What they're reading—web communities for learning community work

The author reviews several Web‐based resources that can help untangle the complex work of launching and sustaining learning communities.     

What they're reading: A theory of patience

When About Campus polled students and professors on what books they would recommend to help people understand other races and cultures, one book kept surfacing, Racism 101 by Nikki Giovanni. For that reason, and in honor of this issue, we decided to devote the entire “What They're Reading” column to a short chapter from Racism 101.     

Trajectories of motivation and their academic correlates over the first year of college

The first year of college is a pivotal time for academic and personal development, yet there is still much to be learned about motivational change during this period. Using Self-Determination Theory (SDT), we assessed six distinct types of motivation among an initial sample of 776 students at four time points over the first year of college. Latent growth models indicated initially high but declining levels of intrinsic motivation and identified regulation, moderate but increasing levels of positive and negative introjection, and low but increasing levels of external regulation and amotivation. These patterns suggest that, on average, more autonomous types of motivation tend to decrease over the first year of college while more controlled types of motivation tend to increase. Academic functioning was predicted by (a) initial levels of both identified regulation and amotivation and (b) change trajectories for intrinsic motivation, identified regulation, and amotivation. These findings suggest that contextual supports for building autonomous motivation and minimizing amotivation appear to be essential both prior to college entry and throughout the first year.     

Influences on students' internal locus of attribution for academic success in the first year of college

This study sought to determine the extent to which students' development of internal locus of attribution for academic success during the first year of college was influenced by institutional characteristics, students' academic experiences, and their social/nonacademic experiences. The sample was 2,392 first-year students attending 23 diverse two- and four-year institutions Iocated in 16 states throughout the country. Controlling for precollege internal attribution, academic ability, and other potentially confounding influences, a number of variables had significant, net, positive associations with end-of-first-year internal attribution. These included attending a two-year (versus a four-year) college, level of exposure to postsecondary education, work responsibilities, the extent of course organization, instructional clarity, and instructor support in the teaching received, and participation in intercollegiate athletics. Additional analyses indicated that many of the associations with internal attribution were conditional rather than general, differing in magnitude for different kinds of students.     

五年一贯制高职生第一阶段培养目标研究

由于"五年一贯制"与普通大专在办学定位、人才培养目标等方面的区别,要求我们对其五年学习过程统筹考虑才能真正达到培养应用型人才的目的。"五年一贯制"第一阶段是学生学习打基础的阶段,确定培养目标就显得尤为重要。