Maria Cardelle-Elawar

Effects of Teaching Metacognitive Skills to Students with Low Mathematics Ability.

Abstract This report presents two studies investigating the effects of metacognitive instruction in mathematics on low-ability sixth-grade students. The first study was conducted in three classes that had scored below average on the Iowa Test of Basic Skills (ITBS) in an elementary school district having a Hispanic population. Two of these classes were randomly assigned to the experimental group and one to the control group. In this study the experimenter was the instructor. A second study was designed as a follow-up to eliminate possible confounded effects between the experimenter and the treatment. Thirty-two additional students were added to the sample of the first study as a new control group. These students had the same characteristics as the students in the first sample. In addition to learning outcomes, sources of errors were examined using Mayers model of problem solving. Results from both studies showed significant main effects favoring the experimental group on achievement in mathematics and attitudes toward mathematics. A lack of linguistic, strategic, and procedural knowledge seemed to be the major source of errors students experienced in solving mathematics problems. The intervention used in this study could be tailored to regular classrooms where a majority of students have demonstrated low performance in mathematics.

Effects of metacognitive instruction on low achievers in mathematics problems

Abstract This study investigates the effects of metacognitive instruction in mathematics on low-achieving third to eighth grade students. The study was conducted in 18 classes in two elementary schools from the same district with a majority of Hispanic population. Students were randomly assigned to the 18 classes. Twelve of these classes were randomly assigned to the experimental group. One class per grade level was assigned to the control group. Results on learning outcomes showed significant effects favoring the experimental group independent of grade level. These results indicate that metacognitive instruction could be tailored to regular classrooms where the majority are low-achievers. Recommendations on how regular classroom teachers might implement the methods are discussed.

An Integrated Analysis of Secondary School Students' Conceptions and Beliefs about Learning.

Students’ conceptions and beliefs about learning are constructs that have been proposed in two independent lines of research, phenomenographic and metacognitive, and analysed using qualitative and quantitative methodologies, respectively. The present research examines and integrates in a single study both constructs and methodologies. Data were collected through an open-ended task (Tynjäla, 1997) and an epistemological questionnaire (Schommer, 1990), administered to a sample of 1,200 secondary students. Three major statistically significant findings emerged. First, students’ conceptions of learning and epistemological beliefs changed from simplistic to more complex as they progressed through school. Second, the two constructs were linked to each other. The most advanced category on the ‘dimension of depth’ of learning conceptions corresponded to the highest scores at the complex pole of the belief system. Third, learning conceptions as well as epistemological beliefs were predictors of academic performance. The more capable students were of constructing meaning, the better their academic achievement appeared to be. Theoretical and educational implications are discussed with regard to further research, classroom instruction, and the value of combining both research methodologies in order to deepen our understanding of students’ learning experience.RésuméLes conceptions et croyances des étudiants sur l’apprentissage sont les constructs qui ont été proposés en suivant deux lignes indépendantes de recherche, la phénoménographique et la métacognitive, et qui on été analysés en utilisant respectivement une méthodologie qualitative et une autre quantitative. La présente recherche examine et intégre ensemble les constructs et les méthodologies dans une même et unique étude. Les données furent obtenues à partir d’une tâche initiée l’élève devait finir (Tynjäla, 1997) et d’un questionnaire épistémologique (Schommer, 1990), tous deux administrés à un échantillon de 1200 collégiens et lycéens. Trois résultats significatifs du point de vue statistique surgirent. En premier lieu, les conceptions d’apprentissage des étudiants et leur croyances épistémologiques changeaient de la simplicité à une plus grande complexité au fur et à mesure qu’ils progressaient durant leur scolarité. En second lieu, les deux constructs étaient en liaison l’un avec l’autre. La catégorie plus avancée concernant la ‘profondeur dimensionnelle’ des conceptions d’apprentissage correspondait aux résultats plus élevés dans le complexe pole du système de croyance. En troisième lieu, aussi bien les conceptions d’apprentissage que les croyances épistémologiques étaient les pronostiqueurs du rendement académique. Plus les étudiants étaient capables de comprendre le sens, meilleur semblait être leur rendement académique.

Enhancement of self-regulation, assertiveness, and empathy

Abstract This study examined the effects of teaching self-regulation strategies and social skills to 40 middle school students in a compulsory secondary education setting, who presented difficulties in self-reflection, self-inquiry, assertiveness, and empathy. A quasi-experimental design with pre- and post-test measurements was employed. Intervention consisted of the performance of tasks, called ‘Portfolio’, related to the criteria skills during the school course. Significant differences between the experimental and the control groups were observed in the measurement of the criteria variables. Results are discussed in terms of the implications concerning how teachers can implement self-regulatory activities in their daily classroom practice to meet the educational needs of students with social problems.

Perspectives on a Freirean Dialectic to Promote Inclusive Education

Research and experience in both general and special education suggest that critical pedagogy and inclusion share much common ground, or at least some common goals. For example, one of the goals of critical pedagogy is to transform the world of education by establishing a dialogue between the self and the community of learners, where the individual must self-reflect and take action to experience a freer self while aiming to transform the world. A goal of inclusive education also is to transform schooling itself in order to welcome, value, and support the learning of all children in shared experiences. Table 1 provides definitions and comparisons among respective key concepts of critical pedagogy and inclusive

Family Environment, Epistemological Beliefs, Learning Strategies, and Academic Performance: A Path Analysis

This study of secondary school students examined the complex interrelationships between family environment variables (antecedents) as predictors of learning strategies and academic performance (consequences) and of epistemological beliefs (mediators) and tested the latter as mediators of the relationship between antecedents and consequences. The results of path analysis support a hypothesis generated from a model that is bound both by the theory and by previous research. Belief in Quick, effortless learning mediated the influence of family variables on Surface strategy, Metacognitive learning strategies and Academic performance. The better the family’s intellectual climate, the higher the students’ mature beliefs about learning, and consequently, her/his Deep and Metacognitive strategies and academic performance. The proposed model showed a better fit to the data when compared with the two alternative models. Finally, we discussed the need to build an integrated model of the likely origins of epistemological beliefs.

Students and Computers as Partners in Developing Students' Problem-Solving Skills

AbstractOne-hundred and twenty students in the second and fourth grades worked in pairs to solve computer-posed problems. Students used the IDEA (Identify, Define, Explore, Assess) Model as a self-regulatory strategy to engage them as partners in a question-and-answer dialog while solving problems. Students reflected on their progress by writing in journals and in classroom debriefings recorded by teachers following the problem-solving sessions. Additional observational data was collected by the researchers through informal classroom discussions with the teachers. The results of this exploratory study indicated that the strategy was successful in helping students monitor their own learning. Implications for teaching practices and future research are discussed.

The role of personal self-regulation and regulatory teaching to predict motivational-affective variables, achievement, and satisfaction: a structural model.

The present investigation examines how personal self-regulation (presage variable) and regulatory teaching (process variable of teaching) relate to learning approaches, strategies for coping with stress, and self-regulated learning (process variables of learning) and, finally, how they relate to performance and satisfaction with the learning process (product variables). The objective was to clarify the associative and predictive relations between these variables, as contextualized in two different models that use the presage-process-product paradigm (the Biggs and DEDEPRO models). A total of 1101 university students participated in the study. The design was cross-sectional and retrospective with attributional (or selection) variables, using correlations and structural analysis. The results provide consistent and significant empirical evidence for the relationships hypothesized, incorporating variables that are part of and influence the teaching–learning process in Higher Education. Findings confirm the importance of interactive relationships within the teaching–learning process, where personal self-regulation is assumed to take place in connection with regulatory teaching. Variables that are involved in the relationships validated here reinforce the idea that both personal factors and teaching and learning factors should be taken into consideration when dealing with a formal teaching–learning context at university.

What teachers need to know about the struggle for self-determination (conscientization) and self-regulation: adults with disabilities speak about their education experiences

The purpose of this paper is to help teachers better understand the struggles that people with disabilities experience in attaining their educational goals and to encourage the development of teaching and learning strategies that help to respect and facilitate the struggle itself. The authors share the generative themes that emerged using a critical pedagogy approach (dialogic interviews) to elicit the voices of adults with disabilities speaking about their public school experiences. In discussing the implications for teachers, the authors show the intersections of educational psychology’s concept self-regulation and critical pedagogy’s concept conscientization and special education’ s concept self-determination. Why the &struggle’ itself is important (from the perspectives provided by conscientization, self-regulation, and self determination) is discussed. The major question is whether or not teachers can structure the awareness process that results in learners becoming aware enough to verbalize, ‘I have di

The Role of Motivation on Strengthening Teacher Identity: Emerging Themes

cultiesa. What do teachers do to stimulate the metacognitive thinking processes that makes it possible for students with disabilities to think, ‘I can monitor myself!a? How can teachers capture the power of the conscientization experience that leads students with disabilities to experience the generative will power ‘to use the powers that I have to make a di!erence in my life’s situation?a How do adults with disabilities come to these kinds of awareness and how can teachers help facilitate the awareness? ( 2000 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.