This study examined cross-level interactions between personal goals and classroom goal structures, as well as their additive contributions to predicting math achievement, engagement, interest, effort ...withdrawal, and avoidance coping, using a sample of 3,943 Grade 5 students from 130 classrooms. Results of hierarchical linear modeling showed that classroom performance goal structures exacerbated (a) the negative association between personal performance-avoidance goals and engagement and (b) the positive relations of personal performance-avoidance goals to effort withdrawal and avoidance coping. Moreover, both classroom performance goal structures and personal performance-avoidance goals had maladaptive patterns of relations to outcomes at their respective levels of analysis, whereas classroom mastery goal structures and personal mastery goals showed adaptive relations. Our findings underscore the importance of a multilevel interactionist perspective in understanding achievement motivation and making recommendations for educational practices.
Adopting a combination of expectancy-value and achievement goal theories, this study examined the role of self-efficacy, task value, and achievement goals in students’ learning strategies, task ...disengagement, peer relationship, and English achievement outcome. A sample of 1475 Year-9 students participated in the study. A structural equation model showed that while task value predicted only mastery goals, self-efficacy predicted each of the three types of achievement goal. Mastery and performance-approach goals were both positive predictors of deep learning and peer relationship. Mastery goals were also negatively associated with task disengagement and positively associated with surface learning. In contrast, performance-avoidance goals were a positive predictor of surface learning and task disengagement but a negative predictor of peer relationship. On the whole, these findings suggest that, like mastery goals, performance-approach goals can generate adaptive outcomes.
This study examined how classroom management practices—care and behavioral control—were differentially associated with students’ engagement, misbehavior, and satisfaction with school, using a large ...representative sample of 3196 Grade 9 students from 117 classes in Singapore. Results of hierarchical linear modeling showed differential relations. After controlling for students’ gender and socioeconomic status, both care and behavioral control were positively related to student engagement. Moreover, behavioral control was a significant negative predictor of classroom misbehavior and care was a significant positive predictor of satisfaction with school. Our findings underscore the importance of blending care and behavioral control to achieve multiple goals of classroom management.
•Students preferred leisure reading more during COVID-19 school closure.•Reading enjoyment before school closure was related to leisure reading during closure.•Students preferred reading in print ...compared to digitally.•Reading digitally was underutilised by students during school closure.•Primary school students need to be socialised into using technology for leisure reading.
Adopting an explanatory sequential mixed methods design, this study examined Singaporean primary school students’ changes in reading enjoyment, reading amount, and their access to resources in print and digital formats during the COVID-19 school closure. Survey data showed reading was a more preferred leisure activity during the school closure. Students’ reading enjoyment prior to the closure was positively correlated with changes in their reading enjoyment and reading amount during the closure, for both print and digital formats. Despite the ubiquity of devices, devices were underutilised for reading purposes. Students demonstrated a clear preference for print reading over reading digitally both before and during the school closure and relied more on home than online resources for reading materials. Changes in time spent on devices during school closure were not related to changes in digital reading amount, but negatively related to changes in reading enjoyment and print reading amount over the same period, suggesting more time on devices may not naturally lead to more reading digitally. Qualitative results revealed several challenges students faced with reading digitally. While students were digital natives in terms of using technology for entertainment purposes, they had difficulty locating digital reading materials as few students were socialised into using technology for reading. When it comes to reading, we propose that primary school students are print natives who are generally more familiar with reading in print and prefer print. Some inherent limitations of digital reading that restrict continuous reading (e.g., eye strain, reliance on power supply, cumbersome navigability) may prevent students from embracing the new form of reading.
Background The expectancy‐value and achievement goal theories are arguably the two most dominant theories of achievement motivation in the contemporary literature. However, very few studies have ...examined how the constructs derived from both theories are related to deep learning. Moreover, although there is evidence demonstrating the links between achievement goals and deep learning, little research has examined the mediating processes involved.
Aims The aims of this research were to: (a) investigate the role of task‐ and self‐related beliefs (task value and self‐efficacy) as well as achievement goals in predicting deep learning in mathematics and (b) examine how classroom attentiveness and group participation mediated the relations between achievement goals and deep learning.
Sample The sample comprised 1,476 Grade‐9 students from 39 schools in Singapore.
Methods Students' self‐efficacy, task value, achievement goals, classroom attentiveness, group participation, and deep learning in mathematics were assessed by a self‐reported questionnaire administered on‐line. Structural equation modelling was performed to test the hypothesized model linking these variables.
Results and conclusions Task value was predictive of task‐related achievement goals whereas self‐efficacy was predictive of task‐approach, performance‐approach, and performance‐avoidance goals. Achievement goals were found to fully mediate the relations between task value and self‐efficacy on the one hand, and classroom attentiveness, group participation, and deep learning on the other. Classroom attentiveness and group participation partially mediated the relations between achievement goal adoption and deep learning. The findings suggest that (a) task‐ and self‐related pathways are two possible routes through which students could be motivated to learn and (b) like task‐approach goals, performance‐approach goals could lead to adaptive processes and outcomes.
Students’ learning is deeply rooted in both home and school environments. This necessitates a person-and-context perspective that considers individual, home, and school factors. This study delved ...into second language learning, an area inherently intertwined with these settings. Utilizing hierarchical linear modeling, the study involved 2,310 fifth-grade English–Chinese bilingual students and 109 teachers across 109 classrooms in 23 Singaporean primary schools where Chinese is taught as a second language. We examined the class compositional effect of Chinese use at home on students’ Chinese language achievement and the cross-level interactions between classroom goal structures (mastery and performance goal structures) and Chinese use at home in predicting Chinese language achievement. Aggregated class-level Chinese use at home exhibited a compositional effect on students’ Chinese language achievement. Additionally, the class-level Chinese use at home strengthened the positive relation between individual students’ home language use and their achievement in Chinese. Moreover, classroom mastery goal structure demonstrated significant moderating effects on the relation between students’ Chinese use at home and Chinese language achievement. While Chinese use at home was positively related to achievement, this relation was weaker in classes with high mastery goal structure and stronger in classes with low mastery goal structure. No main effect or interaction effect concerning classroom performance goal structure was observed. These findings highlight the intricate relation between home language exposure and classroom goal structures. Being surrounded by peers who use the second language often at home may enhance second language achievement. Furthermore, mastery-focused environments may compensate for students with limited second language exposure at home. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2024 APA, all rights reserved) (Source: journal abstract)
► Ninth graders were lower in positive motivation factors than 5th graders. ► Ninth graders were higher in negative motivation factors than 5th graders. ► Gender differences were small but boys were ...consistently lower for positive factors. ► Boys were also consistently higher for negative factors. ► Girls had better motivation than boys in 5th grade but not in 9th grade.
Student motivation may have significant influences on essential academic outcomes. However, students’ motivation may decline as they grow older. This study examined six motivation constructs (self-efficacy, interest, mastery goal orientation, engagement, avoidance coping, and effort withdrawal) of students from 78 schools in Singapore (
N
=
4214) in learning English. Using a large and diverse sample of primary 5 (5th grade) and secondary 3 (9th grade) students, grade and gender differences in these constructs were examined. Applying a MIMIC approach to structural equation modeling, the paths from grade and gender as well as the grade
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gender interaction variable were found to be significant. That is, (a) the scores for self-efficacy, interest, mastery goal orientation, and engagement tended to be lower whereas avoidance coping and effort withdrawal tended to be higher for the secondary students, (b) boys tended to have lower scores; and (c) the gap in motivation between primary and secondary tended to be greater for girls. Since motivation may have important influences on subsequent learning outcomes, we need to seriously consider the implications of these grade- and gender-related patterns and pay attention particularly to boys in primary schools and girls in secondary schools.
This study examined the predictive relationships among teachers' perceptions of principal's and immediate supervisor's empowering behaviours, teachers' psychological empowerment and three teachers' ...work-related outcomes in terms of job satisfaction, organisational commitment and professional commitment. 304 teachers in Singapore participated in this study. Results from path analysis indicated that the four dimensions of psychological empowerment (i.e. ‘meaning’, ‘competence’, ‘autonomy’, and ‘impact’) mediated the relationships between teachers' perceptions of immediate supervisor's empowering behaviours and teachers' work-related outcomes. However, only ‘meaning’, ‘autonomy’ and ‘impact’ dimensions of psychological empowerment mediated the relationships between teachers' perceptions of principal's empowering behaviours and teachers' work-related outcomes.
•Both principal and teachers' immediate supervisor played key roles in empowerment.•Perceptions of leaders' empowering behaviours predicted psychological empowerment.•Teachers' psychological empowerment predicted teachers' work-related outcomes.•Psychological empowerment was both a predictor variable and a mediating variable.
This study aimed to examine the relationships between motivational variables, self-regulated writing strategy use and writing competence with 511 fourth graders in Hong Kong. The high writing ...achievers reported a higher level of motivation, i.e. self-efficacy, task values (i.e. interest and utility) and growth mindset in English writing than the low writing achievers. The high achievers also used various self-regulated writing strategies more frequently than their low achieving counterparts. Self-efficacy and growth mindset were found to be almost equally important predictors of strategy use, while the impacts of interest and utility were weaker. The results indicated that self-regulated learning and competence in English writing can be improved through the promotion of motivation. This study highlights the influence of the social-cultural context on motivation. More importantly, growth mindset may emerge as a new research agenda in English as a Second/Foreign Language (ESL/EFL) writing.
The present study examined the relations between three motivational variables, i.e. academic self-efficacy, task importance, and interest with three types of learning behaviours, i.e. class ...engagement, metacognitive self-regulation, and avoidance coping with 1954 secondary students in Singapore. Positive correlations were found between the three motivational variables, class engagement and metacognitive self-regulation, whereas negative correlations were found between the three motivational variables and avoidance coping. Multiple regression analysis results showed that academic self-efficacy, interest and task importance all significantly predicted class engagement. However, only academic self-efficacy and interest significantly predicted metacognitive self-regulation and avoidance coping, but not task importance. The results were similar for both boys and girls. These findings suggest that academic self-efficacy and interest have a more desirable motivational function in comparison with task importance, especially when students face challenging tasks in learning English. Important implications for teaching are discussed.
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