Pupil perceptions of national tests in science: perceived importance, invested effort, and test anxiety

Although large-scale national tests have been used for many years in Swedish compulsory schools, very little is known about how pupils actually react to these tests. The question is relevant, however, as pupil reactions in the test situation may affect test performance as well as future attitudes towards assessment. The question is relevant also in light of the changing assessment culture in Sweden and other European countries. The main purpose of the present study was to explore how a sample of grade 9 pupils perceived their first encounter with national tests in science, mainly in terms of perceived importance of the test, reported invested effort, and feelings of test anxiety, and how these aspects were related to test performance. Results show that a majority of the pupils seemed to perceive the test as rather important and claimed that they spent effort on the test. There was, however, also a fair group of students who did not perceive the test as very important. Ratings of perceived importance and invested effort and motivation were positively related to performance, particularly for the boys. Many students also reported that they felt anxious before and during the test, but the relationship between test anxiety and test performance was rather weak. Findings illuminate how pupils may perceive and behave in the assessment situation, and point to the need of further studies investigating the psychology of test-taking.     

Informal learning in a formal context: problematizing the concept of social capital in a contemporary Swedish context

Definitions of social capital, advanced by Coleman and Fukuyama, and definitions of lifelong learning and intergenerational learning are discussed and compared, and a synthetic model is presented. This model relies heavily on the practical implementation of strategies for augmenting social capital, such as those applied within the granddad project, an intergenerational learning initiative conducted in schools in the Stockholm County area. It is concluded that intergenerational learning in this theoretical framework provides a foundation for lifelong learning practice in a social capital perspective, even though the definition of social capital used is broad and bears strong resemblance to the Japanese concept of kokoru, advanced by Okamoto (1992).     

Dimensions of test performance in English as a foreign language in different European settings: a two-level confirmatory factor analytical approach

The present study explored data from a survey of students’ performance in English at the end of compulsory school in 6 European countries. The aim was to gain deeper knowledge of the internal structure of the test and to discuss similarities and differences between the different settings regarding patterns in language proficiency. The analyses, conducted by a factor analytic approach and 2-level structural equation modelling (SEM) techniques, indicated an overall English achievement factor at both student and school levels. Furthermore, an effect of format differences at the student level, constituted by a factor related to tasks demanding constructed response, was found. Three correlated modality factors related to listening, linguistic, and reading skills were identified but not further elaborated on as they improved the model only modestly. Considerable differences in between-school variation were found in the different settings. The results are discussed in relation to the instrument, student achievements, and the state of English in the participating countries.     

Kulturelle Partizipation bei Jugendlichen als Feld der Person-Umwelt-Transaktion

What motivates adolescents to cultural participation? This question is important for the discourse on aesthetic education, in which cultural participation is regarded as contributing to the development of adolescents’ personality, values, and competencies. However, research on this issue suffers from fragmentation. Unconnected research on cultural participation from the sociology, cultural education, and differential psychology literature are reviewed, and it is shown how they may be supplemented using the theory of planned behaviour and integrated in a single theoretical framework. This framework centers on cultural participation as a field of person-environment transaction. Participation is regarded as being determined by both person and environmental variables and has the potential of changing these variables. On both its person and its environment sides, the model contains domain-specific determinants that mediate effects of the domain-general variables on which research on cultural participation has focused up to now. An overview of own empirical research related to the model is given and avenues for future research on cultural participation are discussed.     

The influence of visual cognitive style when learning from instructional animations and static pictures

In a 2 × 2 design, we examined the role of visual cognitive style in two multimedia-based learning environments (text plus static pictures/animations). A statistically significant interaction was obtained for deeper comprehension: Highly developed visualizers (HDV) who learned with static pictures performed better than HDV who learned with animations, and less developed visualizers (LDV) performed the same with static pictures or animations.For factual knowledge, there was a main effect in favor of HDV. Subsequent tests revealed that HDV outperformed LDV only when learning from static pictures, but not when studying animations. There were no overall differences between animations and static pictures. The assumption is made that HDV benefit from their cognitive style when they have to construct a mental animation from static pictures.Concluding, we did not find any rationale for converting static pictures to animations — HDV learned better with static pictures, while for LDV, it made no difference.     

Discourse comprehension intervention for high‐functioning students with autism spectrum disorders: preliminary findings from a school‐based study

Many students with autism spectrum disorders (ASD) demonstrate comprehension difficulties. In the present study, 12 high‐functioning Swedish students with ASD (aged 10–15 years) took part in a naturalistic classroom‐based intervention to support comprehension of connected narrative discourse. An effective approach for supporting discourse comprehension in children with ASD was assumed to include: (i) providing teachers and students with a shared and explicit set of concepts for talking and thinking about the activity of comprehension, that (ii) can structure the child's discourse comprehension under scaffolding and modelling from the teacher. In the pre‐testing session, the students with ASD presented with poor discourse comprehension but receptive vocabulary and reading decoding skills close to normative performance. Post‐intervention test results, following 4 weeks of training, indicated specific and significant improvements in discourse comprehension. Support for the potential of this type of teaching was also obtained from teachers and students. The teachers reported that they would continue to use the same or similar comprehension instruction for 11 out of 12 students, and for multiple reasons, and students were also mostly positive to the training. Implications for practice and further research are discussed, as are limitations of the study.     

Vocational Self-Esteem and Psychological Needs in Turkish Counseling Students

In this study, relationships between vocational self-esteem and psychological needs (autonomy, affiliation, achievement, and dominance) in Turkish counseling students were examined. In addition, the moderating effect of gender on the relationships between vocational self-esteem and psychological needs was investigated. The participants consisted of 281 undergraduate counseling students at Pamukkale University, in Denizli, Turkey. Data were gathered by using the Vocational Self-Esteem Scale and the Needs Assessment Questionnaire. Results indicated that vocational self-esteem was positively related to need for affiliation and achievement in Turkish counseling students. Vocational self-esteem was higher in female students compared to male students. There was a stronger relationship between vocational self-esteem and need for achievement in females than males.     

Prior mathematics achievement,cognitive appraisals and anxiety as predictors of Finnish students’ later mathematics performance and career orientation

The aim of this two‐year longitudinal study was to investigate the role and impact of prior mathematics performance, cognitive appraisals and mathematics‐specific, affective anxiety in determining later mathematics achievement and future career orientation among Finnish adolescents. The basic ideas of the control‐value theory, assumed to be culturally universal, and previous controversial results regarding the relationship between mathematics anxiety and mathematics achievement were tested in the Finnish cultural context with a longitudinal design. The key premise of the control‐value theory is that control and value appraisals are significant determinants of both activity and outcome achievement emotions. Our results suggest that mathematics anxiety, a prospective outcome emotion, is determined by outcome expectancies (success or failure) and outcome value (the importance of performing well). They also suggest that anxiety as a negative affective emotion is a problem not only for those who perform poorly but probably also for certain pupils across all achievement levels. Compared with the performance level and with the boys, the girls exhibited inaccurately low outcome expectancies in mathematics. These low expectancies connected to the negative value of failure are a potential cause for their higher anxiety level. The educational implications of the findings are discussed.     

Supporting emerging teacher identities: can we identify teacher potential among students?

The research focuses on Estonian university students’ emerging teacher identity and their interest in becoming teachers. Five hundred and sixty‐five first, third and fifth year students participated in the survey. The results suggest that pedagogical reasons for entering teacher education and clear motives for studying are significant indicators of teacher potential. Pedagogical reasons for entering teacher education or the teaching profession and the wish to function as a change agent in the society were related to academic self‐efficacy beliefs and the belief that the teacher expertise is mainly pedagogical in nature. However, at the point in their studies at which the students are able to choose their masters programme and entry into teacher education, their likelihood of choosing teacher education remains low, indicating that there is a need to develop pedagogical content, study counselling and career guidance services to encourage students’ continued interest in and entry to teacher education and the teaching profession.