یادگیری اجتماعی و عاطفی در فضاهای مشترک عاطفی برای کاهش زورگویی: چشم انداز فرهنگی اجتماعی

Abstract A sociocultural perspective (Vygotsky, 1978) framed the qualitative study, to understand how to create 'shared affective spaces' as an enabling factor to scaffold within the zone of proximal development (ZPD). Social and emotional learning is conceptualised as a social concept, focusing on the collective knowledge of the peer group. The longitudinal study was conducted with thirty-one students 9-10 years of age in a composite Year 4/5 classroom. There were 17 students in the Year 5 cohort drawn from sixty students distributed across four similar classes to cope with volume of antisocial behaviour. The teacher/researcher implemented sociocultural strategies such as the weekly class meetings to scaffold students to make connections with their emotions and the impact of bullying behaviour on the perpetrators and victims. Rogoff's (1995) analytical planes frame the discussion of students' participation and the case study of Lindsay, a Year 5 student who was a bully. Lindsay's journey exemplifies the positive outcomes for teacher scaffolding of understandings about making friends and prosocial behaviour to reduce bullying, using holistic classroom practices that made explicit the affective aspects of learning. Future research is required to develop teachers' expertise in understanding the scaffolding process to enlist students' emotions as an enabling factor.

1. Introduction Schools are recognised as places of academic learning but also a context for social and emotional development. Bullying is a pervasive issue in schools and the negative repercussions can be enduring into adulthood (Rigby, 2007). Early intervention and supporting social and emotional development assists students to reach their academic potential (Bodrova & Leong, 2007). As the peer group constitutes one of the most important contexts for child development and socialization and is critical in the formulation of values and social norms for behaviour (Ladd et al., 1996, Lovat et al., 2011, Lovat et al., 2009, Rubin et al., 2006 and Wentzel, 2005) it is appropriate to consider the peer group when addressing bullying. Children are in a vulnerable position to become the victims of bullying when there is an inequality of power amongst peers on a physical, verbal or psychological level (Slee, 2003), accompanied by a deliberate intent to repeatedly harm (Spears, Slee, Owens, & Johnson, 2009). If children do not develop positive peer relationships they are more likely to experience social and emotional problems (Ladd & Burgess, 1999) such as loneliness, a low self-esteem or behave aggressively (Schmidt, Demulder, & Denham, 2002). Limited social and emotional development affects a child’s ability to collaborate and learn effectively with peers (Boyd et al., 2005 and Ladd et al., 1996). Many research studies conceptualise social and emotional learning primarily as an individual endeavour (Elias, 2006, Zins et al., 2007 and Zins and Elias, 2007). Anti-bullying programs often focus on the perpetrators and victims (Bernard, 1996 and Cross, 2010) while ignoring the peer group. However, in the current research bullying is conceptualised as a social issue and the collective knowledge of the peer group is viewed as critical to developing prosocial behaviour. The classroom teacher, who was also the researcher, scaffolded students with questions about their behaviour and feelings to foreground the affective elements of learning. Recognising the emotional aspect of classroom research is an area that is often neglected by researchers (Goldstein and Freedman, 2003, Meyer and Turner, 2002 and Meyer and Turner, 2006) but it is considered as an enabling factor in scaffolding (Bruner, 1986, Goldstein, 1999, Renshaw, 2013, Rogoff, 1995 and Rogoff, 2003). This paper examines scaffolding social and emotional learning by creating ‘shared affective spaces’ (Goldstein & Freedman, 2003) that supported students’ ability to adopt prosocial behaviour. The notion of zone of proximal development (ZPD), scaffolding and ‘shared affective spaces’ (Goldstein, 1999) is discussed next to elucidate the links between the sociocultural activities in the classroom and developing student empathy. Later Rogoff, 1995 and Rogoff, 2003 planes provide an analytical framework to discuss the classroom activities that promoted prosocial behaviour.

9. Conclusion The social aspect of developing positive relationships is paramount to addressing bullying issues as the basis to develop students’ confidence to express their point of view without feel of ridicule. Peer groups are fundamental to child development and socialization and it is argued that teachers have a role to structure the classroom to support prosocial behaviour to facilitate scaffolding learning (Bruner, 1986). Noddings (1984) notion of ‘caring’ highlights the duality of the teacher and learner where the teacher (one-caring) has a responsibility to the learner (one cared for) by providing full attention to understand the learner’s needs. Understanding different students’ perspectives is integral to a teacher’s role to reduce bullying but can be extended to the teacher scaffolding students to understand their peers’ perspectives too. Vygotsky (1978) unique view of learning as primarily a social concept reinforces the value of sociocultural activities that contribute to developing students’ social knowledge and personal aspirations to make new friends, work hard and become a role model in small social groups for their peers. The interpersonal nature of learning and collaboration is highlighted by other researchers who concur that positive relationships are at the heart of true learning that engages the heart and mind (Goldstein, 1999, Meyer and Turner, 2002, Meyer and Turner, 2006, Noddings, 1984 and Rogoff, 2003). The scaffolding process has been extended in this study to highlight the emotional and interpersonal nature of scaffolding social and emotional development to reduce bullying. This demonstrates ‘that learning with and from others can be as much about building a relationship as it is about mastering a specific skill’ (Renshaw, 2013). When the emotions are enlisted through sociocultural activities such as constructing class agreements (Feels like section on the Y chart) students are provided with a model of the affective links between feelings and behaviours. The five class agreements established what prosocial behaviour ‘looked like’, ‘sounded like’ and ‘felt like’. The discussions of emotions and feelings about behaviour legitimatised an approach to enlist the support of all peers to personalise what happens during bullying for the victims and perpetrators. This process made explicit that students’ words and actions have positive and negative consequences and elicit prosocial and antisocial behaviour in the future with their peers. The widening of friendship groups, promoted through the daily social circle and small social groups in the classroom, allowed further scaffolding amongst peers to develop social and emotional skills. The collective viewpoint was sought through weekly classroom meetings. The teacher’s intention was made explicit during the research to shift students’ values and attitudes about bullying by enlisting their emotions, to develop empathy, alongside developing their social knowledge about each other. The teacher/researcher used sociograms and observations from the field to create the conditions to scaffold learning within shared affective spaces to support students’ aspirations to change their behaviour and make new friends. There are limitations to generalisability of the findings for this study as it was conducted in a single classroom. Nonetheless the classroom social strategies could be adapted by teachers who are keen to promote prosocial behaviour through a holistic approach that includes social and emotional learning. A distinction made in the current research is the notion of connecting with children’s emotions to develop empathy rather than a focus solely on developing social skills. This approach differs from using a commercial anti bullying program that promotes a generic set of social skills which may or may not resonate with the students’ current needs. Students in the current research had been engaged in previous years with commercial social and emotional programs but this had little effect on a large group of students who continued to bully others. In this paper it is argued that a holistic approach in the classroom, where students talked about their emotions and linked their behaviour with feelings promoted a deeper level of understanding of what bullying behaviour is and why it needs to stop. Sociocultural theory (Vygotsky, 1978) melds the social and emotional aspects of cognitive learning, foregrounding learning as a social concept and the role of emotions as an enabling factor in scaffolding (Renshaw, 2013). Understanding how teachers’ expertise can be developed: to create ‘shared affective spaces’ to engage students’ emotions as well as the mind, to scaffold learning is an important area for future research and a challenge for educators (Goldstein and Freedman, 2003 and Renshaw, 2013).