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    Sunshine After Showers: Creating a Classroom Climate for Resilient Learners


    Duffy, Karen (2025) Sunshine After Showers: Creating a Classroom Climate for Resilient Learners. Masters thesis, National University of Ireland Maynooth.

    Abstract

    My research question is, 'How Can I, as a Classroom Teacher, Enhance the Wellbeing of the Children in my Classroom to Support Resilient Learners? Essentially, how can I ensure there is sunshine after the showers within my classroom? Through the implementation of Educational Action Research (EAR) and a variety of carefully crafted and designed interventions, I entered my classroom last September with a genuine compulsion to enhance children's wellbeing and support their resilience. To begin, I reflected on and considered research already available on the area of wellbeing and resilience. I contemplated and analysed Piagetian, Erikson and Vygotskian theories on psychological, sociocultural and developmental ideas on critical milestones in the development of the child. Furthem10re, the current SPHE Curriculum (1999) served as a beneficial tool in enabling me to identify current practice in terms of Wellbeing and the proposed draft specifications (2023) on Wellbeing enlightened me further. Following on from this, I set about gathering data from my classroom. This was achieved through the specific and intentional use of a myriad of interventions including circle time, daily check-ins, the Weaving Wellbeing Programme, Writers Theatre, art activities and selfreflection through the use of a reflective journal. Relevant themes were generated and the findings illustrated that my values and their enactment were of critical importance. Looking to the future, the findings illustrate that it is crucial for teachers and the educational community in general to consider and utilise child-friendly, relational and values-based approaches in order to enhance wellbeing and resilience.
    Item Type: Thesis (Masters)
    Additional Information: A Research Dissertation submitted to the Froebel Department of Primary and Early Childhood Education, Maynooth University, in fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Education
    Keywords: Classroom Climate; Resilient Learners; M.Ed. Froebel Department of Primary and Early Childhood Education;
    Academic Unit: Faculty of Social Sciences > Froebel Department of Primary and Early Childhood Education
    Item ID: 21461
    Depositing User: IR eTheses
    Date Deposited: 23 Apr 2026 14:47
    Use Licence: This item is available under a Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial Share Alike Licence (CC BY-NC-SA). Details of this licence are available here

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