Academic boredom,approaches to learning and the final-year degree outcomes of undergraduate students

Academic boredom is a largely negative and disabling achievement-related emotion. In this mixed-methods exploration of 224 students attending a single university in England, academic boredom was found to arise at the point of course delivery, while studying at other times and during the completion of assignments for assessment. Quantitative data from the recently adapted Boredom Proneness Scale for use across the UK higher education sector (the BPS-UKHE) and the Approaches and Study Skills Inventory for Students (ASSIST), enriched with qualitative data from 10 semi-structured research interviews, indicate that those with a higher propensity towards academic boredom than others displayed the deep, strategic and surface profiles of ‘less effective learners’. This was reflected in their interest in ideas, their ability to organise resources and manage time, what they had to memorise or do to ‘get by’, their achievement motivation and their sense of purpose. As part of a greater evolving network of other contributing factors, this translated into lower final degree marks and fewer ‘good’ degree awards. Recommendations surrounding boredom mitigation and approaches to learning are suggested which warrant serious consideration. The work presented here makes an important contribution to a surprisingly neglected field of UK higher education research and the student engagement agenda.     

Dyslexia and oral reading errors

Thomson was the first of very few researchers to have studied oral reading errors as a means of addressing the question: Are dyslexic readers different to other readers? Using the Neale Analysis of Reading Ability and Goodman's taxonomy of oral reading errors, Thomson concluded that dyslexic readers are different, but he found that they do not resemble beginning readers. Thomson's study and his use of miscue analysis is re‐evaluated, both in relation to the educational and political climate of the time – which was hostile to the concept of dyslexia – and in the light of research and social developments since then. The study of oral reading still has value today, both for the teacher and the researcher, provided its limitations as a technique are fully appreciated.     

Self-Expression,Social Roles,and Faculty Members’ Attitudes towards Online Teaching

There is a widening gap between administrators’ and faculty members’ attitudes towards online education. This post-positivist grounded theory study explored features of the experiences that shaped sixteen faculty members’ attitudes towards online education. Two features are identified: (a) they strived to express subject matter of personal significance, and (b) they strived to take on various social roles. The degree to which these efforts were facilitated – or thwarted – shaped their attitudes towards online education. This analytical focus recognizes that online education changes not only how faculty members teach; it also introduces new activities that affect the meaning of teaching for faculty members.     

Identifying didactic knowledge: An empirical study of the educationally critical aspects of learning about information systems

This paper backgrounds and illustrates an approach to researching didactic knowledge. Underlying the approach are some of the frameworks developed from the student learning research. Based on these frameworks the experience of learning about a particular phenomenon is theorised as having educationally critical aspects. Without addressing these aspects in learning experiences, students are highly unlikely to achieve the target understanding desired by the teacher. The approach developed to research educationally critical aspects compares scholarly and student experiences of learning about a phenomenon using the analytical framework of a structure of awareness. An application of the approach is reported in the form of a phenomenographic study which researched didactic knowledge about the concept of an information system (IS). Multiple, previously unreported, educationally critical aspects of learning about the concept of an IS were identified. Some implications of this finding for the design of IS undergraduate curricula, textbooks, teaching strategies and learning tasks are proposed. Finally, the research approach is promoted as a means to investigate didactic knowledge about other phenomena.     

New data and prior belief: The two faces of scientific reasoning

Kuhn (1989) has argued that at the heart of the ability to reason scientifically is the process of differentiating existing mental models (i.e. theory) from new data. In this regard she has proposed a developmental sequence in which, in the early stages, theory and data are fully integrated and are used interchangeably. Later, when theory and data are compatible, they tend to be moulded together as ‘the way things are’, but when they are incompatible conflict is avoided by the use of strategies which bring the two into line: these strategies often include selective attention to the data. Only at the upper levels of this developmental spectrum are theory and data conscientiously differentiated, with each being used to reflect on the other. This paper analyses the responses made by Year 11 students to problems which required them to evaluate a prediction based on some provided data. The problems were set in two contexts, one scientific and one social, and the predictions to be evaluated combined plausibility/implausibility and validity/invalidity. The response patterns were very similar to those described by Kuhn, and the implications of this for teachers, especially those attempting to use conflict based teaching approaches, are developed. Specializations: science teacher education, scientific problem solving, changing students’ alternative conceptions. Specializations: psychological theories applied to science education.     

Assessing the social and affective outcomes of inclusion

The systematic assessment of the social and affective outcomes of inclusion has been lagging behind the assessment of academic outcomes. This is particularly problematic in view of research evidence supporting concerns about peer rejection and bullying. In this article, Norah Frederickson and Elizabeth Simmonds, of University College London, and Lynda Evans and Chris Soulsby, from Foxwood Special School, report their evaluation of the social and affective outcomes of a special- mainstream school inclusion initiative that places particular emphasis on peer preparation. Measures completed by pupils were used to assess peer group inclusion, social behaviour, bullying and feelings of belonging at school. Results showed that pupils who had transferred from special to mainstream schools experienced positive social outcomes and none experienced peer group rejection. However, results were less positive for mainstream pupils with special educational needs and the authors discuss possibilities for development. Trends in peer reports of bullying suggest that there is no room for complacency and that ongoing monitoring is required.     

Assessment and learning without grades? Motivations and concerns with implementing gradeless learning in higher education

The relationship between assessment and learning in higher education often comes down to a single thing: a grade. Despite widespread criticism of grades as inexact tools, whose overemphasis undermines student learning and negatively affects student well-being, they continue to be the norm in the assessment of student learning. This paper analyses an alternate form of assessment: so-called ‘gradeless learning’. This study theoretically and geographically contextualises the recent implementation of a gradeless learning policy at a large public university in Asia, and presents findings from a student opinion survey about the policy. The paper shows that respondents overwhelmingly understand and often agree with the central claims of gradeless learning, including its potential to ease students into college life, allow them to make more daring choices in their studies and even develop as lifelong learners. However, the aim of relieving stress among one group of students has increased stress for others. The study explains the circumstances that create this divergence in student stress levels, which are both locally specific and common to all gradeless systems. The paper concludes by discussing the effectiveness of the gradeless system in achieving its aims and suggesting future research avenues.     

Stepwise reductions in US density and intensity: Maintenance and extinction of conditioned suppression

Information was sought on how the strength of fear, acquired and extinguished in a classical conditioning paradigm, might be affected by certain of the circumstances that normally are associated with the course of avoidance learning. Following preconditioning exposures to the conditioned stimulus, one group of rats (Group PRF) was given continuous conditioned stimulus-unconditioned stimulus (CS-US) acquisition trials followed by stepwise reductions in US probability (given the CS) over three phases to about 11% for the final phase. Another group, Group US(lo), was given continuous CS-US pairings throughout, but, following acquisition, received stepwise reductions in US intensity (to permit evaluation of a progressively changing feature of the US over a wide range without having to employ excessive shock) over the same phases. A third group, Group US(hi), received unchanging (from acquisition) CS-US pairings over these phases, and an explicitly unpaired control group (Group RU) was included. Although outcomes differed somewhat depending upon whether suppression ratios or absolute measures of responding were considered, the major findings were that suppression to the CS was complete by the end of acquisition and persisted thereafter throughout the three phases for all but control subjects. In contrast to Group US(lo), which showed relatively little resistance to extinction of suppression to subsequent CS-only exposures, Groups US(hi) and PRF displayed marked resistance over two separate, extended sets of extinction sessions. Suppression to context cues was pronounced only for Groups US(hi) and RU, and varied as a function of US parameters and not whether the shocks were or were not signaled. Theoretical reconciliation of these findings was most difficult for Groun PRF.