A Survey-based Study On The Impacting Factors And Nurturing Strategies Of Leadership Among Elementary Students

Elementary stage builds up foundations for individuals'ability development in various areas. According to the theory of critical period of leadership learning, elementary stage is also a critical period for leadership development. Therefore, it can be argued that nurturing leadership among elementary students is a significant issue, in terms of individual as well as social development in the long term.In this study, we collected data from 3978 elementary students in six primary schools in Fujian province in China to analyze the impacting factors of students' leadership skill, using the modified Leadership Skills Inventory (LSI) as the instrument. We also conducted in-depth interviews with several teachers, elementary students and parents, to further explain the impacting factors and to indicate the problems and strategies in improving students' leadership skills.The main findings are as follows:1. The relatively high internal consistence indicates that the modified Leadership Skills Inventory in this study is appropriate for the measurement and evaluation of elementary students'leadership skills.2. The overall leadership skills of participants in this study is on the medium level, while the scores on decision-making skills is low. Rural students demonstrate lower level of leadership compared to their companions in the city areas.3. There are significant statistic differences of leadership skills among participants in this study in terms of gender, with female students scoring higher than male students.4. The factors that affect the development of the student leadership mainly include factors of the schools, families and individuals.5. It is reported that leadership skills development among elementary students have not raised adequate attention from both schools and parents in this study. Therefore, the efforts exerted in nurturing leadership from both parties are also limited.6. Based on the findings, we make several suggestions on strengthening the cultivation of leadership among elementary students.