This study examined the relationship between special education teachers' emotional intelligence and the learning motivation of students with specific learning disorders, moderated by the teachers' inclusion ability in regular education in Arab minority in Israel. The research setup is quantitative-correlative. The sample included 406 special education teachers (128 male and 278 female) in elementary and middle schools. The participants were asked to answer the following self-report questionnaires: sociodemographic background data, emotional intelligence, learning motivation, and a school inclusion index. The findings indicated significant positive relationships between emotional intelligence, school inclusion ability and learning motivation among the students from the teachers' viewpoint. In addition, the school inclusion variable was a moderator between the teachers' emotional intelligence and the learning motivation of the students with specific learning disabilities. Also, differences were found in the teachers' emotional intelligence and school inclusion ability on the demographic variables: age, gender, role and teaching experience. The necessary conclusion indicated that intelligent use of emotion and inclusion ability predicts the learning motivation among students with specific learning disorders.
Arab society in Israel is a traditional patriarchal culture holding collectivistic, interdependent values. Arabs in Israel receive basic human rights and privileges, but the Israeli society treats them as a separate minority group. The basic premise of the current study was that improving the emotional intelligence and the empathy abilities of adolescent Arabs in general – through a uni-national group program – would result in stronger empathy towards Jews in Israel – a change that would improve the Arab participant's attitudes and behaviors towards the Jews in Israel. The research accompanying the implementation of the program was quasi-experimental. The main goals of the current intervention were to improve the intra-personal, interpersonal and inter-group skills and functioning, to strengthen awareness and skills in identifying and understanding emotions in themselves and other people – their causes and effects, to improve emotion regulation and ability to manage other people's emotions, to improve empathy towards members of the in-group (Arabs) and the out-group (Jews), to reduce stereotypes against minority groups, and to improve Jewish-Arab relations. The sample included 172 Arab 10th and 11th grade adolescents in northern Israel. The main research hypotheses were: 1) The participants' emotional intelligence and empathy towards Arabs will be higher at the end of the program than at its beginning; 2) The participants' empathy towards Jews will be higher at the end of the program than at its beginning.
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