Transitions are defined as areas the student might struggle or due to unforeseen circumstances my research questions hope to address:

Research Question 2. Do third grade classrooms experience transitions that interfere with student learning? Transitions are defined as:

·       Group 1: Curriculum/lesson stoppage or changes, teacher engagement, district/school policies (Drills, restroom breaks, lunch, parties, recess, field trips, and cell phone), and classroom schedule.

·       Group 2: Classroom design, food insecurity or poverty, and COVID-19 pandemic aftermath, and family dynamics (Single parent, multiple households/caregivers, divorce, or neglect).

·       Group 3: Discipline, elopement, attendance, and mental health support.

Looking at our second research question about how many third-grade classrooms experience transitions that interferes with student learning? Transitions are defined as: Group 1: Curriculum/lesson stoppage or changes, teacher engagement, district/school policies (Drills, restroom breaks, lunch, parties, recess, field trips, and cell phone), and classroom schedule. Group 2: Classroom design, environmental (lead contamination), food insecurity or poverty, and COVID-19 pandemic aftermath, and family dynamics (Single parent, multiple households/caregivers, divorce, or neglect). Group 3: Discipline, elopement, attendance, and mental health support”. This researcher does believe that much of group one, two, and three are occurring from the observations at the Sunflower and witnessing students struggling with elopement, lesson stoppage, false fire drills, restroom breaks, lunch (Entire class waited in line outside room for one student who refused to exit class until he lined up so the whole class could go to lunch), discipline, attendance, and mental or cognitive issues. Also, this researcher observed an unscheduled fire drill, which students in another grade level pulled the fire alarm and disrupted over 50 minutes of instructional time for the entire school. The two students involved were captured on video surveillance cameras and given a five day In-School-Suspension (ISS) consequence with a call home to parents.

         Parents surveyed also indicated disruptions in group one as teacher engagement, fire alarms, cell phones, and district/school policies; group two disruptions include single parent and food insecurity/poverty, and group three disruptions included fighting, talking over the teacher, bullying, name-calling, refusal to stop talking, disrupt teacher’s lesson, disrespect, and students arguing with the teacher in Figure 11, 12, and 13 helped this researcher map out notes from observations and third grade referrals that revealed something hidden in daily instruction that all of the disruptions can be quantified if this researcher counted each word as minutes of lost instruction in this area of the phenomenon gathered in the NVivo software memoing section for data collection.  

 Word Maps

The NVivo word map helped this researcher chart out the journaling text discovered during observations reveal something is going on in this area of the phenomena in Figures 11, 12, and 13 respectively. Please visit doctoral digital portfolio (DDP) dissertation at Webster University Library's digital library for additional findings.