Organizational Identification: A Mixed Methods Study Exploring Students’ Relationship with Their University

Organizational identification (OID) is the outcome of social construction processes in which individuals define themselves in terms of their organizational membership. Students’ identification with their university reflects value congruence with the institution and is reflected in communication. Drawing on social identity theory (SIT) and utilizing quantitative and qualitative data from students (n = 555), we found relationships between OID and construed external image of the university, trust in the university, satisfaction with the university, perceived interorganizational competition, and outcomes, including intended future involvement. Students were re-surveyed nine months later (n = 397, with 83 respondents matching Time 1 and Time 2) to assess their OID stability. Open-ended responses describe situations and events that strengthen/lessen OID. We offer implications for OID, SIT, and for organizational communication research and practice.     

Exploring the Impact of Assessment on Medical Students’ Learning

Abstract

What and how students learn depend largely on how they think they will be assessed. This study aimed to explore medical students’ perception of the value of assessment and feedback on their learning, and how this relates to their examination performance. A mixed methods research design was adopted in which a questionnaire was developed and administered to the students to gain their perceptions of assessments. Perceptions were further explored in focus group discussions. Survey findings were correlated with students’ performance data and academic coordinators’ perceptions. Students’ perceptions of the level of difficulty of different assessments mirrored their performance in examinations, with an improvement observed in clinical assessments as students progressed through their degree. Students recognised that feedback is important to allow improvements and seek more timely, better quality and personalised feedback. Academic coordinators identified that some of the students’ suggestions are more realistic than others. Students had a positive attitude towards assessment, but emphasised the need for educators to highlight the relevance of assessment to clinical practice.     

Mentoring Undergraduate Researchers: An Exploratory Study of Students’ and Professors’ Perceptions

Mentoring is believed to be one of the most influential factors in US efforts to encourage college‐aged students to seek careers in science, yet the role that mentoring plays in this process has not been elucidated. The researchers were interested in understanding whether the long‐held beliefs about the importance of mentoring would be revealed as what actually occurs in an undergraduate research program. They describe students’ perceptions of the mentoring process and students’ beliefs about how it impacted their experiences as undergraduate researchers and their development as scientists. Also described are professors’ perceptions of their roles and effectiveness as mentors in students’ development as scientists. A multi‐case narrative analysis was conducted of two groups, undergraduate science scholars (n=5) and mentoring professors (n=5), who were each interviewed on two occasions at the beginning and end of the first year of a funded research program. As this grounded research study shows, students and professors described student gains as increased technical expertise and communication skills. Professors suggested that they were available to students on a regular and frequent basis. However, students’ experiences suggested a contradiction. They were often mentored by postgraduates, technical assistants, and other students; their meetings with mentoring professors were infrequent and at times distant. With respect to mentoring, this finding highlights the differences between beliefs and the reality of what was delivered. Professors discussed the challenges associated with mentoring including the recruitment of and difficulty of working with students whose first language was not English and concerns about the quality of instruction from graduate students.     

A Study on Teachers’and Students’Beliefs about English Teaching

Teacher and learner beliefs have been found to play an important role in EFL teaching and learning.The present em pirical study explores a group of college teachers’and students’beliefs about English teaching by using questionnaire.The statisti cal result shows that teachers and students have divergent views about many issues in English teaching.     

A Study on Sixth Grade Students’ Misconceptions and Errors in Spatial Measurement: Length,Area, and Volume

The purpose of the present study was to portray students’ misconceptions and errors while solving conceptually and procedurally oriented tasks involving length, area, and volume measurement. The data were collected from 445 sixth grade students attending public primary schools in Ankara, Türkiye via a test composed of 16 constructed-response format tasks. The findings revealed a wide range of misconceptions and errors such as “believing that all rulers are 30 cm long,” “confusing area formula with perimeter formula,” “believing a box has more than one surface area,” “using the volume formula for surface area,” “believing that ruler must be longer than the object measured,” etc. These misconceptions and errors could be considered as the evidences indicating the sixth graders’ lack of comprehension of the fundamental concepts of spatial measurement and their relationships and the procedures and formulas used for measuring length, area, and volume. The possible causes of such misconceptions and overcoming ways were also discussed.     

On the Impact of Learning Cycle Teaching on Austrian High School Students’ Emotions,Academic Self-Concept,Engagement, and Achievement

Research in Science Education - Over the past several decades, empirical support for inquiry-based forms of science teaching has accumulated. Critical voices, however, also exist, claiming that...     

A Study on the Impact and Referential Significance of IELTS to China’s Education System

IELTS is the shortcut to the Commonwealth countries, whether for study or for immigration, the test has been becom?ing an important key to the gate of Commonwealth. The quantity of examinee keeps a g...     

Exploring Social Competence as a Mediator of Head Start’s Impact on Children’s Early Math Skills: Evidence from the Head Start Impact Study

Children from low-income families often enter kindergarten academically behind their higher income peers. Recent findings also indicate gaps in social-emotional aspects of school readiness, raising questions about cross-domain relations. Using a subsample (N = 3,485) of 3- and 4-year-olds attending center-based programming in the Head Start Impact Study, we investigate whether improvements in children’s social competence may mediate the effect of Head Start assignment on children’s early math skills. We posit that social competence can be effectively captured via a combination of two distinct constructs: social skills when interacting with peers and teacher–child relationships. Indeed, confirmatory factor analyses revealed good fit for a measurement model of social competence using indicators of these constructs, each of which measure different, yet complementary, aspects of children’s interpersonal skills. Structural equation modeling showed that, although random assignment to Head Start did not impact early math skills or social competence in this subsample, children’s social competence was positively related to math achievement during the preschool year. Taken together, results suggest that preschoolers’ relationships with others – effectively interacting with both peers and teachers in classroom settings – positively predicts math skills. Findings can guide curricular decision-making and time allocation, particularly in preschools serving children from low-income families.     

Students’ Needs,Teachers’ Support,and Motivation for Doing Homework: A Cross-Sectional Study

Self-determination theory provided the theoretical framework for a cross-sectional investigation of elementary and junior high school students’ autonomous motivation for homework. More specifically, the study focused on the role of teachers’ support of students’ psychological needs in students’ motivation for homework in the two school systems. The study also investigated the contribution of a match between teachers’ support and students’ expressed level of psychological needs to autonomous motivation for homework. The findings indicated that teacher support partially mediated the difference in autonomous motivation for homework between students in the two school systems. In addition, the findings suggested that whereas students’ with different level of expressed needs may perceive different levels of teachers’ support, and that teachers’ support might be more important for students who express higher level of needs, perceived teachers’ support of psychological needs was important for students’ adaptive motivation for homework, irrespective of their expressed level of needs.     

A Comparison of Multiple-Strategy Methods: Effects on Fourth-Grade Students’ General and Content-Specific Reading Comprehension and Vocabulary Development

Abstract

In this study, we compared the effects of two experimental multiple-strategy approaches (content-area comprehension and vocabulary) to typical fourth-grade social studies instructional practices. An 18-week, cluster-randomized study was conducted to estimate effects measured by normative-referenced reading comprehension and vocabulary measures and researcher- and district-developed measures of social studies vocabulary and content. Forty-eight teachers and their respective 903 students from 15 schools were randomly assigned by school to one of three conditions: content vocabulary, content reading comprehension, or typical practice. Experimental teachers participated in 6 professional development sessions over 21 weeks. Structural equation modeling results indicated reliable differences favoring both experimental conditions over typical practice on the social studies content measure and substantively important effects on content and standardized vocabulary measures. Students in the vocabulary intervention also outperformed typical practice peers on the curriculum-based vocabulary assessment. Effects of the comprehension and vocabulary conditions were comparable except for the significant effect of vocabulary on the curriculum-based vocabulary measure. Effect sizes for teaching quality on the standardized comprehension measure ranged from d = .26 to .32; however, these effects were not statistically significant.     

A Study on Direct Feedback and Indirect Feedback in Graduate Students ’Writing

Feedback plays a central role in writing development. However correcting students’writing is one of the most time-consuming tasks for our senior English teachers. By conducting a survey of direct feedb...     

A Simple Study of the Teacher’s Influence on Students’ Psychology in English Learning

This paper analyzes the teacher’s influence on students’psychologyin English learning from two aspects and emphasizes the importance of English teachers’role in helping students establish healthy psychology in English learning.     

‘I don’t Study Physics Anymore’: a Cross-Institutional Australian Study on Factors Impacting the Persistence of Undergraduate Science Students

Research in Science Education - University is a critical timepoint for students in the science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) career pathway. Gender differences in the persistence...     

The Impact of Teachers and Their Science Teaching on Students’ ‘Science Interest’: A four-year study

There is a crisis in school science in Australia and this may be related to insufficient students developing an interest in science. This extended study looked at changes in 14 students’ interest in science as they moved through junior secondary school into Year 10. Although the majority of these students still had an interest in science in Year 10, it had fluctuated for most students from year to year. The presence or absence of simple, but effective, teaching practices, identified by these students, seems to suggest one way to retain or improve situational and, it would appear, in several cases, personal interest.     

College Students’ Experiences with Diversity and Their Effects on Academic Self-Confidence,Social Agency,and Disposition toward Critical Thinking

The results of this study conducted at the University of Michigan (n = 289) indicate that students with more experiences with diversity, particularly enrollment in diversity courses and positive interactions with diverse peers, are more likely to score higher on academic self-confidence, social agency, and critical thinking disposition. In addition, the study provides evidence that diversity experiences may work together to foster development of certain aspects of self.The work reported herein is supported under the National Institute for Student Achievement, Curriculum and Assessment program, agreement number R305T990402-00, CFDA/Subprogram No: 84.305T, as administered by the Office of Educational Research and Improvement (OERI), U.S. Department of Education. The findings and opinions expressed in this report do not reflect the position or policies of OERI or the U.S. Department of Education.     

The Influence of Motivational Regulation Strategies on Online Students’ Behavioral,Emotional, and Cognitive Engagement

Providing effective motivational support is a critical determinant of a successful online distance learning experience for students in higher education. In this study, we examined how students’ academic level and use of 8 motivational regulation strategies influence 3 types of student engagement: behavioral engagement, emotional engagement, and cognitive engagement. A total of 95 undergraduate and graduate students enrolled in online courses in 4-year universities in the United States participated in this study. A series of hierarchical regression analyses of undergraduate and graduate online students (N = 95) showed that behavioral engagement, emotional engagement, and cognitive engagement are predicted by different motivational regulation strategies after controlling for the academic level. Additionally, students’ academic level was found to be a predictor of cognitive engagement but not a predictor of behavioral engagement or emotional engagement. The results suggest that online course instructors, tutors, and designers should provide students with differentiated motivational scaffolding based on their motivational profile in order to promote different aspects of learning engagement.