Individual Learning Context Research Articles

CLIL implemented and scaffolded in an EFL higher education context: Engineering research methodology course

The increasing global and local demands to improve English proficiency have been a burgeoning challenge across the entire paradigm and domains. Specifically, in academia, the ability to read English research articles is of paramount importance. Meanwhile, Content Language Integrated Learning (CLIL) implementation has been recognized to be a successful teaching approach. This study aims to estimate the CLIL impact on enhancing the students’ English research article reading skills, enlarging their vocabulary repertoire, and boosting the students’ and instructors’ satisfaction. The focus of the study is on a “research methodology” course for engineering students in Thailand. Throughout CLIL, the language teachers and engineering teachers closely collaborated, designing course materials and developing language activities. To assess research article reading skills and vocabulary knowledge, two sets of similar pretests/posttests were administered. Then, to assess the students’ level of CLIL satisfaction, questionnaires were completed, and two separate focus group discussion sessions were conducted with the students and teachers. Test score analysis yielded a significantly enhanced output in both the content subject and English vocabulary knowledge. Additionally, questionnaire and focus group discussion data analysis indicated that both the students and teachers had positive attitudes toward CLIL instruction. Taken together, this study demonstrates that to achieve full optimization of CLIL benefits, scaffolding needs to be supplemented to accommodate individual learning contexts.

Understanding the Effects of Structured Note-taking Systems for Video-based Learners in Individual and Social Learning Contexts

Video-based learning is widely adopted by online learners, yet, learning experience and quality may be negatively affected by asynchronous and remote natures of video-based learning. As note-taking is a common practice employed by video-based learners and is known to be an effective way to trigger active construction and processing of knowledge, yet as a meta-skill, it is challenging to most learners. In this study, we aim to approach the goal of providing cognitive and social scaffolds to video-based learners by structuring their note-taking process. We presented and evaluated structured note-taking systems designed for learners in two contexts, namely, individual learning context and social learning context. With an online controlled study involving 43 participants, we compared the structured note-taking systems with two baseline systems (for individual learning and social learning contexts respectively) and found that structured note-taking significantly improved certain aspects of video-based learning such as and higher cognitive engagement and lower distraction. We discussed our results to inform the design, iteration, and adoption of note-taking tools in video-based learning.

Alayered analysis of self-explanation and structured reflection to support clinical reasoning in medical students.

Self-explanation and structured reflection have been studied independently with results suggesting that both learning interventions can effectively support medical students’ clinical reasoning development. Given this evidence, medical schools may want/begin to implement these interventions in their curricula. Implementing educational interventions requires educators to maintain the core philosophy and principles of the interventions intact while adjusting implementation techniques to the specificities of individual learning contexts. Educational scholars have yet to explicitly articulate the philosophy, principles and techniques of self-explanation and structured reflection. Without such descriptions, educators risk failing to realize self-explanation’s and structured reflection’s effect to support students’ clinical reasoning skill development in their implementations. Relying on the layered analysis approach, we articulate the philosophy, principles and techniques of self-explanation and structured reflection. This description is framed within the context of an actual implementation to illustrate the philosophies underpinning self-explanation and structured reflection, the principles that realize those philosophies, and the techniques that can be used to enact those principles. Building on the similarities between self-explanation and structured reflection, while also harnessing their differences, we identify why and how these interventions can be combined in a single implementation, while preserving their philosophies and principles. The layered analysis of self-explanation and structured reflection offers essential insights into the underpinnings of these interventions. They are articulated in this manuscript in hopes that other scholars will continue to refine these descriptions thereby facilitating effective use of self-explanation and structured reflection for clinical reasoning development.Electronic supplementary materialThe online version of this article (10.1007/s40037-020-00603-2) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.

Communal and Individual Learning Contexts as They Relate to Mathematics Achievement Under Simulated Classroom Conditions

The current study builds on previous communalism research by exploring the enduring facilitative effects of communal learning contexts on academic achievement for African American children over extended time and while calling on critical thinking skills. In addition, this study sought to explore the communalism construct in a more applied academic environment that approximated real classroom conditions. This study examined performance differences in fraction problem solving among 96 low-income African American students in Grades 3 to 6 participating in either a communal or individual learning context. Pretest to posttest gains showed that students randomly selected for the communal learning context significantly outperformed students who learned in the individualistic context. Additionally, communal learning students outperformed their individual counterparts during each weekly domain assessments. Several promising results obtained draws the communalism construct to a more applied culturally relevant pedagogical tool.

Motivational Dynamics in Language Learning: Change, Stability, and Context

Motivation as a variable in L2 development is no longer seen as the stable individual difference factor it was once believed to be: Influenced by process‐oriented models and principles, and especially by the growing understanding of how complex dynamic systems work, researchers have been focusing increasingly on the dynamic and changeable nature of the motivation process. In this study we micro‐map the motivational dynamics of 4 language learners during their language lessons over a period of 2 weeks, using a novel instrument—the Motometer—combined with classroom observations and a questionnaire on motivation and attitude. The article answers three current questions concerning L2 motivation: (a) Can we demonstrate variability in students' L2 motivation in class; (b) Is there a detectable stable level of students' in‐class motivation; and (c), If both of these are demonstrated, can they be accounted for by the classroom context? The results affirm that student motivation can be successfully explored using a dynamic systems framework. Our findings demonstrate how motivation changes over time on an individual level, while also being characterised by predictable and stable phases, and how it is inseparable from the learner's individual learning context. The data also show that motivation can be meaningfully studied at different interacting time scales.

New Frontiers: Regulating Learning in CSCL

Despite intensive research in computer-supported collaborative learning (CSCL) over the last decade, there is relatively little research about how groups and individuals in groups engage, sustain, support, and productively regulate collaborative processes. This article examines the role of regulatory processes in collaborative learning and how CSCL environments can be used for shared regulation of learning. First, we establish the importance of regulation processes and introduce three types of regulation contributing to successful collaboration: self-, co-, and socially shared regulation of learning. Second, we illuminate two strands of seemingly diverse research that lay an important foundation for supporting and researching regulation in CSCL contexts establishing that (a) computer-based pedagogical tools used to successfully support regulation in individual learning contexts can be leveraged for collaborative task contexts, and (b) computer-based tools for supporting collaborative knowledge construction can be leveraged for supporting regulatory processes. Finally, we draw on emerging research in our own programs of research to demonstrate how regulation can be supported and researched in CSCL environments. The article concludes by charting a course for future CSCL research focused on supporting regulated learning in collaborative task contexts.

Imitation with intention and memory: An experiment

The experiment described in this paper analyzes imitation in an individual learning context. It supplements the results obtained for imitation in evolutionary processes. The paper makes three main contributions. First, it provides a clear distinction between intentional imitation and genuine learning. Second, it shows that players consider more than just last period's performance when choosing imitation examples. This contrasts with the assumption in most theoretical and experimental research. Third, since the design makes imitation explicit, it allows a detailed analysis of imitation behavior, showing that players do not imitate rationally.

Imitation with Intention and Memory: An Experiment

Three results emerge from a simple experiment on imitation. First, I find behavior which strongly suggests an intention to imitate. Second, players imitate successful other players rather than repeating successful actions. Third, to find imitation examples, players use several periods of memory. This lends support to learning models with a non-trivial role of memory. The experiment analyzes imitation in an individual learning context. It supplements the results obtained for imitation in evolutionary processes.

Contribution of Distance Education to the Development of Individual Learners

An important touchstone of distance education has been to contribute to the development of individual learners whatever their life circumstances. The first half of the article provides an overview of this contribution and of the understanding and awareness that has been developed about distance learners in their individual learning contexts. The overview is based around five themes: access to education, adjustment to new learning environments, individual development, knowledge and awareness of learners in context, and the importance of understanding the learner’s perspective of distance education. In the latter part of the article it is argued that the way ahead for distance education requires attention to more than technological approaches to learning, and that the field is well placed to provide an informed critique of current trends and developments, to focus on the student experience, and to contribute to learner development and practitioner development.

Regulative processes in individual, 3D and computer supported cooperative learning contexts

Three studies of student regulation of learning were undertaken. In the first study, the temporal organization of the self-regulation process was examined within an individual learning context. Multilevel analysis showed linear and quadratic relations between self-regulation process and the phase of learning. An unexpected negative direct relation between self-regulation and test performance was only found for the process of “directing”. In the two other studies, collaborative computer learning within a 3D environment, on the one hand, and within the context of literacy practices, on the other hand, was examined. Self-regulative processes as “monitoring,” “directing,” and “testing” occurred less frequently than “grounding” and “common agreement” activities. In all three studies, the students rarely “orient” themselves towards the learning task. It is concluded that the adequacy of regulation and not the frequency is important for student learning.

The influence of communal vs. individual learning context on the academic performance in social studies of grade 4?5 African-Americans

Empirical research utilizing the communal learning construct suggests that culturally-informed pedagogy enhances academic performance for African-American children. The present investigation examined the effect of culturally-informed learning contexts on recall performance in geography lessons. The sample consisted of 69 African-American Grade 4–5 public school students. Weeks 1 and 2 consisted of both learning and testing phases. Week 3 consisted only of a testing phase. Analyses of variance techniques revealed that, overall, subjects in the communal learning context performed significantly better on each of the two weekly quizzes and on the comprehensive examination than those in the individual learning context. Limitations of the findings and future research directions are discussed.

The Effects of Social Learning Context and Modeling on Persistence and Dynamism in Academic Activities

Abstract The authors investigated 138 third-and fourth-grade students' responses to failures and successes in a mathematics computation task in four experimental conditions varied by the two independent variables of social learning context and modeling. Interaction effects indicated that a collaborative learning context increased students' persistence following failures and dynamism after successes in a nonmodeling group, and modeling enhanced persistence and dynamism in an individual learning context. The enhancing effects of the collaborative learning context can be best explained by the familiarity with the problem solving, and the enhancing effects of modeling may be best explained by the identification between students and the model. Findings from this study demonstrate the motivational advantages of both collaborative learning and modeling.