The Role of Content Specificity in Situational Interest and Physical Activity

Purpose: To identify the role of content specificity in moderating situational interest and its relationship with physical activity (PA), we examined the between- and within-content relations of situational interest and PA in an urban elementary physical education context using fitness and basketball as comparative contents. Method: Fourth and fifth graders (N = 125) completed questionnaires and wore pedometers to assess situational interest and PA across a fitness unit and a basketball unit, respectively. Results: Based on our confirmatory factor analyses and fit indexes, situational interest, and PA demonstrated strong content specificity. Strengths of associations between the two units differed by situational interest dimensions and PA (r ≤ .50). Within-content interrelations of these dimensions and PA were not consistent (X² Decrease ≥ 3.40, p < .05). Conclusion: Our findings suggest that content specificity in physical education plays a significant role in moderating students' motivation and its function on PA.

Teamwork attitudes, interest and self-efficacy between online and face-to-face information technology students

Purpose

Challenges of teamwork in online classes may adversely affect students’ future attitudes toward teamwork. Further, there is a concern about whether online programs foster students’ teamwork skills. To answer these questions, the purpose of this paper is to compare online and face-to-face students’ attitudes toward teamwork, interest in learning teamwork skills and teamwork self-efficacy.

Design/methodology/approach

The authors developed a conceptual model explaining how students’ background, engagement in learning teamwork, teamwork self-efficacy and interest in learning teamwork affect attitudes toward teamwork and rigorously tested the model for a meaningful comparison between online and face-to-face students. Attitudes toward teamwork, teamwork interest and teamwork self-efficacy of 582 online and face-to-face students who attend the same academic program were compared.

Findings

The results suggest that online students have less positive attitudes towards teamwork compared to face-to-face students although online students have a higher level of teamwork self-efficacy. Therefore, online students’ relative less positive attitudes toward teamwork cannot be explained by the lack of engagement, teamwork skills or interest.

Research limitations/implications

The homogeneity of the sample population is one of the limitations of the paper although it provides the opportunity for a comparative study of online and face-to-face students by controlling the majors.

Practical implications

Instructors should evaluate the appropriateness of team assignments while incorporating teamwork in online classes.

Originality/value

Concerns about online teamwork are discussed but have not been rigorously investigated in the literature. The authors conducted a comprehensive study involving 582 undergraduate students. The findings of this paper suggest that new approaches are needed to incorporate teamwork in online classes. The results also show that importance of building teamwork self-efficacy.

Procrastinating Behavior in Computer-Based Learning Environments to Predict Performance: A Case Study in Moodle

Introduction: Research about student performance has traditionally considered academic procrastination as a behavior that has negative effects on academic achievement. Although there is much evidence for this in class-based environments, there is a lack of research on Computer-Based Learning Environments (CBLEs). Therefore, the purpose of this study is to evaluate student behavior in a blended learning program and specifically procrastination behavior in relation to performance through Data Mining techniques.

Materials and Methods: A sample of 140 undergraduate students participated in a blended learning experience implemented in a Moodle (Modular Object Oriented Developmental Learning Environment) Management System. Relevant interaction variables were selected for the study, taking into account student achievement and analyzing data by means of association rules, a mining technique. The association rules were arrived at and filtered through two selection criteria: 1, rules must have an accuracy over 0.8 and 2, they must be present in both sub-samples.

Results: The findings of our study highlight the influence of time management in online learning environments, particularly on academic achievement, as there is an association between procrastination variables and student performance.

Conclusion: Negative impact of procrastination in learning outcomes has been observed again but in virtual learning environments where practical implications, prevention of, and intervention in, are different from class-based learning. These aspects are discussed to help resolve student difficulties at various ages.

Multiple aspects of high school students' strategic processing on reading outcomes: The role of quantity, quality, and conjunctive strategy use

BACKGROUND

While the literature on strategy use is relatively mature, measures of strategy use overwhelmingly measure only one aspect of that use, frequency, when relating that strategy use to performance outcomes. While this might be one important attribute of strategy use, there is increasing evidence that quality and conditional use of cognitive and metacognitive strategies may also be important.

AIMS

This study examines how multiple aspects of strategy use, namely frequency, quality, and conjunctive use of strategies, influence task performance on both well- and ill-structured task outcomes in addition to other concomitant variables that may interact with strategic processing during reading.

SAMPLE

The sample consisted of 21 high school students enrolled in an upper-level biology class in a suburban school in the north-eastern United States.

METHODS

These participants completed measures of prior knowledge and interest, then read either an expository or persuasive text while thinking aloud. They then completed a passage recall and open-ended response following passage completion.

RESULTS

In general, quantity was not positively related to the study outcomes and was negatively related to one of them. Quality of strategy use, on the other hand, was consistently related to positive reading outcomes. The influence of knowledge and interest in terms of strategies is also discussed as well as six cases which illustrate the relation of aspects of strategy use and the other concomitant variables.

CONCLUSIONS

Evaluating strategy use by solely examining the frequency of strategy use did not explain differences in task performance as well as evaluating the quality and conjunctive use of strategies. Further, important relations between prior knowledge, interest, and the task outcomes appeared to be mediated and moderated by the aspects of strategy use investigated.

Examining the validity of self-reports on scales measuring students' strategic processing

BACKGROUND

Self-report inventories trying to measure strategic processing at a global level have been much used in both basic and applied research. However, the validity of global strategy scores is open to question because such inventories assess strategy perceptions outside the context of specific task performance.

AIMS

The primary aim was to examine the criterion-related and construct validity of the global strategy data obtained with the Cross-Curricular Competencies (CCC) scale. Additionally, we wanted to compare the validity of these data with the validity of data obtained with a task-specific self-report inventory focusing on the same types of strategies.

SAMPLE

The sample included 269 10th-grade students from 12 different junior high schools.

METHODS

Global strategy use as assessed with the CCC was compared with task-specific strategy use reported in three different reading situations. Moreover, relationships between scores on the CCC and scores on measures of text comprehension were examined and compared with relationships between scores on the task-specific strategy measure and the same comprehension measures.

RESULTS

The comparison between the CCC strategy scores and the task-specific strategy scores suggested only modest criterion-related validity for the data obtained with the global strategy inventory. The CCC strategy scores were also not related to the text comprehension measures, indicating poor construct validity. In contrast, the task-specific strategy scores were positively related to the comprehension measures, indicating good construct validity.

CONCLUSION

Attempts to measure strategic processing at a global level seem to have limited validity and utility.

The influence of domain specificity on motivation in physical education

With the assumption that domain specificity would significantly influence students' motivation, our study was designed to investigate between- and within-domain relations of task value, perceived autonomy and competence, and achievement goal orientations across physical education and mathematics. Urban adolescents (N = 273, ages 12-14 years) completed questionnaires assessing these motivational constructs in both subjects. Based on our confirmatory factor analyses and fit indexes, all motivational constructs demonstrated strong subject specificity. Strengths of associations between physical education and mathematics differed by individual motivational constructs. Within-domain interrelations of these constructs were not consistent across physical education and mathematics. Our findings suggest that domain specificity in physical education plays a significant role in students' motivation.

Does "sneaky fox" facilitate learning? Examining the effects of seductive details in physical education

While seductive details are enjoyable, they are unimportant content or activities intentionally inserted to make class fun and interesting. The purpose of this study was to examine the effect of seductive details on students' learning of net games in physical education. Participants were 240 middle school students. A videotaped lesson example named "outfox your opponent" was used as the stimulus, and a 2 x 3 (condition x grade) factorial analysis was designed. The results showed that seductive details directly interrupted students' recall of important learning content and transferring problem solving in learning net games. It is suggested that the function of seductive details on learning should be reconsidered when designing effective motivational strategies in physical education.