Using an expectancy-value approach to examine teachers’ motivational strategies

This study explored verbal motivational strategies in exemplary teachers’ classrooms. A framework derived from expectancy-value theory, which addresses student motivation for academic tasks, was applied. Audiotaped math and literacy lessons of two exemplary second-grade teachers showed a high number of comments related to expectancies and relatively fewer related to valuing tasks. In addition, teachers made more motivational statements when in the process of instruction than when introducing or concluding instructional episodes. Interviews revealed that some teacher beliefs, such as the importance of rationales or ensuring student success, were related to classroom strategies. Implications for theory, practice, and research are discussed.     

Two Fifth Grade Teachers' Use of Real-World Situations in Science and Mathematics Lessons

The purpose of this study was to investigate the types, sources, and cognitive levels of tasks that included real-life situations used in science and mathematics lessons in the classrooms of two 5th-grade teachers at an urban elementary school in Turkey. A qualitative approach was used to analyze data that included classroom observations, teacher interviews, and document collection. Results showed that in contrast to mathematics instruction, science instruction often relied on real-life situations in explaining scientific concepts. Mathematics lessons mainly included textbook-oriented real-life situations. On the other hand, the science lessons relied primarily on teacher- and student-oriented real-life contexts. While science instruction included personal, social, global, and historical situations, mathematics instruction involved only personal and educational situations in making real-life connections. Results further showed that, in contrast to science instruction, many of the real-life tasks used by the teacher in the mathematics lessons were cognitively demanding.     

Students’ goals and self-regulation in the classroom

This chapter argues for an understanding of action regulation as inextricably related to the motivational process of goal setting and planning. Within this conceptual framework our research has explored students’ action patterns, both in normal ongoing classroom situations and in stressful circumstances. Goals are emphasized as essential aspects of the motivational quality of activities, namely through the role they play in the regulation of action. In this study the detection of students’ behavioral goals is addressed. Several achievement and social goals are described and ways to assess students’ goal setting and planning processes are proposed. Strategies that students use to handle classroom stressors are explored. These include strategic flexible action, strategic rigid action, passive behavior, and disorganized behavior. These strategies represent distinct forms of action regulation. Relations between students’ strategies, which are viewed as indications of their control, and agency beliefs are also examined. Finally, classroom features, which might help or hinder students’ self-regulation are discussed, including teachers’ goals and students’ perceptions of teachers’ goals for classroom activities.     

Collaborative processes during report writing of a science learning project: The nature of discourse as a function of task requirements

The aim of this article is to specify how different aspects of task assignments are related to different types of student discourse during the report writing phase of a science learning project. A group of four ninth-grade students of the Finnish comprehensive school (about 15-year-olds) participated in a project work involving laboratory experiments, reading literature, and analysing and reporting research findings. The empirical data were collected through videotaping and interviews in authentic classroom settings. The results indicated that construction of shared, high-level understanding was quite rare in this case of small group interaction. As one of the main reasons for this, we suggest that the learning tasks were defined in a way that did not encourage shared reflection and high-level discourse. The students’ task was mostly to answer fact-seeking questions made by their teacher to guide the report writing, which promoted recollection rather than reasoning. In order to facilitate high-level discourse and learning, more attention should be paid to the kind of processes that task assignment triggers. The findings are discussed in the framework of how teachers could formulate their task assignments to promote high-level discourse.     

Building a framework for determining the authenticity of instructional tasks within teacher education programs

We propose a framework for evaluating the degree of authenticity of instructional tasks used within a teacher education program. First, we provide a defense for authenticity as an exemplary aspect of education. Second, we synthesize the theoretical literature on authenticity into conceptual codes. Using these codes, we build our authenticity framework around five criteria: the instructional task (1) is routinely performed by teachers, (2) involves students in a classroom, (3) promotes knowledge of practice, (4) involves self-reflection, and (5) serves formative purposes. We then discuss potential applications of our framework for the individual teacher educator and for program evaluation.     

Children's heart rate reactivity responses to three school tasks

The effects of three routine classroom tasks upon heart rate reactivity were investigated with a sample of 30 typical fifth-grade children. Instructions for a mental arithmetic task, the mental arithmetic task itself, and silent reading were administered under standardized conditions, with a reward being offered for performance on the mental arithmetic task to enhance competition. Heart rate was individually monitored each second during these tasks, and data were collected on mental arithmetic performance and reading ability. Results indicated that some children showed large increases in their heart rates during the three tasks, and that these children should be considered as at-risk in terms of their cardiac health.     

Conceptualizing teachers' understanding of students' mathematical learning by using assessment tasks*

The study was designed to support teachers on conceptualizing their understanding of students' learning by the use of assessment tasks. A school-based assessment team consisting of the researcher and four third-grade teachers teaching in the same school was set up as a learning context of supporting teachers in developing assessment tasks integral to instruction. The assessment tasks along with students' responses to the task, classroom observations, interviews, routine weekly meetings, teachers' weekly reflective journals, and students' responses to the assessment tasks were the data collected in the study. The teachers' views of using assessment tasks and the generation of assessment tasks were developed in the course of the study. In the process of generating assessment tasks, teachers improved their awareness of students' various solutions and learning difficulties to a specific problem, their awareness of the importance of developing students' critical thinking, and their awareness of where students need to make a remedial instruction. The research reported in the paper was supported by the National Science Council of Taiwan under Grant NSC 90-2521-S134-003-. The opinions expressed in this paper are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the view of funding agency.     

Students' construction of external representations in design-based learning situations

This article develops a theoretical framework for the study of students' construction of mixed multiple external representations in design-based learning situations involving an adaptation of professional tasks and tools to a classroom setting. The framework draws on research on professional design processes and on learning with multiple external representations. An authentic classroom situation and student dialogue and productions from one dyad were interpreted in the light of the framework in order to uncover major pitfalls of design-based learning situations. In particular, students showed a preoccupation with geometrical features of problems and solutions in contrast to the framework-derived importance of geometrical, material and functional features of future artefacts. Lack of occurrences of deep understanding in relating representations by students might be due to them being novices to the design task as the intertwined construction and representation of a future artefact.     

大学英语任务型教学探索

任务型教学是目前外语课堂教学研究的一个热点。文章研究运用威廉姆斯、博登的社会建构主义理论和Krashen的“输入与互动假设”理论对任务型教学模式进行了积极的探索,将知识教学融入到自身完成一项任务的具体活动当中,让学生不仅能学到英语知识,而且还能亲自体验到“做事”的经历和乐趣,从而提高他们运用英语的能力。     

A closer look at integrated writing tasks: Towards a more focussed definition for assessment purposes

The use of integrated tasks is increasingly common in second language assessment in both high stakes and classroom contexts. However, because of the vague definition of what constitutes an integrated task, the types of tasks included in this area and the assessment of the resulting writing is highly varied. In this paper, we argue for a better definition of the term ‘integrated writing task’. We start by reviewing current definitions available in the literature, discuss the construct underlying integrated tasks and then propose a number of features which we feel need to be present in integrated tasks. We then propose a new, narrower definition of the term. We hope that this will result in better task design, improved assessment outcomes for test takers, more detailed test specifications, better replicability of research and a shared research agenda.     

大学英语任务型教学研究

任务型教学是目前外语课堂教学研究的一个热点,文章运用威廉姆斯、博登的社会建构主义理论和Krashen的"输入与互动假设"理论对任务型教学模式进行了积极的探索,将知识教学融入到亲自完成一项任务的具体活动当中,让学生不仅能学到英语知识,而且还能亲自体验到"做事"的经历和乐趣,从而提高他们运用英语的能力.     

A secondary reanalysis of student perceptions of non‐traditional writing tasks over a ten year period

This study aims to add to the growing research related to the implementation of non‐traditional writing tasks in classrooms to encourage science literacy. A secondary reanalysis methodology was employed to review student interviews collected as a part of several individual studies during a ten year research program. This method established an interpretive framework different than the particular frameworks guiding the individual studies. In doing so, a greater ability to generalize findings was sought. Main assertions emerging from the student responses analyzed include recognition of benefits of non‐traditional writing, recognition of the need for particular task characteristics to encourage these benefits, and recognition of greater cognitive activity than is present in typical science classroom writing. © 2009 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Res Sci Teach 47: 518–539, 2010     

Roles of a teacher and researcher during in situ professional development around the implementation of mathematical modeling tasks

Partnership with teachers for professional development has been considered beneficial because of the potential of collaborative work in the teacher’s own classroom to be relevant to practice. From this perspective, both teachers and researchers can draw on their own expertise and work as authentic partners. In this study, we address the need for such collaboration and focus on how a teacher and a researcher performed their roles when collaboratively implementing mathematical modeling tasks within a context of in situ professional development. Using multi-tier design-based research, as a framework, a researcher worked in a teacher’s classroom to implement a series of research-based mathematical modeling activities. A broad corpus of data from this interaction was analyzed, including audio recordings of interviews with the teacher, video recordings of three mathematical modeling lessons, researcher field notes and journal reflections, instructional materials, and students’ written work using the principles for designing activities for teachers. The emerging roles and relationships between the teacher and the researcher were documented, as (1) the researcher implemented the professional development, (2) the teacher shared her concerns, (3) the researcher responded to the teacher’s challenges, and (3) the teacher reflected on student development. As a case study of collaboration, the participants’ roles and strategies to overcome challenges and achieve shared objectives can benefit teachers and researchers who plan to collaboratively implement modeling in the classroom. The study supports the value and viability of this form of in situ professional development, indicating that significant changes in teachers’ thinking about their students’ mathematical model development can occur in relatively short periods of time.     

面向智慧课堂的灵活深度学习设计框架研制

深度学习是智慧教育的核心支柱,但目前尚缺少智慧课堂专属的深度学习设计方案。如何针对深度学习的灵活性诉求,研制一种智慧课堂赋能的灵活深度学习设计框架,是推进深度学习实践落地的关键所在。基于深度学习架构理念、采用教育设计研究范式研制的面向智慧课堂的灵活深度学习设计框架,遵循逆向设计逻辑,包括课堂环境分析、明确目标、确定评估、学生分析、任务设计、编列制定、绘制分布和决策预设等8个步骤,既体现了智慧课堂精准把脉、互动支持、适性推送、即时反馈等四大特色功能,也为智慧课堂中的学习任务、学习活动、学习进程和教学决策等四个方面的灵活性设计提供了详细的方案支持,并且还能够可视化学生深度学习的个性化进程。该框架经过高质量评估标准锚定下的专家校验与迭代修订,已达到可交付实施的质量要求。这一框架在智慧课堂中的应用有助于促使学生深度参与学习,引导学生采用高级学习方略,促进高阶知能的发展,加深概念理解及其迁移应用。     

Unraveling the culture of the mathematics classroom: A video-based study in sixth grade

Changing perspectives on mathematics teaching and learning resulted in a new generation of mathematics textbooks, stressing among others the importance of mathematical reasoning and problem-solving skills and their application to real-life situations. The article reports a study that investigates to what extent the reform-based ideas underlying these mathematical textbooks impact the current teaching of mathematics. Two problem-solving lessons were videotaped in 10 sixth-grade classrooms and a coding scheme was developed to analyze these lessons with regard to three aspects of the classroom culture that are assumed to enhance students’ mathematical beliefs and problem-solving competencies: (1) the classroom norms that are established, (2) the instructional techniques and classroom organization forms, and (3) the set of tasks students are confronted with. Two instruments were administered to measure students’ beliefs about learning mathematical word problem solving, and to assess their problem-solving processes and skills. The results indicate that some reform-based aspects seemed to be easier to implement (e.g., a strong focus on heuristic skills, embedding tasks in a realistic context) than others (e.g., the use of group work, an explicit negotiation of appropriate social norms).     

The Quality and Impact of Relationships between Elementary School Students and Teachers

The purpose of the present study was to begin to examine, from the expectancy-value framework, several cognitive and motivational variables believed to affect the development of the student/teacher relationship and, in turn, classroom success. Guided by the expectancy-value framework, three student variables are viewed as essential in guiding the success of the student/teacher relationship: (1) their social self-concept beliefs, (2) the value they place on developing a positive relationship with their primary teacher, and (3) their nonverbal communication skills. Eighty-two fourth- and fifth-grade students participated in the study. Variation in the students' perceptions of the quality of their relationship with their primary teacher and their classroom achievement were examined. In general, results suggest students develop schemas, their social self-concept beliefs, about their relationships with teachers that are consistent with their nonverbal communication skills. Furthermore, results suggest that for both positive perceptions of the relationship and academic achievement, valuing the relationship with the primary teacher may compensate for nonverbal difficulties.     

A “top-down” analysis of high school teacher motivation

Classroom instruction may be affected by school contexts that are increasingly performance-driven because of legislative demands. Interpreting this as a need to investigate the relationships between school context and classroom practice, this study took a “top-down” approach by examining contextual elements of school goal structure and teacher community on teachers’ sense of self- and collective efficacy, and classroom goal structures. After collecting data from teachers in four Midwestern high schools, results indicated that teachers in highly performance-oriented schools reported significantly less adaptive motivational beliefs, lower community, and more performance-oriented instruction than teachers in a low performance-oriented school. Furthermore, a path analysis revealed that classroom goal structures were significantly and indirectly related to teacher community. We discuss how academic context may affect teachers’ motivational beliefs as well as classroom practices, and make recommendations for future research and practice.