A Motivated Look into Students’ Affective Response to an Authentic Examination Experience

Pekrun suggests academic emotions are “multi-component, coordinated processes of psychological subsystems including affective, cognitive, motivational, expressive, and peripheral physiological processes” (Pekrun, 2006 p. 316). Limited studies have attempted to tease out potential associations between these processes,particularly around authentic classroom experiences (e.g., exams)

Integrating Coursework and Field Placements: The Impact on Preservice Elementary Mathematics Teachers\u27 Connections to Teaching

A brief narrative description of the journal article, document, or resource. Teacher education programs provide many environments and experiences in an effort to support elementary preservice teacher development. Ultimately the goal is to transform the student into the teacher. Students enter teacher education programs focused on their present education, grades, and getting that long-sought-after degree; by selecting a degree in education, students also make a commitment to becoming a teacher. But what do these students really know and understand about what it means to be a classroom teacher? This article presents a study that considers the influence of the integration of methods coursework and field placements on the preservice teaching experience, especially its impact on preservice teachers\u27 motivation in college coursework and understanding of what it means to be an elementary mathematics teacher. The goal of this study was to examine the impact of integrating methods coursework and field placements at a school site on preservice teachers\u27 motivation in their college coursework and their understandings of becoming a teacher. Preservice teachers who attended their methods courses on the university campus (Group 1) seemed to retain their college-student focus throughout the year, whereas the preservice teachers who attended their methods courses on an elementary school campus (Group 2) seemed focused on developing the skills necessary to achieve their future goals of becoming a teacher. In the final analysis, it seemed that the impact on the preservice teachers may have been less a result of the methods courses being situated at the school site and more a result of the preservice teachers being situated at the school site for an extended length of time, the methods coursework integrated with that experience, and the placement of the entire group at one school site together

Planning for the Future: Future Time Orientation and Life Project Scales

Project files are comprised of 1 page pdf and presentation recording in mp4 format.Planning for the Future: International Future Time Orientation and Life Project Scales Author: Smith, Madeleine, Educational Foundations Major and Vinicius Coscioni, University of Coimbra, Portugal Abstract: Throughout the years, extensive research has been done on what influences people’s decisions. What prompts a student to apply to one school over another? Do future goals really influence a student’s academic performance in a class? Researchers have found that psychological future and personal goals play a vital role in an individual’s present behavior, decision making, and self-concept. More specifically, future time orientation (FTO) is the degree to which people’s thoughts of the future influence their present-day actions (Husman & Lens, 1999). Similarly, the theory of Life Project (LP) refers to a set of short to long-term goals that shape self-concept and identity (Little, Salmela-Aro, & Phillips, 2017). This project will develop an International Future Time Orientation Scale and Life Project Scale working in conjunction with research teams in Portugal, Brazil, Spain, the United States, and Uruguay. FTO and LP constructs have recently been created by Portuguese research teams. The remaining research teams will conduct focus groups for construct evaluation. This evaluation will focus on main constructs such as distance, connectedness, and valence from FTO as well as organization, identification, and involvement from LP. The structures of both scales’ factors will be analyzed quantitatively with exploratory and confirmatory factor analysis. The development of reliable international FTO and LP scales are a necessary instrument as they could be applicable to larger populations. Overall, this exciting research focuses on what influences an individual’s decisions and can greatly benefit prospective psychological and educational studies

An Exploration of Engineering Student Effort: Correlations toExam Performance

A presentation explaining the correlation between engineering students\u27 efforts and their exam performance

Stretched Too Much? A Case Study of Engineering Exam-Related Predicted Performance, Electrodermal Activity, and Heart Rate

Test writing is one of the essential activities that university faculty must do. Evidence-based instructional practice indicates that the exam content and difficulty should match the content taught in the course. Many faculty, however, hold the belief that tests should “stretch” students to tease out the best students or to extend content beyond what is covered in a course. In this case study, we explored if exam items, which are in the scope of the course but are “a stretch,” affected engineering students’ ability to self-monitor and reflect on performance. We compared and contrasted two examination experiences from the same engineering statics course. In scenario one, students recently learned a concept, and their practice exam reflected that content. In scenario two, students had yet to learn the concepts contained in the practice exams, but the concepts were related to the course. We explored this from a pre- and post-dicted expected performance, actual performance, and physiological response (electrodermal activity and heart rate) perspective for 26 engineering students. This research examines the relationship between expected performance, actual performance, time per question or exam, and arousal response. Findings suggest the pre- and post-dicted expected performances may influence physiological responses (e.g., electrodermal activity and heart rate), which may not necessarily support students\u27 actual performances on the exam

An Exploratory Factor Analysis of the Pittsburgh Freshman Engineering Attitudes Survey

The Pittsburgh Freshman Engineering Attitudes Survey (PFEAS) has become an important tool in engineering education for measuring students’ attitudes about engineering and their confidence in their abilities to achieve in the engineering classroom. Although different versions of the scale have been developed for students at different points in their educational careers, 28 of the items are equable across the various forms of the survey. The authors administered these items to a large sample (N = 372) of engineering majors at a large public university in the southwest. Item and factor analysis of the items revealed problems with the structural validity of the scale, and items and factors were removed based on theoretical and empirical justification. The remaining items produced a structurally valid three factor solution. The authors found these factors were significantly correlated with student study strategies

Future Time Perspective Connectedness to a Career: The Contextual Effects of Classroom Knowledge Building

Professor Willy Lens has provided inspiration through his scholarship and mentorship for research in Future Time Perspective (FTP) theory. The traditional conceptualization of FTP consists of hierarchically organized psychological constructs that define individual differences in perceptions of the future across varying levels of specificity. The levels of specificity create a nested variable structure that is often described in a top-down fashion, from domain-general to context-specific. In the current study, relations among measures of connectedness, an FTP construct regarding concern for and planfulness about the future, are examined at three levels of specificity: domain-general, domain-specific, and context-specific. We examine interactions between domain-specific and domain-general levels of FTP. A sample of 3962 undergraduate engineering majors (mean age 20) from a large research university in the southwestern United States of America were surveyed. Hierarchical linear modeling was used to examine the hypothesis that aggregate classroom levels of student knowledge building moderate relations in the nested connectedness variable structure. At the student level of analysis measures of students’ domain-general, domain-specific, and context-specific connectedness were significantly and positively related. At the classroom level of analysis, results indicated that higher levels of aggregate classroom knowledge building shifted the direction of relations suggesting that in more engaging classroom contexts perceived value of learning for reaching a future goal may shape how students plan for future careers (domain-specific FTP). Implications for FTP theory are discussed