Conference Agenda

Mathematical and reading comprehension skills are extremely important for success in everyday life, which is why it is important to assess them during school age (Grimm 2008). In Hungary, student competence results are examined lot of studies based on various criteria, which may cover the entire population or a specific group (Guld and Csanádi 2020, Ambrusné Magony 2020, Szemerszki 2020). The Hungarian competency assessment is based on the PISA study, which also examines several areas based on several background variables (Hegedűs 2024a). Lot of studies have examined the impact of family background on performance (Borgen et al. 2025), and family involvement in learning and providing the necessary conditions for learning leads to better competency results (Wilder 2014). The language patterns used at home also have an impact on students' school performance, as people from different family backgrounds use different language codes, so disadvantaged children often do not know the common language used in education (Daniele 2021). In addition to family background, there are also gender differences, with girls performing better in reading comprehension and boys in mathematics (Granocchio 2023).

The school maintainer also has a significant impact on children's performance (Kyriakides et al. 2024). In Hungary, children perform better in church-run schools, which is due to the fact that these institutions use entrance exams and select students, often based on their family background (Hegedűs 2024b). There are significant differences between institutions in terms of the extra opportunities they offer children (e.g., extracurricular activities), as well as in the availability and quality of teachers (Rowe 2020). Every of these factors determine how well children perform on tests, as well as the conditions under which disadvantaged children learn. The aim of the education system should be to reduce social differences, but this is not the case in Hungary (Hegedűs 2024b).

Lot of foreign (Jakubowski et al. 2025) and national (Hermann and Molnár 2022) studies have examined student performance and education during the COVID period, with results showing that student performance declined and differences based on social background have increased even more because disadvantaged student groups did not have access to the appropriate information and communication equipment for home learning. Home learning is also influenced by parents' educational attainment, as parents with lower levels of education are less able to help their children (Silinskas & Kikas 2022). Disadvantaged families generally have more children, which makes learning more difficult. Even if information and communication technology equipment is available, they cannot log in to multiple classes at the same time (Mönkediek et al. 2020).

The aim of our current research is to examine the reading comprehension and mathematics results of students in the 2019 sixth-grade student database and the 2022 sixth-grade student database, as well as the differences between the two years. We use trend analysis in our research because we examine the differences between student groups based on the same age group. In our research, we examine how different background variables (e.g., family background, gender, school operator) influence students' reading comprehension and mathematics performance.

Research questions:

What differences are there in reading comprehension and math performance between the two years based on school maintainer?

What differences are there in reading comprehension and math performance between the two years based on family background?

What differences are there in reading comprehension and math performance between the two years based on gender?

The end of the school day increasingly marks not a pause in learning, but a transition into a second educational space shaped by private tutoring. Private tutoring, often referred to as “shadow education”, derives its name from its tendency to mimic the curriculum of formal schools and is typically provided out of regular school hours in academic subjects in exchange for money (Bray, 2014). The popularity of this practice among students and parents, who seek it to compensate for school shortcomings or for enrichment purposes, is often fueled by the assumption that additional instructional time would lead to improved learning outcomes.

In Europe, shadow education has expanded markedly over recent decades, yet with diverse patterns of development across countries (Bray, 2021). Studies examining (non) academic benefits of shadow education in Europe have accumulated over time, yet yielding inconclusive results across countries. Some studies report positive impacts (e.g., Jansen et al., 2020; Neto-Mendes et al., 2013), while others point to negative associations (e.g., Guill et al., 2020; Zumbuehl et al., 2024), and some find no meaningful effects (e.g., Smyth, 2009). Review studies suggest that such inconsistencies can be partly attributed to variations in operational definitions and methodological designs, a pattern further complicated by differences in tutoring attributes such as type, duration, and intensity (Bray, 2014; Luo & Chan, 2022). These insights indicate that understanding benefits of private tutoring requires moving beyond the question of “whether tutoring works” to examining how its specific attributes shape students’ learning experiences in a European context.

In this regard, Bray (2014) argued shadow education is not a homogeneous intervention but a heterogeneous set of practices. It varies in when and how long it is taken, how often lessons occur, who provides the instruction, what is taught, and how strongly students themselves want to participate. In line with Bray’s (2014) observation, this study treats private tutoring not as a uniform intervention but as a set of differentiated educational experiences shaped by specific attributes.

Beyond variation in tutoring attributes, another key source of inconsistent findings in the literature is how educational benefits themselves are conceptualized. Research on private tutoring in Europe and elsewhere has increasingly questioned the adequacy of treating educational benefits as a single, objective outcome. Drawing on prior scholarship, educational benefits are better understood as multidimensional, encompassing not only academic performance but also students’ non-academic aspects, including motivation, confidence, and studying habits (Alam & Zhu, 2022; Benckwitz et al., 2022; Jansen et al., 2020). Reviews of the shadow education literature highlight that tutoring may generate diverse forms of benefits across behavioral and affective domains, which are not always captured by standardized achievement indicators (Luo & Chan, 2022).

Empirical studies have also shown that students and parents often perceive tutoring as highly beneficial even in the absence of measurable gains in academic achievement (Guill & Bos, 2014). From this perspective, students’ own evaluations of tutoring constitute a theoretically meaningful dimension of benefit rather than a mere proxy for achievement outcomes. In this study, perceived benefits refer to students’ own evaluations of how private tutoring supports their academic learning. Against this backdrop, this Czech context-specific study contributes to the European literature on shadow education by examining how different tutoring attributes (e.g., intensity, duration, organizational form) relate to students’ evaluations of its benefits across academic domains. More specifically, it aims to answer following research questions:

1) How do Czech lower secondary students perceive the shadow education they took and its benefits?

2) How are the attributes of shadow education (length, duration, intensity, provider etc.) related to students’ perceptions of benefits (before and after controlling for relevant factors)?

Longer-term school-based study abroad experiences during secondary education have been shown to positively affect students’ personal development and educational outcomes (Hübner et al., 2021). However, beyond the length of stay, students’ psychological and sociocultural adjustment to the host culture is crucial for deriving benefits from such experiences (Behrnd & Porzelt, 2012; Bruggmann, 2009; DeLoach et al., 2021; Pedersen et al., 2011; Ward & Kennedy, 1993). Psychological adjustment refers to subjective well-being and emotional responses in a new cultural context, whereas sociocultural adjustment concerns the acquisition of skills and behaviors that facilitate effective interaction in the host society (Berry, 1997). Both dimensions are commonly subsumed under the concept of acculturation (Berry, 1980; Berry & Sam, 2016). Acculturation is shaped by characteristics of the host context, such as norms and expectations, as well as by individual and social resources students bring with them (Berry, 2006; Ward & Geeraert, 2016).

So far, it remains largely unexplored what role social background plays in the acculturation of adolescents during school-based study abroad experiences. This gap is highly relevant given current educational policies that aim to broaden access to school exchange programmes and include students from less socially privileged backgrounds. Whether such initiatives can reduce educational inequalities depends on students’ ability to cope with challenges and integrate into the host society. Empirical evidence is limited, as participation in school exchange programmes has traditionally been dominated by students from socioeconomically advantaged families (Gerhards & Hans, 2013; Hübner et al., 2021). Consequently, little is known about the potentially compensatory effects of study abroad experiences for less privileged adolescents. Initial findings from higher education suggest that social background plays a role in acculturation outcomes. International students from less privileged backgrounds report higher acculturative stress (Koo et al., 2021) and lower social connectedness in the host country (Chen et al., 2021).

Differences in acculturation by social background may be explained by unequal access to intercultural resources prior to departure. Adolescents from socioeconomically advantaged families tend to have higher foreign language competencies (Stanat et al., 2023), stronger intercultural interest (Weis et al., 2020), and more prior international mobility experiences (Weenink, 2014). These resources may facilitate early adjustment, whereas students from less privileged backgrounds may face greater initial challenges. Based on this, two hypotheses are proposed: exchange students from advantaged backgrounds are expected to report lower acculturative stress (psychological acculturation) and higher acculturative behavior (sociocultural acculturation) (H1), and these differences are assumed to be explained by disparities in intercultural resources (H2).

Acculturation is a dynamic process that unfolds over time (Ward et al., 2001). Classical models propose a U-shaped trajectory of psychological adjustment (Lysgaard, 1955; Oberg, 1960), though empirical support is mixed. Stress and coping approaches suggest an inverted U-shaped pattern, with lower well-being at the beginning and end of the stay and higher well-being in between (Ward et al., 1996, 1998). Sociocultural acculturation, in contrast, appears to follow a learning-curve trajectory rather than a U-shape (Kennedy, 1999; Schwartz et al., 2015; Ward & Kennedy, 1996). Longitudinal evidence for exchange students is still scarce. While some studies report stable average trajectories with substantial interindividual variation (Serrano-Sánchez et al., 2021), it remains unclear whether such differences are systematically related to students’ social background. Competing assumptions include a Matthew effect, implying increasing advantages for privileged students, and a compensation effect, suggesting stronger gains among less privileged students.

Given the limited and partly contradictory evidence, this study addresses the following open research questions: how psychological and sociocultural acculturation develop over the course of a school-based study abroad experience (Q1), and whether these trajectories differ according to students’ social background (Q2).

Whole-class discussions as a core element of teaching are one of the most common instructional features (i.e. Seidel & Prenzel, 2006; Böheim et al., 2020). Students’ oral participation in these situations are important for different reasons: active participation of students in class discourse leads to higher motivation, supports their learning processes, and improves their skills in communication and problem solving (e.g., Aziz et al., 2018). It also provides teachers with relevant insights into their students’ learning processes.

In order to improve students’ oral participation in classroom discussions and to balance out the predominantly written assessment of performance, the assessment of oral participation was introduced in Germany in the 1970s (Krüll, 2023). Since then, oral participation forms essentially the certificate grades students receive in various subjects. Depending on the federal state, oral participation can account for the majority of the certificate grade in so called oral subjects, in which no class tests or exams are written. In this context, students’ contributions in a teacher-led classroom discussion serve as key indicators for assessing the underlying oral competencies of the students (Krüll, 2023).

Against this background, however, the use of oral participation as an indicator of oral competencies is problematic. Not least because there are numerous non-performance-related factors preventing students from speaking up in class: For example, high shyness at the emotional level, a lack of interest in the subject at the motivational level, and/or a poor teacher-student relationship at the social level. The same applies to characteristics such as introversion or fear of speaking. Over- or under-challenged students could also reduce their willingness to participate actively in such activities. Therefore, oral participation faces the particular problem, that it does not necessarily allow conclusions about students' competencies. Beyond this assessment problem, the factors mentioned also mean that students with these characteristics miss important learning opportunities which in turn can lead to lower achievement.

Studies focusing on student oral participation have increased in recent years, but are still rare, especially those examining assessment related aspects (Krüll, 2023). Some of these studies investigate how indicators of student participation, such as hand-raising, are related to motivational concepts like student engagement and achievement (i. e. Böheim et al., 2020; Schnitzler et al., 2021; in a broader sense Decristan et al., 2023). Other studies focus on factors influencing oral participation (i.e. Decristan et al., 2023; Mundelsee & Reschke, 2025), but primarily with a focus on sociodemographic (gender, linguistic background), cognitive (basic cognitive skills, prior knowledge) or classroom (social relations) characteristics. A few studies examined classroom environmental or instructional features that might promote oral participation among quiet or particularly shy students (i.e. Morek et al., 2023; Mundelsee & Jurkowski, 2024). However, the extent to which psychosocial characteristics such as introversion, public speaking anxiety, or mastery/achievement goal orientations influence classroom participation has hardly been investigated so far. Initial results from a study surveyed secondary school students regarding their reported hand-raising behavior and their reasons for this in classroom discussions (Radtke & Krüll, 2025) show that introversion, language skills, and intrinsic motivation influence participation more than expectations of success, anxiety, or, above all, extrinsic motivation. In addition to this, the question arises to what extent subject-specific aspects of the learning situation (e.g. teacher-student relation) may play a role.

The following paper therefore explores two research questions:

1. To what extent do students differ in their hand-raising behavior (as an indicator of students' participation) between subjects?
2. What subject-specific factors cause students to raise their hands particularly frequently in one subject but rather rarely in another?