Self-efficacy, the belief in one's ability to achieve, motivates one to sustain efforts toward accomplishing a goal.

Self-efficacy is the belief in one's ability/knowledge to attain a goal. It is a strong predictor of academic success. Students with strong self-efficacy show interest, value a goal, and are able to sustain attention toward a goal. But, what happens to students who believe they do not have the skills necessary to attain the goal? Sometimes they give up.  These students are often labeled as 'underachievers' or 'lazy.'  

Low self-efficacy has been shown to positively correlate with low motivation. And, low motivation is positively correlated to low academic performance. Makes sense, right? ...If I believe that math is not my 'thing' and that no matter what I do I still can't get an 'A,' why waste energy on a lost cause!  

Case in point (true story). . . a junior in high school has never excelled in math. For three years he had a tutor to help him with homework to help him squeak by with mediocre math scores.  In his junior year he hits a new low, a D+ in Algebra II/Trig.  A new strategy was put in place at home... no tutor was hired but his mother decided to do homework along with him every night. The reason for this decision was two fold. One, mom wanted to model good math study behavior. And two, she wanted to monitor and help him reflect on the process of learning math. Not an easy task. Mom was not ready to tackle the math curriculum, but they worked along with the book and when they did not understand the son had to teach mom or they visited math site or YouTube videos.

For months, mom and son sat side by side doing homework. They worked on math homework problems individually then compared answers. When the answers did not match they talked through the problem, watched YouTube videos until they agreed on one correct answer ( he circled the question to ask his teacher for help later). It was a painful process and one that took an extraordinary amount of time and commitment.

Progress was slow, but one night for the first time in his math academic career mom witnessed a spark of confidence. The 'not a math' student finished a problem first and taught mom why absolute values have to be isolated and ordered between signs before interval notations!

Beyond competency in math, this student increased his math efficacy. As he became more mindful, effortful, and engaged in math practice he experienced more success at school (grades). As he experienced more success at school, his belief in his ability increased and he moved math homework from the bottom of his 'to-do' list to the top.  

How Beliefs impact Academic Achievement, CHADD 2013

CHADD2013

"I'm just not a math person." "The test was easy." "I guessed."...

     Beliefs play a key role in student academic achievement. They influence the internal standards learners use to create goals, exert effort, and persist in the face of difficulty. Students who believe a task is manageable have a belief that they have the ability or the necessary tools to successfully act to complete the task. Acting to complete a task is more commonly known as motivation. On the other hand, students who believe they don't have the ability to achieve the task will avoid the task because they believe it is not in their ability to complete it.

    Helping struggling students achieve begins with helping them recognize how the beliefs they hold may negatively influence their progress toward achievement. This training begins with uncovering/examining the beliefs that drive struggling students. Inventory instruments such as the Adolescent Self-regulation Inventory(ASRI) or a teacher made surveys (below) are useful tools in uncovering the belief systems students  use to direct their energy toward achievement.

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     In my work with students, I use the information gained from the survey above to help students identify areas of weakness and strengths; to evaluate past experiences; and to plan the 'action steps' toward Specific,  Measureable, Attainable, Relevant, and Timely goals. Ultimately, the outcome will be academic achievement, but students must first find motivation to achieve.  

     In one-to-one sessions my work with students revolves around modeling for them specific self-regulatory strategies: planning, goal setting, reflecting on feedback and evaluating outcomes. This work is slow in the beginning, but it does yield success when students begin to experience success toward their goals.  One way to train students in a classroom of 30 is to use an index card tracking system. At the beginning of a unit, quarter, semester, or year...ask students to reflect on past performances in your subject: what worked, what didn't work, and what they could do differently this unit, quarter, semester, year.  Then, ask them to write a goal (for the unit, quarter, semester, year) on an index card along with 3 action steps that will help them achieve their goal, and 1 to 3 things that could stop them.  Collect the cards and use them each time you hand back a graded work. At these times, as students to fill out the back of the card. This is a feedback process to train student to monitor and evaluate their progress toward the goal.  

    This process of belief retraining toward academic achievement has been researched and shown to effectively predict positive achievement outcomes. (Zimmerman 2000, Hofer 2007, Alexander 2011, Muis 2112)

front of index card

back of index card

   

Using Intentional Conceptual Change to enhance Self-regulated learning for Academic Performance

     Working with students often labeled as 'lazy,' 'unmotivated,' and/or 'learned helplesss,'  two things have become evident for me... One, students do not want to fail, but in the face of constant difficulty they 'give up.' And two, if a history of failure exists it is accompanied with the self-theory of "I'm  'dumb' and no amount of effort will change the inevitable failure I experience."  If you ask any teacher about student who seem unmotivated or exhibit 'learned helplessness' behaviors they will speak volumes about how difficult it is to work with these students.  These are the unprepared students. The ones whose homework is either missing or incomplete, whose projects show minimal effort, and who often attribute their failure to the difficulty of the task rather than on their own lack of effort.  Assisting these students is frustrating work because they often possess a set of beliefs about learning and themselves as learners that demand time and effort a classroom teacher cannot afford.

     What does it take to turn these kids around? I've discovered a 4 step plan targeted at helping them find their motivation for learning...Research on self-regulated learning for academic performance offers several aspects of a learner's profile to examine and is included in the plan: self-efficacy, motivation resources, goal setting, and self-reflection/evaluation. However, before starting the arduous process of changing established learning behaviors, one has to help students understand who they are as learners and what they believe learning entails. Intentional conceptual change is a fairly new concept that emphasizes direct instruction for helping students recognize and change the reasons they give for their failures. The beliefs students hold about their ability and their conception of intelligence as either fixed (can't change how smart you are) or malleable (intelligence is constructed and learned) frames their goal orientation which shapes learning behavior patterns that may or may not be beneficial. In other words, the reasons they give for their performance matters! If a student puts the blame for a bad grade on the teacher, their ability or the difficulty of the task, they will take no ownership because they do not think they are in control. Conversely, a student who attributes failure to lack of effort, a controllable factor, is more likely to make the necessary adjustments to avoid failure in the future.

     The plan that has worked for me when helping students find and sustain motivation includes helping students to: 1) compare prior learning behaviors to performance outcomes in order to identify the adaptive behaviors they should keep and maladaptive behaviors they should discard; 2) helping students to set specific, measurable, attainable, realistic, and timely goals that motivate them to keep working in the face of difficulties;  3) helping students to establish a monitoring systems to sustain learning behaviors toward the goals, and finally 4) helping students to self-reflect on the progress and if necessary revise goal and/or learning strategies.

The program is simple, but is initially time consuming. It begins with a metacognitive activity to learn who they are as learners (their implicit theories about intelligence) and what it takes to learn.

Figure 1: Understanding how beliefs about learning shape learning behaviors

Step 1) Revising beliefs about how they got to where they are: a survey and interview design.
In a one-to-one interview students discuss successful school performance and unsuccessful school performance with a focus on the learning behaviors that contributed to previous success (ability, effort, study strategies, teacher, easy subject) or unsuccessful (lack of ability, homework, help-seeking, etc.)   performance. The survey (figure 1 formsite.com) is an effective way to gather information for the one-to one interview.This information is helpful in formulating the goals in step two of the program: setting goal.

Figure 2: Setting goals

Step 2) Goal setting allows students to recognize and be cognizant of learning behaviors and is crucial in helping students become self-regulated learners, adaptive, persistent and cognizant of their learning. Goals help keep students motivated with a tangible understanding of what the day-to-day effort will yield in the long term. The learning goals set will  direct the learning patterns during class time, homework time, study time. Two types of goals direct learning behaviors: performance and mastery goals. Both goals are valid and can yield positive results. However, research shows that students who value the 'grade' over 'learning' are less likely to persist in the face of difficulty. Performance goal oriented students with a low assessment of their ability  display low effort, weak learning strategies, low motivation, and are generally the low achievers (Dweck & Leggett, 1998).  Step two in the Intentional conceptual change program is to set a long term goal for academic success (the grade desired) with two or more mastery goals (proximal goals) that can be used to monitor attainment of the 'long-term goal.'  (figure 2)

     Step 3) Monitoring the progress toward attainment of the 'performance goal' (the grade) using mastery goals (improving ability) is important in ensuring students stay motivated. The use of agendas and 'check-ins' has proven invaluable in helping students sustain motivation. Organizational tools such as agendas or electronic diaries help students keep track of tasks and make positive time-management decisions. Feedback in this step is important!  I use an electronic diary along with student agendas to help them plan out their week.  Recognizing patterns in one's approach is essential for implementing Step 4.
   
     In step 4, students evaluate their performance. They keep the strategies that are working and change those that are not. Essential in this step is the ability to effectively assess the academic behaviors that produced success or failures. Here is where the student compares the effort to the goal set in step 1.

     The research in Self-regulated learning supports this approach (Zimmerman 2000). When students set goals and use them to gauge their progress they are taking a more agentic role in their learning. Self-regulated learners are proactive, self-directed, and self-determined.

Preparing Students for Winter EXAMs

Preparing students for exams means helping them De-stress through goal setting, organizing the information, and Planning how often and how much to study.

Below is a plan to scaffold student test preparation. In addition, students will meet with me to discuss how to 'chunk' review guides, how to handle procrastination (goal setting), what does effortful studying look like, and finally how, when, and why do students SEEK help and from whom?

Self-Efficacy and Motivation: High School students

            Every September my junior class of high school students begins their first day by reflecting on the previous year's successes and difficulties: "Which subject/class did you feel most successful and why?" Which class did you feel less successful? Why?" These questions allow my students to reflect on how they approached learning. Additionally, this self-reflection helps me better understand my students' epistemic beliefs which informs how I approach helping them stay motivated throughout the year.

            To further help my students become aware of their own learning; I ask that they set a goal for the year. Included in the goal are 2-3 objectives that will help them reach this goal and 1 or 2 things that undermine their success. At first, the juniors I work with moan and groan about setting goals. However, by November they are beginning to see the utility in the goal, especially because our biweekly meetings revolve around the progress toward the goal and the ultimate result...academic success. 

            This approach for helping students become independent learners is grounded in the social-cognitive theory of self-regulation learning (SRL).  Self-regulated learners are active participants in their learning. They are motivated by the goals they set and sustain motivation through their choice of strategies and feedback received from self-assessments or from others, i.e., teachers, parents, peers. (Zimmerman 2002)  

            Self-regulated learners are more likely to be the successful students in school. These are the kids who have a plan for this week's homework and tests, they study effectively, and make good choices about strategies that improve their learning environment. Every year, my efforts begin in the forethought phase of SRL and cycle through all the phases throughout the year. My students and I move through phases, sometimes in a linear fashion, at other times we have to cycle back or forward until the goals are attained and new goals are created.  My goal?. . .Self-regulated seniors in June.

How do we teach kids to control inhibition? Brain Research says...

What My Teacher Should Know About My Learning Style: RISA Conference Presentation: Rome, Italy (2011)

A review by cognitive psychologists Pashler, McDaniel, Rohrer and Bjork (Learning Styles: Concepts and Evidence 2008) of all major studies promoting learning style found that the literature fails to provide adequate support for applying learning-style assessments in school settings. Does this mean using learning style information is not valid for teachers? No, it does not.

Learning styles is a useful tool for metacognition. Learning styles, like its forebear the Myers-Briggs assessment (C. Jung 1964), is a useful tool for identifying preferences and understanding how an individual learns best. Knowing the 'best' modality for acquiring information (cognitive processes) allows students to make decisions about how to best study, listen to lectures, plan and complete long-term projects.

What teachers should know about learning style is that it has the utility for motivating students. Brunner, Majewski, and Quinn (1993) found that when students recognize that they can succeed academically, their self-esteem increases and their behavior improves. Thus, the learning style data can be adopted to helping students understand themselves as learners and helping them use that information to succeed.

While the study by Pashler et. al. does not provide sufficient evidence to design educational grouping by learning styles, it does provide information useful for understanding how learning profiles can be used to help students understand how to code information (metacognitive processes) according to their best modality (learning-to-learn). In addition, teachers can use learning style information to develop instruction with elements for all learning styles (auditory, visual, kinesthetic). One such mode of instruction is the Universal Design Learning (UDL)model. The Universal Design Learning model is based on principles that promote lessons infused with the elements necessary for all learners (auditory, visual and kinesthetic) to transfer information from sensory memory to long-term memory.

Universal design learning (UDL) uses multiple, accessible instructional methods that are accessible to all learners. Example: Use multiple modes to deliver content; when possible allow students to choose from multiple options for learning; and motivate and engage students-consider lectures, collaborative learning options, hands-on activities, Internet-based communications, educational software, field work, and so forth. In addition, UDL provides specific feedback on a regular basis. Example: Allow students to turn in parts of large projects for feedback before the final project is due. UDL is about regularl assessments of student progress using multiple accessible methods and tools, and adjust instruction accordingly. Example: Assess group and cooperative performance, as well as individual achievement. Finally universal design learning is planning for accommodations for students whose needs are not met by the instructional design. Example: Know campus protocols for getting materials in alternate formats, rescheduling classroom locations, and arranging for other accommodations for students with disabilities.

Some strategies for ensuring lesson plans include all learners are: highly structured lessons, explicit instructions, use of "Essential Question," Maps of the Lesson Plan (LEARN); Frontloading ELL learners with the vocabulary; Temporal spacing, Interleaving, Graphic Organizers to go along with lectures, Cornell Note taking, turn textbook heading into questions, etc.






For more brain based teaching ideas go to

http://www.educationworld.com/a_curr/profdev/profdev156b.shtml

To view or copy the RISA presentation slide:
http://prezi.com/vmlei5jlvo9y/what-my-teacher-should-know-about-my-learning-style/