Collaboration between classroom teachers and a school counselor through literature circles: building self-esteem.

This study describes how two second grade teachers along with a school counselor used bibliotherapy trade books with students within Literature Circles to build self-esteem in reading. Two second grade teachers and one school counselor worked collaboratively for two months. Twenty-six students participated in this study. The revised Tennessee Self-Concept Scale--Children's Form was administered at the beginning and again at the end of the study. No significant differences were found between the pre-test and post-test scores. A significant difference was found in only one score (Identify) when the two teachers were compared.

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Schools provide many services to students, in addition to learning the basic skills of reading, writing, and arithmetic. Support personnel such as counselors, enrichment teachers, physical education teachers and other support personnel need time to work with students; yet classroom teachers are pressured to provide quality instruction in less time due to the need for time for these activities. Collaboration between teachers and counselors is a logical option, when scheduling time for group counseling especially when their goals overlap.

One such area of potential for cooperation and collaboration is during reading class. Major emphasis is placed on reading in the classroom and when students lack in their ability to read, low self-esteem is certain to follow. Teachers who feel pressured to raise test scores and enhance the reading ability of their students tend to forget the need to work on self-esteem right along with reading. Self-concept is closely correlated with mathematics and reading achievement (Reynolds, 1997). Students who have higher scores in mathematics and reading were found to have correspondingly higher scores in most areas of self-esteem.

Teachers and counselors have similar goals (Myrick, 1987). Lee (1993) sited many studies in which a positive link between classroom guidance and academic achievement were found. Both work toward the mental health of students, but they rarely collaborate. The National Standards for School Counseling Programs published by the American School Counseling Association states that, "The school counseling program has characteristics similar to other educational programs, including a scope and sequence; student outcomes or competencies; activities and processes to assist students in achieving these outcomes." (Campbell & Dahir, 1997, p. 9). The most effective way for counselors to help prevent academic problems is by discussing developmental problems during large group guidance in the classroom. Therefore, self-esteem issues such as; behavior, peer relationships, self-control, physical development, stress, dealing with feelings and emotions, and school success are most effectively discussed in classroom groupings.

These concepts are also often included in the daily lessons presented by teachers, especially during reading classes. When counselors and teachers work together to co-teach academic subjects that directly impact self-esteem, more effective learning and high self-esteem for students can be accomplished. This project studied the results of a collaborative intervention by two-second grade classroom teachers and a school counselor using trade books with a self-esteem focus to teach reading in Literature Circles.

Review of the Literature

Self-esteem can be affected by the method of teaching. Cooperative learning enhances self-esteem as well as promotes student achievement (Lampe & Rooze, 1996). For example, the self-esteem of gifted students taught in heterogeneous cooperative learning groups increased (Johnson & Johnson, 1993; Melser, 1999). Cooperative learning involves the cognitive function of interaction with peers. Chandler, Lee, & Pengilly, (1997) found that expectations for success may have a causal relationship to self-esteem. In the Literature Circle environment students have opportunity for success while learning about interesting topics.

Literature Circles consist of small groups of readers reading the same piece or a piece about the same topic. Students select their own reading from sets of books previously selected by teachers. They decide how many pages to read for each session, and each student takes responsibility for preparing for the discussion that will ensue by taking notes (Daniels, 1994 13). Literature Circles permit students to interact with each other and allows them to select books on topics of interest to them. In contrast students traditionally read from one series of texts for the duration of the school year. Reading sessions are usually followed by teacher-directed discussion with teacher-made objective tests or end of chapter questions, often used to determine achievement.

Theorists such as Dewey (1916), Rogers (1969), and Piaget (1947) suggest that learning takes place best when children are allowed to learn by doing, take ownership of their studies through opportunities that lead to freedom of choice, and when social interaction abounds in the learning environment. Researchers such as Johnson and Johnson (1991), Kamii (1985), Routman (1996), and Daniels (1994) discuss the importance of allowing students to work together. Kamii (1985) states that when children are allowed to socially interact or communicate with each other critical thinking is increased "... confrontation of points of view serves to enhance children's ability to reason at increasingly higher levels. Peer interaction should, therefore, be maximized" (p. 36). Routman (1996) states that when children discuss what they read, their reading skills improve. She further suggests that as students discuss information together and have to defend their points of view, they are constantly evaluating and reevaluating information so that they might clarify their own thinking. Through this act of collaboration greater comprehension occurs.

Steffy and Hood (1994) discuss the effect empowerment has on students. Each chapter in their book discusses what happens when students are allowed to make choices about what they will read in their literature groups. The authors give examples of increased learning that takes place in such classes. Instead of reading only one book, students often extend that learning to include information from more books about the topic being studied.

As Dewey (1916) tells us, children learn by doing. Routman (2000, 1996) says that we learn to read by reading. The more children read, the better readers they become. In addition, the reading material must be developmentally appropriate so that children feel comfortable as readers and have a sense of success in what they do (Calkins, 2001). Otherwise, we stifle their feelings of accomplishment and turn students off to reading.

Purpose

There is little quantitative research on Literature Circles and their effect on self-esteem and reading comprehension. The qualitative research suggests that children engaged in Literature Circles have greater self-esteem. The purpose of this study was to examine the effects of the method of teaching, and collaboration between teachers and the counselor on student self-esteem.

Method

Two-second grade teachers and one school counselor worked collaboratively for two months to teach reading using bibliotherapy trade books. The books were chosen based on their reading level and appropriateness for the developmental level of the students. Also the subject content of the books was carefully selected to deal with a variety of self-esteem concerns typical of second graders. One university reading teacher educator and a counselor educator met with the teachers and counselor and clarified the roles of each person involved. The teachers and counselor were trained in the use of Literature Circles. While each teacher worked with trade books in Literature Circles within their respective classrooms, the school counselor was present during these sessions and worked alongside the teachers. During this time the counselor was available to assist students as needed with questions or concerns about self-esteem issues that came up during the literature discussions.

Subjects

Parent consent to participate was obtained from second grade students (n=33) in two classrooms (17 in Group One, 16 in Group Two) in the same elementary school in a southeastern state. Several students moved away and questionnaires for some students were not usable; results for 12 students from Group One and 14 students from Group Two were analyzed in this study. The subjects were 7, 8, and 9 years of age. Of the 26 students in both groups, 10 were male and 16 were female. The description of the subjects in both groups is reported in Table 1.

The subjects were intact groups and the two teachers and the counselor volunteered to participate in the study.

Instrument

The revised Tennessee Self-Concept Scale--Children' s Form was administered to students at the beginning of the study in January 2001 and again at the end of the study in March 2001. The revised Tennessee Self-Concept Scale--Children's Form (TSCS:2) (Fitts & Warren, 1996) was chosen because it has been used in a number of studies, is normed for children 7 years old, and produces sub-scores in the areas related to the books used in Literature Circles. It has high internal consistency (0.91) for total self-concept and reliability scores (0.72 in a one week test/retest) for total self-concept. Validity has been established through comparison with other similar instruments (r = 0.71 when compared with Piers-Harris Children's Self-Concept Scale).

The TSCS:2 yields a total scale score, which is a composite of Physical, Moral, Personal, Family, Social and Academic/ Work self-concept sub-scale scores. Physical self-concept describes how the child views his or her body, appearance, skills, and health. Moral self-concept relates to the child's perception of being good or bad. Personal self-concept reflects the child's self-evaluation of his or her personality as separate from others and the body. It shows feelings of worth and adequacy. Family self-concept relates to a child's feelings of worth, adequacy, and value in the family. Social self-concept shows the family feelings but in relation to others and is often associated with physical self-concept. Academic/Work self-concept is a measure of how the child sees him or herself at school and the way he or she thinks others at school see him or her. Supplementary scores for identity, Satisfaction, and Behavior are also provided. They are used in combination with other scores; primarily Behavior and Identity are compared to satisfaction. Identity describes the child's basic identity, Behavior describes how the child sees his or her behavior, and Satisfaction describes how satisfied the child is with him or herself.

Design

A pre-test, post-test design was used. The intervention lasted for two months. Teachers used Literature Circles with the counselor present to assist and address any concerns students had related to topics within their reading. The counselor was available for possible one-on-one counseling if students were observed to be stressed.

Results

The self-concept scores were analyzed both as a whole group and partitioned by teacher. Typically most students had scores between 40 and 60; therefore, the means for most generally in the 50s. In twelve of the 22 pre-test/post-test means, the pre-test value was higher than the post-test value. The specific mean and standard deviation of the self-concept scores for both groups of students are reported in Table 2.

The pre-test and post-test scores were compared using the t-Test. All of the t-scores were not found to be significant. While there were some differences in the data, these differences were not large enough to be considered significant. The means, standard deviations and t-Test scores are reported in Table 3.

The post-test scores were subtracted from the pre-test scores for all subjects. These differences were compared using the Pearson Correlation Coefficient. The correlations of the eleven score categories were calculated and they are reported in Table 4.

It was expected that the total scores were found to be significantly correlated to several of the sub scores since several of the sub scores are used to calculate the total scores. The Physical scores were found to be significantly correlated to Moral, Personal, Academic/Work, Identity, Satisfaction and Behavioral scores. The Moral scores were found to be significantly correlated to Academic/Work, Identity, and Satisfaction. The Personal scores were significantly correlated to Identity and Satisfaction, and Social and Behavioral scores were significantly correlated. Finally, Academic/Work was found to be significantly correlated to Identity and Satisfaction.

The self-concept scores were further analyzed by Analysis of Variance (ANOVA). The self-concept scores were the dependent variable and the subjects were partitioned between the two teachers. The degrees of freedom were 1 and 24 for each of the ANOVA calculations. The results are reported in Table 5.

Significant F values were found for Identity (F = 5.02 with p=0.03). The other F values were not found to be significant. Hence the differences between the two teachers were significant only for one score (Identity).

Discussion

The focus of this study was to determine if placing a school counselor in two second grade classrooms while teachers conducted Literature Circles using bibliotherapy trade books would have an effect on student self-esteem. The differences in the pre-test and post-test measures of self-concept were not found to be significant.

This study was conducted over a two-month period. The researchers think that if these procedures were followed over a longer period of time, the results would reflect greater differences. During testing it appeared to the researchers that there might have been a problem with seven year olds in using the test. Though the test was normed for 7 year old students, these young students seemed to have trouble with the gradations of the scoring system.

The comparison of the self-concept scores between the two teachers were found to be significant in the area of identify only. The other sub scores were not found to be significant. Identify is a measure of self-view. A higher self-view indicates students can tolerate stress associated with change in other areas of self-concept. A low identify score would indicate students had self-doubt and more inflexible self-concept.

Table 1
Description of the Subjects Involved in the Study

Group                                  N    %

Group One                              12
        Female                         5    42
                 Black       2 (40%)
                 Caucasian   2 (40%)
                 Other       1 (20%)
        Male                           7    58
                 Black       1 (14%)
                 Caucasian   6 (86%)
                 Other       0

Group Two                              14
        Female                         5    36
                 Black       1 (20%)
                 Caucasian   4 (80%)
                 Other       1 (20%)
        Male                           9    34
                 Black       5 (55%)
                 Caucasian   4 (44%)
                 Other       0

Table 2
Means and Standard Deviations of Self-Concept Scores for Both Groups

Self-Concept Scores      Teacher A          Teacher B

Total Self-Concept     Pre: 58/6.95 **    Pre: 53.9/12.9
                      Post: 56/9.34      Post: 54.3/8.25
Conflict               Pre: 47.3/6.3      Pre: 50.9/10.4
                      Post: 49.2/12.6    Post: 48.4/9.4
Physical               Pre: 54.4/11.2     Pre: 5.06/9.12
                      Post: 51.8/9.45    Post: 51.4/9.25
Moral                  Pre: 59.6/8.9      Pre: 56.6/14.2
                      Post: 58.3/8.9     Post: 57.1/10.7
Personal               Pre: 55.3/15.5     Pre: 51.1/12.4
                      Post: 50.3/11.7    Post: 55.3/9.36
Family                 Pre: 54.4/7.11     Pre: 56.4/14.99
                      Post: 58/10.7      Post: 51.6/8.67
Social                 Pre: 57.8/5.27     Pre: 50.3/12.76
                      Post: 56/10.89     Post: 52.7/11.1
Academic/Work          Pre: 59.2/7.95     Pre: 57.4/10.2
                      Post: 58.2/8.08    Post: 54.4/6.38
Identity               Pre: 59.3/9.9      Pre: 50.6/15.4
                      Post: 50.3/8.3     Post: 54.9/9.77
Satisfaction           Pre: 57.3/7.7      Pre: 58.2/15.4
                      Post: 58.2/9.98    Post: 56.7/10.59
Behavioral             Pre: 55.8/6.86     Pre: 51.9/9.76
                      Post: 56.4/8.9     Post: 51.7/12.1

** Note: The pretest mean Total Self-Concept for Teacher
A's students was 58.0 and the standard deviation was 6.95.

Table 3
Means and Standard Deviations of Self-Concept Scores and t-Test Values

Self-Concept Scores   Pre Test     t-Test   P
                      Post Test

Total Self-Concept    55.8/10.6      0.39   0.7
                      55.1/8.6
Conflict              49.3/8.8       0.27   0.79
                      48.7/10.8
Physical              52.4/10.1      0.44   0.66
                      51.5/9.2
Moral                 58/11.9        0.20   0.84
                      57.7/9.7
Personal              53.1/13.8      0.03   0.97
                      53/10.6
Family                55.5/11.8      0.37   0.73
                      54.5/10.0
Social                53.8/10.6     -0.22   0.82
                      54.2/10.9
Academic/Work         58.2/9.1       0.94   0.35
                      56.1/7.3
Identity              54.6/13.6      0.57   0.57
                      52.7/9.2
Satisfaction          57.8/12.2      0.20   0.84
                      57.4/10.1
Behavioral            53.7/8.6      -0.09   0.92
                      53.9/10.8

** Note: The pretest mean Total Self-Concept
was 55.8 and the standard deviation was 10.6.

Table 4
Correlation of Self-Concept Scores

Scores          Total        Conflict       Physical

Total                         -0.03          0.699 *
                               0.88          0.0001
Conflict                                     0.11
                                             0.59
Physical

Moral

Personal

Family

Social

Academic/Work

Identity

Satisfactory

Behavioral

Scores         Moral         Personal        Family

Total           0.527           0.62 *         0.10
                0.002           0.0008         0.62
Conflict        0.11           -0.19          -0.31
                0.59            0.35           0.12
Physical        0.58 *          0.46 *        -0.10
                0.002           0.02           0.63
Moral                           0.30           0.15
                                0.14           0.48
Personal

Family

Social

Academic/Work

Identity

Satisfactory

Behavioral

Scores           Social      Academic/Work    Identity

Total            0.52 *         0.65 *         0.68 *
                 0.007          0.0004         0.0001
Conflict         0.07          -0.06          -0.04
                 0.75           0.76           0.87
Physical         0.30           0.49 *         0.46 *
                 0.14           0.01           0.017
Moral            0.04           0.49 *         0.64 *
                 0.83           0.01           0.0004
Personal         0.20           0.39           0.49 *
                 0.33           0.05           0.01
Family          -0.24            .032           .021
                 0.24           0.11           0.29
Social                         -0.02           0.33
                                0.93           0.10
Academic/Work                                  0.51 *
                                               0.007
Identity

Satisfactory

Behavioral

Scores          Satisfactory    Behavioral

Total             0.53 *         0.60 *
                  0.006          0.002
Conflict         -0.04          -0.003
                  0.85           0.99
Physical          0.45 *         0.59 *
                  0.02           0.002
Moral             0.47 *         0.24
                  0.02           0.23
Personal          0.40 *         0.12
                  0.04           0.56
Family            0.05           0.25
                  0.80           0.22
Social            0.21           0.50 *
                  0.31           0.01
Academic/Work     0.56 *         0.13
                  0.003          0.51
Identity          0.26           0.30
                  0.19           0.13
Satisfactory                     0.08
                                 0.71
Behavioral

Table 5
F Values and Probabilities Comparing Teachers for Self-Concept Scores

Dependent Variable   F Value   Probability

Total Self Concept    0.45         0.51
Conflict              1.18         0.29
Physical              0.83         0.37
Moral                 0.32         0.58
Personal              3.32         0.08
Family                2.85         0.10
Social                1.02         0.32
Academic/Work         0.21         0.65
Identity              5.02 *       0.03
Satisfaction          0.30         0.59
Behavioral            0.04         0.84

References

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Suzanne J. Stringer, Associate Professor, Department of Elementary Education, Judson College. Glenda P. Reynolds, Assistant Professor, Department of Counselor, Leadership and Special Education, Auburn University--Montgomery. F. Morgan Simpson, Director, Certification and Laboratory Experiences/Professor, Foundations, Secondary and Physical Education, Auburn University--Montgomery.

Correspondence concerning this article should be addressed to Dr. Suzanne Stringer, 340 County Road 497, Sardis, AL 36775.