Scaffolding a Complex Task of Experimental Design in Chemistry with a Computer Environment

When solving a scientific problem through experimentation, students may have the responsibility to design the experiment. When students work in a conventional condition, with paper and pencil, the designed procedures stay at a very general level. There is a need for additional scaffolds to help the students perform this complex task. We propose a computer environment (copex-chimie) with embedded scaffolds in order to help students to design an experimental procedure. A pre-structuring of the procedure where the students have to choose the actions of their procedure among pre-defined actions and specify the parameters forces the students to face the complexity of the design. However, this is not sufficient for them to succeed; they look for some feedback to improve their procedure and finally abandon their task. In another condition, the students were provided with individualized feedbacks on the errors detected in their procedures by an artificial tutor. These feedbacks proved to be necessary to accompany the students throughout their experimental design without being discouraged. With this kind of scaffold, students worked longer and succeeded better to the task than all the other students.     

Academic self-concept,autonomous academic motivation,and academic achievement: Mediating and additive effects

Three conceptual models were tested to examine the relationships among academic self-concept, autonomous academic motivation, and academic achievement. This allowed us to determine whether 1) autonomous academic motivation mediates the relation between academic self-concept and achievement, 2) academic self-concept mediates the relation between autonomous academic motivation and achievement, or 3) both motivational constructs have an additive effect on academic achievement. A total of 925 high school students (404 boys and 521 girls) were asked to complete a questionnaire on two occasions separated by a year interval. Results from SEM analyses provided good support for the hypothesized model positing that autonomous academic motivation mediates the academic self-concept–academic achievement relation. Results are discussed in light of self-determination theory and self-concept theory.