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This chapter reviews successful pedagogical interventions in teaching literacy in languages of teaching and learning in the upper primary grades in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) and explores how researchers and teachers decolonized classroom spaces to ensure student achievement of learning outcomes. Themes emerging from the analysis of data are biliteracy interventions, interventions in official and national languages, teacher professional development, and ecological interventions. Results of the review indicate that researchers decolonized classroom spaces by using student linguistic repertoires, evidence-based pedagogical strategies student cultural capital and engaging families and communities. The review also reveals that more research needs to be conducted on teaching and learning in upper primary grades. The linguistic diversity of LMICs provides rich contexts for more research in bilingual education and L2 acquisition which could be useful worldwide as stakeholders in the education process explore the best ways to improve learning outcomes in schools.

This research aims to investigate effective public library environmental education interventions in order to inform the development of a framework for public libraries.

A qualitative research method was developed incorporating surveys and follow-up interviews with librarians working in USA public libraries, who were known to have been involved in environmental education initiatives.

The research determined which environmental education interventions were most likely to lead to action and behaviour change in public library users. The resulting discussion has allowed for the creation of a framework which establishes factors useful for successful implementation of environmental education programmes and activities. These elements include partnership, institutional commitment, inclusion and outreach and practical activities linked to a larger vision.

The research participants were limited to those libraries in the USA which were all affiliated with the American Library Association (ALA) Resilient Communities programmes and had received grants.

The paper concludes with a framework for implementing environmental education programmes in public libraries. Effective interventions are also shared which provide practical ideas and strategies.

Providing structure and considerations for establishing an environmental programme enables libraries to build on experiences of other libraries. As climate change action becomes a more pressing issue, providing these interventions supports action.

The paper discusses the concepts of environmental education and the role which public libraries can play in this arena, concluding that sustainable development should be treated as a new tenet of librarianship and environmental education as a new research field of library and information science.

This paper aims to investigate the e-waste aspect of sustainability in education, with a specific interest in engineering education. Specifically, it focuses on recycling through reclaiming electronic components from e-waste and reusing them in repairs or in the design and construction of new devices.

A systematic literature review is performed according to the PRISMA methodology. In total, 27 articles are analysed as to publication parameters, characteristics and evaluation of educational interventions on e-waste and evaluation results across major domains of learning (cognitive, affective and 21st century skills).

The reviewed subject is under-research; publications are rare and mostly in conference proceedings. The majority of interventions take place at university level, in face-to-face mode, using a practical approach in hands-on labs. Educational methods draw from modern, learner-centred pedagogies such as collaborative learning and constructionism. Topics focus on innovative design and construction, while interventions tend to become embedded in engineering curricula/courses. Evaluation of learners’ gains across domains of learning is rare and follows informal procedures that shake the reliability of results. Domains other than the cognitive are scarcely and subjectively evaluated.

Contrary to other aspects of sustainability, the aspect of e-waste has not been reviewed. The applied, hands-on approach and the analytic, synthetic, collaboration and creativity skills it requires are all much valued in education. The current review, therefore, comes to inform, inspire and guide educators and researchers in planning and implementing activities on this subject.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the effects of an exercise education intervention on exercise behavior, depression and fatigue status of chronic kidney disease (CKD) patients.

This was a pilot study using an exercise education program as an intervention for CKD patients. The authors used the transtheoretical model (TTM) to design the exercise education programs. A total of 94 subjects diagnosed with CKD at a medical center in Taiwan participated in this quasi‐experimental study. Subjects were randomly divided into the experimental group (n=45) and the control group (n=49). The education program included written materials and teaching activities designed to encourage participants to initiate and continue regular exercise. Both groups took the pre‐test and post‐test containing a depression inventory, a fatigue scale and an exercise behavior inventory.

The findings indicated that changes in the exercise behavior, depression and fatigue status of the experimental group were statistically significant after the exercise education intervention compared with the control group.

The paper demonstrates that exercise education intervention can be administered by nursing staff, or a health educator, to encourage patients to exercise in order to enhance their quality of care.

This article illustrates the key findings from the economics literature on education investment, in particular the findings focused on early child investment. The article shows the impact of early investment, particularly evidence from experimental programmes on later life outcomes such as labour market performance and societal position. It demonstrates how investment in children is both an important investment for the child but also an important tool for economic and social policy.

Four reputed leaders for the coming years in the field of special education for individuals with emotional and behavioral disorders (EBD) each with a slightly different perspective on the field were asked to respond independently to a prompt asking what does special education mean for students with EBD and what is being done and how do we maintain tradition? The contributors' responses to the prompt are presented and then summarized across the essays. A remarkable consistency emerges across the independent essays. In addition to the tradition of providing a free and appropriate education in the least restrictive environment, the contributors identify needs to support teachers serving this population. Needs in teacher training and the expertise required to meet the needs of individuals with EBD are outlined as well as potential contributions of technology to carry out specific tasks. We conclude with a call for increased advocacy for use of the knowledge that we currently possess and that which will soon be discovered to support students with EBD as well as their teachers. We also note that the contributors' names are listed alphabetically to acknowledge the equality of each person to the final product.

The innovations in this volume instill a sense of optimism about how special education professionals might improve outcomes for students with disabilities. Although many interventions illustrate scientific progress toward an evidence-based profession, many special educators may find it challenging to discriminate between scientifically validated innovation and various fads. While innovation reflects the gradual progress of science, fads usually arise suddenly and lack an evidentiary foundation. Some fads may persist over time but without supportive evidence. We present several reasons why we believe special educators adopt fad interventions during an era when scientifically validated special educational practices are readily available. We propose that fads and similar unsubstantiated practices likely will be a persistent problem for special educators. A conservative and judicious approach to adopting “the next big thing” therefore seems important to an evidence-based special education.

The purpose of this paper is to map and identify evidence for effective components of combined school and family alcohol education interventions. The paper describes current practice, evaluative evidence of its effects, and highlights specific elements of school and family linked education associated with effective prevention or reduction of alcohol misuse by young people aged 11-18 years.

This paper takes the form of a systematic review.

The review found evidence of small positive effects for interventions delivered over short and longer term duration and low and higher levels of direct contact with students and families. Family-based elements that correlated with positive effects were targeting information and skills development, family communications, and stricter parental attitudes to alcohol misuse. School-based components which involved life skills and social norms approaches were associated with reductions in risky behaviours. Weaker evidence indicated that peer-led programmes, external delivery agents and linkages of school-based components to community-level change may strengthen combined school and family intervention programmes.

The heterogeneity of the studies precluded the option to perform meta-analysis.

There is a need for more focused use of planning and evaluation tools, and especially more explicit articulation of behaviours and/or behavioural determinants targeted; the methods that will be employed and the conceptual basis for the programme design could contribute to deeper understanding amongst the intervention community of how and why impact is or is not achieved.

Few studies provide information on the concepts, assumptions or change objectives that shape programme design. The potential benefits of combining school and family education interventions warrants further exploration.

The authors believe this is the first review to systematically examine objectives, design and impact of combined school and family alcohol education interventions.

We review the interventions that promote motivation in academic contexts, with a focus on two primary questions: How can we motivate students to take more STEM courses? Once in those STEM courses, how can we keep students motivated and promote their academic achievement?

We have approached these two motivational questions from several perspectives, examining the theoretical issues with basic laboratory research, conducting longitudinal questionnaire studies in classrooms, and developing interventions implemented in different STEM contexts. Our research is grounded in three theories that we believe are complementary: expectancy-value theory (Eccles & Wigfield, 2002), interest theory (Hidi & Renninger, 2006), and self-affirmation theory (Steele, 1988). As social psychologists, we have focused on motivational theory and used experimental methods, with an emphasis on values – students’ perceptions of the value of academic tasks and students’ personal values that shape their experiences in academic contexts.

We review the experimental field studies in high-school science and college psychology classes, in which utility-value interventions promoted interest and performance for high-school students in science classes and for undergraduate students in psychology courses. We also review a randomized intervention in which parents received information about the utility value of math and science for their teens in high school; this intervention led students to take nearly one semester more of science and mathematics, compared with the control group. Finally, we review an experimental study of values affirmation in a college biology course and found that the intervention improved performance and retention for first-generation college students, closing the social-class achievement gap by 50%. We conclude by discussing the mechanisms through which these interventions work.

These interventions are exciting for their broad applicability in improving students’ academic choices and performance, they are also exciting regarding their potential for contributions to basic science. The combination of laboratory experiments and field experiments is advancing our understanding of the motivational principles and almost certainly will continue to do so. At the same time, interventions may benefit from becoming increasingly targeted at specific motivational processes that are effective with particular groups or in particular contexts.

Federal education laws increasingly seem to expect educational research to follow the same processes, approaches, and designs as all scientific research. Scientific inquiries typically are based on empiricism, seen as methodical and producing results that are reliable and generalizable, all of which are appealing when examining educational approaches (National Research Council, 2002). The implementation of scientific inquiry uses experimental conditions, comparison of control groups to groups who received the educational intervention, and clearly measurable outcomes. Experimental conditions require random assignment, which means that participants are just as likely to be selected for the control condition as they are for the experimental/intervention condition. In most educational settings, research rarely achieves random assignment of participants to control and experimental conditions because students are grouped into classrooms with teachers who have different teaching styles, communication styles, and relationships with individual students (Odom et al., 2005).