research problem in elementary education

Elementary Education Research Paper Topics

This comprehensive guide to elementary education research paper topics is designed to assist students and researchers in the field of education. The guide provides a wide array of topics divided into ten categories, each with ten unique topics, offering a diverse range of areas to explore in the field of elementary education. Additionally, the guide offers expert advice on how to choose a research topic and how to write an elementary education research paper. The final sections of the guide introduce iResearchNet’s professional writing services and encourage students to take advantage of these services for their research needs.

100 Elementary Education Research Paper Topics

Elementary education is a broad field with numerous areas to explore. Whether you’re interested in teaching methods, curriculum development, educational technology, or the social aspects of elementary education, there’s a research topic for you. Here, we present a comprehensive list of elementary education research paper topics, divided into ten categories. Each category contains ten unique topics, offering a diverse range of areas to explore in your research.

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1. Teaching Methods and Strategies

• The effectiveness of Montessori methods in elementary education.
• The role of play in learning in the early years.
• The impact of differentiated instruction on student achievement.
• The benefits and challenges of cooperative learning in the elementary classroom.
• The role of feedback in promoting student learning.
• The impact of teaching strategies on students’ motivation.
• The effectiveness of inquiry-based learning in science education.
• The role of storytelling in teaching literacy skills.
• The impact of technology on teaching and learning in the elementary classroom.
• The role of creativity in teaching and learning.

2. Curriculum and Instruction

• The impact of curriculum design on student learning.
• The role of interdisciplinary teaching in elementary education.
• The effectiveness of project-based learning in teaching science.
• The role of cultural relevance in curriculum design.
• The impact of standardized testing on curriculum and instruction.
• The role of critical thinking in the elementary curriculum.
• The effectiveness of integrating arts in the curriculum.
• The impact of curriculum alignment on student achievement.
• The role of experiential learning in the elementary curriculum.
• The challenges of teaching social studies in the elementary classroom.

3. Educational Technology

• The impact of digital technology on student learning.
• The role of educational games in teaching math.
• The effectiveness of using iPads in the classroom.
• The role of virtual reality in teaching science.
• The impact of technology on student engagement.
• The challenges of integrating technology in the classroom.
• The role of technology in promoting collaborative learning.
• The effectiveness of using technology in teaching reading skills.
• The impact of technology on teacher-student communication.
• The role of technology in personalized learning.

4. Social Aspects of Elementary Education

• The impact of classroom climate on student learning.
• The role of social-emotional learning in elementary education.
• The effectiveness of character education programs.
• The role of peer relationships in student learning.
• The impact of school culture on student achievement.
• The challenges of teaching diversity and inclusion in the elementary classroom.
• The role of student-teacher relationships in student learning.
• The effectiveness of anti-bullying programs in elementary schools.
• The impact of parental involvement on student achievement.
• The role of community partnerships in promoting student learning.

5. Special Education

• The effectiveness of inclusive education in the elementary classroom.
• The role of individualized education programs in supporting students with special needs.
• The impact of teacher training on the success of inclusive education.
• The challenges of teaching students with learning disabilities.
• The role of assistive technology in supporting students with special needs.
• The effectiveness of earlyintervention programs for students with special needs.
• The impact of classroom accommodations on the academic success of students with special needs.
• The role of collaboration between general and special education teachers.
• The effectiveness of behavior management strategies for students with emotional and behavioral disorders.
• The impact of special education policies on student outcomes.

6. Early Childhood Education

• The impact of early childhood education on academic success.
• The role of play in early childhood education.
• The effectiveness of early literacy programs.
• The role of parental involvement in early childhood education.
• The impact of early childhood education on social skills development.
• The challenges of teaching math in early childhood education.
• The role of creativity in early childhood education.
• The effectiveness of early intervention programs.
• The impact of early childhood education on cognitive development.
• The role of teacher-child relationships in early childhood education.

7. Educational Policies and Reforms

• The impact of No Child Left Behind on elementary education.
• The role of Common Core State Standards in curriculum development.
• The effectiveness of school choice policies.
• The role of educational policies in promoting equity in education.
• The impact of teacher evaluation policies on teaching and learning.
• The challenges of implementing educational reforms in elementary schools.
• The role of educational policies in promoting teacher quality.
• The effectiveness of policies aimed at reducing the achievement gap.
• The impact of educational funding policies on student achievement.
• The role of educational policies in promoting parental involvement.

8. Teacher Education and Professional Development

• The impact of teacher education programs on teacher effectiveness.
• The role of ongoing professional development in promoting teacher quality.
• The effectiveness of mentorship programs for novice teachers.
• The role of reflective practice in teacher professional development.
• The impact of teacher beliefs on teaching practices.
• The challenges of teaching in high-needs schools.
• The role of teacher collaboration in professional development.
• The effectiveness of teacher induction programs.
• The impact of teacher leadership on school improvement.
• The role of teacher autonomy in promoting job satisfaction.

9. Classroom Management

• The impact of classroom management strategies on student behavior.
• The role of positive reinforcement in promoting appropriate behavior.
• The effectiveness of classroom rules and procedures.
• The role of teacher-student relationships in classroom management.
• The impact of classroom environment on student learning.
• The challenges of managing disruptive behavior.
• The role of behavior management strategies in promoting a positive classroom climate.
• The effectiveness of conflict resolution strategies in the classroom.
• The impact of classroom management on student engagement.
• The role of classroom routines in promoting student responsibility.

10. Assessment and Evaluation

• The impact of formative assessment on student learning.
• The role of feedback in student assessment.
• The effectiveness of performance-based assessment.
• The role of self-assessment in promoting student learning.
• The impact of standardized testing on teaching and learning.
• The challenges of assessing student learning in diverse classrooms.
• The role of assessment in curriculum planning.
• The effectiveness of portfolio assessment.
• The impact of grading policies on student motivation.
• The role of assessment in identifying students at risk of academic failure.

This comprehensive list of elementary education research paper topics provides a wide range of areas to explore. Whether you’re interested in teaching methods, curriculum development, educational technology, or the social aspects of elementary education, there’s a research topic for you. Remember, the best research topic is one that you’re genuinely interested in and passionate about.

Elementary Education Research Guide

Elementary education, also known as primary education, is a crucial stage in the educational journey of a child. It is during these formative years that children acquire foundational skills in areas such as reading, writing, mathematics, science, and social studies. Additionally, they develop critical thinking skills, creativity, and social competencies that are essential for their overall growth and development.

Elementary education serves as the building block for all future learning. The experiences and knowledge gained during these years can significantly influence a child’s attitude towards learning, their academic success, and their lifelong learning habits. Therefore, it is essential to ensure that children receive quality education during these years.

Research in elementary education is of paramount importance. It helps educators, policymakers, and stakeholders understand the best practices, methodologies, and strategies to enhance learning outcomes in primary education. It also provides insights into the challenges faced in elementary education and how to address them effectively.

Elementary education research paper topics can span a wide range of areas, including teaching methods, learning styles, the impact of technology on learning, educational policies, classroom management, and many more. Choosing a research topic in this field requires careful consideration of various factors, including your interests, the relevance of the topic, and the availability of resources.

In the following sections, we provide a comprehensive list of elementary education research paper topics, expert advice on choosing a topic and writing a research paper, and information about iResearchNet’s professional writing services. Whether you are a student embarking on your first research project or a seasoned researcher looking for new areas to explore, this guide is designed to assist you in your research journey.

Choosing Elementary Education Research Paper Topics

Choosing a research topic is a critical step in the research process. The topic you select will guide your study, influence the complexity and relevance of your work, and determine how engaged you are throughout the process. In the field of elementary education, there are numerous intriguing topics that can be explored. Here are some expert tips to assist you in this process:

• Understanding Your Interests: The first step in choosing a research topic is to understand your interests. What areas of elementary education fascinate you the most? Are you interested in how teaching methods influence student learning, or are you more intrigued by the role of technology in the classroom? Reflecting on these questions can help you narrow down your options and choose a topic that truly engages you. Remember, research is a time-consuming process, and your interest in the topic will keep you motivated.
• Evaluating the Scope of the Topic: Once you have identified your areas of interest, the next step is to evaluate the scope of potential elementary education research paper topics. A good research topic should be neither too broad nor too narrow. If it’s too broad, you may struggle to cover all aspects of the topic effectively. If it’s too narrow, you may have difficulty finding enough information to support your research. Try to choose a topic that is specific enough to be manageable but broad enough to have sufficient resources.
• Assessing Available Resources and Data: Before finalizing a topic, it’s important to assess the available resources and data. Are there enough academic sources, such as books, journal articles, and reports, that you can use for your research? Is there accessible data that you can analyze if your research requires it? A preliminary review of literature and data can save you from choosing a topic with limited resources.
• Considering the Relevance and Applicability of the Topic: Another important factor to consider is the relevance and applicability of the topic. Is the topic relevant to current issues in elementary education? Can the findings of your research be applied in real-world settings? Choosing a relevant and applicable topic can increase the impact of your research and make it more interesting for your audience.
• Seeking Advice: Don’t hesitate to seek advice from your professors, peers, or other experts in the field. They can provide valuable insights, suggest resources, and help you refine your topic. Discussing your ideas with others can also help you see different perspectives and identify potential issues that you may not have considered.
• Flexibility: Finally, be flexible. Research is a dynamic process, and it’s okay to modify your topic as you delve deeper into your study. You may discover new aspects of the topic that are more interesting or find that some aspects are too challenging to explore due to constraints. Being flexible allows you to adapt your research to these changes and ensure that your study is both feasible and engaging.

Remember, choosing a research topic is not a decision to be taken lightly. It requires careful consideration and planning. However, with these expert tips, you can navigate this process more effectively and choose an elementary education research paper topic that not only meets your academic requirements but also fuels your passion for learning.

How to Write an Elementary Education Research Paper

Writing a research paper is a significant academic task that requires careful planning, thorough research, and meticulous writing. In the field of elementary education, this process can be particularly challenging due to the complexity and diversity of the field. However, with the right approach and strategies, you can write a compelling and insightful research paper. Here are some expert tips to guide you through this process:

• Understanding the Structure of a Research Paper: A typical research paper includes an introduction, literature review, methodology, results, discussion, and conclusion. The introduction presents your research question and its significance. The literature review provides an overview of existing research related to your topic. The methodology explains how you conducted your research. The results section presents your findings, and the discussion interprets these findings in the context of your research question. Finally, the conclusion summarizes your research and suggests areas for future research.
• Developing a Strong Thesis Statement: Your thesis statement is the central argument of your research paper. It should be clear, concise, and debatable. A strong thesis statement guides your research and helps your readers understand the purpose of your paper.
• Conducting Thorough Research: Before you start writing, conduct a thorough review of the literature related to your topic. This will help you understand the current state of research in your area, identify gaps in the literature, and position your research within this context. Use academic databases to find relevant books, journal articles, and other resources. Remember to evaluate the credibility of your sources and take detailed notes to help you when writing.
• Writing and Revising Drafts: Start writing your research paper by creating an outline based on the structure of a research paper. This will help you organize your thoughts and ensure that you cover all necessary sections. Write a first draft without worrying too much about perfection. Focus on getting your ideas down first. Then, revise your draft to improve clarity, coherence, and argumentation. Make sure each paragraph has a clear topic sentence and supports your thesis statement.
• Proper Citation and Avoiding Plagiarism: Always cite your sources properly to give credit to the authors whose work you are building upon and to avoid plagiarism. Familiarize yourself with the citation style required by your institution or discipline, such as APA, MLA, Chicago/Turabian, or Harvard. There are many citation tools available online that can help you with this.
• Seeking Feedback: Don’t hesitate to seek feedback on your drafts from your professors, peers, or writing centers at your institution. They can provide valuable insights and help you improve your paper.
• Proofreading: Finally, proofread your paper to check for any grammatical errors, typos, or inconsistencies in formatting. A well-written, error-free paper makes a good impression on your readers and enhances the credibility of your research.
• Incorporating Elementary Education Concepts: When writing an elementary education research paper, it’s crucial to accurately incorporate elementary education concepts. Make sure you understand these concepts thoroughly and can explain them clearly in your paper. Use examples where appropriate to illustrate these concepts.
• Analyzing and Interpreting Data: If your research involves data analysis, be sure to explain your analysis process and interpret the results in a way that is understandable to your readers. Discuss the implications of your findings for the broader field of elementary education.
• Discussing Real-World Applications: Elementary education is a practical field with many real-world applications. Discuss how your research relates to these applications. This can make your research more interesting and relevant to your readers.

Remember, writing a research paper is a process that requires time, effort, and patience. Don’t rush through it.Take the time to plan your research, conduct thorough research, write carefully, and revise your work. With these expert tips, you can write an elementary education research paper that is insightful, well-structured, and contributes to the field of elementary education.

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The 10 Most Significant Education Studies of 2021

From reframing our notion of “good” schools to mining the magic of expert teachers, here’s a curated list of must-read research from 2021.

It was a year of unprecedented hardship for teachers and school leaders. We pored through hundreds of studies to see if we could follow the trail of exactly what happened: The research revealed a complex portrait of a grueling year during which persistent issues of burnout and mental and physical health impacted millions of educators. Meanwhile, many of the old debates continued: Does paper beat digital? Is project-based learning as effective as direct instruction? How do you define what a “good” school is?

Other studies grabbed our attention, and in a few cases, made headlines. Researchers from the University of Chicago and Columbia University turned artificial intelligence loose on some 1,130 award-winning children’s books in search of invisible patterns of bias. (Spoiler alert: They found some.) Another study revealed why many parents are reluctant to support social and emotional learning in schools—and provided hints about how educators can flip the script.

1. What Parents Fear About SEL (and How to Change Their Minds)

When researchers at the Fordham Institute asked parents to rank phrases associated with social and emotional learning , nothing seemed to add up. The term “social-emotional learning” was very unpopular; parents wanted to steer their kids clear of it. But when the researchers added a simple clause, forming a new phrase—”social-emotional & academic learning”—the program shot all the way up to No. 2 in the rankings.

What gives?

Parents were picking up subtle cues in the list of SEL-related terms that irked or worried them, the researchers suggest. Phrases like “soft skills” and “growth mindset” felt “nebulous” and devoid of academic content. For some, the language felt suspiciously like “code for liberal indoctrination.”

But the study suggests that parents might need the simplest of reassurances to break through the political noise. Removing the jargon, focusing on productive phrases like “life skills,” and relentlessly connecting SEL to academic progress puts parents at ease—and seems to save social and emotional learning in the process.

2. The Secret Management Techniques of Expert Teachers

In the hands of experienced teachers, classroom management can seem almost invisible: Subtle techniques are quietly at work behind the scenes, with students falling into orderly routines and engaging in rigorous academic tasks almost as if by magic. 

That’s no accident, according to new research . While outbursts are inevitable in school settings, expert teachers seed their classrooms with proactive, relationship-building strategies that often prevent misbehavior before it erupts. They also approach discipline more holistically than their less-experienced counterparts, consistently reframing misbehavior in the broader context of how lessons can be more engaging, or how clearly they communicate expectations.

Focusing on the underlying dynamics of classroom behavior—and not on surface-level disruptions—means that expert teachers often look the other way at all the right times, too. Rather than rise to the bait of a minor breach in etiquette, a common mistake of new teachers, they tend to play the long game, asking questions about the origins of misbehavior, deftly navigating the terrain between discipline and student autonomy, and opting to confront misconduct privately when possible.

3. The Surprising Power of Pretesting

Asking students to take a practice test before they’ve even encountered the material may seem like a waste of time—after all, they’d just be guessing.

But new research concludes that the approach, called pretesting, is actually more effective than other typical study strategies. Surprisingly, pretesting even beat out taking practice tests after learning the material, a proven strategy endorsed by cognitive scientists and educators alike. In the study, students who took a practice test before learning the material outperformed their peers who studied more traditionally by 49 percent on a follow-up test, while outperforming students who took practice tests after studying the material by 27 percent.

The researchers hypothesize that the “generation of errors” was a key to the strategy’s success, spurring student curiosity and priming them to “search for the correct answers” when they finally explored the new material—and adding grist to a 2018 study that found that making educated guesses helped students connect background knowledge to new material.

Learning is more durable when students do the hard work of correcting misconceptions, the research suggests, reminding us yet again that being wrong is an important milestone on the road to being right.

4. Confronting an Old Myth About Immigrant Students

Immigrant students are sometimes portrayed as a costly expense to the education system, but new research is systematically dismantling that myth.

In a 2021 study , researchers analyzed over 1.3 million academic and birth records for students in Florida communities, and concluded that the presence of immigrant students actually has “a positive effect on the academic achievement of U.S.-born students,” raising test scores as the size of the immigrant school population increases. The benefits were especially powerful for low-income students.

While immigrants initially “face challenges in assimilation that may require additional school resources,” the researchers concluded, hard work and resilience may allow them to excel and thus “positively affect exposed U.S.-born students’ attitudes and behavior.” But according to teacher Larry Ferlazzo, the improvements might stem from the fact that having English language learners in classes improves pedagogy , pushing teachers to consider “issues like prior knowledge, scaffolding, and maximizing accessibility.”

5. A Fuller Picture of What a ‘Good’ School Is

It’s time to rethink our definition of what a “good school” is, researchers assert in a study published in late 2020.⁣ That’s because typical measures of school quality like test scores often provide an incomplete and misleading picture, the researchers found.

The study looked at over 150,000 ninth-grade students who attended Chicago public schools and concluded that emphasizing the social and emotional dimensions of learning—relationship-building, a sense of belonging, and resilience, for example—improves high school graduation and college matriculation rates for both high- and low-income students, beating out schools that focus primarily on improving test scores.⁣

“Schools that promote socio-emotional development actually have a really big positive impact on kids,” said lead researcher C. Kirabo Jackson in an interview with Edutopia . “And these impacts are particularly large for vulnerable student populations who don’t tend to do very well in the education system.”

The findings reinforce the importance of a holistic approach to measuring student progress, and are a reminder that schools—and teachers—can influence students in ways that are difficult to measure, and may only materialize well into the future.⁣

6. Teaching Is Learning

One of the best ways to learn a concept is to teach it to someone else. But do you actually have to step into the shoes of a teacher, or does the mere expectation of teaching do the trick?

In a 2021 study , researchers split students into two groups and gave them each a science passage about the Doppler effect—a phenomenon associated with sound and light waves that explains the gradual change in tone and pitch as a car races off into the distance, for example. One group studied the text as preparation for a test; the other was told that they’d be teaching the material to another student.

The researchers never carried out the second half of the activity—students read the passages but never taught the lesson. All of the participants were then tested on their factual recall of the Doppler effect, and their ability to draw deeper conclusions from the reading.

The upshot? Students who prepared to teach outperformed their counterparts in both duration and depth of learning, scoring 9 percent higher on factual recall a week after the lessons concluded, and 24 percent higher on their ability to make inferences. The research suggests that asking students to prepare to teach something—or encouraging them to think “could I teach this to someone else?”—can significantly alter their learning trajectories.

7. A Disturbing Strain of Bias in Kids’ Books

Some of the most popular and well-regarded children’s books—Caldecott and Newbery honorees among them—persistently depict Black, Asian, and Hispanic characters with lighter skin, according to new research .

Using artificial intelligence, researchers combed through 1,130 children’s books written in the last century, comparing two sets of diverse children’s books—one a collection of popular books that garnered major literary awards, the other favored by identity-based awards. The software analyzed data on skin tone, race, age, and gender.

Among the findings: While more characters with darker skin color begin to appear over time, the most popular books—those most frequently checked out of libraries and lining classroom bookshelves—continue to depict people of color in lighter skin tones. More insidiously, when adult characters are “moral or upstanding,” their skin color tends to appear lighter, the study’s lead author, Anjali Aduki,  told The 74 , with some books converting “Martin Luther King Jr.’s chocolate complexion to a light brown or beige.” Female characters, meanwhile, are often seen but not heard.

Cultural representations are a reflection of our values, the researchers conclude: “Inequality in representation, therefore, constitutes an explicit statement of inequality of value.”

8. The Never-Ending ‘Paper Versus Digital’ War

The argument goes like this: Digital screens turn reading into a cold and impersonal task; they’re good for information foraging, and not much more. “Real” books, meanwhile, have a heft and “tactility”  that make them intimate, enchanting—and irreplaceable.

But researchers have often found weak or equivocal evidence for the superiority of reading on paper. While a recent study concluded that paper books yielded better comprehension than e-books when many of the digital tools had been removed, the effect sizes were small. A 2021 meta-analysis further muddies the water: When digital and paper books are “mostly similar,” kids comprehend the print version more readily—but when enhancements like motion and sound “target the story content,” e-books generally have the edge.

Nostalgia is a force that every new technology must eventually confront. There’s plenty of evidence that writing with pen and paper encodes learning more deeply than typing. But new digital book formats come preloaded with powerful tools that allow readers to annotate, look up words, answer embedded questions, and share their thinking with other readers.

We may not be ready to admit it, but these are precisely the kinds of activities that drive deeper engagement, enhance comprehension, and leave us with a lasting memory of what we’ve read. The future of e-reading, despite the naysayers, remains promising.

9. New Research Makes a Powerful Case for PBL

Many classrooms today still look like they did 100 years ago, when students were preparing for factory jobs. But the world’s moved on: Modern careers demand a more sophisticated set of skills—collaboration, advanced problem-solving, and creativity, for example—and those can be difficult to teach in classrooms that rarely give students the time and space to develop those competencies.

Project-based learning (PBL) would seem like an ideal solution. But critics say PBL places too much responsibility on novice learners, ignoring the evidence about the effectiveness of direct instruction and ultimately undermining subject fluency. Advocates counter that student-centered learning and direct instruction can and should coexist in classrooms.

Now two new large-scale studies —encompassing over 6,000 students in 114 diverse schools across the nation—provide evidence that a well-structured, project-based approach boosts learning for a wide range of students.

In the studies, which were funded by Lucas Education Research, a sister division of Edutopia , elementary and high school students engaged in challenging projects that had them designing water systems for local farms, or creating toys using simple household objects to learn about gravity, friction, and force. Subsequent testing revealed notable learning gains—well above those experienced by students in traditional classrooms—and those gains seemed to raise all boats, persisting across socioeconomic class, race, and reading levels.

10. Tracking a Tumultuous Year for Teachers

The Covid-19 pandemic cast a long shadow over the lives of educators in 2021, according to a year’s worth of research.

The average teacher’s workload suddenly “spiked last spring,” wrote the Center for Reinventing Public Education in its January 2021 report, and then—in defiance of the laws of motion—simply never let up. By the fall, a RAND study recorded an astonishing shift in work habits: 24 percent of teachers reported that they were working 56 hours or more per week, compared to 5 percent pre-pandemic.

The vaccine was the promised land, but when it arrived nothing seemed to change. In an April 2021 survey  conducted four months after the first vaccine was administered in New York City, 92 percent of teachers said their jobs were more stressful than prior to the pandemic, up from 81 percent in an earlier survey.

It wasn’t just the length of the work days; a close look at the research reveals that the school system’s failure to adjust expectations was ruinous. It seemed to start with the obligations of hybrid teaching, which surfaced in Edutopia ’s coverage of overseas school reopenings. In June 2020, well before many U.S. schools reopened, we reported that hybrid teaching was an emerging problem internationally, and warned that if the “model is to work well for any period of time,” schools must “recognize and seek to reduce the workload for teachers.” Almost eight months later, a 2021 RAND study identified hybrid teaching as a primary source of teacher stress in the U.S., easily outpacing factors like the health of a high-risk loved one.

New and ever-increasing demands for tech solutions put teachers on a knife’s edge. In several important 2021 studies, researchers concluded that teachers were being pushed to adopt new technology without the “resources and equipment necessary for its correct didactic use.” Consequently, they were spending more than 20 hours a week adapting lessons for online use, and experiencing an unprecedented erosion of the boundaries between their work and home lives, leading to an unsustainable “always on” mentality. When it seemed like nothing more could be piled on—when all of the lights were blinking red—the federal government restarted standardized testing .

Change will be hard; many of the pathologies that exist in the system now predate the pandemic. But creating strict school policies that separate work from rest, eliminating the adoption of new tech tools without proper supports, distributing surveys regularly to gauge teacher well-being, and above all listening to educators to identify and confront emerging problems might be a good place to start, if the research can be believed.

The pandemic has had devastating impacts on learning. What will it take to help students catch up?

Subscribe to the brown center on education policy newsletter, megan kuhfeld , megan kuhfeld senior research scientist - nwea @megankuhfeld jim soland , jim soland assistant professor, school of education and human development - university of virginia, affiliated research fellow - nwea @jsoland karyn lewis , and karyn lewis director, center for school and student progress - nwea @karynlew emily morton emily morton research scientist - nwea @emily_r_morton.

March 3, 2022

As we reach the two-year mark of the initial wave of pandemic-induced school shutdowns, academic normalcy remains out of reach for many students, educators, and parents. In addition to surging COVID-19 cases at the end of 2021, schools have faced severe staff shortages , high rates of absenteeism and quarantines , and rolling school closures . Furthermore, students and educators continue to struggle with mental health challenges , higher rates of violence and misbehavior , and concerns about lost instructional time .

As we outline in our new research study released in January, the cumulative impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on students’ academic achievement has been large. We tracked changes in math and reading test scores across the first two years of the pandemic using data from 5.4 million U.S. students in grades 3-8. We focused on test scores from immediately before the pandemic (fall 2019), following the initial onset (fall 2020), and more than one year into pandemic disruptions (fall 2021).

Average fall 2021 math test scores in grades 3-8 were 0.20-0.27 standard deviations (SDs) lower relative to same-grade peers in fall 2019, while reading test scores were 0.09-0.18 SDs lower. This is a sizable drop. For context, the math drops are significantly larger than estimated impacts from other large-scale school disruptions, such as after Hurricane Katrina—math scores dropped 0.17 SDs in one year for New Orleans evacuees .

Even more concerning, test-score gaps between students in low-poverty and high-poverty elementary schools grew by approximately 20% in math (corresponding to 0.20 SDs) and 15% in reading (0.13 SDs), primarily during the 2020-21 school year. Further, achievement tended to drop more between fall 2020 and 2021 than between fall 2019 and 2020 (both overall and differentially by school poverty), indicating that disruptions to learning have continued to negatively impact students well past the initial hits following the spring 2020 school closures.

These numbers are alarming and potentially demoralizing, especially given the heroic efforts of students to learn and educators to teach in incredibly trying times. From our perspective, these test-score drops in no way indicate that these students represent a “ lost generation ” or that we should give up hope. Most of us have never lived through a pandemic, and there is so much we don’t know about students’ capacity for resiliency in these circumstances and what a timeline for recovery will look like. Nor are we suggesting that teachers are somehow at fault given the achievement drops that occurred between 2020 and 2021; rather, educators had difficult jobs before the pandemic, and now are contending with huge new challenges, many outside their control.

Clearly, however, there’s work to do. School districts and states are currently making important decisions about which interventions and strategies to implement to mitigate the learning declines during the last two years. Elementary and Secondary School Emergency Relief (ESSER) investments from the American Rescue Plan provided nearly $200 billion to public schools to spend on COVID-19-related needs. Of that sum, $22 billion is dedicated specifically to addressing learning loss using “evidence-based interventions” focused on the “ disproportionate impact of COVID-19 on underrepresented student subgroups. ” Reviews of district and state spending plans (see Future Ed , EduRecoveryHub , and RAND’s American School District Panel for more details) indicate that districts are spending their ESSER dollars designated for academic recovery on a wide variety of strategies, with summer learning, tutoring, after-school programs, and extended school-day and school-year initiatives rising to the top.

Comparing the negative impacts from learning disruptions to the positive impacts from interventions

To help contextualize the magnitude of the impacts of COVID-19, we situate test-score drops during the pandemic relative to the test-score gains associated with common interventions being employed by districts as part of pandemic recovery efforts. If we assume that such interventions will continue to be as successful in a COVID-19 school environment, can we expect that these strategies will be effective enough to help students catch up? To answer this question, we draw from recent reviews of research on high-dosage tutoring , summer learning programs , reductions in class size , and extending the school day (specifically for literacy instruction) . We report effect sizes for each intervention specific to a grade span and subject wherever possible (e.g., tutoring has been found to have larger effects in elementary math than in reading).

Figure 1 shows the standardized drops in math test scores between students testing in fall 2019 and fall 2021 (separately by elementary and middle school grades) relative to the average effect size of various educational interventions. The average effect size for math tutoring matches or exceeds the average COVID-19 score drop in math. Research on tutoring indicates that it often works best in younger grades, and when provided by a teacher rather than, say, a parent. Further, some of the tutoring programs that produce the biggest effects can be quite intensive (and likely expensive), including having full-time tutors supporting all students (not just those needing remediation) in one-on-one settings during the school day. Meanwhile, the average effect of reducing class size is negative but not significant, with high variability in the impact across different studies. Summer programs in math have been found to be effective (average effect size of .10 SDs), though these programs in isolation likely would not eliminate the COVID-19 test-score drops.

Figure 1: Math COVID-19 test-score drops compared to the effect sizes of various educational interventions

Source: COVID-19 score drops are pulled from Kuhfeld et al. (2022) Table 5; reduction-in-class-size results are from pg. 10 of Figles et al. (2018) Table 2; summer program results are pulled from Lynch et al (2021) Table 2; and tutoring estimates are pulled from Nictow et al (2020) Table 3B. Ninety-five percent confidence intervals are shown with vertical lines on each bar.

Notes: Kuhfeld et al. and Nictow et al. reported effect sizes separately by grade span; Figles et al. and Lynch et al. report an overall effect size across elementary and middle grades. We were unable to find a rigorous study that reported effect sizes for extending the school day/year on math performance. Nictow et al. and Kraft & Falken (2021) also note large variations in tutoring effects depending on the type of tutor, with larger effects for teacher and paraprofessional tutoring programs than for nonprofessional and parent tutoring. Class-size reductions included in the Figles meta-analysis ranged from a minimum of one to minimum of eight students per class.

Figure 2 displays a similar comparison using effect sizes from reading interventions. The average effect of tutoring programs on reading achievement is larger than the effects found for the other interventions, though summer reading programs and class size reduction both produced average effect sizes in the ballpark of the COVID-19 reading score drops.

Figure 2: Reading COVID-19 test-score drops compared to the effect sizes of various educational interventions

Source: COVID-19 score drops are pulled from Kuhfeld et al. (2022) Table 5; extended-school-day results are from Figlio et al. (2018) Table 2; reduction-in-class-size results are from pg. 10 of Figles et al. (2018) ; summer program results are pulled from Kim & Quinn (2013) Table 3; and tutoring estimates are pulled from Nictow et al (2020) Table 3B. Ninety-five percent confidence intervals are shown with vertical lines on each bar.

Notes: While Kuhfeld et al. and Nictow et al. reported effect sizes separately by grade span, Figlio et al. and Kim & Quinn report an overall effect size across elementary and middle grades. Class-size reductions included in the Figles meta-analysis ranged from a minimum of one to minimum of eight students per class.

There are some limitations of drawing on research conducted prior to the pandemic to understand our ability to address the COVID-19 test-score drops. First, these studies were conducted under conditions that are very different from what schools currently face, and it is an open question whether the effectiveness of these interventions during the pandemic will be as consistent as they were before the pandemic. Second, we have little evidence and guidance about the efficacy of these interventions at the unprecedented scale that they are now being considered. For example, many school districts are expanding summer learning programs, but school districts have struggled to find staff interested in teaching summer school to meet the increased demand. Finally, given the widening test-score gaps between low- and high-poverty schools, it’s uncertain whether these interventions can actually combat the range of new challenges educators are facing in order to narrow these gaps. That is, students could catch up overall, yet the pandemic might still have lasting, negative effects on educational equality in this country.

Given that the current initiatives are unlikely to be implemented consistently across (and sometimes within) districts, timely feedback on the effects of initiatives and any needed adjustments will be crucial to districts’ success. The Road to COVID Recovery project and the National Student Support Accelerator are two such large-scale evaluation studies that aim to produce this type of evidence while providing resources for districts to track and evaluate their own programming. Additionally, a growing number of resources have been produced with recommendations on how to best implement recovery programs, including scaling up tutoring , summer learning programs , and expanded learning time .

Ultimately, there is much work to be done, and the challenges for students, educators, and parents are considerable. But this may be a moment when decades of educational reform, intervention, and research pay off. Relying on what we have learned could show the way forward.

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Educational outcomes of recess in elementary school children: A mixed-methods systematic review

Erin K. Howie

1 Department of Health, Human Performance and Recreation, University of Arkansas, Fayetteville, Arkansas, United States of America

Kristi L. Perryman

2 Department of Rehabilitation, Human Resources and Communication Disorders, University of Arkansas, Fayetteville, Arkansas, United States of America

Joseph Moretta

Laura cameron.

3 University Libraries, University of Arkansas, Fayetteville, AR, United States of America

Associated Data

All relevant data are within the paper and its Supporting Information files

Recess provides a key physical activity opportunity for students in school, yet a wide range of recess requirements exist. To design optimal recess policies, the effect of recess on students’ educational outcomes must be better understood. Therefore, the purpose of this mixed-method systematic review is to identify and systematically evaluate research on the effects of recess on student educational outcomes, including behavior, cognitive performance and academic achievement.

A systematic search of the literature in ERIC (EBSCO), ProQuest Central, PsycINFO, Teacher Reference Center, MEDLINE Complete (EBSCO), and CINAHL Complete was performed through September 2022. Data was extracted from quantitative studies, and reported themes with exemplar quotes were extracted from qualitative studies. The Mixed Method Appraisal Tool (MMAT) was used to assess study quality.

The search identified 932 articles, of which 13 were included in the review, including 8 quantitative and 5 qualitative studies. Eleven studies were conducted in the United States, and reported sample size of studies ranged from 12 to 11,624. Studies found mixed effects on student behavior, discipline referrals and academic achievement. Qualitative studies reported multiple benefits of recess including increased focus, improved problem solving and academic achievement.

Conclusions

Overall, evidence suggests positive benefits for behavior and either positive or null benefits of recess on academic achievement. However, evidence is limited by non-controlled study designs and diversity in outcome assessments. Additional quantitative evidence is needed to convince policymakers of the specific evidence supporting recess, but also to advise on the optimal recess policies and practices to improve student learning.

Introduction

In the United States, only nine states require recess in elementary schools according to the National Association of State Boards of Education: Arizona, Arkansas, Connecticut, Florida, Missouri, New Jersey, Rhode Island, Virginia, and West Virginia [ 1 ], with Washington and California most recently deliberating bills. Even within the small group of states with recess legislation, these policies vary widely. For example, Arizona requires two distinct recess periods without specifying duration, Arkansas requires a minimum of 40 minutes of daily recess [ 1 ], while the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) recommends 20 minutes of daily recess for children [ 2 ]. Media reports and advocates cite the benefits of recess for educational outcomes as the driving factor behind these requirements [ 3 ]. The American Academy of Pediatrics supports the need for recess with a policy statement describing the importance of recess for social, emotional, physical and cognitive development [ 4 ]. However, the body of scientific evidence has not been systematically summarized to help inform current and future policies on optimal durations and implementation of recess practices to achieve maximal educational outcomes. Thus, there is a need to better understand the evidence supporting the impact of recess on academic outcomes.

Recess, according to the CDC is “…a regularly scheduled period in the school day for physical activity and play that is monitored by trained staff or volunteers,” and it includes opportunities for physical activity [ 2 ]. A large amount of literature has assessed the amount of physical activity obtained during recess e.g. [ 5 , 6 ], including interventions to increase it [ 7 ]. There are several benefits of this recess physical activity for children. While there is an association with decreased risks of obesity, diabetes, heart disease, cancer and poor mental health [ 8 ], research has found that physical activity specifically during recess may improve children’s cardiorespiratory fitness and body composition [ 9 , 10 ]. This highlights that recess can provide a substantial physical activity opportunity for children during the school day.

There has been a growing body of research on the association between physical activity and educational outcomes in children, both immediately after physical activity and after regular exercise [ 11 , 12 ]. Educational outcomes examined have included cognition, on-task behavior, and academic achievement [ 11 – 13 ]. A meta-analysis of 26 studies found physical activity improved classroom behaviors and mathematics and reaching achievement [ 13 ], while another meta-analysis of 31 studies found acute physical activity improved attention, but regular physical activity had improvements on attention, executive functions and academic achievement in children [ 11 ]. When examining acute effects of physical activity, Hillman et al. found changes in brain activity and cognitive performance in nine to ten year old children following 20 minutes of treadmill walking [ 14 ]. Comparatively, to examine the effects of regular physical activity, a nine month afterschool program found improvements in executive functions [ 15 ], however a three-year classroom physical activity intervention found no intervention effects on academic achievement [ 16 ]. Studies have examined the positive acute effects of physical activity on on-task behavior and attention in the classroom, with a systematic review finding confirming these positive effects [ 17 ]. While there are several limitations in previous research including unknown effects of the duration and intensity of physical activity [ 11 , 13 , 17 ], evidence suggests physical activity can improve educational outcomes in children.

Besides its opportunity for physical activity, recess may provide a unique physical activity opportunity, that not only includes the physiological response to physical activity, but also benefits of being outdoors, interacting with other children, and enabling creative time during free play (Carlson et al., 2015; CDC, 2020; Hillman et al., 2014; Perryman, et al., 2022). Early research by Piaget classified the developmental stages of play as critical to the intellectual and cognitive development of children [ 18 ]. Due to the many benefits of play for development in children, play is guaranteed in the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child [ 19 ]. As designed, recess includes social interaction, where children have opportunities to develop social skills, practice conflict resolution, and problem-solving skills allowing them to cultivate essential social skills [ 20 ]. Activities during recess, such as creative play, can have additional benefits for student outcomes [ 21 ]. Recess is typically outdoors, and research on exposure to outdoor nature suggests affective, cognitive, and physical benefits for children [ 22 ], leading to a group of Canadian experts creating a position statement on the importance of outdoor active play [ 23 ]. Outdoor play, compared to indoor play, includes exposure to nature, sunlight, increased opportunities for risky play, and reduced exposure to potential harms of the internet and screentime which can all influence developmental outcomes [ 23 ]. Research suggests that a 15 minute walk outdoors improves cognitive functions such as attention and working memory, while walking indoors, did not [ 24 ]. Thus, it is plausible that recess may have effects on educational outcomes in addition to the benefits solely from participating in physical activity.

In order to better understand the effect of recess on educational outcomes, the current literature should first be critically reviewed. Therefore, the purpose of this systematic review was to search and systematically evaluate research on the effects of recess on student educational outcomes, including behavior, cognitive performance and academic achievement. This will help to identify gaps to address in future research and ultimately offer best practice policies for stakeholders and policymakers.

Search. The search strategy was registered in PROSPERO [CRD42021221579] and the original protocol is included as Supplementary material 1. The only deviation from the registered protocol was the exclusion of using the GRADE assessment due to the limited search findings and study types. The PRISMA 2020 checklist [ 25 ] was used to guide methodology and reporting for this systematic review and the completed checklist is attached as Supplementary Material 2. The search was performed by a health sciences librarian and included the following electronic bibliographic databases: ERIC (EBSCO), ProQuest Central, APA PsycINFO (EBSCO), Teacher Reference Center, MEDLINE Complete (EBSCO), and CINAHL Complete and included “school” and “recess”. The search strategy for MEDLINE Complete (EBSCO) was as follows: S1. MH “Schools+”, S2. Recess, S3. S1 AND S2 with Limiters: 01-01-2009 to present. The original search was performed in 2019, and thus a 10 year window was used to include recent research. The search was repeated in September 2021 and September 2022 to update search results. The search strategy was adapted for use with other bibliographic databases. No language restrictions were used in the search strategy. Results were limited by date, with results included through September 2022 and published before 2009 excluded. Limiters for source type of academic journal or dissertation were used in ERIC, ProQuest Central, APA PsycINFO, and CINAHL Complete. Following the search, dissertations were removed due to potential duplication with published manuscripts and differing peer-review processes from published peer-reviewed manuscripts. Results were exported to EndNote citation manager, which was used to identify and remove duplicates. In addition to searching electronic bibliographic databases, a hand search was executed to retrieve additional studies for inclusion. The hand search included examining bibliographies of included articles.

The criteria list for study inclusion was based on the following: primary sourced, English language, all elementary (defined as kindergarten through 6 th grade) students, recess defined as a regular unstructured break in the school day typically outdoors and including an educational outcome. Educational outcomes considered were defined from previous literature to include student behaviors (i.e. on-task behavior, classroom behavior) cognitive functions (i.e., executive functions, attention, memory, IQ) and academic achievement (i.e., classroom grades, standardized tests, classroom behavior), and could include perceived changes in these outcomes from qualitative studies. All study designs were included. Studies examining a particular population sub-set (e.g., students with autism) were excluded. Additionally, studies of interventions where recess was manipulated and no longer unstructured activity (e.g., a fitness program during recess or an educational program) or part of a multicomponent study where the individual effects of recess were not separated were excluded unless the effects of recess alone were reported.

Two reviewers independently assessed titles, abstracts and full-articles for inclusion. Disagreements were settled by a consensus or when necessary a third senior reviewer. Relevant PICO (population, intervention, comparison and outcomes) information from quantitative studies was extracted by two reviewers separately, and then reviewed until consensus was reached. Reported themes with exemplar quotes were extracted from qualitative studies [ 26 ]. A senior researcher (Author EKH) supervised the review and facilitated discussion of disagreements. Study quality was assessed by two reviewers in consultation. Due to the potential for numerical rating systems to under identify bias, subjective interpretation is recommended [ 27 ]. Due to the heterogeneity in study designs, the Mixed Method Appraisal Tool (MMAT) was used for qualitative and quantitative studies. This rating system has been widely used across disciplines and guides reviewers to assess internal validity of multiple study types [ 28 ]. Within person studies were evaluated as quantitative non-randomized studies. The tool developers discourage the use of overall scoring but advise for detailed presentation of the ratings of each criterion, thus individual scores for each item are reported and overall bias of studies is discussed.

Summary of search process

The PRISMA flow diagram can be seen in Fig 1 . After removing duplicates, 658 articles were found and 50 were added through a hand search of reference lists. 671 articles were excluded after examining titles, including 71 dissertations or theses by reported publication type. Thirty-seven full articles were reviewed and 24 were excluded, resulting in 13 included articles. The primary reasons for exclusion were not examining an association between recess and educational outcomes, recess was not separately examined from other physical activity opportunities, or the study included an additional recess intervention.

The number of studies identified, screened and included through the systematic review process.

Study details

There was wide heterogeneity in studies, and a summary of quantitative studies can be seen in Table 1 and qualitative studies in Table 2 . Study publication dates ranged from 2009 to 2021. Study designs included qualitative (n = 5), quantitative descriptive (n = 3), and quantitative non-randomized (n = 5). All but two of the studies were conducted in the United States (Texas n = 1, New York n = 1, Kentucky = 2, Mississippi n = 1, multiple states n = 5, not reported n = 1); the international studies were from Turkey and Greece. Quantitative studies included students from kindergarten through 6 th grade. Sample size of quantitative studies ranged from 12 to 11,624 participants with one study not reporting included sample size [ 29 ]. Three studies were secondary analyses of the Early Childhood Longitudinal Studies–Kindergarten class of 1998–1999 (ECLS-K). In the experimental studies, the majority were pre-post designs. Two tested the effects of increasing the amount and frequency of recess to two, 15 minute recesses [ 30 , 31 ]. Quantitative studies on the LiiNK project, a specific recess intervention where four,15 minute recess periods were implemented, were excluded due to the LiiNK program also including a character development intervention [ 32 , 33 ]. Another two studies evaluated the acute effects after a single recess period [ 34 , 35 ]. One study examined the timing of discipline referrals related to recess scheduling [ 31 ]. Qualitative study participants included teachers, principals, parents and students. Three examined perceptions of recess benefits in general [ 36 – 38 ], one examined perceptions of the LiiNK program which increased recess to four, 15 minute recesses per day [ 39 ], and one compared perceptions of regular recess to a structured activity program Let Grow Play Club [ 40 ].

Relationships between recess and educational outcomes

Of the quantitative studies, 5 studies examined some type of behavior which included observed on-task behavior,[ 33 , 35 ] teacher rated classroom behavior [ 42 , 44 ], and discipline referrals[ 30 , 31 ]. In the ECLS-K data, Barros et al found that having some recess was associated with better teacher reported behavior compared to having minimal or no daily recess [ 42 ]. Stapp examined on-task behavior immediately after a 25 minute recess, compared to before recess and found that on-task behavior improved but did not have a control comparison [ 35 ]. Using a paired-test for the 12 included participants, time on-task increased from 36.6% to 70.3%. Massey et al found better recess quality was associated with some aspects of behavior [ 44 ]. Two studies utilizing the same natural experiment found that discipline referrals increased when recess doubled from one, 15 minute recess to 2, 15 minute recesses utilizing mixed-effects models [ 30 ], but more discipline referrals were made with increased time elapsed from the scheduled recess [ 31 ].

Three studies examined the effect of recess on academic achievement. Yesil Dagli found no relationship between recess duration or frequency with reading scores in the ECLS-K kindergarten sample [ 43 ], Dills found no effects of recess time on reading or math achievement longitudinally in the ECLS-K cohort [ 29 ], while Erwin et al. found improved math achievement scores but not reading after recess increased from one recess to two 15 minute recesses [ 30 ]. Other outcomes included cognitive tasks of sustained attention and creativity [ 34 ]. Sustained attention, but not creativity, improved following a single recess period among 3 rd and 5 th graders [ 34 ].

Of the themes discussed in the qualitative studies relating to the perceived benefits of recess, participants reported multiple perceived benefits. Three studies described focus [ 36 , 39 , 40 ], and three described benefits in problem solving skills [ 36 , 39 , 40 ]. Two studies described better academic achievement as a perceived benefit [ 37 , 39 ]. Two mentioned creativity [ 38 , 39 ], and two mentioned improvements to behavior [ 36 , 37 ]. Only one study conducted by Ozkal in Turkey reported a negative theme, that students become distracted by preferring to be out at recess [ 37 ].

Study quality

Results from the MMAT assessment can be found in Table 3 . All but one qualitative study was of good methodological quality for each criterion. The one mixed-methods study rated highly for the qualitative component but did not integrate the quantitative and qualitative components towards an overall research purpose. The quantitative non-randomized studies had varying quality mostly due to lack of reporting of sample characteristics and missingness in outcome data. Two studies were limited in their ability to answer the proposed research questions, one due to a small sample size and one due to the combination of lunch and recess in the exposure. The quantitative descriptive studies were at minimal risk of bias.

Y Yes, N No, C Can’t determine, NA not applicable, S1 : Are there clear research questions? S2 : Do the collected data allow to address the research questions? 1.1 : Is the qualitative approach appropriate to answer the research question? 1.2 : Are the qualitative data collection methods adequate to address the research question? 1.3 : Are the findings adequately derived from the data? 1.4 : Is the interpretation of results sufficiently substantiated by data? 1.5 : Is there coherence between qualitative data sources, collection, analysis and interpretation? 3.1. Are the participants representative of the target population? 3.2 . Are measurements appropriate regarding both the outcome and intervention (or exposure)? 3.3 . Are there complete outcome data? 3.4 . Are the confounders accounted for in the design and analysis? 3.5 . During the study period, is the intervention administered (or exposure occurred) as intended? 4.1 . Is the sampling strategy relevant to address the research question? 4.2 . Is the sample representative of the target population? 4.3. Are the measurements appropriate? 4.4 . Is the risk of nonresponse bias low? 4.5 . Is the statistical analysis appropriate to answer the research question? 5.1 . Is there an adequate rationale for using a mixed methods design to address the research question? 5.2 . Are the different components of the study effectively integrated to answer the research question? 5.3 . Are the outputs of the integration of qualitative and quantitative components adequately interpreted? 5.4 . Are divergences and inconsistencies between quantitative and qualitative results adequately addressed? 5.5 . Do the different components of the study adhere to the quality criteria of each tradition of the methods involved?

This review examined the relationships between recess and educational outcomes in elementary students. Overall, quantitative evidence suggests positive benefits for behavior and either positive or null benefits of recess on academic achievement. Qualitative reports from teachers describe multiple benefits including problem solving and focus. However, evidence is limited by non-controlled study designs and diversity in outcome assessments.

Studies found that either having more recess [ 35 , 42 ] or better quality recess [ 44 ] was associated with better student behavior, however, the magnitude of the effect cannot be interpreted from the few studies, diverse study designs and measures, and consistent reporting of statistical findings. This may be due to several underlying cognitive or executive function mechanisms such as neuroelectric changes in response to acute bouts of exercise [ 46 ] or changes in brain health, structure and function [ 47 ]. However, another study found that the number of discipline referrals increased with a doubling of recess time [ 30 ]. This is likely due to a high percentage of discipline referrals occurring during recess; thus, increasing the duration of recess would increase the amount of discipline referrals. Additionally, there has been variety in how student behavior has been assessed from official discipline referrals to teacher reported behavior to observed classroom behavior. The study which evaluated the implementation of two, 15 minute recesses in Kentucky, also found that the occurrence of discipline referrals increased as time since the last recess elapsed [ 31 ]. This has important implications for principals scheduling recess. It may be best to reduce discipline referrals by spreading recess throughout the day to minimize long durations of school time without recess. Additionally, for schools, districts, and states considering increasing the amount of recess, it may be prudent to i nclude positive behavior or conflict resolution curriculums to help mitigate increases in discipline referrals. Playworks is a non-profit organization that provides training, staffing and resources to improve the quality of recess that has shown to improve physical activity in girls [ 48 ], teacher perceptions of safety and inclusion, and reduced teacher perceptions of bullying and time to transition to learning activities [ 49 ]. Other strategies such as schoolyard greening [ 50 ], or token economy incentives [ 51 ], might improve play and reduce negative behaviors and ultimately improve educational outcomes for students.

The quantitative studies did not specifically examine a dose response between recess duration and outcomes, however, the experimental studies that had improved outcomes examined a 25 minute recess period [ 35 ], or two 15 minute recess periods [ 30 ]. Additionally, in a study where greater recess time was associated with lower externalizing problems, the average recess time was 30 minutes with a range from 20 to 60 minutes [ 44 ]. Additionally, three of the qualitative studies where recess duration was specified were all 40 minutes of daily recess or more, with two breaking up the total time into shorter periods [ 39 , 45 ]. While the evidence is limited, this suggests that there may be additional educational benefits of recess length longer than the CDC recommended 20 minutes per day, but that this can be broken up into shorter recess periods.

Only three studies directly examined the effect of recess on academic achievement, with studies utilizing the ECLS-K cohort finding no relationship between recess and academic achievement measured as math and reading achievement on the National Assessment of Educational Progress [ 29 , 43 ], and one study finding an increase in math achievement on the Measure of Academic Progress (MAP) standardized test with two, 15 minute recesses per day [ 30 ]. This is important as often increasing recess time is considered to take away from classroom learning time; however, the additional time allocated to recess was not shown to reduce academic achievement. Other academic related outcomes such as sustained attention and creativity [ 34 ] have been shown to improve immediately following a recess period. More studies examining the effects of recess on these cognitive outcomes, both acutely and longer term, may help to bridge the gap in understanding the impact of recess on more distal academic achievement [ 12 ]. Physical activity has been shown to improve cognitive performance, particularly executive functions, even after 20 minutes of walking in children [ 14 ]. In addition to the physical benefits of physical exercise, recess, which also includes social interactions, games, and opportunities for creative play, may have additional cognitive benefits compared to non-cognitively engaging physical activity [ 21 ]. Additional research examining the acute effects of recess, and some of the contextual factors of recess, on both cognitive performance and behavior may provide intermediary mechanisms to influence ultimate academic achievement. Potential contextual factors that may influence recess could be the intensity of physical activity, type of play, peer interactions, and teacher involvement [ 21 , 52 ].

Other similar reviews conducted have differed in their methodology. One recent systematic review searched for in-school play opportunities, without focusing on recess [ 53 ]. However, they were unable to find studies of other in-school play opportunities and qualitatively reviewed 20 studies on recess. They concluded that recess was beneficial for student behavior with mixed outcomes for academic achievement; however, they did not include a discussion of differences in outcome measures and the review included recess interventions where play was structured such as the Playworks program. Another review specifically looking at recess included nine studies [ 54 ]. While they excluded recess interventions, they did not conduct a study quality assessment and i ncluded studies on the physical benefits of recess physical activity. They concluded that recess does not have a negative impact on academic achievement and has positive benefits on student behavior. The strengths of the current systematic review were pre-registration in PROSPERO, systematic approach to reviewing quantitative and qualitative literature, in addition to a systematic review of study quality.

The studies included in this review were quasi-experimental and most lacked a control condition. This is expected as changes to recess durations often involve large scale policies or school district changes that do not lend themselves to randomized control trials. Leading experts on school physical activity interventions have advocated for the need to include context in both the design and evaluation of programs and policies [ 55 ]. Importantly, they emphasize the need to consider other rigorous study designs to randomized control trials. Natural experiments may be helpful to examine the impact of changes in recess policies [ 56 ]. Additionally, as the effects of recess may be acute, within subject designs may help to elucidate some of these acute cognitive and behavioral impacts immediately following recess. While the qualitative studies reported generally favorable perceptions of recess by teachers and stakeholders, additional quantitative evidence is needed to convince policymakers of the specific evidence supporting recess, but also to advise on the optimal recess policies and practices to improve student learning.

This review only examined English language, peer-reviewed, primary research articles. Many commentaries and dissertations from the education field were not included, though not all met inclusion and exclusion criteria, to avoid duplication with peer-reviewed articles and maintain a consistent standard of peer-reviewed evidence. To avoid publishing bias, it may be beneficial for students and their mentors to produce high quality, publishable research to submit before or after graduation. Additionally, this review did not include widely heterogenous intervention studies where recess was manipulated in order to examine the effects of standard recess. Some of these interventions [ 48 , 51 ] have shown to have positive effects on student behaviors, and many are included within wider school-based physical activity interventions [ 57 ]. As recess has a large potential reach, many schools may not have the resources to implement staff or equipment intensive recess programs. However, they may be able to schedule additional recess time, if they are provided evidence on the optimal scheduling and tangible, meaningful outcomes for students’ academic achievement. Furthermore, these interventions may provide information on some of the contextual factors, such as teacher involvement, peer behaviors, and loose equipment needs that can help to guide practitioners when resources are available.

This systematic review found limited evidence that recess may be associated with improved student behavior, with no negative effects on academic achievement. The optimal daily recess duration may be greater than 20 minutes, with multiple recess periods in a day. However, the current evidence is heterogenous and limited by methodological rigor and outcome assessments. Researchers should conduct natural experiments or other controlled study designs to further clarify the effects of recess quantity and quality on student educational outcomes, including acute responses in cognitive function. Though additional evidence on the effects of the optimal recess dosage is still needed to maximize the potential improvements to not only student health, but also educational outcomes, educational stakeholders such as superintendents, principals, or legislators should consider implementing CDC recommended 20 minutes of daily recess and potentially more.

Supporting information

S1 checklist, funding statement.

The author(s) received no specific funding for this work.

Data Availability

• PLoS One. 2023; 18(11): e0294340.

Decision Letter 0

14 Aug 2023

PONE-D-23-20058Educational outcomes of recess in elementary school children: A mixed-methods systematic reviewPLOS ONE

Dear Dr. Howie,

Thank you for submitting your manuscript to PLOS ONE. After careful consideration, we feel that it has merit but does not fully meet PLOS ONE’s publication criteria as it currently stands. Therefore, we invite you to submit a revised version of the manuscript that addresses the points raised during the review process.

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Reviewer #1: Yes

Reviewer #2: Partly

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Reviewer #1: N/A

Reviewer #2: I Don't Know

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Reviewer #2: Yes

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Reviewer #1: An interesting and important study. The paper would have benefited from inclusion of some statistical data to exemplify the degree to which interventions affects outcomes because this was largely absent. A few additional suggestions to improve the paper.

Page 6 line 95, it may be useful to elaborate a little on the concept of playing outdoors compared to indoors as this may be pivotal to your argument.

Page 11 Line 168. Yu mention that your studies included through to grade 6, but your methods say grade 5 (page7 line 123), this needs to be reconciled.

Page 19 and 20, discuss aspects that suggest shorter recess periods (discipline referrals) and longer recess periods ((educational benefits). It would be nice to see these two concepts integrated into a single argument to provide a more structured conclusion and opinion.

Reviewer #2: I am reviewing this manuscript from the lens of my expertise, evidence synthesis information retrieval. I am concerns about the lack of detail about the search which makes it irreproducible.

PRISMA Flow should have total # of results form electronic databases pre and post deduplication. There isn't enough detail about the search strategy to be reproducible.

A search in ERIC (Ebsco) for

( DE "Recess Breaks" OR TI (Recess) OR AB (Recess) ) AND ( TI (School*) OR AB (School*) )

limited to 2009 to present gave me 413 results on Aug. 2, 2023. That's just one database which has me confused about the total number of unique search results.

See PRISMA guidelines for each database total needing to be represented in the flow diagram.

Limiting to English-only should be listed as a limitation. The 2009 publication date limit should be justified and/or listed as a limitation.

It's unclear how duplicates were removed pre-screening. Was it a citation manager like Zotero? Covidence? Please indicate. I am happy to see that handsearching was conducted to find things not showing up in the electronic search strategy.

In the body of the manuscript, the search strategy is described but without enough information to make it reproducible.

MH is not a field code in ERIC so the depiction of the search doesn't make sense. MH is likely reflecting field codes in either CINAHL or Medline.

Electronic search strategies should consist of relevant subject headings and search terms (e.g., titles and abstract fields). In ERIC, the subject heading for recess is DE Recess Breaks. Authors should disclose which platform was used to search PsycINFO (Ovid? Ebsco?).

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Reviewer #2: No

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Author response to Decision Letter 0

28 Aug 2023

Overall, we thank both Reviewers’ for their careful review and thoughtful critiques. We believe the detailed changes as detailed below, including a more complete description of the search strategy, strengthen the review.

Reviewer #1: An interesting and important study. The paper would have benefited from inclusion of some statistical data to exemplify the degree to which interventions affects outcomes because this was largely absent. A few additional suggestions to improve the paper.

Response to Review: We thank the Reviewer for their interest and positive view of our study. With the few quantitative studies of various designs, we were not able to conduct a complete meta-analysis of the intervention effects as there were only four experimental studies which had wide variation in the completeness of reporting for statistical interpretation. We have added description of individual statistical findings when it would aid in interpreting, e.g. “Using a paired-test for the 12 included participants, time on-task increased from 36.6% to 70.3%.” We have added this limitation to the Discussion, “however, the magnitude of the effect cannot be interpreted from the few studies, diverse study designs and measures, and consistent reporting of statistical findings.

Response to Review: We have added to the discussion of the benefits of outdoor exposure, in addition to the previous empirical evidence directly comparing indoor and outdoor walking.” Outdoor play, compared to indoor play, includes exposure to nature, sunlight, increased opportunities for risky play, and reduced exposure to potential harms of the internet and screentime which can all influence developmental outcomes [54].”

Response to Review: We apologize for the mistake. Elementary was defined as kindergarten through 6th grade and this has been clarified in the Methods.

Response to Review: Only one study (with 2 reports) included in the review found an increase in discipline referrals, with 3 studies suggesting positive effects on student behavior, and no studies have directly measured both behavior and discipline referrals. We have included a practical discussion of these findings, “This has important implications for principals scheduling recess. It may be best to reduce discipline referrals by spreading recess throughout the day to minimize long durations of school time without recess. Additionally, for schools, districts, and states considering increasing the amount of recess, it may be prudent to include positive behavior or conflict resolution curriculums to help mitigate increases in discipline referrals.”

Reviewer #2: I am reviewing this manuscript from the lens of my expertise, evidence synthesis information retrieval. I am concerns about the lack of detail about the search which makes it irreproducible.

Response to Review: The authors appreciate the Reviewer’s expertise and feedback, and have incorporated revisions to the manuscript to address the reviewers concerns. Notably, the PRISMA Flow diagram has been updated with more complete information, including the number of unique results located within each database pre-duplication.

The methods section has been expanded to make the search strategies used more explicit and, in turn, more reproducible. We thank the reviewer for catching the error in our provided search statement, which was the search for MEDLINE Complete, not ERIC. Other errors, such as the missing platform name used to search APA PsycINFO, have also been fixed.

Response to Review: We have updated the PRISMA flow chart to include the total results from each database.

Response to Review: We have more clearly defined the search strategy in the Methods section, along with the search results by database.

Response to Review: We have updated our PRISMA flow chart to include the results from each database.

Response to Review: We have clarified in the methods that the 2009 date was included from the first search in 2019, which was later repeated to update the results. We have added the English-only limitation to the Discussion.

Response to Review: Duplicates were removed using a citation manager, which we have added ot the Methods section.

Response to Review: We have added detail to the search strategy in the Methods section.

Response to Review: Our apologies for the mis-identified example search (MEDLINE Complete (EBSCO). We have more specifically identified the databases searched.

Response to Review: We have specified the APA PsycINFO (EBSCO) platform was used.

Submitted filename: Response to Review.docx

Decision Letter 1

31 Oct 2023

PONE-D-23-20058R1

We’re pleased to inform you that your manuscript has been judged scientifically suitable for publication and will be formally accepted for publication once it meets all outstanding technical requirements.

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Francisco Wilker Mustafa Gomes Muniz

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Reviewer #1: All comments have been addressed

Reviewer #2: All comments have been addressed

2. Is the manuscript technically sound, and do the data support the conclusions?

3. Has the statistical analysis been performed appropriately and rigorously?

4. Have the authors made all data underlying the findings in their manuscript fully available?

5. Is the manuscript presented in an intelligible fashion and written in standard English?

6. Review Comments to the Author

Reviewer #1: I accept the response regarding absence of statistical information and thank you for addressing the remaining queries.

Reviewer #2: Thank you for the opportunity to review the revision of this manuscript. I am pleased to see that the team modified their PRISMA flow diagram to reflect key details (result totals, platforms). Additionally the methods section was expanded to include more detail about the search strategies. The syntax is now correctly labeled for ERIC. Thank you for clarifying deduplication details. In the future, please search with multiple metadata fields and OR them together. For example in Medline (Ebsco), it'd be (MH Schools+ OR TI school* OR AB school*) AND (TI recess OR AB recess). Since you did citation searching by-hand, I am hopeful that any items missed during your electronic search strategy were caught via your complementary handsearching. Also, it's a PRISMA 2020 rule to include the full electronic search strategy (not handsearching) for all databases. I recommend including those in the appendix or supplemental files.

7. PLOS authors have the option to publish the peer review history of their article ( what does this mean? ). If published, this will include your full peer review and any attached files.

Acceptance letter

13 Nov 2023

Dear Dr. Howie:

I'm pleased to inform you that your manuscript has been deemed suitable for publication in PLOS ONE. Congratulations! Your manuscript is now with our production department.

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PLOS ONE Editorial Office Staff

on behalf of

Dr. Francisco Wilker Mustafa Gomes Muniz

Research Topics & Ideas: Education

170+ Research Ideas To Fast-Track Your Project

If you’re just starting out exploring education-related topics for your dissertation, thesis or research project, you’ve come to the right place. In this post, we’ll help kickstart your research topic ideation process by providing a hearty list of research topics and ideas , including examples from actual dissertations and theses..

PS – This is just the start…

We know it’s exciting to run through a list of research topics, but please keep in mind that this list is just a starting point . To develop a suitable education-related research topic, you’ll need to identify a clear and convincing research gap , and a viable plan of action to fill that gap.

If this sounds foreign to you, check out our free research topic webinar that explores how to find and refine a high-quality research topic, from scratch. Alternatively, if you’d like hands-on help, consider our 1-on-1 coaching service .

Overview: Education Research Topics

• How to find a research topic (video)
• List of 50+ education-related research topics/ideas
• List of 120+ level-specific research topics 
• Examples of actual dissertation topics in education
• Tips to fast-track your topic ideation (video)
• Free Webinar : Topic Ideation 101
• Where to get extra help

Education-Related Research Topics & Ideas

Below you’ll find a list of education-related research topics and idea kickstarters. These are fairly broad and flexible to various contexts, so keep in mind that you will need to refine them a little. Nevertheless, they should inspire some ideas for your project.

• The impact of school funding on student achievement
• The effects of social and emotional learning on student well-being
• The effects of parental involvement on student behaviour
• The impact of teacher training on student learning
• The impact of classroom design on student learning
• The impact of poverty on education
• The use of student data to inform instruction
• The role of parental involvement in education
• The effects of mindfulness practices in the classroom
• The use of technology in the classroom
• The role of critical thinking in education
• The use of formative and summative assessments in the classroom
• The use of differentiated instruction in the classroom
• The use of gamification in education
• The effects of teacher burnout on student learning
• The impact of school leadership on student achievement
• The effects of teacher diversity on student outcomes
• The role of teacher collaboration in improving student outcomes
• The implementation of blended and online learning
• The effects of teacher accountability on student achievement
• The effects of standardized testing on student learning
• The effects of classroom management on student behaviour
• The effects of school culture on student achievement
• The use of student-centred learning in the classroom
• The impact of teacher-student relationships on student outcomes
• The achievement gap in minority and low-income students
• The use of culturally responsive teaching in the classroom
• The impact of teacher professional development on student learning
• The use of project-based learning in the classroom
• The effects of teacher expectations on student achievement
• The use of adaptive learning technology in the classroom
• The impact of teacher turnover on student learning
• The effects of teacher recruitment and retention on student learning
• The impact of early childhood education on later academic success
• The impact of parental involvement on student engagement
• The use of positive reinforcement in education
• The impact of school climate on student engagement
• The role of STEM education in preparing students for the workforce
• The effects of school choice on student achievement
• The use of technology in the form of online tutoring

Level-Specific Research Topics

Looking for research topics for a specific level of education? We’ve got you covered. Below you can find research topic ideas for primary, secondary and tertiary-level education contexts. Click the relevant level to view the respective list.

Research Topics: Pick An Education Level

Primary education.

• Investigating the effects of peer tutoring on academic achievement in primary school
• Exploring the benefits of mindfulness practices in primary school classrooms
• Examining the effects of different teaching strategies on primary school students’ problem-solving skills
• The use of storytelling as a teaching strategy in primary school literacy instruction
• The role of cultural diversity in promoting tolerance and understanding in primary schools
• The impact of character education programs on moral development in primary school students
• Investigating the use of technology in enhancing primary school mathematics education
• The impact of inclusive curriculum on promoting equity and diversity in primary schools
• The impact of outdoor education programs on environmental awareness in primary school students
• The influence of school climate on student motivation and engagement in primary schools
• Investigating the effects of early literacy interventions on reading comprehension in primary school students
• The impact of parental involvement in school decision-making processes on student achievement in primary schools
• Exploring the benefits of inclusive education for students with special needs in primary schools
• Investigating the effects of teacher-student feedback on academic motivation in primary schools
• The role of technology in developing digital literacy skills in primary school students
• Effective strategies for fostering a growth mindset in primary school students
• Investigating the role of parental support in reducing academic stress in primary school children
• The role of arts education in fostering creativity and self-expression in primary school students
• Examining the effects of early childhood education programs on primary school readiness
• Examining the effects of homework on primary school students’ academic performance
• The role of formative assessment in improving learning outcomes in primary school classrooms
• The impact of teacher-student relationships on academic outcomes in primary school
• Investigating the effects of classroom environment on student behavior and learning outcomes in primary schools
• Investigating the role of creativity and imagination in primary school curriculum
• The impact of nutrition and healthy eating programs on academic performance in primary schools
• The impact of social-emotional learning programs on primary school students’ well-being and academic performance
• The role of parental involvement in academic achievement of primary school children
• Examining the effects of classroom management strategies on student behavior in primary school
• The role of school leadership in creating a positive school climate Exploring the benefits of bilingual education in primary schools
• The effectiveness of project-based learning in developing critical thinking skills in primary school students
• The role of inquiry-based learning in fostering curiosity and critical thinking in primary school students
• The effects of class size on student engagement and achievement in primary schools
• Investigating the effects of recess and physical activity breaks on attention and learning in primary school
• Exploring the benefits of outdoor play in developing gross motor skills in primary school children
• The effects of educational field trips on knowledge retention in primary school students
• Examining the effects of inclusive classroom practices on students’ attitudes towards diversity in primary schools
• The impact of parental involvement in homework on primary school students’ academic achievement
• Investigating the effectiveness of different assessment methods in primary school classrooms
• The influence of physical activity and exercise on cognitive development in primary school children
• Exploring the benefits of cooperative learning in promoting social skills in primary school students

Secondary Education

• Investigating the effects of school discipline policies on student behavior and academic success in secondary education
• The role of social media in enhancing communication and collaboration among secondary school students
• The impact of school leadership on teacher effectiveness and student outcomes in secondary schools
• Investigating the effects of technology integration on teaching and learning in secondary education
• Exploring the benefits of interdisciplinary instruction in promoting critical thinking skills in secondary schools
• The impact of arts education on creativity and self-expression in secondary school students
• The effectiveness of flipped classrooms in promoting student learning in secondary education
• The role of career guidance programs in preparing secondary school students for future employment
• Investigating the effects of student-centered learning approaches on student autonomy and academic success in secondary schools
• The impact of socio-economic factors on educational attainment in secondary education
• Investigating the impact of project-based learning on student engagement and academic achievement in secondary schools
• Investigating the effects of multicultural education on cultural understanding and tolerance in secondary schools
• The influence of standardized testing on teaching practices and student learning in secondary education
• Investigating the effects of classroom management strategies on student behavior and academic engagement in secondary education
• The influence of teacher professional development on instructional practices and student outcomes in secondary schools
• The role of extracurricular activities in promoting holistic development and well-roundedness in secondary school students
• Investigating the effects of blended learning models on student engagement and achievement in secondary education
• The role of physical education in promoting physical health and well-being among secondary school students
• Investigating the effects of gender on academic achievement and career aspirations in secondary education
• Exploring the benefits of multicultural literature in promoting cultural awareness and empathy among secondary school students
• The impact of school counseling services on student mental health and well-being in secondary schools
• Exploring the benefits of vocational education and training in preparing secondary school students for the workforce
• The role of digital literacy in preparing secondary school students for the digital age
• The influence of parental involvement on academic success and well-being of secondary school students
• The impact of social-emotional learning programs on secondary school students’ well-being and academic success
• The role of character education in fostering ethical and responsible behavior in secondary school students
• Examining the effects of digital citizenship education on responsible and ethical technology use among secondary school students
• The impact of parental involvement in school decision-making processes on student outcomes in secondary schools
• The role of educational technology in promoting personalized learning experiences in secondary schools
• The impact of inclusive education on the social and academic outcomes of students with disabilities in secondary schools
• The influence of parental support on academic motivation and achievement in secondary education
• The role of school climate in promoting positive behavior and well-being among secondary school students
• Examining the effects of peer mentoring programs on academic achievement and social-emotional development in secondary schools
• Examining the effects of teacher-student relationships on student motivation and achievement in secondary schools
• Exploring the benefits of service-learning programs in promoting civic engagement among secondary school students
• The impact of educational policies on educational equity and access in secondary education
• Examining the effects of homework on academic achievement and student well-being in secondary education
• Investigating the effects of different assessment methods on student performance in secondary schools
• Examining the effects of single-sex education on academic performance and gender stereotypes in secondary schools
• The role of mentoring programs in supporting the transition from secondary to post-secondary education

Tertiary Education

• The role of student support services in promoting academic success and well-being in higher education
• The impact of internationalization initiatives on students’ intercultural competence and global perspectives in tertiary education
• Investigating the effects of active learning classrooms and learning spaces on student engagement and learning outcomes in tertiary education
• Exploring the benefits of service-learning experiences in fostering civic engagement and social responsibility in higher education
• The influence of learning communities and collaborative learning environments on student academic and social integration in higher education
• Exploring the benefits of undergraduate research experiences in fostering critical thinking and scientific inquiry skills
• Investigating the effects of academic advising and mentoring on student retention and degree completion in higher education
• The role of student engagement and involvement in co-curricular activities on holistic student development in higher education
• The impact of multicultural education on fostering cultural competence and diversity appreciation in higher education
• The role of internships and work-integrated learning experiences in enhancing students’ employability and career outcomes
• Examining the effects of assessment and feedback practices on student learning and academic achievement in tertiary education
• The influence of faculty professional development on instructional practices and student outcomes in tertiary education
• The influence of faculty-student relationships on student success and well-being in tertiary education
• The impact of college transition programs on students’ academic and social adjustment to higher education
• The impact of online learning platforms on student learning outcomes in higher education
• The impact of financial aid and scholarships on access and persistence in higher education
• The influence of student leadership and involvement in extracurricular activities on personal development and campus engagement
• Exploring the benefits of competency-based education in developing job-specific skills in tertiary students
• Examining the effects of flipped classroom models on student learning and retention in higher education
• Exploring the benefits of online collaboration and virtual team projects in developing teamwork skills in tertiary students
• Investigating the effects of diversity and inclusion initiatives on campus climate and student experiences in tertiary education
• The influence of study abroad programs on intercultural competence and global perspectives of college students
• Investigating the effects of peer mentoring and tutoring programs on student retention and academic performance in tertiary education
• Investigating the effectiveness of active learning strategies in promoting student engagement and achievement in tertiary education
• Investigating the effects of blended learning models and hybrid courses on student learning and satisfaction in higher education
• The role of digital literacy and information literacy skills in supporting student success in the digital age
• Investigating the effects of experiential learning opportunities on career readiness and employability of college students
• The impact of e-portfolios on student reflection, self-assessment, and showcasing of learning in higher education
• The role of technology in enhancing collaborative learning experiences in tertiary classrooms
• The impact of research opportunities on undergraduate student engagement and pursuit of advanced degrees
• Examining the effects of competency-based assessment on measuring student learning and achievement in tertiary education
• Examining the effects of interdisciplinary programs and courses on critical thinking and problem-solving skills in college students
• The role of inclusive education and accessibility in promoting equitable learning experiences for diverse student populations
• The role of career counseling and guidance in supporting students’ career decision-making in tertiary education
• The influence of faculty diversity and representation on student success and inclusive learning environments in higher education

Education-Related Dissertations & Theses

While the ideas we’ve presented above are a decent starting point for finding a research topic in education, they are fairly generic and non-specific. So, it helps to look at actual dissertations and theses in the education space to see how this all comes together in practice.

Below, we’ve included a selection of education-related research projects to help refine your thinking. These are actual dissertations and theses, written as part of Master’s and PhD-level programs, so they can provide some useful insight as to what a research topic looks like in practice.

• From Rural to Urban: Education Conditions of Migrant Children in China (Wang, 2019)
• Energy Renovation While Learning English: A Guidebook for Elementary ESL Teachers (Yang, 2019)
• A Reanalyses of Intercorrelational Matrices of Visual and Verbal Learners’ Abilities, Cognitive Styles, and Learning Preferences (Fox, 2020)
• A study of the elementary math program utilized by a mid-Missouri school district (Barabas, 2020)
• Instructor formative assessment practices in virtual learning environments : a posthumanist sociomaterial perspective (Burcks, 2019)
• Higher education students services: a qualitative study of two mid-size universities’ direct exchange programs (Kinde, 2020)
• Exploring editorial leadership : a qualitative study of scholastic journalism advisers teaching leadership in Missouri secondary schools (Lewis, 2020)
• Selling the virtual university: a multimodal discourse analysis of marketing for online learning (Ludwig, 2020)
• Advocacy and accountability in school counselling: assessing the use of data as related to professional self-efficacy (Matthews, 2020)
• The use of an application screening assessment as a predictor of teaching retention at a midwestern, K-12, public school district (Scarbrough, 2020)
• Core values driving sustained elite performance cultures (Beiner, 2020)
• Educative features of upper elementary Eureka math curriculum (Dwiggins, 2020)
• How female principals nurture adult learning opportunities in successful high schools with challenging student demographics (Woodward, 2020)
• The disproportionality of Black Males in Special Education: A Case Study Analysis of Educator Perceptions in a Southeastern Urban High School (McCrae, 2021)

As you can see, these research topics are a lot more focused than the generic topic ideas we presented earlier. So, in order for you to develop a high-quality research topic, you’ll need to get specific and laser-focused on a specific context with specific variables of interest.  In the video below, we explore some other important things you’ll need to consider when crafting your research topic.

Get 1-On-1 Help

If you’re still unsure about how to find a quality research topic within education, check out our Research Topic Kickstarter service, which is the perfect starting point for developing a unique, well-justified research topic.

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58 Comments

This is an helpful tool 🙏

Special education

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Research title related to school of students

Research title related to students

Good idea I’m going to teach my colleagues

You can find our list of nursing-related research topic ideas here: https://gradcoach.com/research-topics-nursing/

Write on action research topic, using guidance and counseling to address unwanted teenage pregnancy in school

Thanks a lot

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Thank you for the information.. I would like to request a topic based on school major in social studies

parental involvement and students academic performance

Science education topics?

plz tell me if you got some good topics, im here for finding research topic for masters degree

How about School management and supervision pls.?

Hi i am an Deputy Principal in a primary school. My wish is to srudy foe Master’s degree in Education.Please advice me on which topic can be relevant for me. Thanks.

Every topic proposed above on primary education is a starting point for me. I appreciate immensely the team that has sat down to make a detail of these selected topics just for beginners like us. Be blessed.

Kindly help me with the research questions on the topic” Effects of workplace conflict on the employees’ job performance”. The effects can be applicable in every institution,enterprise or organisation.

Greetings, I am a student majoring in Sociology and minoring in Public Administration. I’m considering any recommended research topic in the field of Sociology.

I’m a student pursuing Mphil in Basic education and I’m considering any recommended research proposal topic in my field of study

Kindly help me with a research topic in educational psychology. Ph.D level. Thank you.

Project-based learning is a teaching/learning type,if well applied in a classroom setting will yield serious positive impact. What can a teacher do to implement this in a disadvantaged zone like “North West Region of Cameroon ( hinterland) where war has brought about prolonged and untold sufferings on the indegins?

I wish to get help on topics of research on educational administration

I wish to get help on topics of research on educational administration PhD level

I am also looking for such type of title

I am a student of undergraduate, doing research on how to use guidance and counseling to address unwanted teenage pregnancy in school

the topics are very good regarding research & education .

Can i request your suggestion topic for my Thesis about Teachers as an OFW. thanx you

Would like to request for suggestions on a topic in Economics of education,PhD level

Would like to request for suggestions on a topic in Economics of education

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l would like to request suggestions on a topic in managing teaching and learning, PhD level (educational leadership and management)

request suggestions on a topic in managing teaching and learning, PhD level (educational leadership and management)

I would to inquire on research topics on Educational psychology, Masters degree

I am PhD student, I am searching my Research topic, It should be innovative,my area of interest is online education,use of technology in education

request suggestion on topic in masters in medical education .

Look at British Library as they keep a copy of all PhDs in the UK Core.ac.uk to access Open University and 6 other university e-archives, pdf downloads mostly available, all free.

May I also ask for a topic based on mathematics education for college teaching, please?

Please I am a masters student of the department of Teacher Education, Faculty of Education Please I am in need of proposed project topics to help with my final year thesis

Am a PhD student in Educational Foundations would like a sociological topic. Thank

please i need a proposed thesis project regardging computer science

Greetings and Regards I am a doctoral student in the field of philosophy of education. I am looking for a new topic for my thesis. Because of my work in the elementary school, I am looking for a topic that is from the field of elementary education and is related to the philosophy of education.

Masters student in the field of curriculum, any ideas of a research topic on low achiever students

In the field of curriculum any ideas of a research topic on deconalization in contextualization of digital teaching and learning through in higher education

Amazing guidelines

I am a graduate with two masters. 1) Master of arts in religious studies and 2) Master in education in foundations of education. I intend to do a Ph.D. on my second master’s, however, I need to bring both masters together through my Ph.D. research. can I do something like, ” The contribution of Philosophy of education for a quality religion education in Kenya”? kindly, assist and be free to suggest a similar topic that will bring together the two masters. thanks in advance

Hi, I am an Early childhood trainer as well as a researcher, I need more support on this topic: The impact of early childhood education on later academic success.

I’m a student in upper level secondary school and I need your support in this research topics: “Impact of incorporating project -based learning in teaching English language skills in secondary schools”.

Although research activities and topics should stem from reflection on one’s practice, I found this site valuable as it effectively addressed many issues we have been experiencing as practitioners.

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110+ Exceptional Education Research Topics Ideas

Topics for education research usually comprise school research topics, research problems in education, qualitative research topics in education, and concept paper topics about education to mention a few.

If you’re looking for research titles about education,  you’re reading the right post! This article contains 110 of the best education research topics that will come in handy when you need to choose one for your research. From sample research topics in education, to research titles examples for high school students about education – we have it all.

Educational Research Topics

Research title examples for college students, quantitative research titles about education, topics related to education for thesis, research titles about school issues, ph.d. research titles in education, elementary education research topics, research title examples about online class, research titles about modular learning, examples of research questions in education, special education research titles.

The best research titles about education must be done through the detailed process of exploring previous works and improving personal knowledge.

Here are some good research topics in education to consider.

What Are Good Research Topics Related to Education?

• The role of Covid-19 in reinvigorating online learning
• The growth of cognitive abilities through leisure experiences
• The merits of group study in education
• Merits and demerits of traditional learning methods
• The impact of homework on traditional and modern education
• Student underdevelopment as a result of larger class volumes
• Advantages of digital textbooks in learning
• The struggle of older generations in computer education
• The standards of learning  in the various academic levels
• Bullying and its effects on educational and mental health
• Exceptional education tutors: Is the need for higher pay justifiable?

The following examples of research titles about education for college students are ideal for a project that will take a long duration to complete. Here are some education topics for research that you can consider for your degree.

• Modern classroom difficulties of students and teachers
• Strategies to reform the learning difficulties within schools
• The rising cost of tuition and its burden on middle-class parents
• The concept of creativity among public schools and how it can be harnessed
• Major difficulties experienced in academic staff training
• Evaluating the learning cultures of college students
• Use of scientific development techniques in student learning
• Research of skill development in high school and college students
• Modern grading methods in underdeveloped institutions
• Dissertations and the difficulties surrounding their completion
• Integration of new gender categories in personalized learning

These research topics about education require a direct quantitative analysis and study of major ideas and arguments. They often contain general statistics and figures to back up regular research. Some of such research topics in education include:

• The relationship between poor education and increased academic fees
• Creating a social link between homeschool and traditional schoolgoers
• The relationship between teacher satisfaction and student performance
• The divide between public and private school performance
• The merits of parental involvement in students’ cognitive growth.
• A study on child welfare and its impact on educational development
• The relationship between academic performance and economic growth
• Urbanization in rural areas and its contribution to institutional growth
• The relationship between students and professors in dissertation writing
• The link between debt accumulation and student loans
• Boarding schools and regular schools: The role these two school types play in cognitive development

Educational-related topics used for a thesis normally require a wide aspect of study and enough educational materials.  Here are some education research topics you can use for write my thesis .

• The difficulties of bilingual education in private universities
• Homework and its impact on learning processes in college education
• Dissertation topic selection: Key aspects and research obligations
• Social media research topics and their educational functions
• A detailed educational review of student learning via virtual reality techniques
• Ethnicities in universities and their participation in group activities
• The modern approach to self-studying for college students
• Developing time management skills in modern education
• Guidelines for teacher development in advanced educational institutions
• The need for religious education in boarding schools
• A measure of cognitive development using digital learning methods

A research title about school issues focuses on activities surrounding the school environment and its effects on students, teachers, parents, and education in general. Below are some sample research titles in education, relating to school issues.

• Learning English in bilingual schools
• A study of teachers’ role as parent figures on school grounds
• Addressing the increased use of illegal substances and their effects in schools
• The benefits of after-class activities for foreign students
• Assessing student and teacher relationships
• A study of the best methods to implement safety rules in school
• Major obstacles in meeting school schedules using boarding students as a case study
• The need for counseling in public and private schools: Which is greater?
• Academic volunteering in understaffed public schools
• Modern techniques for curbing school violence among college students
• The advantages and disadvantages of teacher unions in schools

As you create your proposed list of research topics in education, consider scientific journals for referencing purposes. Here are some Ph.D. research titles for education.

• The modern methods of academic research writing
• The role of colleges in advanced mental care
• The merits and demerits of Ph.D. studies in Europe and Africa
• Interpersonal relationships between students and professors in advanced institutions
• A review of community colleges: merits and demerits
• Assessing racism in academic ethnic minorities
• The psychological changes of students in higher education
• The questionable standards of student loan provisions
• The merits of personalized teaching techniques in colleges
• The wage gap between private and public university teachers
• Teacher responsibilities in private universities versus public universities

The research topics in elementary education in 2023 are very different from the elementary education research topics from five or ten years ago. This creates interesting grounds for different research titles for elementary education.

Here are some elementary education title research ideas.

• Assessing quick computer literacy among elementary school pupils.
• The role of video games in childhood brain development
• Male vs female role models in early education periods
• The advantages of digital textbooks in elementary schools
• The impact of modern curriculums on elementary education
• Lack of proper school grooming is a cause of violence.
• Should elementary school children be taught about LGBTQ?
• A review of the need for sexual education in elementary schools
• The effects of emotional dependence in early childhood learners.
• The need for constant technology supervision of elementary school students
• Advantages of computer-guided education in elementary schools

Here are some research title examples for students taking online classes.

• The academic difficulties experienced by online students.
• A study of decreased attention in online classes
• The upsides and downsides of online education
• The rising fees of online and traditional education in universities
• A detailed study on the necessity of college internships
• The need to provide college scholarships based on environmental achievements
• How online education terminates university fraternities and sororities.
• The role of academic supervisors in career selection
• Why interactive assignments improved learning capabilities during the pandemic
• Merits of education in online learning environments
• Why online lessons are the least effective for some college students

The modular learning approach focuses primarily on learning outcomes. Here are some examples of research titles about modular learning.

• Modular learning and the role of teachers in its execution
• Teaching techniques of religious institutions
• Potential risks of accelerated learning
• Modular learning on students’ future performances
• The general overview of modular learning amongst students
• The modern Advantages and disadvantages of inclusive classes
• Observing student developments in modular learning
• Music therapy for fostering modular learning techniques
• The creation of a personalized curriculum for students.
• Applications of modular learning both in home-schooling?
• The benefits of modular learning towards creating a more holistic educational system

These research title examples about education answer important questions and they can also be argumentative essay topics .

Here are some titles of research about education questions.

• What impacts do learning approaches provide for students?
• How can schools manage their increasing gender differences?
• What fosters the provision of learning needs?
• What are the best educational recruitment methods?
• How can cognitive development improve education?
• How can you assess the moral growth of institutions?
• What are the primary causes of educational differences in geographical locations?
• How can institutions address increasing mental health needs?
• Why is early intervention essential in students with mental health setbacks?
• What are the characteristics of mental health deterioration among students?
• What techniques are acceptable in regulating the violence of students in institutions

Some of the research title examples about education include:

• How do schools create more personalized learning methods?
• Evaluating mental health setbacks during education
• The impact of modern technology on special education
• The cognitive improvements via specialized learning in dyslexic children
• The psychological link between dyslexia and bullying in high school
• Impact of social isolation in special education classes
• The difficulties in providing specialized learning environments
• A study of orphan students with disabilities and their aptitudes for learning
• How special classes improve the self-esteem of disabled students.
• How to use modern teaching techniques in unique learning environments.
• A study of the application of digital games to autistic learning

Final words about education research topics

We have provided some reliable examples of a research topic about education you can use for write my thesis . You can use these research titles in education to cultivate your ideas, create inspiration, or for online research. Remember always to select a topic that you’re naturally passionate about and do diligent research, and reach out to our professional writing services if you need any help.

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An elementary school in Kansas is combating bad behavior — by putting kids to work

Suzanne Perez

A pilot program in elementary schools gives kids meaningful work as a way to handle post-pandemic behavior problems.

AILSA CHANG, HOST:

Schoolteachers across the country say they are still struggling with post-pandemic behavior problems in classrooms. The spike in tantrums, outbursts and fidgeting coincides with a national mental health crisis. Suzanne Perez of the Kansas News Service shows us how one elementary school that state is responding to bad behavior by putting kids to work.

SUZANNE PEREZ, BYLINE: Twice a week at Woodman Elementary School in Wichita, a third-grader named Reagan reports for duty with school counselor Shauna Barnes.

SHAUNA BARNES: So you're spraying each one of the tiny plants.

PEREZ: Reagan is the school's official plant waterer. Armed with a kid-sized spray bottle, she checks each plant on the windowsill of the teacher's lounge and gives it a quick drink. Barnes offers direction.

BARNES: See how much water they need?

REAGAN: This one's kind of wet, so I'll give it a little bit.

PEREZ: It may not look like much, but experiences like this can be life-changing for some children. Woodman is experimenting with a program called Meaningful Work. Counselors take kids who regularly misbehave in class and pair them with a mentor, then offer them something constructive to do on a regular schedule - a simple task like feeding fish or making copies. School psychologist Jaime Johnston says the concept is pretty simple.

JAIME JOHNSTON: Students were acting out to get attention with people they like. We have a fun group of supporting adults, and the students enjoyed hanging out with us. But we need them to display appropriate behaviors and stay in class.

PEREZ: Assigning jobs to students is not necessarily new. Elementary school teachers often post job charts denoting things like line leaders or trash collectors, but those are in class and supervised by the regular teacher. With Meaningful Work, students are matched with adults outside the classroom, including counselors, psychologists and social workers. Jessica Sprick is an education consultant with Safe & Civil Schools, an Oregon-based company that promotes the Meaningful Work program. She says, when children get attention for negative behavior, their behavior gets worse. Giving them a job and positive feedback can turn that around.

JESSICA SPRICK: If you can start getting some of that groundwork in place to make the kid feel that you're noticed, that you're wanted - that, when you're not here, there's a piece of our school that isn't as good as when you are - then we can get the kid coming to school, and then the academics improve, and then the behavior improves, right? So it really can be the starting place for whole-scale change.

PEREZ: The program isn't just for kids who misbehave. At Woodman Elementary, some students are selected because they get fidgety and need regular movement breaks. Others have anxiety and need to practice interacting with peers and adults. Jovany, a third-grader, is nonverbal and communicates with a handheld device that can be programmed to say certain phrases. Twice a week, Jovany fills a wagon with fresh fruits or vegetables from the cafeteria and delivers them to classrooms as part of the school's healthy snack program.

JOVANY: (Through handheld device) Here's your vegetables.

UNIDENTIFIED TEACHER: Thank you.

JOVANY: (Through handheld device) You're welcome.

UNIDENTIFIED TEACHER: Can everybody say thank you?

UNIDENTIFIED CHILDREN: Thank you.

UNIDENTIFIED TEACHER: Thank you, Jovany. Bye-bye.

UNIDENTIFIED CHILD: Bye.

PEREZ: Sprick recalls one teacher who assigned a student to be the school's official door unlocker. The child made rounds with the custodian every morning to check locks and welcome staff inside. He took the job so seriously he didn't want to take a sick day.

SPRICK: The mom actually called and said, you know, can you tell my son that the doors will be unlocked if he doesn't come to school? 'Cause he's got 103 fever and he's trying to tell me he needs to come.

PEREZ: School leaders say behavior problems have decreased since they launched the jobs program last fall, and attendance is up. They plan to expand the program next year.

For NPR News, I'm Suzanne Perez in Wichita.

(SOUNDBITE OF THE AUDIBLES SONG, "NOT THE SAME")

Copyright © 2024 NPR. All rights reserved. Visit our website terms of use and permissions pages at www.npr.org for further information.

NPR transcripts are created on a rush deadline by an NPR contractor. This text may not be in its final form and may be updated or revised in the future. Accuracy and availability may vary. The authoritative record of NPR’s programming is the audio record.

Rick Hess Straight Up

Education policy maven Rick Hess of the American Enterprise Institute think tank offers straight talk on matters of policy, politics, research, and reform. Read more from this blog.

Is Education Research Too Political?

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On Monday, I talked with departing Institute of Education Sciences Director Mark Schneider, who just wrapped up his six-year term. In our conversation, he argued for newer and better research centers at IES, along with a heightened commitment to producing timely and accessible reports. Well, as anyone who knows Mark well can attest, he almost always has more to say. I thought I’d reach back out and see if he had anything else he wanted to get off his mind. Here is Part Two of our conversation.

Rick: On Monday, you mentioned that Marguerite Roza, Emily Oster, and Sean Reardon are doing good, serious work on education topics and releasing it in a timely fashion. Can you say a bit about what they’re doing right and why NCES isn’t meeting that need?

Mark : As noted on Monday, the most telling example is the collection of school-level finance data. Not only are these data required by law, they are also among the most important pieces of information needed to understand the distribution of resources and to relate detailed expenditure data to school outcomes. But despite years of pressure—from Jim Blew, who headed the policy division of ED during the last few years of the DeVos era, from me, and from many others—NCES has never produced timely district financial data and has yet to produce complete school-by-school financials. District financials are released more than two years after the close of the fiscal year, and school-by-school financial pilot data dating back to FY18 have not yet been released. Looking ahead, NCES has promised to release its first set of complete FY22 school-level financials at the end of 2024—again, over two years after the close of the fiscal year . Assuming NCES meets its promise—a risky bet, given past missed deadlines—this would be “fast” by government standards—but far too slow to meet real-world needs.

Rick : What’s responsible for this?

Mark: Much of the problem is that NCES uses an antiquated approach to data collection, issuing a uniform survey that doesn’t match up to different state systems and then waiting for all submissions before releasing datasets. In contrast, teams from Georgetown, Brown, Stanford, and others grab data directly from the source and then convert them into a more standardized format. Teams then release the state-by-state files as they are available instead of holding it all until the very last state has a clean file. The process is far faster. For instance, Georgetown’s NERD$ site—run by Roza—is posting FY23 school-by-school financial files for some states in as few as six to eight months after the close of the fiscal year. With the quick turnaround, district leaders can, for example, marry the finance data with Stanford’s SEDA performance data and use it to inform decisions during the next budget season.

Rick : OK. So, what’s some of this other work that you flagged?

Mark : Similarly, Emily Oster’s work on school closures during the pandemic was released faster than NCES’s and its coverage was more comprehensive. In part because of NCES’s lagging performance, I was able to get additional money from Congress to set up the School Pulse Survey, which has finally given NCES a tool for gathering close to real-time information about conditions in schools. Fair warning, though: NCES calls it “experimental,” which means they are lying in wait to encumber it with more and more statistical tests that will likely delay the release of the data.

Oster and Sean Reardon have also been far ahead of NCES in gathering and releasing detailed data on student performance. Reardon’s Educational Opportunity Project presents detailed and timely information about COVID-related learning loss and recovery. Oster is also working on releasing more detailed and extensive data on student assessment from all states. To this point, they have released data through 2023. In contrast, NCES’s EdFacts promised the 2022 data in December 2023, but it’s not been released yet. Here’s an additional wrinkle: Oster did her work with one salaried employee and a team of undergrads. EdFacts costs around $13 million per year.

Rick : I’ve been struck that, during Secretary Cardona’s tenure, political appointees have gotten far more involved in the release of NAEP results and used the releases to promote administration talking points more than they have in past administrations. How concerned should we be about IES getting caught up in our partisan divides?

Mark: I was both lucky and happy to serve during both the Trump and Biden administrations. Although appointed by Trump, I have found that most of my dealings with senior leaders appointed by Biden have been quite good. But will that political distance and professionalism hold in a second administration of either major candidate? The signs are not good. For instance, IES has an advisory board called the National Board of Education Sciences, or NBES. When the Obama administration was on its way out the door, it tried to fill NBES with their appointees. However, the commissions were never fully executed, and the Trump administration refused to honor the unfinished appointments. Both administrations were within their legal rights to take these actions—but we will still need to see what political ramifications follow.

When I assumed the IES director’s role about halfway through the Trump administration, there were few people on the board, all holdovers from the Obama administration. It was very hard to get the White House to pay attention to the open seats, and I was only able to get three people, all high quality, appointed to the board. At the end of 2020, on his way out the door, Trump appointed a whole bunch of people to the board, many of whose qualifications raised eyebrows. When Biden took office, those commissions had not been finalized, leaving the board consisting of the three people I was able to get appointed. One morning, each of them received an email saying that they had to resign by the end of the day or be fired. The administration then appointed 14 people to the 15-person board. I fear that if the Republicans win the presidency this fall, they will fire the board and replace it with people more to their liking, making what should be a nonpartisan science board highly politicized. I can’t help but wonder if that will lead to the politicization of the director’s tenure.

Rick: Looking outside of IES, it certainly feels to me like the professional education research organizations have become increasingly ideological over the years. Is that a valid criticism? If so, what might help?

Mark: I agree. In 1996, mathematics professor Alan Sokal published the paper “ Transgressing the Boundaries: Towards a Transformative Hermeneutics of Quantum Gravity ” as a hoax to show the shallowness of postmodern critical theory. When he wrote it, I’m sure he was hoping to put an end to that line of work. But, as James Meigs notes in a 2021 Commentary piece: “Sokal meant his essay as a parodic warning. Twenty-five years later, it appears that the Sokal Hoax was actually an instruction manual.” Rick, as you recall, for years, as the AERA annual conference approached, you would go through the program and identify what you considered the most bizarre takes on education. I’m not sure that you could do this today, since you’d have to publish just about the entire program.

Rick: Oh, man, that takes me back. Yeah, I eventually gave that up. I’d hoped that shame could help discourage some of the sillier stuff, but it felt, like you note, that the silly stuff won out. Why is that?

Mark: Education research is highly ideologically driven. If DEI has affected more established and rigorous sciences, which it has, then what can we expect from a far weaker scientific field such as ours? As Meigs noted about Sokal’s paper turning into an instruction manual, I guess your lists could be viewed as a guide to the future work in education.

Rick: Here’s a final question. If you could leave your successor at IES with one piece of advice, what would it be?

Mark: My daughter told me that she learned this parable while in business school.

A new executive is meeting with the executive she is replacing and asks for advice. The outgoing exec says, “I left three envelopes in the desk drawer. Open them sequentially as crises emerge.”

Sure enough, at the inevitable first crisis, the new exec opened the first envelop, which read: “Blame your predecessor.” At the second crisis, the exec opened the second envelop, which read: “Apologize and swear to do better.” Then the third crisis showed up, and the third envelop read: “Write three letters.”

When I pass the baton, I hope that I have gotten IES a little further down the track than people expected. But the race is long, there’s a lot of work left unfinished, and the demand for accountability and innovation won’t go away any time soon.

Oh, and finally, the next director should pray that we don’t have another pandemic. While there are many reasons we should hope never to see a pandemic again, from a narrow perspective, COVID punched a two-year hole in my tenure, limiting what I was able to accomplish.

The opinions expressed in Rick Hess Straight Up are strictly those of the author(s) and do not reflect the opinions or endorsement of Editorial Projects in Education, or any of its publications.

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What federal education data shows about students with disabilities in the U.S.

Public K-12 schools in the United States educate about 7.3 million students with disabilities – a number that has grown over the last few decades. Disabled students ages 3 to 21 are served under the federal  Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) , which guarantees them the right to free public education and appropriate special education services.

For Disability Pride Month , here are some key facts about public school students with disabilities, based on the latest data from the  National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) .

July is both Disability Pride Month and the anniversary of the Americans with Disabilities Act. To mark these occasions, Pew Research Center used federal education data from  the National Center for Education Statistics  to learn more about students who receive special education services in U.S. public schools.

In this analysis, students with disabilities include those ages 3 to 21 who are served under the federal  Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) . Through IDEA, children with disabilities are guaranteed a “free appropriate public education,” including special education and related services.

The 7.3 million disabled students in the U.S. made up 15% of national public school enrollment during the 2021-22 school year. The population of students in prekindergarten through 12th grade who are served under IDEA has grown in both number and share over the last few decades. During the 2010-11 school year, for instance, there were 6.4 million students with disabilities in U.S. public schools, accounting for 13% of enrollment.

The number of students receiving special education services temporarily dropped during the coronavirus pandemic – the first decline in a decade. Between the 2019-20 and 2020-21 school years, the number of students receiving special education services decreased by 1%, from 7.3 million to 7.2 million. This was the first year-over-year drop in special education enrollment since 2011-12.

The decline in students receiving special education services was part of a 3% decline in the overall number of students enrolled in public schools between 2019-20 and 2020-21. While special education enrollment bounced back to pre-pandemic levels in the 2021-22 school year, overall public school enrollment remained flat.

These enrollment trends may reflect some of the learning difficulties and health concerns students with disabilities and their families faced during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic , which limited or paused special education services in many school districts.

Many school districts struggle to hire special education professionals. During the 2020-21 school year, 40% of public schools that had a special education teaching vacancy reported that they either found it very difficult to fill the position or were not able to do so.

Foreign languages (43%) and physical sciences (37%) were the only subjects with similarly large shares of hard-to-fill teaching vacancies at public schools that were looking to hire in those fields.

While the COVID-19 pandemic called attention to a nationwide teacher shortage , special education positions have long been among the most difficult for school districts to fill .

The most common type of disability for students in prekindergarten through 12th grade involves “specific learning disabilities,” such as dyslexia.  In 2021-22, about a third of students (32%) receiving services under IDEA had a specific learning disability. Some 19% had a speech or language impairment, while 15% had a chronic or acute health problem that adversely affected their educational performance. Chronic or acute health problems include ailments such as heart conditions, asthma, sickle cell anemia, epilepsy, leukemia and diabetes.

Students with autism made up 12% of the nation’s schoolchildren with disabilities in 2021-22, compared with 1.5% in 2000-01.  During those two decades, the share of disabled students with a specific learning disability, such as dyslexia, declined from 45% to 32%.

The percentage of students receiving special education services varies widely across states. New York serves the largest share of disabled students in the country at 20.5% of its overall public school enrollment. Pennsylvania (20.2%), Maine (20.1%) and Massachusetts (19.3%) serve the next-largest shares. The states serving the lowest shares of disabled students include Texas and Idaho (both 11.7%) and Hawaii (11.3%).

Between the 2000-01 and 2021-22 school years, all but 12 states experienced growth in their disabled student populations. The biggest increase occurred in Utah, where the disabled student population rose by 65%. Rhode Island saw the largest decline of 22%.

These differences by state are likely the result of inconsistencies in how states determine which students are eligible for special education services and challenges in identifying disabled children.

The racial and ethnic makeup of the nation’s special education students is similar to public school students overall, but there are differences by sex.  About two-thirds of disabled students (65%) are male, while 34% are female, according to data from the 2021-22 school year. Overall student enrollment is about evenly split between boys and girls.

Research has shown that decisions about whether to recommend a student for special education may be influenced by their school’s socioeconomic makeup, as well as by the school’s test scores and other academic markers.

Note: This is an update of a post originally published April 23, 2020.

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