Advisor,teacher, partner: Using the learning partnerships model to reshape academic advising

An academic advisor who has built a one‐on‐one relationship with a student over an extended period is in an ideal position to become a partner in helping shape the advisee's academic experience. The author offers one model for taking full advantage of this opportunity.     

An examination of self-directed contract learning as an instructional strategy

In recent years, instructors, academic programs, and innovative educational institutions have begun utilizing self-directed learning concepts and contract learning structures for assumed development of student self-directed learning outcomes. However, prior investigations of development of self-directed learning have been hortative in form or have examined correlative relationships of self-directed behavior with specific learner characteristics. Does learner participation in a self-directed contract learning course influence his/her future behavior and attitudes toward self-directed learning? This study examined the impact of a self-directed contract learning course upon participant self-directed learning behavior and attitudes. Findings of this study were examined from three forms of impact evaluation. Significant positive gains were noted on participant pre- and postgain scores on the Self-Directed Learning Readiness Scale (SDLRS). Course evaluations noted a majority of positive participant responses regarding perceived changes in knowledge and skill of self-directed learning as well as reported value of the course experience. The third form of impact evaluation came from observational diaries analysis. Diaries from selected students and the instructor were analyzed for major themes and transitions. A discussion of these themes and transition points are presented in a framework analysis of the Fuller and Bown “Concerns model.” Findings are discussed for their varying significance in understanding the development of self-directed learning behavior.     

自主学习质量控制要素探析

在现代远程教育中,影响自主学习质量的要素包括学习观念、学生的知识基础和社会背景、办学条件、质量评价和质量控制体系以及考试与考核等。提高自主学习质量的措施与途径包括转变观念、加强师资队伍建设、完善现代化教学设备和教学支持服务体系、建立自主学习质量体系和加强自主学习质量监控以及全面深化教学全过程的改革等。     

远程教育环境下农村教师自主学习模式的研究

本文在分析了农村远程教育自主学习特性的基础上,依据远程自主学习与校本培训相结合的原则,提出了农村教师自主学习模式的基本框架和运行策略。     

Authentic and self-directed learning in vocational education: Challenges to vocational educators

This article analyses the dilemmas and practical tensions in implementing competence-based vocational education. Eleven case studies were conducted, including observation of lessons and interviews with teachers and students. The results show that schools meet various fundamental issues in realising this approach. A crucial question is how to stimulate the acquisition and use of a way of knowing and thinking that is based on vocational theory. Reflection, authenticity and coaching are relevant characteristics that are hardly put into practice yet. To understand these results the article reflects on factors that account for the distance between promising concepts and actual teaching practice.     

An experiential system for learning probability: Stat Lady description and evaluation

This paper describes a computer-based instructional system called Stat Lady, and reports the results of an evaluation study that tested the efficacy of learning probability from this program in relation to a traditional Lecture and a no-treatment Control group. Results showed that both treatment groups learned significantly more than the Control group, yet there was no difference between the two treatment groups in outcome performance after three hours of instruction. This was viewed as encouraging because: (a) due to sampling error, students assigned to the Stat Lady condition were at a disadvantage, scoring about 20 points less on the quantitative SAT measure compared to the Lecture group, and about 25 points less than the Control group, (b) the lecture constituted a more familiar learning environment for these subjects, and (c) the professor administering the Lecture had more than 20 years experience teaching this subject matter, while this was Stat Lady's first teaching assignment. We also found a significant aptitude-treatment interaction where high-aptitude subjects learned more from Stat Lady than from the Lecture environment, but for low-aptitude subjects, there was no difference in learning outcome by condition. Implications of these findings will be discussed in relation to future computer-based instructional research.

     

The relationship between perceived learning and satisfaction with college: An alternative view

Student and alumni reports of learning and development during college play an important role in research on educational outcomes. An intriguing finding of this research is the positive relationship between perceived learning and satisfaction with college. While studies have documented an association between perceptions of learning and satisfaction, the nature of the relationship is not clearly defined. This study evaluates two competing models of perceived learning and satisfaction. The first model represents a true relationship between learning and satisfaction, while the second treats the relationship as an artifact of a halo effect. Data came from subjects who completed learning and satisfaction questions as seniors and again two years after graduation. Analyses revealed that treating the learning-satisfaction relationship as an artifact of a halo effect provided the best representation of the data. Although not conclusive, results suggested that educational researchers and assessment practitioners should be careful in interpreting self-reports of learning and development, particularly as they relate to satisfaction with college.Presented at the Annual Forum of the Association for Institutional Research, Atlanta, Georgia, May 10–13, 1992.     

自我导向学习及其与成人教育发展述评

自我导向学习孕育于成人教育,又推动成人教育的发展。自我导向学习对成人教育的发展影响巨大,奠定了成人教育学的学科基础,形成了成人学习的基本模式;澄清了成人学习认识上的误区,促进了成人学习研究的深化;推动了成人学习流派、学说的涌现和实践模式的建构。拓展理论基础、建构基本原理、加强课程领导和开发有效策略是自我导向学习在我国成人教育研究领域的发展趋势。     

The design and evaluation of Link: A computer-based learning system for correlation

This paper describes the design and evaluation of a computer-assisted learning program called Link , which was designed to be used by psychology students to review their understanding of correlation. Unlike existing computer-assisted learning programs that were reviewed, Link makes use of data from authentic research studies in psychology and provides learner activities that are specifically designed to address students' misconceptions about correlation. A summative evaluation study of Link involving fifty psychology students was carried out to assess the effect on students' understanding of correlation. It was found that the use of Link significantly contributed to students' general understanding of correlation. However, it was found that students use of paper-based instructional materials could also achieve this. The implication of this research outcome is considered in relation to the design and use of computer-assisted learning applications for statistics in higher education.     

The effects of mathematical modeling on creative production ability and self-directed learning attitude

What should we do to educate the mathematically gifted and how should we do it? In this research, to satisfy diverse mathematical and cognitive demands of the gifted who have excellent learning ability and task tenacity in mathematics, we sought to apply mathematical modeling. One of the objectives of the gifted education in Korea is cultivating creative production ability. Another objective is to develop the self-directed learning attitude of the gifted. To examine the objectives, Mathematical Modeling was applied to the gifted. We analyzed the behaviors of the mathematically gifted students attending the class, which applied Mathematical Modeling to assess the potential for cultivating creative production ability. And in the aspect of the self-directed learning attitudes, two groups were compared: the gifted students who participated in the Mathematical Modeling class and other gifted students who did not. From these results, Mathematical Modeling is proposed as an appropriate program to achieve educational objectives for the mathematically gifted students.     

The ‘no problem’ Discourse model: Exploring an alternative way of researching student learning

In this paper we explore an alternative way of characterising the student learning experience, drawing on sociocultural perspectives on learning. Here, learning is not merely the application of an approach to a cognitive task, but a social process of identity formation. In particular, we draw on Gee's concept of Discourse models to identify the implicit theories students use to make sense of their learning and assessment experiences. From interviews with third year engineering students, we identified what we termed the ‘no problem Discourse model’, in which students construct an upbeat portrayal of their experience of a course, despite experiencing crises induced by assessment events. Through a process of justification the seriousness of the crisis is denied. This Discourse model appears to have its roots in a popular Discourse of self-actualization. There was evidence of co-construction of this model during the student learning interviews. This suggests implications for the roles that teachers can play in either maintaining or challenging the Discourse models that are adopted by students.     

An alternative to social learning theory: Discussion of papers by Whitehurst,Zimmerman, and Brody

Social learning theory, in explaining cognitive development, fails to account for rule invariance in the face of capricious and informationally impoverished experience, offers no explanatory mechanism for the process by which systems of abstract rules are acquired, and offers less flexibility than alternative explanations based on operations and reflective abstraction.     

The effects of portfolio-based advice on the development of self-directed learning skills in secondary vocational education

This experimental study was designed to investigate whether supervision meetings, in which students receive specific advice on how to use a development portfolio to monitor their progress and plan their future learning, helps them to develop self-directed learning skills and improve their learning in the domain. In the first year of a hairdressing program in vocational education, supervision meetings were used to provide students with either specific advice or not. Students in the advice group (n = 21) formulated better learning needs, selected more suitable learning tasks, completed more practical assignments, and acquired more certificates than students in the feedback-only group (n = 22). Interviews also showed that students in the advice group appreciated the supervision meeting more and perceived them as more effective than students in the feedback-only group. Guidelines are provided for the use of development portfolios and the organization of supervision meetings in on-demand vocational education.