Primary School students’ narratives of school well-being: an initial diagnosis

Abstract

The interest in understanding well-being within educational centers, especially from the perspective of its main actors, boys and girls, occupies a central place in current research. The aim of the study was to investigate the indicators that shape the school well-being of primary school pupils. A qualitative study was carried out, in which 95 students from two public schools participated. They were administrated the Open-ended Questionnaire of School Well-being (OQSW). Four elements about students’ experience at school were drawn from their discourse: school climate (relational, safety, and learning), school engagement (behavioral, affective, and cognitive domains), emotions (related to school activities, epistemic, thematic, and social) and educational discontinuity (role and context differentiation, family-school relationship). In short, the school world represents a space of significant experiences, that are perceived and felt differently by each student. There is no possible to refer to a single or common manner of expressing what school well-being means, although it is possible to define some of its key axes. This is the only way to propose actions that are coherent with the needs expressed by the students.