Self-regulation of motivation when learning online: the importance of who, why and how

Successful online students must learn and maintain motivation to learn. The Self-regulation of Motivation (SRM) model (Sansone and Thoman 2005) suggests two kinds of motivation are essential: Goals-defined (i.e., value and expectancy of learning), and experience-defined (i.e., whether interesting). The Regulating Motivation and Performance Online (RMAPO) project examines implications using online HTML lessons. Initial project results suggested that adding usefulness information (enhancing goals-defined motivation) predicted higher engagement levels (enhancing experience), which in turn predicted motivation (interest) and performance (HTML quiz) outcomes. The present paper examined whether individual interest in computers moderated these results. When provided the utility value information, students with higher (relative to lower) individual interest tended to display higher engagement levels, especially when usefulness was framed in terms of personal versus organizational applications. In contrast, higher engagement levels continued to positively predict outcomes regardless of individual interest. We discuss implications for designing optimal online learning environments.     

Franchisees in crisis: using action learning to self-organise

The present article describes the use of action learning by a group of 30 franchisees to organise themselves and work through a period of upheaval and uncertainty when their parent company faced liquidation. Written from the perspective of one of the franchisees who found herself adopting action learning principles to facilitate the group, it describes the value of this way of organising until a point where the context became both clearer and more time-pressured, for which the group adopted a project management approach to organising.     

Scholarly article seeking,reading, and use: a continuing evolution from print to electronic in the sciences and social sciences

Electronic journals are now the norm for accessing and reading scholarly articles. This article examines scholarly article reading patterns by faculty in five US universities in 2012. Selected findings are also compared to some general trends from studies conducted periodically since 1977. In the 2012 survey, over three‐quarters (76%) of the scholarly readings were obtained through electronic means and just over half (51%) of readings were read on a screen rather than from a print source or being printed out. Readings from library sources are overwhelmingly from e‐sources. The average number of articles read per month was 20.66, with most articles read by the medical and other sciences, and on average each article was read for 32 minutes.     

Schooling effects on preschoolers’ self-regulation, early literacy, and language growth

The present study examined the influence of schooling during children's first and second years of preschool for children who experienced different amounts of preschool (i.e., one or two years), but who were essentially the same chronological age. Children (n = 76) were tested in the fall and spring of the school year using measures of self-regulation, decoding, letter knowledge, and vocabulary. Using hierarchical linear modeling (HLM), preschool was not associated with children's development of self-regulation in either year. For decoding and letter knowledge, children finishing their second year of preschool had higher scores, although both groups of children grew similarly during the school year. Thus, our results suggest that the first and second years of preschool are both systematically associated with decoding and letter knowledge gains, and the effects are cumulative (two years predicted greater gains overall than did one year of preschool). Finally, children's chronological age, and not whether they experienced one versus two years of preschool, predicted children's vocabulary and self-regulation outcomes. Implications for preschool curricula and instruction are discussed, including the increasing emphasis on literacy learning prior to kindergarten entry and the need to address self-regulation development along with academic learning.     

Productive friction: How conflict in student teaching creates opportunities for learning at the boundary

Student teaching is contested ground for teacher candidates’ learning. Struggling to implement practises when expectations of university and schools are inconsistent, they experience conflicts between these two worlds. In this article, we conceptualise student teaching as a space where conflicts can be generative for candidates’ learning. We use the idea of productive friction—dissonance experienced by teacher candidates when two or more social worlds conflict that leads to more sophisticated practise—to consider student teaching as a potential boundary space that benefits from diverse perspectives. Drawing on ethnographic data, we contrast the cases of four candidates’ productive and unproductive friction during student teaching. Furthermore, we discuss the qualities of student teaching that can promote productive friction for learning.     

Study of Self: The Self as Designer in Online Teacher Education

In this article we describe our engagement in self-study as part of an examination of design-based research for education. We focus on graduate-level online teacher education as an example of how self-study provided a means of examining deeply our teaching and our roles as teacher and designer in the learning environment. We posit that online learning environments are particularly well suited for self-study to enhance design perspectives because the interactions between teacher and students are informed by personal context and mediated by technological tools. The graduate students in our courses were teacher leaders in literacy or mathematics who were learning how to support professional development for other teachers. Throughout our self-study research we found ourselves drawing upon our previous design research experiences, which aided our ability to engage in self-study: We were part of the classroom system, focusing on our roles within the teaching and learning process as designers of the online learning environment. Three key design principles resulted from our self-study process: focusing on systems of learning and teaching, designing pedagogical tools and products, and using iterative processes. Engaging in self-study enhanced our understanding and implementation of synchronous online instruction, particularly regarding our use of technological tools to enhance student learning and support learning communities.     

24‐Month‐Old Children With Larger Oral Vocabularies Display Greater Academic and Behavioral Functioning at Kindergarten Entry

Data were analyzed from a population‐based, longitudinal sample of 8,650 U.S. children to (a) identify factors associated with or predictive of oral vocabulary size at 24 months of age and (b) evaluate whether oral vocabulary size is uniquely predictive of academic and behavioral functioning at kindergarten entry. Children from higher socioeconomic status households, females, and those experiencing higher quality parenting had larger oral vocabularies. Children born with very low birth weight or from households where the mother had health problems had smaller oral vocabularies. Even after extensive covariate adjustment, 24‐month‐old children with larger oral vocabularies displayed greater reading and mathematics achievement, increased behavioral self‐regulation, and fewer externalizing and internalizing problem behaviors at kindergarten entry.     

It’s Good to Talk: Oral History,Sports History and Heritage

The purpose of this paper is to reflect on what appears to be the relatively under-used methodologies associated with oral history – principally the interview as a primary source of data – in the writing of sports history. The observation is acknowledged as one made from a UK perspective, not least on account of the authors’ status as monolingual researchers, albeit from the different but culturally diverse nations of England and Scotland. The points of reference within this article are, therefore, necessarily drawn from works published in English, and the substantive oral history case studies are mostly sampled from those researched in the UK to date, chosen because they are either groundbreaking or illustrative of the opportunities, methodological challenges and politics that have come to be associated not only with the method itself, but the discipline of sports history. This paper will, therefore, firstly outline the development of oral history. Secondly, it will discuss the ways in which it has been applied within British sports history and, finally propose opportunities it presents for the future development of the discipline and those historians researching sport.     

The Relation of Gender Understanding to Children''s Sex-typed Preferences and Gender Stereotypes

Our goal was to explore how children's understanding of gender as a social category relates to their acquisition of sex-typed knowledge and preferences. Children's gender concepts, sex-typed preferences, and stereotyped knowledge were measured in 61 boys and girls (3-5 years). Gender concept measures included ability to identify and to discriminate the sexes, understanding gender group membership, temporal stability of gender, and gender consistency over situational changes. Children improved with age on most of the measures except gender consistency. With the exception of consistency, measures of gender concept understanding were found to be related to children's stereotyped toy and clothing knowledge and/or to their sex-typed toy preferences (with age controlled). It was shown that only rudimentary gender understanding is needed prior to children learning about sex stereotypes and prior to showing strong sex-typed preferences for peers or toys. The roles of gender identity, stability, consistency, and group membership in the sex-typing process are discussed.