No full-text available
To read the full-text of this research,
you can request a copy directly from the author.
Motivation for math in rural schools: Student and teacher perspectives
Abstract
Rural schools, students, teachers, administrators, families and community leaders face unique challenges from those of their
urban and suburban counterparts. This paper investigates motivation in rural secondary schools, with a particular focus on
mathematics, from teacher and student perspectives. It integrates recent research on math learning and motivation from the
fields of educational psychology, human neuroscience and rural education, to present an integrated systemic view of motivation
for learning math in rural schools.
KeywordsRural–Math–Motivation
... Other literature suggests that the characteristics of rural locations and communities can be used to enhance rural mathematics education. There is evidence from the USA that local rural contexts and partnerships with local organisations can be used to enrich student learning in mathematics (Avery and Kassam 2011;Clark et al. 2015;Hardre 2011;Howley et al. 2013;Ihrig et al. 2018), though there is very limited evidence in Australian contexts. Hardre (2011) argues that the close community relationships typical of rural locales provide opportunities to improve rural mathematics education. ...
... There is evidence from the USA that local rural contexts and partnerships with local organisations can be used to enrich student learning in mathematics (Avery and Kassam 2011;Clark et al. 2015;Hardre 2011;Howley et al. 2013;Ihrig et al. 2018), though there is very limited evidence in Australian contexts. Hardre (2011) argues that the close community relationships typical of rural locales provide opportunities to improve rural mathematics education. There is minimal mathematics education research to support this assertion; however, there is solid general education research that suggests this may be the case. ...
... Teacher support is a strong predictor of student motivation (Hardre et al. 2009). Unfortunately, Hardre's (2011) study of 25 rural American secondary schools found that rural mathematics teachers have a relatively poor understanding of how motivated their students are, and how to motivate their students, compared to teachers of other disciplines, and their students perceive them as relatively unsupportive. ...
Mathematics education is seen as a right for all children, and important to ensure a prosperous future. However, in Australia and other nations, rural students and students from low socioeconomic backgrounds both perform less well in mathematics and are less likely to pursue advanced mathematics. This paper presents a case study of a low socioeconomic status, rural government school that has high engagement and achievement in senior mathematics, despite its setting. The study uses a conceptual framework informed by Appreciative Inquiry and the theory of Practice Architectures to explore the activities and facilitatory elements that have likely contributed to the school’s mathematics success. Rather than being attributed to one or two key programmes, the school’s mathematics success seemed associated with a collection of whole-school factors. Setting high expectations while providing proactive learning support, differentiating instruction, emphasising the value of mathematics, linking mathematics to careers, and building mathematics teacher capacity were all associated with the school’s higher than expected mathematics performance. Rather than hindering the school’s mathematics programme, its small size and rural context were used to enable practices that contributed to mathematics success.
... Rural teachers tend to overestimate students' motivation, compared with students' own parallel reporting (Hardré, 2011). The importance of rural teachers' perceptions of their students' motivation drives their efforts to motivate and where they focus their energy and concern Hardré & Sullivan, 2008b). ...
... This being true, it is critical that they know and choose the most effective strategies for motivating, with lasting benefits. Yet most teachers report using content-relevant and short-term strategies rather than internal and long-term motivating strategies (Hardré, 2011). Attention to strategies to internalize motivation can be much more lasting (Ryan & Deci, 2000), and linking to long-term goals make sense for secondary students in particular. ...
... Rural secondary teachers recognize that their contexts present both assets and challenges for motivating students academically. In reporting factors that tend to reduce students' school-related motivation, rural teachers across schools cited ruralspecific factors led by rural lack of jobs, rural poverty and isolation, rural lack of diverse experiences, lack of educated and successful role models, and lack of family support for education (Hardré, 2011). On the balance side of their motivating equation, teachers also saw the closeness of families and the interpersonal relatedness that they develop with students as assets supported by the small rural community context . ...
Rural schools face the challenges of motivating and retaining students, often in the face of severe resource constraints. This paper synthesizes fifteen years of the author’s rural research on secondary students’ school-related motivation, distilling it into strategic principles for rural teachers and administrators. Effective motivational knowledge and strategies supported by both theory and research can help school staff fill the gap between potential and actual student achievement. Multi-level strategies for motivating individuals and groups include elements of classroom instructional practice, interpersonal relationships, and the broader school motivational climate including policy. By motivating students effectively, teachers and administrators can bridge the gap between what students do achieve and what they could achieve.
... A major aim of the study reported here is to advance our understanding of teachers' perceptions of student engagement in mathematics. Importantly, these perceptions influence teachers' beliefs and drive the instructional choices and efforts they make to promote student engagement in mathematics (Hardré et al. 2008;Hardré 2011;Skilling et al. 2015). ...
... The extent to which teachers believe that they can engage students is important because it influences the types of strategies teachers use and the efforts they make in their classrooms (Hardré et al. 2008;Hardré 2011;Skilling et al. 2015). In a mixed-method study designed to measure 202 secondary teachers' self efficacies for identifying student motivation and for intervening to motivate students in their disciplines, Hadré (2011) found that teacher efficacy for identifying and addressing students' motivational needs was lower in mathematics compared to that of teachers of other disciplines. ...
... Addressing this situation will, at the very least, require teachers to invest time or effort to understand and build their knowledge about engagement to develop a repertoire of strategies for engaging their students. It is important to understand teacher perceptions about and efficacy for student engagement because these drive the instructional choices and efforts teachers make to promote student engagement in mathematics (Hardré et al. 2008;Hardré 2011;Skilling et al. 2015). Knowing how to engage students requires clearer ideas about the types of and intensities of engagement combined with specific practices to promote engagement of students. ...
The importance of promoting student engagement, participation and interest in learning mathematics has long been a concern of mathematics teachers and educators with still too few students choosing not to continue studying mathematics beyond post compulsory requirements. Importantly, the value and importance of mathematics education continues to be emphasised not only as a fundamental discipline for all leaners but for providing core content and thinking habits essential for grounding science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) education. As STEM education is being shaped, mathematics educators call for a better understanding of the reciprocal relationship between mathematics and other STEM disciplines (English, 2016) and to consider the role of mathematics as the underlying language and tool across STEM learning. It is also envisaged that integrated STEM experiences will provide opportunities to foreground mathematics content and promote thinking processes. Providing settings that illustrate the importance of mathematics helps students understand its relevance and value as well as sparking interest for sustained engagement and participation.
Previous research that investigated student engagement in mathematics found that students were more alike in terms of their dis/engagement than their level of achievement (Skilling et al. 2015). These findings have important implications for teachers as understanding why high achieving students are disengaging and low achieving students are engaging in mathematics can influence the instructional choices teachers make in their mathematics classrooms. It is therefore critical to understand teacher beliefs about student engagement. This paper reports on a complementary study that investigated teacher beliefs about student engagement in mathematics. First, literature about engagement is drawn upon to define and conceptualize this construct and to discuss the underlying motivational factors that are likely to influence the way students engage in learning. The second part reports on teacher beliefs about student engagement in mathematics.
... A major aim of the study reported here is to advance our understanding of teachers' perceptions of student engagement in mathematics. Importantly, these perceptions influence teachers' beliefs and drive the instructional choices and efforts they make to promote student engagement in mathematics (Hardré et al. 2008;Hardré 2011;Skilling et al. 2015). ...
... The extent to which teachers believe that they can engage students is important because it influences the types of strategies teachers use and the efforts they make in their classrooms (Hardré et al. 2008;Hardré 2011;Skilling et al. 2015). In a mixed-method study designed to measure 202 secondary teachers' self efficacies for identifying student motivation and for intervening to motivate students in their disciplines, Hadré (2011) found that teacher efficacy for identifying and addressing students' motivational needs was lower in mathematics compared to that of teachers of other disciplines. ...
... Addressing this situation will, at the very least, require teachers to invest time or effort to understand and build their knowledge about engagement to develop a repertoire of strategies for engaging their students. It is important to understand teacher perceptions about and efficacy for student engagement because these drive the instructional choices and efforts teachers make to promote student engagement in mathematics (Hardré et al. 2008;Hardré 2011;Skilling et al. 2015). Knowing how to engage students requires clearer ideas about the types of and intensities of engagement combined with specific practices to promote engagement of students. ...
What teachers’ think about student engagement influences the teaching practices they adopt, their responses to students, and the efforts they make in the classroom. Interviews were conducted with thirty-one mathematics teachers from ten high schools to investigate their perceptions and beliefs about student engagement in mathematics. Teachers also reported the practices they used to engage their students during mathematics lessons. Teacher perceptions of student engagement were categorised according to recognised ‘types’ (behavioural, emotional and cognitive) and ‘levels’ (ranging from disengaged to engaged). The teachers’ reports emphasised immediate attention being paid to students’ behaviours and overt emotions towards mathematics with fewer and less extensive reports made about students’ cognitive engagement. Teachers’ abilities to implement practices considered supportive of student engagement were linked to a number of elements, including their self-efficacy. Perceptions of being powerless to engage their students resulted in many teachers limiting their efforts to attempt some form of intervention. Author shared link: http://rdcu.be/mH7A
... Thus teachers, who provide intrinsic motivational sources, can have a direct effect on student learning (Loima & Vibulphol, 2016;Middleton & Spanias, 1999). These findings suggest that mathematics teachers should design meaningful learning activities by providing interesting tasks (Murayama, Pekrun, Lichtenfeld, & vom Hofe, 2013;Waege, 2009), giving real-life mathematics problems to solve (Hardré, 2011;Matteson, Swarthout, & Zientek, 2011), and providing encouragement for successes (Githua & Mwangi, 2003;Middleton & Spanias, 1999), to enhance students' motivation and learning. Therefore, this study seeks to answer two Research Questions (RQs): offered another classification scheme for motivation, autonomous motivation and controlled motivation, based on their effects on the learning outcomes (see also Deci & Ryan, 2008). ...
... However, the varying levels indicated that students identified different perception of topics and their value (Tsai, Kunter, Lüdtke, Trautwein, & Ryan, 2008) and teachers' motivating styles did not clearly employ autonomy support (Reeve, 2009;Tsai et al., 2008). Teachers should explain the usefulness of topics for students' learning and future lives (Hardré, 2011), and design learning activities to enhance students' interest and engagement in learning (Jang, Reeve, & Deci, 2010;Tsai et al., 2008). Thirdly, Thai students had various levels of mathematics learning which were classified in all scales, from low to moderate-high (see Appendix). ...
... This finding pointed out that mathematics activities and lessons did not attract these students to learn. The reason might simply have been the nature of mathematics as a subject and its required tasks, as well as students' lack of interest and ability in mathematics (Hardré, 2011;Middleton & Spanias, 1999;Ryan & Deci, 2000). No matter what was the accurate reason for Thai students, the data suggested that mathematics teachers should provide meaningful learning activities to enhance each individual student's motivation. ...
The aims of this qualitative research were to investigate the level of motivation and learning of ninth grade students in mathematics classrooms in Thailand and to reveal how the teachers supported students’ levels of motivation and learning. The participants were 333 students and 12 teachers in 12 mathematics classrooms from four regions of Thailand. The results showed, first, that the students’ levels of learning ranged from low to moderate-high while the levels of motivation were from moderate to high. In addition, most students had intrinsic motivation; however, some students still lacked motivation and were only motivated by external sources. Second, teachers enhanced students’ learning by encouraging them to learn as a whole class the most by using lectures and asking questions. The other top methods were allowing time for self-paced learning and answering, and relying on internal sources of motivation using positive interpersonal and group activities. Most teachers employed both autonomy-supportive and controlling motivating styles in classroom. Even with a variety of motivating methods, the students’ learning did not seem to be supported adequately, especially for students who showed a low level of learning.
... Teachers are encouraged to anticipate multiple factors which impact on learning such as socio-economic background (Lupton & Thomson, 2015), parental support (Eamon, 2005), resources at home (Mohammadpour, 2013), and motivation for, and engagement in, learning (Hardré, 2011;Schumm & Bogner, 2016). Our research seeks to explore whether science teachers hold preconceptions about differences in how girls and boys learn. ...
... We draw on field notes, teacher survey responses (n=18), and student surveys (n=26; 9 girls and 17 boys) and focus group interviews (n=4; 2 girls and 2 boys). Our analytical framework was developed from emergent themes drawing on gendered learning (Hart, 2016;Tichenor, Tichenor & Piechura, 2015) and student experience and motivations (Hardré, 2011;Ryan & Deci, 2000;Shirazi, 2017). ...
Science teachers are continually under scrutiny as researchers explore how they attempt to enable their students to ‘do science’ both in school and in preparation for ‘becoming scientists’. Questions have been raised, for instance, about the tendency of boys to dominate in science lessons by gaining more of teacher attention compared with girls during dialogic interactions. Drawing on notions of gendered learning within the context of science teacher questioning, this research examines whether there is a tendency for teachers to address questions during classroom dialogue to boys over girls in secondary science classrooms. Data were collected in 211 science classes in London, UK. Pre-service science teachers mapped whom teachers asked questions to during randomly selected lessons, and reflected on their strategies and intentions. In addition, a teacher-researcher carried out teacher and student surveys and an in-depth student focus group interview in their school, in which 14-15 year old students are taught science in both mixed- and single-gendered settings, to examine any perceptions of gendered learning. Early evidence shows there may be a gender bias towards teachers asking boys questions more frequently, sometimes as part of behaviour management agendas rather than as direct scaffolding for learning ideas. Teacher perceptions of boys responding more readily to competitive learning were refuted by girls in our sample. Students did not perceive gendered grouping as aiding their learning or their enjoyment of it. This study has implications for teacher training, and teachers’ preconceptions of how girls and boys may respond to different learning approaches in the science classroom.
... Motivation is the factors and the process that drive and govern the interest, intensity, and quality of goal-directed behavior (Paulsen & Feldman, 1999). Motivation deals with interest, engagement, and attention, which directly and indirectly influence students' cognitive process, learning process, construction of tasks, and problem-solving (Hardré, 2011). Based on this definition, motivation plays a key role in driving students' learning activities. ...
Investigating factors affecting students' academic performance seems a hard job for researchers on the empirical front. Beliefs, parents' educational background, motivation, and attitudes have been proven significantly influence achievement. However, concurrent research on the relationship among these variables seems scarce. Therefore , to contribute to this gap in knowledge, the purpose of this study is to examine the structural relationships among beliefs, parents' educational level, attitude, motivation, and achievement in mathematics learning. We selected 30 classes randomly from six schools in Surabaya, Indonesia. This study involved 894 fifth-and sixth-grade students (448 boys and 446 girls). Structural equation modeling results showed that this model predicts students' achievement in mathematics (R 2 = 0.49). Beliefs are positively associated with students' achievement (β = 0.20, p < 0.001), attitude (β = 0.82, p < 0.001), and motivation (β = 0.68, p < 0.001). Parents' educational level is positively associated with achievements (β = 0.17, p < 0.001) and motivation (β = 0.07, p = 0.04). Beliefs were indirectly associated with achievements through attitude (β = 0.31, p < 0.001) and motivation (β = 0.08, p = 0.01). The indirect association between par-ents' educational level and achievement through motivation was insignificant. This study is valuable because it helps unpack the relationship between beliefs, parents' educational level, attitudes, motivation, and achievement.
... Consistent with other studies (e.g., Hardré, 2011;Hardré & Hennessey, 2013;Sedawi & Eshchar-Netz, 2022), we discovered teachers paid more attention to motivation indicators such as their students' behavioral and emotional engagement than to their cognitive engagement, perhaps because behavioral and emotional displays are more observable (Appleton et al., 2008;Fredricks et al., 2004). As elementary science teachers, their tendency not to address cognitive engagement may also be related to their limited pedagogical science knowledge and lack of professional language to conceptualize and discuss disciplinary cognitive engagement (Berg & Mensah, 2014;Chen & Mensah, 2018). ...
Science teachers' professional learning about student motivation can play a key role in developing their ability to nurture student motivation and cope with motivational challenges. To advance the understanding of how on-the-job discussions facilitate teacher learning about student motivation, this study investigated how elementary-school science teachers described and reasoned about student motivation in school-based team meetings, by analyzing 20 audio-recorded meetings of three Israeli elementary school science teams. The analysis included characterizing 123 episodes in which teachers referred to student motivation, coding how central and specific the references to motivation were, what indicators of motivation teachers addressed, and what influencing factors they considered. It also included a thematic analysis of teachers' discussions about motivation-promoting methods and a microanalysis of one select event, drawing on linguistic ethnographic concepts and methods. The findings showed that teachers often addressed student motivation, but briefly and in relation to other topics. They tended to address behavioral and emotional indicators of motivation much more than cognitive indicators. They focused on instructional methods, predominantly addressing motivational issues from a practical perspective and seldom considering them from the student perspective or accounting for internal factors. Teachers often offered methods for promoting student motivation, but they expressed reservations without critically exploring them. Furthermore, critical discussions about motivation-supporting methods were frequently constrained by teachers' attempts to manage the face threat these discussions entailed. These findings highlight how a theory-crossing framework that integrates theories of student motivation with a theory of teacher-productive discourse can serve as a guide for teachers' on-the-job discussions to develop their motivation-related professional learning and their capacity to support student motivation.
KEYWORDS: discourse analysis, on-the-job learning, student motivation, eachers' professional discourse.
... education. Many rural specific problems such as the absence of professional teachers, economic problems [16], [17], social pressure, and absence of educational amenities reported in Iranian context may influence rural students' motivation negatively. Therefore, one's curiosity is aroused as to what goals the underserved rural high school students might adopt or prefer under the influence of such detrimental factors. ...
The study aimed to examine rural high schoolers’ achievement goal preferences and the potential gender variations in a neglected rural context in Iran. To this end, a sample of 252 high schoolers answered Elliott and Murayama’s (2008) Achievement Goal Questionnaire-Revised (AGQ-R). Quantitative results indicated the prevalence of mastery approach (MAp) and performance approach (PAp) goals, followed by performance avoidance (PAv) and mastery avoidance (MAv) goals. Further, an examination of gender differences indicated no significant differences between male and female high schoolers in their adoption of MAp, PAp and MAv goals. However, a significant difference was observed between male and female students in their resort to PAv goal. Results may have implications for different individuals in educational settings such as educational authorities, teachers, and counselors as well as researchers.
... in recruiting and hiring specialized content teachers (Hardré, 2011;Monk, 2007). Consequently, rural school teachers may be highly taxed when dealing with classroom situations that require them to teach outside of their content area (Fortney et al., 1999;Hammer et al., 2005;Henry, 2019;Jimmerson, 2004). ...
Rural communities are geographically isolated and have limited access to specialized services and ongoing support from content educational experts. As a result, rural school districts across the nation face many challenges related to the recruitment, retention, and professional development for their teachers. Studies have reported that rural school districts experience a shortage of specialized teachers and it is likely that rural school teachers will teach in content areas outside of their area of expertise. Finding mathematics and science teachers is a constant challenge. In response, we developed the Professional Development for Secondary School Teachers and Educational Professionals (PD-STEP) into STEM Fields Model, which utilizes research-based lessons aligned with curriculum standards and purposefully centered on (a) agricultural mathematics, science, and technology knowledge and skills; (b) specific needs of English language learners; and (c) indigenous, authentic agricultural topics through field-based experiences for teachers. The PD-STEP into STEM Fields Model encompasses the development of a lesson plan template and lesson topics that incorporate teachers’ professional development training on food, agriculture, natural resources, and human sciences. These professional development activities explore opportunities available in the career paths described by the United States Department of Agriculture and engender resource-rich partnerships among university faculty and rural school teachers.
... One of the challenges in building a virtual online community is identifying and using the most appropriate tool to create a flexible environment to reach intended users and one that will function effectively as a virtual learning hub (Hardré, 2011;. To function effectively as a learning hub, the system needs to be accessible and understandable, inviting and appealing, functional and usable, and attractive to users who will create content that draws peers in to participate with them. ...
Professional development opportunities provide teachers with enhanced learning experiences, deeper subject knowledge, and improvement of their teaching practices, all for the goal of increasing student achievement (Nelson, 2009). Unfortunately, most rural teachers have much less access to professional development opportunities compared to their urban and suburban peers (Hardré, P.L., et al., 2014). A Research Experience for Teachers (RET ), which is a National Science Foundation (NSF) funded program, was created for rural high school math and science teachers in collaboration with the University of Oklahoma and the Center for Bioanalysis. As participants, teachers applied and were accepted to participate in a seven-week summer research experience to connect bioanalytical engineering and their research experiences into their classrooms and to stimulate their students’ critical thinking skills. The following narrative and analysis chronicle the teams’ design, development and learning experience in redesigning the seven-week professional development for rural science and math teachers.
... Consequently, students need supports that enable them to understand the relevance of foundational math competencies to their future success after school. Hardré (2011Hardré ( , 2012 emphasizes the importance of relevance in teaching math to rural students, as do results of the rural systemic initiatives funded by the National Science Foundation (Harmon & Smith, 2011). In essence, the RMEP model of shared responsibility that is under development must address gaps in "what" math content students should learn, as well as the cultural gap of "why" students must learn the math competencies. ...
The Rural Math Excel Partnership (RMEP) identified math competencies used by technicians in the workplace compared to standards of learning required in the public school curriculum. A modified DACUM process revealed 39 math competencies used by technicians in STEM-related occupations of the rural region. Group interviews with faculty in three community colleges helped substantiate math gaps. A project math specialist and team of teachers identified four types of learning gaps: (1) math competencies not included in state standards; (2) math competencies included in state standards taught prior to Algebra I, Algebra II, Geometry, and Algebra Functions and Data Analysis (AFDA) courses; (3) math competencies included in high school state standards that students struggle to learn; and (4) math competencies community college students struggle to learn. Implications include five lessons learned in the gap analysis process and six questions for guiding future innovation and research.
... The literature provides few clues as to why this may be the case. There is some research suggesting that successful rural schools build strong links with both school families and the wider community (Barley and Beesley 2007;Hardre 2011;Semke and Sheridan 2012). It is reasonable to speculate that rural schools may make use of these ties to use the local natural environment, industry and agriculture to enhance engagement and learning in the sciences. ...
Science and science education are recognised internationally as essential for ensuring a sustainable and prosperous future. At the same time, significant equity issues are apparent in science education. This study used enrolment and academic result data, routinely collected from government schools in Victoria, Australia, to examine the impact of socioeconomic status and school location on patterns of participation and achievement in senior school Biology, Chemistry, Environmental Science, Physics and Psychology. This research shows that though non-metropolitan students are less likely to have the sciences provided by their school, where they are provided they enrol in similar proportions to metropolitan students. In line with other research, it shows that high SES students are more likely than other students to study senior secondary Chemistry and Physics, and outperform low SES students in all senior sciences. While the findings of this study suggest that non-metropolitan students underperform their metropolitan counterparts in senior sciences, they suggest the gap in performance is not dramatic. More promising, the variation in school performance revealed in this study suggests that non-metropolitan schools can achieve just as well as metropolitan schools in the sciences. The study also suggests location has a moderating effect on SES not noted in the current literature, where science achievement in non-metropolitan schools appears less impacted upon by SES than similar schools in urban environments. This provides impetus for further research into high science performing non-metropolitan schools as a step towards addressing some of the equity concerns in science education.
... In addition, Skilling (2013) found that teachers reported practices for promoting cognitive engagement that were restricted to completing homework and study strategies focusing on behavioural aspects, such as time management; little did the teachers report about planning, monitoring, and evaluating student learning during lessons. Moreover, similar to a finding by Hardré (2011), the majority of teachers reported using practices that met students immediate motivational needs such as explaining relevance, future use and application of mathematics concepts compared to few teachers who used practices that met students internal motivational needs, supported autonomous learning and mastery of concepts. ...
Cognitive engagement (including self-regulation) is crucial for promoting student learning, but research suggests that teacher beliefs about cognitive engagement are less refined than their beliefs about other kinds of engagement. We used surveys and interviews from 40 teachers across 8 secondary schools to investigate teacher beliefs and practices that the teachers report using to promote cognitive engagement in their classes. Participants responded to questions about two fictitious teacher scenarios. About half of them identified with Teacher A, believing in the importance of completing practice questions and providing students with a list of revision topics. Those who identified with Teacher B favoured encouraging students to self-assess their competency, monitor their progress, and develop individual revision plans.
... This is relevant to the present study because concerns about student engagement and achievement in mathematics during early secondary years highlight sensitivities to the cognitive demands and emotional challenges that influence student participation and interest in mathematics study. Hardré (2011) specifically sought to identify the types of motivating strategies that teachers explicitly used in mathematics classrooms. A number of strategies were identified including those that focused on the relevance of content, the value of learning and the application of mathematics. ...
With persistent concerns about student engagement, interest and participation in mathematics, this research investigated the range of practices 31 year 7 mathematics teachers reported using and how they perceived these practices influenced student engagement in mathematics. In-depth interviews revealed similarities in teachers' perceptions of student engagement, but differences in what teachers did to address engagement through their practices. This paper reports on teacher practices identified as promoting and hindering student engagement in mathematics. This paper reports on research that emanates from concerns about declines in student participation, interest and achievement in mathematics in the middle years of school. A key aim was to identify effective pedagogy that teachers perceived supported and shaped student engagement in mathematics in early secondary school. Increasingly, educational research is taking note of student engagement and how motivational factors influence student learning Sullivan & McDonough, 2007) as well as attitudes, interests and beliefs (Lomas, Grootenboer, & Attard, 2012). Additionally, the significance of students' emotions (Linnenbrink-Garcia & Pekrun, 2011) their cognitive functioning (Hannula, 2006) and interpersonal relationships with teachers and peers within the mathematics classroom, are central to student engagement (Martin, 2007; Zan, Brown, Evans, & Hannula, 2006). Seeking clarity about how teacher practices for teaching mathematics, including their perceptions of cognitive and emotional aspects are crucial for addressing student engagement, as it is unlikely that improvements in levels of engagement and participation will occur of their own accord. Student Engagement
Promoting engagement is crucial for encouraging student participation, interest, and learning in mathematics. Student engagement has been conceptualized as interrelated types comprising behavioural, emotional, and cognitive characteristics. Cognitive engagement, our focus in this paper, relates to students’ psychological investment in learning and practices used to enhance learning, such as self-regulatory strategies and metacognitive processes. Although crucial for students’ learning, research suggests that teachers’ practices for promoting students’ cognitive engagement are not well understood. In this qualitative study, we investigated the beliefs of 40 secondary mathematics teachers across eight English schools concerning promoting cognitive engagement in mathematics classrooms, and whether teachers with different cognitive engagement beliefs differ in the features of classroom practice they attend to in relation to promoting student self-regulation and metacognition. We developed a Cognitive Engagement Framework (CEF) for the following purposes: (1) to develop vignettes that described the practices of two contrasting teachers (Teacher A and Teacher B), who differed in their use of specific self-regulation and metacognitive processes; and (2) to use as a tool for analysis. 17 participants identified with Teacher A who favoured a controlling style towards student strategy use such as activating knowledge, planning, and enacting and regulating strategies, and a passive approach towards students’ use of self-reflection. 14 participants identified with Teacher B who favoured promoting student autonomy for planning and enacting and regulating strategies, self-reflection, and acknowledged affective elements. In addition to its findings, the paper makes a methodological contribution by using ‘vignettes’ as a new way of investigating teachers’ beliefs, and a theoretical contribution through the development of the CEF.
This qualitative study aimed to investigate the influences on 32 rural Iranian high school students’ adoption of achievement goals. To this end, the high school students took part in individual semi-structured interviews. The outcomes indicated the high school students’ goal orientation adoption was impacted by a host of significant individuals in four contexts: (1) school (e.g. teachers, classmates), (2) family (e.g. parents, relatives), (3) rural community (e.g. neighbors and rural university graduates) and (4) media (e.g. counselors on TV). Likewise, various factors (i.e. social, psychological, economic, educational, rural, biological and religious) also appeared to influence their achievement goal adoption. Results may have implications for various stakeholders such as educational authorities, policy makers, researchers and significant others (e.g. teachers, counselors, parents, among many others).
This chapter addresses the uniqueness of rural schools and the importance of teacher leaders in those settings. The teacher leader model will be different in a smaller school, although this context is less studied. Because teacher leaders have experience in the community context, they can guide others. Rural schools often have more difficulty recruiting and retaining teachers; while location cannot be changed, working conditions can. Supportive mentors can help rural school districts retain new teachers; however, teacher leaders are often not formally recognized. Less than half of states have a teacher leader licensure, and even fewer have standards in this area. Although national standards exist, little research has focused on how these and other professional development strategies can be effectively implemented in the rural setting.
A significant but largely overlooked equity issue in STEM education is the relatively low engagement and performance of rural students in STEM. Students from rural schools tend to achieve more poorly in the STEM disciplines and are less likely to engage in further STEM study than their metropolitan counterparts. This chapter reports on findings of an Australian project examining STEM education success in rural Victorian government schools. The project investigated the STEM practices of four schools that consistently attracted higher enrolments and achieved stronger results in senior STEM subjects, compared with similar rural schools. This chapter presents a cross-case synthesis of practices that appeared to contribute to the STEM success of these schools, and discusses the findings in relation to theoretical models of motivation and academic emotion. The four rural schools employed a complex array of practices to improve student engagement in STEM, including holding high expectations while providing generous support, place-based learning, STEM enrichment opportunities, and differentiated mathematics programs. While the practices employed are not restricted to rural schools, each school felt their rural nature facilitated these engaging practices.
In this chapter, the engagement of 244 students is measured across three different types of mathematical problems (modelling problems, word problems, and mathematical exercises). We also investigate the potential of teaching modelling problems in changing students’ attitude towards mathematics. This research was conducted with a pre-test, followed by an educational intervention and a post-test. During the educational intervention, two groups of students with different instructional formats attended six sessions of modelling problem solving. The results of this study show that, although, there existed no significant difference in engagement existed between the three types of mathematical problems in the pre-test data, both quantitative and qualitative analysis of the post-test data showed that students generally experienced more engagement on word problems. Results also show that teaching modelling problems improved students’ attitudes towards mathematics in both groups.
In many countries, there is pressure for schools to increase student engagement and skills in mathematics, in particular for disadvantaged students. This is certainly true in Australia. This study repurposes school level data to examine patterns of participation and achievement in senior secondary school mathematics in Victoria, Australia. It confirms that school socioeconomic status (SES) is strongly tied to participation and achievement in these subjects, and that nonmetropolitan schools tend to perform more poorly than metropolitan schools in these areas. It shows that nonmetropolitan schools are less likely to offer advanced mathematics subjects than metropolitan schools, and where they do, their students are less likely to choose those options. This study also reveals that correlations between mathematics performance and SES are far weaker in the nonmetropolitan school population than the metropolitan school population. This suggests that a nonmetropolitan location has a moderating effect on the impact of SES, pointing the way for potentially fruitful lines of future inquiry.
This paper presents the partial results of a research project where the incidence that the multigraduate rural school has on its students was studied, within the framework of a phenomenological qualitative paradigm, resulting in a first exploratory study on the conceptions, motivations and learning strategies of the students, according to the model on learning factors (SAL). The submitted results refer to the meanings that the students infer regarding three variables related to their learning, based on the answers given in semistructured interviews and the analysis of the ideas underlying their content. With regard to the conception of learning, the results show that students play an important role in their socialization function; furthermore, the importance of classmates and the relationships between them are considered keys to a successful learning. On the other hand, in reference to learning strategies, the individualistic vision of the students is significant, considering learning as a personal and non-transferable process of each of them, which does not, then, hang together with what has been expressed previously. Concerning motivation for learning, a study-prize relationship of a superficial approach to learning predominates.
Developing an operational definition of rural is a crucial component of rural education research. Although researchers have discussed the challenges of defining rural (e.g., Coladarci in J Res Rural Educ 22(3), 2007; Cromartie and Bucholtz in Amber Waves 6:28–34, 2008; Hart et al. in Am J Public Health 95:1149–1155, 2005; Howley et al. in J Res Rural Educ 20(18), 2005; Isserman in Int Reg Sci Rev 28:465–499, 2005), these discussions have generally been presented at a theoretical level or do not consider issues that occur once a definition has been chosen. Examples of existing definitions and suggested guidelines are needed to ensure researchers understand the importance of aligning their operational definition of rural with the context and goals of their study, as this alignment influences the generalizability of their findings. The purpose of this chapter is threefold. First, we aim to inform rural researchers of the variety of definitions used within policy and research by providing a description of the most common definitions available to education policy makers and researchers. Next, we provide empirical examples of the impact of the choice of rural definition on statistical results and substantive inferences. Finally, we discuss practices advocated by Koziol et al. (J Res Rural Educ 30(4), 2015) that outline how to identify a suitable definition of rural, and communicate the findings given the chosen definition. We conclude by providing recommendations for future research.
Diverse learning opportunities and deep engagement are needed to support development of engineering competencies and expertise. Deep engagement evolves from productive and high-quality motivation that derives from both internal and external sources. Motivation to learn is lacking in many fields, like engineering, because it is too often assumed or ignored, rather than explicitly built into course instruction. While the lack of motivation in engineering education is clear in data-like attrition, there is little relevant research that informs the necessary changes for the field. The purpose of this study is to present a systematic approach that explicitly considers motivational elements in engineering courses. First a comprehensive set of motivational characteristics and the interrelationships for productive motivation of mechanical engineering students are identified. Students’ motivational characteristics and profiles of change over time are assessed using a multipoint predictive correlational design. This information is then used to strategically redesign motivational elements of a senior-level mechanical engineering design course. The SUCCESS framework has been used to redesign motivational features of the existing course. This paper reports results of the study, including implications for redesign of other engineering courses. Analysis of the data demonstrates the complexity of motivation in the engineering classroom, which includes addressing implicit and explicit, intrinsic and extrinsic, individual and team interaction and instruction. These elements extend not only to direct communication and interactions of instructor with students but into the full scope of the learning environment, peer-to-peer interactions, grading, (a)synchronous activities, face to face, and virtual communications. Key features of engineering students’ productive (learning and engagement-related) motivational profiles consisted of clusters of perceptual and experiential variables that were strongly correlated with motivational and learning outcomes. Tracking these factors demonstrated that they changed over time. These changes corresponded to perceptions of instructor and peer interactions, which were amenable to instructional intervention and responsive to social modeling. This study also revealed links among engineering students’ perceptions of their field of study, their own development of self-efficacy, and success expectations in both the design course and for their careers. This work revealed important distinctions between engineering students’ self-efficacy for, and engagement in, the course generally and for group tasks more specifically. These newly revealed relationships offer the opportunity to improve engineering instruction and the design of dynamic learning environments that support adaptive skill development.
The purpose of this study was to determine the effects of motivation in engineering design courses. In this study we present a structured approach to identify motivational gaps and instructional design to explicitly address motivational needs in a current course in mechanical engineering design. The SUCCESS framework (Hardré, 2009) has been proposed to assess the existing motivational components of the course, examine gaps in the course relative to its goals, and then propose motivating strategies to address those gaps. This paper presents the model and course description, along with the process and products of the analysis of the course to improve motivation for engagement and innovation.
On the basis of a new model of motivation, we examined the effects of 3 dimensions of teacher (n = 14) behavior (involvement, structure, and autonomy support) on 144 children's (Grades 3-5) behavioral and emotional engagement across a school year. Correlational and path analyses revealed that teacher involvement was central to children's experiences in the classroom and that teacher provision of both autonomy support and optimal structure predicted children's motivation across the school year. Reciprocal effects of student motivation on teacher behavior were also found. Students who showed higher initial behavioral engagement received subsequently more of all 3 teacher behaviors. These findings suggest that students who are behaviorally disengaged receive teacher responses that should further undermine their motivation. The importance of the student-teacher relationship, especially interpersonal involvement, in optimizing student motivation is highlighted.
The central argument of this book is that cognition is not the whole story in understanding intellectual functioning and development. To account for inter-individual, intra-individual, and developmental variability in actual intellectual performance, it is necessary to treat cognition, emotion, and motivation as inextricably related.
Motivation, Emotion, and Cognition: Integrative Perspectives on Intellectual Functioning and Development:
*represents a new direction in theory and research on intellectual functioning and development;
*portrays human intelligence as fundamentally constrained by biology and adaptive needs but modulated by social and cultural forces; and
*encompasses and integrates a broad range of scientific findings and advances, from cognitive and affective neurosciences to cultural psychology, addressing fundamental issues of individual differences, developmental variability, and cross-cultural differences with respect to intellectual functioning and development.
By presenting current knowledge regarding integrated understanding of intellectual functioning and development, this volume promotes exchanges among researchers concerned with provoking new ideas for research and provides educators and other practitioners with a framework that will enrich understanding and guide practice.
The recent No Child Left Behind legislation has defined a vital role for large-scale assessment in determining whether students are learning. Given this increased role of standardized testing as a means of accountability, the purpose of this article is to consider how individual differences in motivational and psychological processes may contribute to performance on high-stakes math assessments. The authors consider individual differences in processes that prior research has found to be important to achievement: achievement goals, value, self-concept, self-efficacy, test anxiety, and cognitive processes. The authors present excerpts from interviews with eighth-grade test takers to illustrate these different achievement-related motivational beliefs, affect, and cognitive processing. Implications for future research studying the situational pressures involved in high-stakes assessments are discussed.
The authors investigated predictive relationships among student characteristics that influence motivation for learning and achievement. Participants were students (N = 900) from all 4 grade levels in 18 rural public high schools in the south-western United States. The authors used AMOS 4.0 (J. L. Arbuckle & W. Wothke, 1996) to test a hypothesized path model in development and validation subsamples. Variables included perceptions of classroom climate, perceived ability, perceived instrumentality of instruction, and achievement goals as predictors of engagement and effort in school. The model fit the data reasonably well, with relatively minor variations in the strength of the paths between subsamples. The authors discuss implications for research and classroom practice.
In this review, we scope the role of interpersonal relationships in students’ academic motivation, engagement, and achievement. We argue that achievement motivation theory, current issues, and educational practice can be conceptualized in relational terms. Influential theorizing, including attribution theory, expectancy-value theory, goal theory, self-determination theory, self-efficacy theory, and self-worth motivation theory, is reviewed in the context of the role of significant others in young people’s academic lives. Implications for educational practice are examined in the light of these theoretical perspectives and their component constructs and mechanisms. A trilevel framework is proposed as an integrative and relationally based response to enhance students’ motivation, engagement, and achievement. This framework encompasses student-level action (universal programs and intervention, targeted programs for at-risk populations, extracurricular activity, cooperative learning, and mentoring), teacher- and classroom-level action (connective instruction, professional development, teacher retention, teacher training, and classroom composition), and school-level action (school as community and effective leadership).
In the field of educational psychology, there is diverse and active research in motivation for learning and achievement. Many instruments exist for assessing students' motivation, primarily as self-report. Fewer instruments are available for assessing teachers' perceptions of their students' motivation, and fewer still for assessing teachers' perceptions of reasons for students' lack of motivation. Teachers' intervention strategies for motivation are linked to their causal perceptions. Therefore, it is important to assess those causal perceptions. In this paper, we offer evidence for the Perceptions of Student Motivation questionnaire, a new measure that offers evidence of validity and reliability for this purpose among high school teachers. It offers potential to increase efficiency and clarity of findings regarding teachers' perceptions of students' motivation.
In "Learning to Leave," Michael Corbett argues that: (1) education has served as a tool to disassociate students--both physically and culturally--from the places from which they come, particularly if they are from rural places, in effect creating an ambivalence toward education; (2) the ways in which individuals express this ambivalence is shaped, in large part, by factors such as socioeconomic status and gender; (3) the purpose of schooling is often in conflict with the values and beliefs of rural communities (i.e., formal education may run counter to local forms of social or cultural capital, and it may also be locally perceived as having little effect on the ability of students to increase their economic capital within the rural context); and (4) the effects of globalization are found in many rural areas as evidenced by increasing access to services typically found in more urban areas; thereby decreasing individuals' need to migrate out of these areas. Guided by these themes, the following questions are considered: (1) How do rural community members, educators and students resolve the tensions between preparing students for success in an increasingly globalized world and maintaining their commitment to the places from which they come?; (2) What does this mean for the sustainability and growth of rural communities and schools?; and (3) How will this affect rural schools and their relationship(s) with the communities they serve? The author responds to these questions using the tradition of storytelling found in Native communities around the globe. In this article, she shares her story which is not simply her story, but an example of the stories shared by countless numbers of Native people living in rural and urban areas across the nation, many of whom have struggled and continue to struggle with the inherent contradictions of education. Many Native youth continue to struggle as they work to navigate the educational system, wondering how they can maintain their sense of self and place, while being successful academically. Unfortunately, their stories are seldom heard outside their own communities, as their relatively small numbers have tended to render them statistically insignificant in large scale studies of the condition of education in both rural and urban settings. (Contains 6 footnotes.)
This research tested a path model for how rural high school students' self-perceptions and environmental perceptions influence their course-related interest, school engagement, and ultimately, post-graduation intentions. Participants were 414 students in all four grades, in 10 rural, public high schools. Correlation and path analyses (in LISREL 8.58) were utilized to identify significant paths and test model ft. All paths in the final model were statistically significant and demonstrated good ft. Among environmental factors, teacher support predicted student interest in subject matter. Of personal characteristics, learning goals and perceived competence most strongly predicted interest and achievement, and content-related perceptions of instrumentality and value strongly predicted class effort as well as future intentions to finish high school and go on to postsecondary education. Overall, these rural students exhibited positive motivational profiles for learning, apart from achievement. However, the MANOVA analysis demonstrated significantly lower motivational profile for math than for all other subjects. (Contains 3 tables, 3 figures and 3 footnotes.)
There recently has been a renewed appreciation of the importance of social context to effective schools. This article describes an ongoing program of research on schools as caring communities. The research spans about a decade and a half and involves a diverse set of elementary schools from across the United States. The findings indicate that sense of school community can be enhanced for both students and teachers, that it is associated with a wide range of positive outcomes for both, and that the potential benefits of enhancing school community may be greatest in schools with large numbers of economically disadvantaged students. At the same time, it is noted that enhancing community has the potential for producing negative as well as positive outcomes, and that the content of the community values is of critical importance. Overall, the concept of school as community appears to provide a powerful framework for looking at educational practice and guiding educational reform efforts.
This study investigated high school teachers’ perceptions of the motivational needs of their students and the strategies they used to address those needs. Participants were 96 teachers in 15 high schools in a Southwestern state in the USA. Data were collected via paper‐based questionnaires addressing teachers’ perceptions of: supportive classroom environment, students’ general motivation, causes of student lack of motivation, teachers’ self‐efficacy for motivating students, interpersonal style, and motivating strategies. Quantitative data were analyzed by correlation and multiple regressions. Teachers’ efficacy for diagnosing and intervening for students’ motivation, and their interpersonal motivating styles, predicted their strategy use. Both internal and external causal perceptions explained important parts of variance in teachers’ perceptions of students’ overall motivation. Strategies that teachers use, in turn, predicted the supportiveness of their classroom environments. Surprisingly, teachers’ perceptions of causes of motivation did not predict either environment or strategy selection. Implications for educational policy and classroom practice are discussed.
Past research has indicated an association between parents' beliefs and adolescent children's self-perceptions of ability and has shown the importance of accounting for parents' gender-stereotyped beliefs when examining boys' and girls' self-perceptions of math-science ability. The current study extends these findings by examining the longitudinal relations between mothers' earlier gender stereotypes and perceptions and adolescents' later math-science achievement beliefs and career choices. As predicted, mothers' earlier perceptions of their adolescents' abilities were related to adolescents' math-science self-efficacy 2 years after high school, with adolescents' self-perceptions of math ability during 10th grade mediating the relation with mothers' perceptions. Moreover, mothers' earlier predictions of their children's abilities to succeed in math careers were significantly related to later career choices. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)
Relationships among 108 college students' self-reported goal orientation, perceived ability, cognitive engagement while studying, and course achievement were examined. Both perceived ability and learning goal scores were positively correlated with meaningful cognitive engagement (self-regulation and deep strategy use). Additionally, learning goals and perceived ability were positively correlated with each other. Performance goals were positively correlated with shallow cognitive engagement. A path analysis supported a causal model in which perceived ability and learning goals influenced meaningful cognitive engagement, which in turn influenced midterm achievement. Shallow processing, which was influenced by performance goals, negatively influenced midterm achievement. The data suggest that meaningful cognitive engagement suppresses the negative effects of shallow engagement on achievement. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)
Using self-determination theory, the authors tested a motivational model to explain the conditions under which rural students formulate their intentions to persist in, versus drop out of, high school. The model argues that motivational variables underlie students' intentions to drop out and that students' motivation can be either supported in the classroom by autonomy-supportive teachers or frustrated by controlling teachers. LISREL analyses of questionnaire data from 483 rural high school students showed that the provision of autonomy support within classrooms predicted students' self-determined motivation and perceived competence. These motivational resources, in turn, predicted students' intentions to persist, versus drop out, and they did so even after controlling for the effect of achievement. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)
Two studies examined the relationship between undergraduates' perceptions of their classroom environment, their adoption of achievement goals for the course, and their graded performance and intrinsic motivation. Results revealed a distinct antecedent profile for each goal in the trichotomous framework: Mastery goals were linked to the presence of lecture engagement and the absence of an evaluation focus and harsh evaluation, performance-approach goals were linked to the presence of evaluation focus, and performance-avoidance goals were linked to the presence of evaluation focus and harsh evaluation. When the perceived classroom environment and achievement goal variables were tested together as predictors of graded performance and intrinsic motivation, the results clearly demonstrated that the influence of the perceived classroom environment on these outcomes measures was indirect; the perceived classroom environment influenced achievement goal adoption, and achievement goal adoption, in turn, directly influenced graded performance and intrinsic motivation. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)
On the basis of a new model of motivation, the authors examined the effects of 3 dimensions of teacher (
n = 14) behavior (involvement, structure, and autonomy support) on 144 children's (Grades 3–5) behavioral and emotional engagement across a school year. Correlational and path analyses revealed that teacher involvement was central to children's experiences in the classroom and that teacher provision of both autonomy support and optimal structure predicted children's motivation across the school year. Reciprocal effects of student motivation on teacher behavior were also found. Students who showed higher initial behavioral engagement received subsequently more of all 3 teacher behaviors. These findings suggest that students who are behaviorally disengaged receive teacher responses that should further undermine their motivation. The importance of the student–teacher relationship, especially interpersonal involvement, in optimizing student motivation is highlighted. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)
Cognition almost invariably occurs in the context of other people: the web of face-to-face encounters, personal relationships, and social group memberships that make us who we are. Not only do these social entities very frequently constitute the content of our thoughts and feelings, but they fundamentally shape the processes underlying our cognition and behavior as well. To detail some of the evidence for this broad claim, this chapter describes the interface of situated cognition with social psychology. We make the case that these two fields focus on many of the same empirical and conceptual issues, although sometimes taking different perspectives. Following a brief section that introduces the field of social psychology, the main body of the chapter is organized under four broad principles that we believe capture major areas of overlap and common interest between situated cognition and social psychology.
When motivating others during uninteresting activities, people typically use extrinsic contingencies that promote controlling forms of extrinsic motivation. In contrast, we investigated a motivational strategy that could support another person's capacity to personally endorse and value the effort he or she put forth during the uninteresting activity. That strategy is the provision of an externally provided rationale when communicated in an autonomy-supportive way. In two studies, we tested and found support for a motivational mediation model, based on self-determination theory, in which the presence of such a rationale (vs. its absence) adds to participants' identification with the task's personal value which, in turn, explains participants' subsequent effort. These studies suggest that extrinsically motivated behaviors can become self-determined through the process of identification and that the promotion of this identification experience depends on the presence of a rationale that is communicated in an autonomy-supportive way.
The purpose of this study is to evaluate the domain specificity of multidimensional motivation and engagement (adaptive cognitions, adaptive behaviors, impeding/maladaptive cognitions, maladaptive behaviors) in mathematics, English and science high school subjects, with an additional focus on three key educational correlates (educational aspirations, class participation, enjoyment of subject). Based on a sample of 1801 students from six Australian high schools, confirmatory factor analysis offered modest support for the domain specificity of motivation and engagement (as measured by the Motivation and Engagement Scale — High School: MES-HS) across three distinct high school subject areas and also in relation to the three key educational correlates. Interestingly, the level of specificity varied as a function of the particular academic motivation construct. For example, between-subject correlations for more ‘state-like’ constructs such as ‘valuing of school subject’ were relatively lower, whereas correlations for more ‘trait-like’ constructs such as ‘anxiety’ were relatively higher suggesting that the latter is relatively more general across mathematics, English and science. The implications of these findings for future practice and research are discussed.
Two studies examined the relationship between undergraduates' perceptions of their classroom environment, their adoption of achievement goals for the course, and their graded performance and intrinsic motivation. Results revealed a distinct antecedent profile for each goal in the trichotomous framework: Mastery goals were linked to the presence of lecture engagement and the absence of an evaluation focus and harsh evaluation, performance-approach goals were linked to the presence of evaluation focus, and performance-avoidance goals were linked to the presence of evaluation focus and harsh evaluation. When the perceived classroom environment and achievement goal variables were tested together as predictors of graded performance and intrinsic motivation, the results clearly demonstrated that the influence of the perceived classroom environment on these outcomes measures was indirect; the perceived classroom environment influenced achievement goal adoption, and achievement goal adoption, in turn, directly influenced graded performance and intrinsic motivation.
Communities in rural America are a complex mixture of peoples and cultures, ranging from miners who have been laid off in West Virginia, to Laotian immigrants relocating in Kansas to work at a beef processing plant, to entrepreneurs drawing up plans for a world-class ski resort in California’s Sierra Nevada. Rural Communities: Legacy and Change uses its unique Community Capitals framework to examine how America’s diverse rural communities use their various capitals (natural, cultural, human, social, political, financial, and built) to address the modern challenges that face them. Each chapter opens with a case study of a community facing a particular challenge, and is followed by a comprehensive discussion of sociological concepts to be applied to understanding the case. This narrative, topical approach makes the book accessible and engaging for undergraduate students, while its integrative approach provides them with a framework for understanding rural society based on the concepts and explanations of social science. This fifth edition is updated throughout with 2013 census data and features new and expanded coverage of health and health care, food systems and alternatives, the effects of neoliberalism and globalization on rural communities, as well as an expanded resource and activity section at the end of each chapter.
Student motivation as an academic enabler for school success is discussed. Contrary to many views, however, the authors conceive of student motivation as a multifaceted construct with different components. Accordingly, the article includes a discussion of four key components of student motivation including academic self-efficacy, attributions, intrinsic motivation, and achievement goals. Research on each of these four components is described, research relating these four components to academic achievement and other academic enablers is reviewed, and suggestions are offered for instruction and assessment.
von Suzanne angeheuert; 2002 in Toronto vorbereitet; Mai 03 abgeschlossen.##erschienen Mai 04
Studies of postsecondary aspirations tend to assume that adolescents from different ethnic groups share commonalities of perspective that are unaffected by the areas in which they live and go to school. Largely missing from this literature is a consideration of the intersection of ethnicity, development, and location. This study looks at the ways in which White and Latino students in an urban and a rural high school differ in their perspectives on postsecondary plans according to grade level, ethnicity, and urbanicity. We find a number of differences in student attitudes and behavior depending on whether students attend rural or urban high schools. High school experiences are also moderated by ethnicity across locations. However, with respect to how students want others to see them, students in the rural high school are more like each other than they are like their ethnic counterparts in the urban school. We conclude that, in many respects, both Latino and White students experience schooling and adolescent development differently in rural and urban schools.
Motivating environments include elements across the whole school-as-system, with contributions made by teachers, students, administrators, and factors outside the school in the surrounding community. Positive motivating environments can support self-determination and intrinsic motivation of both students and teachers despite a number of risk factors for school failure. This study addresses schoolwide environments that may promote motivation in areas characterized by isolation and resource limitations. The researcher conducted a systemic analysis of motivationally relevant resources and conditions across four rural schools and communities, using teacher, administrator, school and community profile data. The data indicate that external resources (family, institutional, and community) and internal (motivational) resources are critical elements of the motivating environments in these rural high schools. Teachers' and administrators' motivational perceptions shaped by their prior experiences and current contexts inform the efforts they make to motivate students. Teachers' workplace climate perceptions influence faculty retention and investment. Schools generate unique motivational dynamics through interactions of individual and organizational characteristics.
This article discusses the research on the relations between achievement goals and develops a conceptual model based on a review of extant literature. The model distinguishes between moods and emotions and the relative roles of perceived classroom goal structures and personal goals. In this article, it is suggested that the relation between achievement goals and affect is asymmetrical and bidirectional. However, given differences in the conceptualization and measurement of affect, the empirical findings are somewhat inconsistent and difficult to interpret in some studies. Thus, there is a clear need for more research on the dynamics of achievement goals and affect in classroom settings.
A motivational science perspective on student motivation in learning and teaching contexts is developed that highlights 3 general themes for motivational research. The 3 themes include the importance of a general scientific approach for research on student motivation, the utility of multidisciplinary perspectives, and the importance of use-inspired basic research on motivation. Seven substantive questions are then suggested as important directions for current and future motivational science research efforts. They include (1) What do students want? (2) What motivates students in classrooms? (3) How do students get what they want? (4) Do students know what they want or what motivates them? (5) How does motivation lead to cognition and cognition to motivation? (6) How does motivation change and develop? and (7) What is the role of context and culture? Each of the questions is addressed in terms of current knowledge claims and future directions for research in motivational science.
This study explored the relationship of the aspirations of rural high school students with the expectations held by their parents and teachers. A sampleofeleventh and twelfth grade studentsfrom 21 rural high schools in 21 states, along with their parents and teachers, revealed significantcoefficients ofconcordanceamong the threegroups' expectationsfor adulthood. While expectationsfor personal and economic success were highly prized, community-mindedgoals for civic responsibility were ascribedfar less importance. Implicationsfor rural schools and communities are discussed.
This report's introductory section notes that both rural and gifted education have received relatively little funding and national attention, and few studies have considered the two issues in tandem. As a first step in the process of strengthening the education of gifted rural students, this report assesses the current state of gifted rural education. Section 2 gives a brief history of rural education in America, noting that today's educational model is essentially a continuation of the common school movement of the mid-1800s, whose emphasis on standardized age and ability grouping resulted in consolidation efforts that are still ongoing. Section 3 recounts the history of gifted education; notes that it has continually been sabotaged by myths and stereotypes; and presents the latest two misconceptions, about the benefits of technology and higher standards. Section 4 reiterates the fact that there is little information of any depth regarding rural and gifted education and cites three recommendations for research into rural gifted education. Section 5 examines the variety of definitions of "rural," and the frustration this causes. Section 6 discusses the unique qualities of rural schools and their implications for gifted education. Sections 7 and 8 present survey results concerning school characteristics in the 20 most rural states, and gifted education practices and obstacles in rural schools. Section 9 proposes seven recommendations for providing effective programming for gifted rural students. Appendices present survey forms, related tables and figures, 71 resources, and 154 references. (TD)
This research investigated expertise development among instructional designers by tracking novice designers' unfolding perceptions of instructional design (ID), design-related self-perceptions, and other individual differences. It examined development toward ID expertise from multiple aspects: processes, product, and cognition, through a case study approach. Evidence included qualitative data from interviews, design artifacts, and metacognitive essays, along with quantitative data from questionnaires which assessed goals, need for structure, need for cognition, previous design competence, and design self-efficacy. Findings indicated that it was not one single characteristic, but the interaction of various factors, that most profoundly seem to influence the development of ID expertise. Relevant characteristics included: perceptions about learning, knowledge and ID; individual needs and learning strategies; and background experiences and orientations. Research in this field will help us to better understand the processes that lead to the development of ID expertise, and to develop better approaches to preparing future instructional designers.
