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Editorial
This issue of CEPSj introduces papers that are not a part of a specific 
focus but fall into the category of Varia. The content of the papers differs, and 
they comprise topics from students’ understanding of pictures in books, how 
sustainable development goals are integrated into the home economics context, 
how to evaluate students’ environmental worldviews and concerns, what the 
relationship between the factors and conditions of the autonomy of pre-school 
teachers is and how they foster the autonomy of pre-school children, what lan -
guage teachers’ discriminatory practices against students are, to music educa -
tion with a paper about rhyming in the context of the phonological awareness 
of pre-school children.
The first paper by Janja Batič entitled Reading Picture Books in Preschool 
and Lower Grades of Primary School introduces the results of a research study 
that involved 443 pre-school and primary school teachers. The investigation’s 
objective was to discover teachers’ views on making picture book reading a part 
of the teaching process, how picture book reading was incorporated into the 
process, and how a productive visual response to a picture book was designed. 
The results indicated that the surveyed teachers do consider picture books to be 
appropriate, not only for very young children, and they had no difficulties se -
lecting an appropriate picture book. Half of the respondents noted that children 
or students visually expressed their impressions after reading a picture book. 
The replies also indicated that, regarding picture books within the teaching 
process, an unused potential remains in terms of developing children’s visual 
and multimodal literacy. 
The second paper entitled In-service Home Economics Teachers’ Atti -
tudes to the Integration of Sustainable Topics in the Home Economics Subject , 
by Martina Erjavšek, Francka Lovšin Kozina, and Stojan Kostanjevec, presents 
education for sustainable development in the discipline of home economics. 
The purpose of this paper is to ascertain whether in-service teachers of home 
economics recognise the opportunities to educate students about sustainable 
development in their courses and if they can identify the topics related to sus -
tainable development that they can integrate into the subject of home econom -
ics. A questionnaire was distributed to 89 Slovenian in-service home econom -
ics teachers. The results were qualitatively and quantitatively analysed, which 
revealed that in-service home economics teachers understand that the topics 
of the subject promote education for sustainable development. They see the 
most opportunities for integrating sustainable topics arising in food and living 
environments and less in economics and textiles. Based on the research results, 
doi: 10.26529/cepsj.1163

6 editorial
the authors emphasise that it can be deduced that in-service home econom -
ics teachers should be offered ongoing professional development in order to 
achieve the competences needed to teach sustainable development as part of 
home economics. They also pointed out that there is a need to update the home 
economics curriculum subject as it offers numerous opportunities to educate 
students about sustainable living topics. 
The third paper, by Gregor Torkar, Vanja Debevec, Bruce Johnson, 
and Constantinos C. Manoli, Assessing children’s environmental worldviews 
and concerns , illustrates the research about the assessment the environmental 
worldviews and concerns of students from the fourth to the seventh grades in 
Slovenia. The New Ecological Paradigm Scale for Children was translated and 
validated for use with Slovenian primary school students. The students were 
also asked about their environmental concerns (using statements from the En -
vironmental Motives Scale) and demographic questions. A confirmatory factor 
analysis was conducted for the New Ecological Paradigm scale using AMOS 
software, confirming a three-dimensional model with ten items. The students 
showed the highest agreement with the items in the factor Rights of Nature 
and the lowest agreement with Human Exemptionalism. The environmental 
attitudes of the students decreased from the fourth to the seventh grade, while 
altruistic environmental concerns significantly increased with higher grades. 
Gender differences were not statistically significant for environmental world -
views and concerns. The results show that biospheric environmental concern 
positively correlates with the factors Rights of Nature and belief in Eco-Crisis, 
and negatively correlates with Human Exemptionalism. The New Ecological 
Paradigm tool will enable the evaluation of education programmes for children 
in Slovenia.
The purpose of the fourth paper, by Tatjana Devjak, Irena Janžekovič 
Žmauc, and Jože Benčina, entitled The Relationship between the Factors and 
Conditions of the Autonomy of Preschool Teachers and Fostering the Autonomy 
of Preschool Children in Kindergarten , argues that fostering the autonomy of 
children in kindergarten contributes to the positive effects of the individual’s 
autonomy later in life. Various sources substantiate the assumption that there 
is a relationship between the child’s autonomy and the autonomy of educators. 
In the paper, how pre-school teachers evaluate the factors of their professional 
autonomy are identified and investigated, the factors and conditions that, in the 
pre-school teacher’s opinion, foster the autonomy of pre-school children are 
determined, and whether the assessment of both factors and conditions affects 
the actual state of the stimulation of the autonomy of children in kindergarten 
is verified. With regard to fostering the autonomy of children, the participation 

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of children, enabling them to play and learn and to manipulate materials and 
teaching aids in their own way, so that pre-school teachers can offer them a 
choice, take into account their feelings and perspectives, and provide them with 
rational feedback, is under consideration. The authors concluded that an evalu -
ation of the factors and conditions for fostering the autonomy of children by 
pre-school teachers has a beneficial effect on fostering such autonomy, but it is 
not crucial. The most important factors in fostering the autonomy of children 
are the pre-school teacher as a person and the participation of children.
The next paper, entitled A Classroom Survey of Language Teachers’ 
Discriminatory Practices against Students: Causes, Consequences and Keys , by 
Seyyed Hatam Tamimi Sa’ d, and Olga Quiñónez Eames, aimed at revealing the 
incidence of discrimination toward English as a Foreign Language students, 
the grounds on which it happens, its adverse effects on students as well as po -
tential solutions to it. The data were collected through questionnaires and were 
further supported by interviews and classroom observations. The participants 
consisted of sixty-five Iranian students from a variety of ethnic, linguistic, and 
socioeconomic backgrounds. The authors report that nearly one-third of the 
students had experienced discrimination of one form or another. Students’ per -
ceptions of discrimination were that it is based on skin colour, age, sex, social 
class, as well as political and religious beliefs. Furthermore, the findings showed 
that discrimination was perceived to negatively impact students’ motivation 
and overall ability by adversely affecting their class attendance, sense of respon -
sibility, class performance, and assignment completion. It was found that teach -
ers overtly discriminated against students by openly mocking them, neglecting 
to call on them for class participation, and unfairly assessing the students and 
their achievements. 
The last paper, by Soňa Grofčíková and Monika Máčajová, with the title 
Rhyming in the Context of the Phonological Awareness of Pre-School Children 
aims to introduce theoretical starting points and the results of research into 
children’s rhyming in the context of phonological awareness. The text explains 
theoretical circumstances pertaining to the theme and defines key concepts. 
The main part of the paper includes the results of the research on pre-school 
children in Slovakia. There were 866 respondents (children) of four to seven 
years of age. The research subject was the rhyming skills of children, which was 
tested in three independent areas: completing the rhyme in a nursery-rhyme, 
awareness of rhymes, and the production of rhymes. 
This CEPSj issue ends with a book review. The review deals with the 
book entitled Leadership in Education. Initiatives and trends in selected Euro -
pean countries , Institute for Educational Research by editors Slavica Ševkušić, 

8 editorial
Dušica Malinić, and Jelena Teodorović, published by Institute for Educational 
Research in Belgrade, Faculty of Education at University of Kragujevac and 
Hungarian-Netherlands School of Educational Management from University 
of Szeged (ISBN 978-86-7447-149-4) written by Gábor Halász. It can be sum -
marised from the review that the book presents important issues for all those 
who are engaged in developing school leadership or planning future initia -
tives in this area, not only in southern and central Europe but throughout the 
continent. It is a vital resource for those who design leadership training pro -
grammes or any development actions in this area. There is perhaps one element 
that could have strengthened the potential impact of this book: a substantial 
synthesis chapter going beyond what the relatively short preface could provide.
Iztok Devetak