SENSE OF SCHOOL BELONGING AMONG ELEMENTARY SCHOOL STUDENTS

The main purpose of this study was to investigate elementary school students' sense of school belonging. The Psychological Sense of School Membership Scale was administrated to 364 (174 female and 190 male) students, attending sixth-, seventh-and eighth-grade in Adana, Turkey. To analyze the gathered data, descriptive statistics were investigated and, one-way analysis of variance and t-test were performed. The findings indicated that female students had significantly higher sense of school belonging and a lower feeling of rejection in school and, significant differences were found in favor of the students who have higher academic achievement. It is also found that students who were attending to the schools that have middle and high socio-economic status have higher sense of school membership.