Julianne Turner

• Ph.D. U. of Michigan, 1992
• Professor at University of Notre Dame

Every career is different, emerging from different circumstances and almost always influenced by unforeseen opportunities and challenges. The script we write will be revised and edited many times. I have found my script changing at important junctures in my career. This reality is difficult to convey to researchers just starting out, but it is impo...

In this article, we explain how our inquiry worldview informs one methodological approach we have used to better understand classroom processes and change, State Space Grids (SSGs). We describe our approach to measuring a fundamental classroom process, that of teacher–student interaction, and its influence on a valued educational outcome, student e...

Professional learning communities (PLCs) can be effective vehicles for teacher learning and instructional improvement, partly because they help change professional culture. However, less is known about how these changes occur. We used Activity Systems Analysis (ASA) to investigate the development of PLCs and their teacher leaders (N = 9) based on i...

PurposeI address the question, Is theory useful when collaborating with teachers to improve student engagement? Design/methodologyWe based our work on four principles of motivation drawn from the research literature: students are more likely to engage in learning if teachers support their perceptions of competence, autonomy, belongingness, and make...

ll teachers (N = 32) at one middle school participated in a university-led intervention to improve student engagement. Teachers discussed four principles of motivation and related instructional strategies. Teachers enacted instructional strategies in their classrooms. We observed six randomly selected teachers and their students over 3 years. Analy...

Current education policy and reform advocate for increasing the level of challenge in K–12 classrooms in order to maximize students’ learning and academic success. This study examined middle school teachers’ views about implementing challenging instruction while participating in a whole-school professional development initiative. A grounded theory...

We investigated the relation of students’ perceptions of mastery goal structure and of teacher support. Original formulations of achievement goal theory proposed that social-relational aspects of classrooms were integral to perceptions of a mastery goal structure, but these components have not survived in current conceptions of goal theory. Recent...

The authors investigated patterns of change in three middle grade teachers’ beliefs and practices about motivation in mathematics during a yearlong professional development project with a university researcher. Four principles of motivation (and corresponding instructional strategies) were introduced in this sequence: supporting students’ competenc...

Translating motivational research to classroom instruction may be so difficult because the two enterprises of psychological research and teaching are inherently different in goals and assumptions. Whereas psychological theory is meant to be broad and generalizable, educational practice must attend to individual and situational differences. For inst...

This article describes how scaffolded instruction during whole-class mathematics lessons can provide the knowledge, skills, and supportive context for developing students' self-regulatory processes. In examining classroom interactions through discourse analysis, these qualitative methods reflect a theoretical change from viewing self-regulation as...

This study examined the effects of change in teacher goal emphases on students' efficacy beliefs in mathematics across the transition to middle school. The sample (N = 929) included primarily White (65%) and Black (27%) students, and approximately one third received free or reduced-fee lunch. Analyses grouped children by cross-classification of tea...

Cognitive, motivational, and affective characteristics define classroom contexts, yet flow theory (e.g., M. Csikszentmihalyi, 1975) is 1 of only a few theoretical perspectives that interrelate these characteristics. The authors adapted constructs and methods from flow theory to examine the motivational, cognitive, and affective quality of experienc...

Background/Context A common perspective found in the literature on classroom activity structures hypothesizes that a whole-class mode of instruction is linked with increased problems of achievement motivation for low-achieving students. If whole-class methods of instruction (e.g., recitation-style question-and-answer sessions) are rich in evaluatio...

In this chapter we focus on teachers' beliefs about student learning and motivation and their manifestation in classroom instruction. Teachers' beliefs appear to reflect longstanding attitudes, “common sense,” and their experiences in education rather than research-based knowledge about learning and motivation. Because teachers' beliefs play a sign...

In this article, we argue for a change in how researchers study motivation to learn. We believe that research can provide better explanations of the origins and outcomes of behavior, and thus be more useful, if we focus on how motivation develops and why it changes. We suggest reframing motivation research in education by extending the current focu...

The idea of scaffolding emotions is not new, although the focus on supporting emotions and using emotions to support other classroom goals is novel. Within instructional interactions, scaffolding is identified as temporary teacher support to achieve two interrelated goals—to provide support only as necessary, and to move from a position of shared r...

Educational research has rarely revealed direct effects of classroom environment on psychosocial development. Using the example of productive and projective coping after negative feedback, this study demonstrates substantial effects of the goal structure when students experience a drastic change in the mastery focus when the move from elementary to...

This study examines children’s perceptions of the achievement goals parents and teachers emphasize for them in mathematics, and the relation of these goals to children’s personal achievement goals, self-efficacy beliefs, and coping strategies. Results indicated that children’s perceptions of both parent and teacher mastery and performance goal emph...

To better inform and improve classroom teaching and learning, now more than ever before, educational researchers need to effectively and efficiently describe essential components of positive learning environments. In this article, we discuss how our research findings about motivation in classrooms have led to a closer examination of emotions. We de...

Ainley and Patrick describe an assessment process designed to “identify self- regulation in action.” In the spirit of this goal, the author offers three suggestions for providing a more holistic and contextual view of self-regulation. These suggestions include (a) expanding the definition of self-regulation used in their studies; (b) measuring self...

The authors explored the relationship between motivation and affect in upper elementary mathematics classes from the perspective of flow theory. They also investigated the relationship between students' motivation and teachers' instructional practices. Students' reported classroom experiences formed 4 factors--Social Affect, Personal Affect, Effica...

This study examined how one type of student work habit-classroom participation-is related to a combination of both student factors (math achievement, personal achievement goals, perceptions of classroom goal structures, and teacher support) and features of the classroom context (teachers' instructional practices, average perceptions of classroom go...

This study examined how one type of student work habit—classroom participation—is related to a combination of both student factors (math achievement, personal achievement goals, perceptions of classroom goal structures, and teacher support) and features of the classroom context (teachers’ instructional practices, average perceptions of classroom go...

The authors reviewed the research on challenge as a motivator, with a view toward application in mathematics classrooms. The authors conclude that traditional motivational research, with its focus on individual differences and decontextualized tasks, is not readily applicable to classrooms. They argue that a combination of challenging instruction a...

In addition to classroom activities, teachers provide personal and instructional supports meant to facilitate the developing sense of student autonomy. In this article, we offer a way of thinking about autonomy-supportive practices that suggests that such practices can be distinguished at a featural level and that different practices may in fact ha...

Observations of the first days of school in eight sixth-grade classrooms identified three different classroom environments. In supportive environments teachers expressed enthusiasm for learning, were respectful, used humor, and voiced expectations that all students would learn. In ambiguous environments teachers were inconsistent in their support a...

Despite its importance to educational psychology, prominent theories of motivation have mostly ignored emotion. In this paper, we review theoretical conceptions of the relation between motivation and emotion and discuss the role of emotion in understanding student motivation in classrooms. We demonstrate that emotion is one of the best indicators o...

Observations of the first days of school in eight sixth-grade classrooms identified three different classroom environments. In supportive environments teachers expressed enthusiasm for learning, were respectful, used humor, and voiced expectations that all students would learn. In ambiguous environments teachers were inconsistent in their support a...

This study examined the relation between the nature of teacher discourse and 34 sixth-grade students' reports of affect and behavior in 2 mathematics classrooms students perceived as emphasizing both mastery and performance goals. Classrooms were observed and teacher discourse was audiorecorded and transcribed for the first 2 days of the school yea...

This article describes how scaffolded instruction during whole-class mathematics lessons can provide the knowledge, skills, and supportive context for developing students' self-regulatory processes. In examining classroom interactions through discourse analysis, these qualitative methods reflect a theoretical change from viewing self-regulation as...

This article discusses the serendipitous findings that illustrated the importance of students' and teachers' emotions during instructional interactions. Through revisiting former assumptions and findings, this article concludes that emotion is an essential part of studying motivation in classroom interactions. Emotions are intertwined in teachers'...

The relation between the learning environment (e.g., students' perceptions of the classroom goal structure and teachers' instructional discourse) and students' reported use of avoidance strategies (self-handicapping, avoidance of help seeking) and preference to avoid novelty in mathematics was examined. Quantitative analyses indicated that students...

The relation between the learning environment (e.g., students' perceptions of the classroom goal structure and teachers' instructional discourse) and students' reported use of avoidance strategies (self-handicapping, avoidance of help seeking) and preference to avoid novelty in mathematics was examined. Quantitative analyses indicated that students...

The video survey is a promising new approach for studying classrooms and teaching across cultures. Drawing from experience in working with two cross-cultural video surveys, the Third International Mathematics and Science Study (TIMSS) and its follow-up study (TIMSS-R), this article presents some of the challenges of studying classrooms across cultu...

The authors investigated the self-reported relationships among 5th- and 6th-grade students' achievement goals in mathematics, their negative affect about making mistakes, and their self-regulatory beliefs and behaviors. Cluster analysis revealed 4 motivational-affective patterns. Two groups were characterized by positive motivational-affective patt...

Students' (21 girls, 21 boys) self-reports of involvement in mathematics were related to instructional strategies observed in their upper-elementary classrooms. Students in high involvement classrooms reported challenges and skills as above average and matched, whereas students in low involvement classrooms reported skills as exceeding challenges....

With these words, the NCTM (1989, 65) portrays a dilemma familiar to many middle-grades teachers. Although many teachers strive to involve their students in active and challenging problem-solving activities, students' past experiences may have instilled preconceptions that mathematics is mechanical, uninteresting, or unattainable. In addition, many...

We studied 14 fifth- and sixth-grade students' challenge seeking during project-based mathematics instruction in 1 classroom. We drew on 5 areas of research: academic risk taking, achievement goals, self-efficacy, volition, and affect. Data included students' responses to a tolerance for failure survey, an adaptive learning pattern survey, and 3 in...

Notes that motivation for learning declines during the middle-grade years and presents suggestions for reversing negative trends in learning, students' willingness to accept challenges, and their feelings of competence and autonomy. Provides instructional-support strategies to address in the mathematics curriculum adolescents' needs for challenge,...

Les contextes scolaires ont des effets, que l'A. etudie, sur la motivation a lire-ecrire de jeunes enfants. L'A. analyse la motivation des enfants selon les categories de tâches: ouvertes (objectifs ou processus centres sur l'enfant, fortes exigences intellectuelles) ou fermees (objectifs au processus orientes differemment, forte exigence relatives...

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Michigan, 1992. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 128-139). Reproduction (photocopy). s

Throughout the 1980s there was a proliferation of achievement testing in America to promote and assure the effectiveness of educational reforms. However, both traditional innovative forms of assessment failed to consider the cumulative impact of repeated testing on students” attitudes and motivation. Our surveys of students in Grades 2–11 revealed...

argue that analyses of motivation should consider the characteristics of personalized evaluations of events in situations and how those settings can be changed to encourage different motivational orientations / show how tasks and situations in school influence students' motivation / begin with a description of some empirical evidence of children's...

offer suggestions for evaluating and reformulating assessment practices in schools so that they foster students' thinking / describe research on students' views of achievement testing that reveal how standardized tests engender maladaptive attitudes and [test taking] strategies / argue that traditional achievement testing can distort educational cu...