Minna Puustinen

Models of self-regulated learning: a review

Questions connected with the regulation of ones own cognitive processes attract increasing numbers of researchers in psychology, as evidenced by the several different models of self-regulation that have been developed over the past two decades. The aim of this article was to present and compare the latest models of self-regulated learning (SRL), including those by Boekaerts, Borkowski, Pintrich, Winne and Zimmerman. The models were compared on four criteria (i.e. background theories, definitions of SRL, components included in the models and empirical work). The results show that theoretical background is an important differentiating feature. The two models that resembled each other more than any other two models (i.e. Pintrich and Zimmerman) were inspired by the same background theory (i.e. social cognitive theory). On the other hand, the models that differed most from the other models (i.e. Borkowski and Winne) were also theoretically the farthest removed ones.

Learning with new technologies: Help seeking and information searching revisited

Education researchers have amply documented the beneficial effects of help seeking on learning and understanding. Requesting help from teachers (or other human sources) when faced with a difficult task is now considered a self-regulated learning strategy. In a related domain, information search refers to learner-initiated efforts to obtain further task-related information from books or other non-human sources when undertaking an assignment. The integration of human and information-based resources in information and communication technology (ICT) tends to blur the distinction between help seeking and information searching, thus offering new perspectives on the study of the processes and skills involved in these activities. The aim of this paper is to redefine the boundaries between help seeking and information searching, by replacing the dichotomous definition (i.e., human versus non-human sources) by a more integrative theoretical framework. Beyond the obvious theoretical importance of the issue, clarifying the boundaries between seeking help and searching for information may contribute to the development of more effective forms of human and non-human support for technology-enhanced learning environments.

Selection into long-term unemployment and its psychological consequences

The factors which predict a person’s long-term unemployment were studied within the framework of an emotional and behavioural regulation model consisting of two orthogonal dimensions: behavioural inhibition versus expression, and low versus high self-control of emotions (Pulkkinen, 1995, 1996). The participants were drawn from the ongoing Jyväskylä Longitudinal Study of Personality and Social Development, in which the same individuals have been followed up from age 8 (n = 369) to 36 (n = 311). In the present study, data collected at ages 8, 14, 27, and 36 were used. The findings showed that low self-control of emotions, especially aggression, at age 8 directly predicted long-term unemployment in adulthood, whereas behavioural inhibition (passive and anxious behaviour) predicted long-term unemployment indirectly (via poor educational attainment). Long-term unemployment in adulthood was related to an increased level of current psychological distress as measured by the presence of depressive symptoms and anxiety. Thus, the present study confirmed both the hypothesis concerning selection into unemployment, and the hypothesis concerning the psychological consequences of unemployment.

Individual and Developmental Differences in Reading Monitoring: When and How Do Children Evaluate Their Comprehension?.

This paper examines evaluation in reading. Evaluation refers to the processes by which readers monitor their ongoing text comprehension to assess performance and task difficulties. Monitoring is assumed to explain a large proportion of individual differences in text comprehension, in that individuals need to be aware of their objectives and difficulties in order to adjust their strategies to match task requirements. The participants were French children in grades 3 and 5. Study 1 examined their evaluation-related knowledge (i.e., knowledge about reading objectives, sources of difficulties, comprehension awareness). Study 2 examined the children’s actual evaluation behavior during a comprehension task. The results showed that few children provided elaborate verbalizable knowledge about reading tasks, goals and corresponding skills, and that in most cases the children were highly confident in their responses to text comprehension questions, regardless of the correctness of their answer. The contribution of metalinguistic awareness to literacy acquisition as well as the implications of this type of study for educational practice are discussed.RésuméL’article porte sur les compétences des enfants à s’auto-évaluer en lecture. L’auto-évaluation renvoie aux processus de contrôle mis en oeuvre par le lecteur au cours de la lecture d’un texte, pour estimer sa performance et les difficultés de sa tâche. L’hypothèse générale est que l’auto-évaluation contribue fortement aux différences individuelles en compréhension écrite dans la mesure ou l’individu doit être conscient de ses objectifs et des difficultés qu’il rencontre pour adapter au mieux ses stratégies aux contraintes des tâches. Les participants de l’étude sont des enfants français en 3ème et 5ème année de l’école primaire (CE2 et CM2). La première étude examine leurs connaissances relatives à l’auto-évaluation (connaissance des objectifs de lecture et des sources de difficultés, par exemple). La deuxième étude examine leurs comportements effectifs d’auto-évaluation au cours d’une tâche de compréhension. Les résultats montrent, d’une part, que peu d’enfants témoignent de connaissances élaborées sur l’activité de lecture, les objectifs et les capacités requises, et d’autre part que beaucoup sont très confiants dans leurs réponses aux questions de compréhension, indépendamment de la qualité de ces réponses. Les implications théoriques, sur le rôle du développement métalinguistique, et pratiques, pour l’éducation, sont discutées.

GESTALT: a framework for redesign of educational software

Design of educational multimedia rarely starts from scratch, but rather by attempting to reuse existing software. Although redesign has been an issue in research on evaluation and on learning objects, how it should be carried out in a principled way has remained relatively unexplored. Furthermore, understanding how empirical research on information and communication technologies (ICT) should feed back into redesign remains difficult. The present paper addresses these problems from the viewpoint of carrying out pedagogical expert evaluations, in the absence of empirical studies of target learners, in order to generate recommendations for redesign. Firstly, redesign proposals should be based on a coherent reconstruction of pedagogical foundations of educational ICT (software, documentation). Secondly, redesign proposals should result from dialogue between stakeholders, such as future users, pedagogical experts, software designers, and deciders. To these ends, we propose a framework, called GESTALT (Goals, (E) SiTuations, Actions, Learners, Tools), as a ‘boundary object’ for dialogical redesign. Within an activity theory approach, GESTALT is based on analysis of available tools, the actions they support, the characteristics of learners who perform actions, and pedagogical goals that could be achieved in specific situations. An illustrative GESTALT analysis of educational software is provided, principally from the viewpoint of pedagogical experts. Finally, the strengths and limits of GESTALT are discussed.