children raised in homes with frequent
interparent disputes demonstrate more elaborate
means of responding to such intense emotional
contexts and will progress through multiple forms of
coping (Cummings et al., 1981). Infant gender can also
shape their emotional ecology. For example, mothers
are generally more emotionally communicative with
daughters but direct more intense displays of fear
toward sons (Rosen et al., 1992).
 Poverty and Child Development
The home environment entails emotional warmth displayed by
parents while interacting with their children, providing
stimulating and learning experiences in the home, and physical
surroundings, such as the safety of play areas and cleanliness.
Poor children are likely to be raised in less emotionally,
cognitively, and physically enriching environments than
children from more affluent families. Several studies of young
children have found that the quality of the home learning
environment accounts for a substantial share of the effect of
poverty on children's achievement and behavioral outcomes.
Home Environment and Academic
Achievement
Higher levels of parent involvement in their children’s
educational experiences at home have been associated
with children’s higher achievement scores in reading
and writing, as well as higher report card grades
(Epstein, 1991; Griffith, 1996; Keith et al., 1998; Sui-
Chu & Williams, 1996).
Research has also shown that parental beliefs and
expectations about their children’s learning are
strongly related to children’s beliefs about their own
competencies, as well as their achievement (Galper,
Wigfield, & Seefeldt, 1997). Improving the home
learning environment has been shown to increase
children’s motivation and self-efficacy (Dickinson &
DeTemple, 1998; Mantzicopoulos, 1997; Parker, Boak,
Griffin, Ripple, & Peay, 1999).
Fantuzzo et. al (2004) extended the above finding in
a longitudinal study of very low SES AA children in
an urban Head Start program, showing that
specific in-home behaviors significantly predicted
children’s receptive vocabulary skills at the end of
the school year, as well as motivation,
attention/persistence, and lower levels of
classroom behavior problems.
Home environment influences the
learning behaviors demonstrated by
children in the classroom, and learning
behaviors such as competency
motivation, attention, and persistence
are essential predictors of academic
success.
Thank you!