Phillip John 莫雅立 Moore

Development of Attributional Beliefs and Strategic Knowledge in Years 5–9: A longitudinal analysis

This paper reports on a three‐year longitudinal study of students’ attributional beliefs and strategic knowledge in school learning. Two cohorts of primary and high school students were followed for three years from Years 5–7 and 7–9, respectively. Data were collected each year on students’ attributional beliefs regarding the reasons for their school success and failure, their knowledge and reported use of learning strategies, and academic achievement. Intervention programs were implemented in six Year 6 and seven Year 8 English classes in the second year of the longitudinal project. The intervention aimed to promote strategic learning in students through combining the teaching of learning strategies with attempts to change students’ attributional beliefs. In the third year of the project, the intervention continued in three Year 7 and three Year 9 English classes as well as in three Year 7 and one Year 9 mathematics classes. This paper focuses on the causal influences of prior measures of attributional beliefs, strategic knowledge, and achievement on measures taken in the following year. Results of the differential patterns of causal influence of these measures for intervention and non‐intervention students are reported.

Academic Attribution of Secondary Students: Gender, Year Level and Achievement Level.

This study is concerned with the attribution of secondary students. Causal interpretations for academic success and failure were analysed to investigate the effect of gender, year level and achievement level on students’ academic attributions in Hong Kong, a Confucian Heritage Culture. The sample for the study comprised 14,846 students currently enrolled in Secondary 1 to Secondary 6 in Hong Kong. Multivariate analyses of variance found significant gender differences in ascriptions to ability, effort and strategy use reasons for school performance of students who shared a common cultural background. These effects remained after controlling for achievement and year levels. Chinese females in this sample were more inclined than Chinese males to explain their academic failure in terms of their lack of ability and strategy use. Females were also more likely to explain their academic success in terms of their effort or strategy use. Nevertheless, the study found secondary students of both genders and across all achievement and year levels, consistently ascribed to effort as the most important reason for academic outcomes. Secondary 4 students were significantly more inclined than students of lower levels to attribute their academic outcomes to effort and strategy use. Cultural influences are discussed in interpreting the findings.

The Use of Help-Seeking by Chinese Secondary School Students: Challenging the Myth of ‘the Chinese Learner’

Abstract This article aims to investigate reasons underpinning academic help-seeking behaviours of Chinese students in Hong Kong, Macau and Taiwan. Data were collected from 23,563 secondary students. The study found significant differences both in attitudes and reported behaviour among secondary school students from the three locations, however, the effect sizes were all very small. Importantly, it was found that no matter which location, students considered grade enhancement to be the least important benefit of help-seeking. Rather, the most important benefit was that help-seeking enabled them to solve their learning difficulties or to solve their learning problems. The study also found that losing face was the last deterrent for the students not to seek help. Instead, Chinese secondary school students refrained from seeking help because they were afraid to disturb others in the act of help-seeking. In addition, a high proportion of students reported seeking help in the past two months in order to get advice on problem-solving approaches. Comparatively, a much smaller proportion of students reported seeking help in the last two months in order to improve on their grades. These results were discussed in light of the previous images of Chinese students.Abstract This article aims to investigate reasons underpinning academic help-seeking behaviours of Chinese students in Hong Kong, Macau and Taiwan. Data were collected from 23,563 secondary students. The study found significant differences both in attitudes and reported behaviour among secondary school students from the three locations, however, the effect sizes were all very small. Importantly, it was found that no matter which location, students considered grade enhancement to be the least important benefit of help-seeking. Rather, the most important benefit was that help-seeking enabled them to solve their learning difficulties or to solve their learning problems. The study also found that losing face was the last deterrent for the students not to seek help. Instead, Chinese secondary school students refrained from seeking help because they were afraid to disturb others in the act of help-seeking. In addition, a high proportion of students reported seeking help in the past two months in order to get ad...

The Development of an Indicator System for the Affective and Social Schooling Outcomes for Primary and Secondary Students in Hong Kong

This paper reports the development of performance indicators for measuring primary and secondary students’ affective and social outcomes of schooling. Psychometric properties as well as norms for the selected performance indicators for Hong Kong students were developed. The performance indicator system developed in this study has been subsequently used for school self‐evaluation and continuous self‐improvement in Hong Kong.

SELF-DIRECTED LEARNING AS A KEY APPROACH TO EFFECTIVENESS OF EDUCATION: A COMPARISON AMONG MAINLAND CHINA, HONG KONG, MACAU, AND TAIWAN

Recent education reforms in countries around the world have had only modest success. Many reasons have been offered to explain the failure of the reforms, but at the top of the list is the inadequate preparation of teachers for the implementation of these reforms. One such type of preparation involves the development of teachers into selflearners. Self-learning throughout the lifespan is a sine qua non of education. Parallel to this is the development of the Internet as an important medium for teaching and learning. There is an urgent need to develop a theory to deepen the understanding of the nature and process of self-learning of teachers, with the support of a networked human and IT environment. The implications drawn from the theory can contribute to the paradigm shift of education in current worldwide education reforms.