A study of pupil preferences of models for elementary school children

Abstract

INTRODUCTION Child psychologists, as well as educators, have been conducting studies on problems of children and adolescents. In spite of the studies thus far undertaken, many problems still remain unsolved although they may have been reduced. In the course of the investigator's work as guidance counselor, he has observed that teachers have called for conferences with parents concerning their children. Sometimes it was a parent seeking conference with the teacher regarding some problem of his child. There was an instance was a boy seen crying who was being persuaded by a teacher to get inside his classroom to attend the class, but he refused to enter because he disliked the teacher. At another occasion, the children refused to join a certain school activity because they disliked the leader. Those incidents led this investigator to interview some teachers in order to get some idea of the extent of pupil problems that are based on a clash of personalities. The result of this limited investigation was the decision to conduct a larger study concerning the problem. Since children would like to identify with some other persons, it was felt that a study of types of persons children prefer to be their ideals should be a study with relevance to the problems so far observed. THE PROBLEM Statement of the Problem. This study of boys and girls of school age attempted to find out the pupils' preferences as to models for elementary school children. Answers to the following questions were sought: 1. Who were the models chosen? 2. What traits were admired by the pupils in their models? 3. Wore there significant differences in the choices, considering age, sex, and religious affiliations of the pupil-respondents? The choices of models and the traits desired by children may reflect ideals, values, and aspirations of the pupils. Knowledge about these models chosen and their traits mentioned would be helpful in understanding the children and adolescents.