Handwriting fluency and the quality of primary grade students’ writing

Reading and Writing - Until children can produce letters quickly and accurately, it is assumed that handwriting disrupts and limits the quality of their text. This investigation is the largest...     

Grammar for writing? An investigation of the effects of contextualised grammar teaching on students’ writing

The role of grammar instruction in the teaching of writing is contested in most Anglophone countries, with several robust meta-analyses finding no evidence of any beneficial effect. However, existing research is limited in that it only considers isolated grammar instruction and offers no theorisation of an instructional relationship between grammar and writing. This study, drawing on a theorised understanding of grammar as a meaning-making resource for writing development, set out to investigate the impact of contextualised grammar instruction on students’ writing performance. The study adopted a mixed-methods approach, with a randomised controlled trial and a complementary qualitative study. The statistical analyses indicate a positive effect on writing performance for the intervention group (e = 0.21; p < 0.001); but the study also indicates that the intervention impact differentially on different sub-groups, benefiting able writers more than weaker writers. The study is significant in being the first to supply rigorous, theorised evidence for the potential benefits of teaching grammar to support development in writing.     

The effects of distant professional development model on second grade teachers’ instruction and students’ quality of procedural papers

Reading and Writing - The purpose of the study was to examine the feasibility and effectiveness of a distant-professional development model that supported the implementation of genre-based strategy...     

Teaching critical questions about argumentation through the revising process: effects of strategy instruction on college students’ argumentative essays

The effects of self-regulated strategy development revising instruction for college students that targeted the use of argumentation schemes and critical questions were assessed in three conditions. In the first condition, students were taught to revise their essays by asking and answering critical questions about the argument from consequences and argument from example schemes while writing about controversial topics. In the second condition, students were taught to revise their essays by using argumentation schemes to justify their standpoint, but did not learn the critical questions. In the third condition, students received no instruction about either the argumentation schemes or the critical questions. Compared to students in the contrasting conditions, those who were taught to ask and answer critical questions wrote essays that were of higher quality, and included more counterarguments, alternative standpoints, and rebuttals. These findings indicate that strategy instruction that includes critical standards for argumentation increases college students’ sensitivity to alternative perspectives.     

Correction to: The effects of distant professional development model on second grade teachers’ instruction and students’ quality of procedural papers

Reading and Writing - A correction to this paper has been published: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11145-021-10141-w     

Do content revising goals change the revising behavior and story writing of fourth grade students at-risk for writing difficulties?

Reading and Writing - This study examined the impact of content revising goals on the revising behavior and story writing performance of fourth grade students at-risk for writing difficulties....     

Analyzing the effects of mathematical discourse-based instruction on eleventh-grade students’ procedural and conceptual understanding of probability and statistics

This study utilized discourse-based instruction as an alternative method of instruction that emphasizes the teaching of mathematics by actively engaging students in mathematical discourse practices. A quasi-experimental study was employed to determine the effectiveness of mathematical discourse-based instruction in enhancing eleventh-grade students’ conceptual and procedural understanding of probability and statistics. A researcher-constructed test instrument was used for data collection from the experimental and control groups. The data analysis performed using the Kruskal-Wallis test showed that the experimental group outperformed the control groups in terms of conceptual and procedural knowledge. Furthermore, the results suggest that discourse-based instruction when appropriately designed and implemented can increase students’ understanding of mathematical topics.     

A typology of chemistry classroom environments: Exploring the relationships between 10th grade students’ perceptions, attitudes and gender

The present study was the first in Greece in which educational effectiveness theory constituted a knowledge base for investigating the impact of chemistry classroom environment in 10 Grade students’ enjoyment of class. An interpretive heuristic schema was developed and utilised in order to incorporate two factors of teacher behaviour at classroom level, namely, ‘content coverage’ and ‘cognitive teaching processes’, with the patterns of a typology of classroom environments. The latter was drawn from data collected in Attica (a region in Greece) using a new and valid instrument, the How Chemistry Class is Working, while the Enjoyment of Chemistry Lessons scale was used to measure students’ attitudes. A two-step cluster analysis revealed four patterns of the typology that were adaptable to the heuristic schema. The relationship between the patterns and students’ gender, as well the variation in the level of students’ enjoyment among the patterns, were explored. The traditional chemistry classroom environments were found to prevail and to be less enjoyable for the students, especially for the girls. It was found also that students enjoy chemistry lessons more when their goals are taken into account and they have an active role in learning process.     

Exploring the effects of web-mediated socially-shared regulation of learning and experience-based learning on improving students’ learning

The application of online learning and educational technologies in higher education has changed teaching methods, the channels of delivering learning materials, and modes of communication between teachers and students. This study is aimed to improve learning effects and investigate, via quasi-experiments, the effects of web-mediated socially-shared regulation of learning (SSRL) and experience-based learning (ExBL) on improving students’ learning results. The experimental design in this study was a 2 (SSRL vs. non-SSRL)?×?2 (ExBL vs. non-ExBL) factorial pretest/post-test design. Four classes in a one-semester course titled “Applied Information Technology: Data Processing” at university level were chosen for this study. Based on the analysis carried out in this study, students who received the treatments of web-mediated SSRL and/or ExBL did not have significantly better computing skills in using Excel. The reasons for these insignificances and implications thereof are discussed in this paper. Nevertheless, students in the SSRL and non-ExBL class had significant increases in scores for their learning motivation at the end of semester compared with the beginning.     

Green writing: the influence of natural spaces on primary students’ poetic writing in the UK and Australia

This paper draws on findings of comparative international research on students’ poetic writing about the natural environment in the context of the classroom and a naturalistic setting. The study involved 97, nine- to 10-year-olds in four classes: two classes were in an English primary school with their counterparts in a Western Australian primary school. One class in each school had vicarious contact with nature as a stimulus for writing, using a previously taught technique for writing poetry; the other class in each school used the same technique but had direct contact with nature. The study has implications for students’ literacy development, creativity and agency and suggests that students’ poetic writing is enhanced through direct contact with nature. Teachers in both England and Australia, countries where ‘high stakes’ testing dominates the literacy curriculum, may find that standards of writing improve when students are given direct contact with natural spaces and are scaffolded to elicit their poetic voice.     

Writing as a learning tool: Testing the role of students’ writing strategies

The claim that writing facilitates students’ learning, although widely accepted, has little support from empirical research. A possible explanation for the lack of empirical evidence is that writing-to-learn research has disregarded that students use different writing strategies. The purpose of the present experimental study is to test whether it is effective to adapt writing-to-learn tasks to different writing strategies when teaching literature. A course “Learning to write argumentative texts about literature” was developed in two different versions: one adapted to a planning writing strategy, the other to a revising writing strategy. Participants were 113 tenth-grade high school students in the Netherlands. Our hypothesis is an adaptation hypothesis: we expect that the more a student will use a planning writing strategy, the more the student will profit from the lessons in the planning condition, and that the more a student uses a revising writing strategy, the more beneficial the revising condition will be. However, results show that for improving literary interpretation skill, a course adapted to the planning writing strategy is more effective for almost all students.     

What motivates students? A study on the effects of teacher leadership and students’ self-efficacy

Students’ educational motivation is significant for performance and achieving learning, but little is known about what fuels such motivation. Educational motivation is regarded as the drive and inner state that energise educational activities, facilitate learning and channel behaviour towards achieving educational goals. Educational motivation paves the way for students to learn and acquire the knowledge that is essential for successful study outcomes. This article aims to explore what determines students’ educational motivation. Building on the self-determination theory, we modelled the influence of teachers’ leadership and students’ self-efficacy on students’ educational motivation. We used survey data from a sample of upper secondary school students in Sweden; we received a total of 993 answers, equal to a response rate of 74%. The results show that students’ self-efficacy and teacher leadership are of extreme importance for students’ educational motivation, and that highly efficacious students lose most educational motivation when the teacher’s leadership is poor. The results thus support the importance of teachers’ leadership for encouraging student learning.     

The effects of being a reader and of observing readers on fifth-grade students’ argumentative writing and revising

Opportunities to read and analyze others?? writing or to observe readers as they analyze writing might enhance one??s own sense of audience and improve one??s own writing. This mixed-methods study investigated whether reader and observer activities in comparison to writing practice activities affected fifth-grade students?? persuasive writing and revising. After writing a first draft of a persuasive letter, 87 fifth-grade students were randomly assigned to one of three conditions: being a reader, observing readers, or practicing writing. The reader group read and discussed three persuasive letters, considering whether they were persuasive and why and selecting the most persuasive. The observer group listened to the reader group??s discussions and took notes; then they had their own discussion to generate a list of criteria for what made the letters persuasive. The practice-writing control group practiced writing persuasive letters. Afterwards, all groups revised their first drafts. The reader group produced second drafts that were of better quality and contained more evidence of audience awareness than the control group. The observer group did not differ from either group. The groups did not differ on a transfer task occurring 1-week later. The authors discuss implications for designing writing curriculums that utilize reader and observer activities.     

Hong Kong primary students’ self-regulated writing strategy use: Influences of gender,writing proficiency,and grade level

The multifaceted nature of writing makes it one of the most challenging school subjects for English-as-a-foreign-language (EFL) students. Despite its importance and wide attention attracted, primary school students’ unsatisfactory writing performance has been little researched. As an optimal way of learning, self-regulated learning (SRL) has gained surging popularity in various academic disciplines but the field of second language (L2) writing is still underexplored. To fill the gap, the study investigated 291 upper-grade (4th-6th grades) Hong Kong primary students’ use of SRL writing strategies, and explored whether the students’ strategy use varied between genders, and across English writing proficiency groups and grade levels. A three-way MANOVA was performed and results showed that the students’ SRL writing strategy use varied significantly between genders, and across different writing proficiency groups and grade levels. Interaction effects of grade level and gender were also discovered. Important implications are drawn.     

Synergistic effects of instruction and affect factors on high- and low-ability disparities in elementary students’ reading literacy

Reading and Writing - This study examined the combined effects of teachers’ instructional practices and students’ reading-related affective engagement on predicting the high and low...     

Metaconceptually-enhanced simulation-based inquiry: effects on eighth grade students’ conceptual change and science epistemic beliefs

This study investigated the effects of metaconceptually-enhanced, simulation-based inquiry learning on eighth grade students’ conceptual change in science and their development of science epistemic beliefs. Two experimental groups studied the topics of motion and force using the same computer simulations but with different simulation guides: one enhanced with metaconceptual scaffolding, while the other was not. The findings led to the following conclusions: (a) metaconceptual scaffolding enhanced simulation-based learning by significantly reducing science misconceptions, but it was not as effective in changing students’ mental models which consisted of multiple interrelated key concepts; (b) students’ beliefs about the speed of learning and the construction of knowledge were strong predictors of conceptual change learning outcomes; (c) epistemologically more mature students did not benefit more from metaconceptual interventions than those with less mature beliefs; (d) further interventions are needed to promote the development of students’ science epistemic beliefs in inquiry learning.     

Effects of explicit instruction in cognitive and metacognitive reading strategies on Iranian EFL students’ reading performance and strategy transfer

This study explored the impact of explicit teaching of reading strategies on English-as-a-foreign-language (EFL) students?? reading performance in Iran. The study employed a questionnaire adapted from Chamot and O??Malley??s (1994) cognitive and metacognitive strategies framework. To test the effects of explicit teaching of cognitive and metacognitive reading strategies on reading performance and strategy transfer, the study has a quasi-experimental design involving a contrast group and a treatment group, with whom an intervention program was implemented. The treatment group achieved significantly better results than the contrast group after four months of strategy-based instruction. Results of paired-sample t-tests and independent t-tests and effect size showed that reading comprehension and reading strategy use improved with strategy instruction. Moreover, SPANOVA analyses showed that the participants in the treatment group performed better than those in the contrast group in reading comprehension and reading strategy transfer. Results also showed that strategy instruction contributed to autonomous reading behaviors. Recommendations for further research are discussed.     

What’s in a word? Effects of morphologically rich vocabulary instruction on writing outcomes among elementary students

Reading and Writing - We examined effects of a 12-week, teacher-delivered, morphology-infused vocabulary intervention on writing outcomes for 4th and 5th grade U.S. students. The intervention (1)...     

Correction to: Exploring students’ science motivation across grade levels and the role of inductive reasoning in science motivation

European Journal of Psychology of Education - The purpose of this study is to explore students’ motivation towards science learning at different grade levels and to investigate whether...