Underachieving Students Research Articles

Relation between students' involvement and teacher management strategies in French ‘difficult' classrooms

Background: Since 2010, French secondary schools with a high proportion of students in academic difficulty benefit from a compensatory education policy called ‘Écoles Collèges et Lycées pour l'Ambition, l'Innovation et la Réussite’ (ÉCLAIR). These students tend to behave poorly and frequently disengage from learning tasks, and thus one of the greatest challenges for teachers is to keep them focused and active. The ‘academic learning time in physical education' is very low, about 14.4%.Purpose: This case study investigates the relations between the students' motor and social involvement and the class management strategies of four experienced physical education (PE) teachers in a difficult educational context.Participants and Setting: This case study focuses on four secondary school classes with the same characteristics: all are part of the ÉCLAIR program, are taught by experienced PE teacher, with hardly manageable underachieving students in drop-out situations (16 in total, between 12 and 16 years old), and offer four units of gymnastics (for a total of 26 lessons). The classes were organized as group activities, with instruction sheets, with an educational project based on the students' sense of autonomy and responsibility.Research Design: This research was conducted following a situated approach from the cognitive anthropology framework of ‘course of action'.Data collection: Extrinsic classroom data were collected by observing the students' and teacher's activities within the classroom and using audiovisual recordings. Intrinsic data were collected during self-confrontation interviews held after the lessons.Data Analysis: The data were processed in three stages: (a) the structure of students' and teachers' behaviors; (b) the dynamic of students' and teachers' experience, and (c) the classroom management strategies related to student misbehavior.Findings: The findings reveal that in spite of permanent classroom agitation, working involvement predominated with only short periods of student disengagement. Compromises organize the relation between students' involvement and teacher management strategies. There is a compromise between work and play time for the students – they mainly remained involved in their work, and were appropriately involved in their task both physically and socially. Then, there is a compromise of acceptance for the teachers, as they use specific management strategies based on controlled short drop-outs as a source of student involvement in work.Conclusions: These findings raise the question of how PE teachers working under the compensatory policy can best manage student misbehavior. The teacher's acceptance, compromises within the classroom, zone of acceptable responses, and articulation of instruction activity with misbehavior management, are as many factors improving teachers' professionalization.

Positive technological and negative pre-test-score effects in a four-year assessment of low socioeconomic status K-8 student learning in computer-based Math and Language Arts courses

Motivated by the Federal Title I program to improve the Math and Language Arts learning of underachieving students of low socioeconomic status, the Education Program for Gifted Youth (EPGY) at Stanford University has developed computer-based online Math and Language Arts courses for such students in elementary and middle schools. Using several large student samples, the four-year statistical assessment of state test performance is the focus of this report. The main statistical conclusion is that sustained and careful computer-based work, guided by motivated teachers, can be done by many, when taught on an individualized basis, at their current level of competence. The gains made by individual students are, to a large extent, monotonically increasing in their amount of net correct computer-based course work, and to an even larger extent monotonically decreasing as pre-test scores rise, a result that favors technological support of the more underachieving students.

An evaluation of nursing and midwifery sign off mentors, new mentors and nurse lecturers' understanding of the sign off mentor role

This paper presents the findings of a small scale evaluation examining nursing and midwifery mentors and nursing lecturers perceptions of the Nursing and Midwifery Council ‘sign off’ mentor role (NMC, 2008). For this evaluation 114 new sign off mentors, 37 preparation for mentorship students and 13 nursing and midwifery lecturers within a Higher Education Institute (HEI) in the United Kingdom participated in the evaluation project. Nursing and midwifery students were not included in this initial evaluation.The initial findings suggested that all participants viewed the introduction of sign off mentors positively; offering a more robust mechanism for ensuring students were competent, helped to protect the public, and offered an increased level of support for students themselves.Concerns were raised about varying levels of support available for sign off mentors and some Stage 2 mentors' abilities to assess competence. Several participants felt the 1 h protected time per week per final placement student would be difficult to implement, whilst anxieties were also expressed about levels of responsibility for ensuring fitness to practice alongside concern that some mentors may leave sign off mentors to manage and identify under-achieving students.

Bring Out the Brilliance: a Counseling Intervention for Underachieving Students

This study evaluated the impact of a small group counseling intervention designed for students who underachieve. The results of the study demonstrated significant improvement for ninth- and tenth-grade underachieving students in the areas of organizational skills, time management, and motivation. The author discusses implications and recommendations for school counselors working with underachieving students.

Bring Out the Brilliance: A Counseling Intervention for Underachieving Students

This study evaluated the impact of a small group counseling intervention designed for students who underachieve. The results of the study demonstrated significant improvement for ninth- and tenth-grade underachieving students in the areas of organizational skills, time management, and motivation. The author discusses implications and recommendations for school counselors working with underachieving students.

The effect of intervention on academic achievement of underachievement students: A Meta-analysis

The effect of intervention on academic achievement of underachievement students: A Meta-analysis

Character, Social–Emotional, and Academic Outcomes Among Underachieving Elementary School Students

One purpose of this research was to examine the psychometric properties of a character assessment scale (the Character Assessment for School Age Children; CASAC) based on 6 pillars of character (Josephson Institute, 2009). Many youth development and character education programs utilize some, if not all, of the pillars of character explicitly or implicitly (e.g., Prestwich, 2004), yet few character assessments integrate these components in a comprehensive way (e.g., Character Education Partnership [CEP], 2008). Furthermore, as many of these programs have been utilized to augment academic achievement, emphasis on the importance of formative evaluation has increased (e.g., Berkowitz & Bier, 2004; Zins, Bloodworth, Weissberg, & Walberg, 2004). Hence, a brief assessment of character that is also predictive of academic achievement among underachieving students would be useful as a formative evaluation tool. A second purpose was to examine the significance of character and other social–emotional indexes in predicting academic outcomes among underachieving elementary school students. Exploratory factor analysis resulted in a 2-dimensional scale. Internal reliability and validity were demonstrated for these CASAC dimensions. Although CASAC dimensions related to academic achievement, the relevance of character and other social-emotional indexes to achievement varied across academic outcomes. The educational implications of the findings for underachieving students were addressed.

Comparative Effects of Multisensory and Metacognitive Instructional Approaches on English Vocabulary Achievement of Underachieving Nigerian Secondary School Students

The purpose of this study was to find out the relative effects of three instructional Approaches i.e. Multisensory, Metacognitive, and a combination of Multisensory and Metacognitive Instructional Approaches on the Vocabulary achievement of underachieving Secondary School Students. The study adopted the quasi-experimental design in which a pre-test, post-test, non - randomized, non-equivalent control group design was employed. One hundred and twenty [120 students-60 males and 60 females] were selected from four secondary schools within the Ilorin metropolis through stratified random sampling technique. The four schools were categorized into three experimental groups and one control group according to the design of the study. The instructional programmes for the teachers and the achievement test for the students were prepared by the researcher from the students’ English text books according to the curriculum specifications and the past questions from the JSS NECO past questions .Six major hypotheses were generated for the study. All of them were based on the general effects of the three instructional approaches on the underachieving students’ vocabulary achievement. The results were analyzed using Analysis of Covariance [ANCOVA]. The Duncan Multiple Range Test was used to confirm which pairs of the variables were significantly different. The results revealed that there was a significant difference in the overall achievement of the students taught using the three approaches. In other words, each of the experimental group performed significantly better than the control group. However, the findings indicated that the Multisensory Instructional Approach [MSIA] was the most potent of the three modes. It was recommended that English Language teachers should consider the interest of the underachievers by employing the Multisensory approach to teach them.

MASALAH SISWA UNDERACHIEVER DAN PERAN GURU BIMBINGAN DAN KONSELING DALAM PENGENTASANNYA

The aim of the research is to disclose some aspects of underachiever students and the role of guidance teachers in handling the students problems. This study is classified into descriptive quantitative method. The underachiever student’s problems based upon each problemed field ranked from the most problems up to the least problems namely: (1) learning skill problems, (2) personal problems, 3) learning environment and socio-emotional problems, (4) lesson material mastery pre requirement problems and (5) medium of learning problems. Most of the underachiever student eventually have less learning motivation. The parents of underachiever student who are most of strata 1 graduates and civil servants. The role of guidance and counseling teacher is not yet optimal and not yet focus because they have no time for entering classes and the ratio number of the guidance and counseling teacher is not equal with the number of the guided students.

A Study on Characteristics of Learner's Experience-Oriented Model and Educational Needs of Under-achievement Hearing-impaired Students

A Study on Characteristics of Learner's Experience-Oriented Model and Educational Needs of Under-achievement Hearing-impaired Students

Supporting young adolescent students from minority cultural groups who are underachieving in learning

Establishing appropriate learning environments for culturally diverse underachieving students continues to challenge educators across a range of international contexts. A synthesis of findings from our studies in New Zealand indicated that teachers and students from Pasifika and Māori backgrounds considered that learning is facilitated by the establishment of positive student–teacher relationships in which their culture and language is acknowledged and valued. Collaboration and co‐operation within small groups also supported learning, which influenced engagement as well as achievement. We contend that developing effective and culturally sensitive pedagogical practices that are informed by research offers a way forward, not only for practitioners, but also for teacher education.

Tinjauan Teoritis: Self Regulation pada Mahasiswa Underachiever

Self regulation is needed by every individual as a description of their ability to control themselves. Not every individual has good self regulation such as students categorized as underachievers. Self regulation on underachiever students could be said to be lower than high achiever students. There are many factors contributing to low self regulation, such as lack of responsibility towards personal goals, even personal goals that may be set by someone else.This theoretical review is anticipated to help realizing conditions that is happening towards ourselves and what is the factor behind it. Parents and educators may also understand the treatment causing children to have low self regulation and becoming an underachiever.

Raising Engagement and Enhancing Learning: School Community Partnerships That Work for Students at Promise

This paper reports on a pilot study that investigates the widely reported issue of underachievement of students from Culturally Linguistically and Economically Diverse (CLED) backgrounds. It involves 15 university education faculty student volunteers and over 40 students and their families in primary (elementary) schools situated in disadvantaged communities of Victoria whose students come from 40 different nationalities, speaking 36 languages and with 75 per cent of its student cohort coming from Non English Speaking Backgrounds. A partnership was formed to focus on the problem of CLED children’s disengagement from their academic learning. We focus on how a productive partnership between schools and a university impact on inclusive teaching and learning practices both at the school and the university level. We investigate whether such an intervention can have an impact on engagement levels and the learning and social outcomes of students from refugee, migrant and working class families. Privileging participant voice we analyze data from interviews, surveys and focus groups with students, teachers and parents to argue that such a program has the capacity to re-engage underachieving students at a minimal cost to the community as an alternative model to other expensive and unsuccessful intervention programs. We conclude that at the core of this successful program is the need for both participants to feel they are empowered in the process. We know that student outcomes can be enhanced when the students feel connected to and involved in their community. Through this project, the students have the opportunity to experience greater community engagement leading to improved school attendance and retention, as well as better academic outcomes.

Strategi untuk Meningkatkan Prestasi Bagi Mahasiswa Underachiever

Underachiever students are a group of students that are existed in our surrounding. The purpose of parents, teachers, and people in general are to develop a nation. Underachiever students have chances to be this nation’s breadwinner. They will need help from other people, in the right way and time. Main factors that influenced underachievers are motivation and emotional problems. Strategies needed are no farer than these main factors, but there should be more preparations.

Underachievement Among College Students

Many high-achieving students do not question their academic success. They do well and are content with the study skills they have developed to ensure that they achieve their goals. However, these students, whose high schools considered them achievers, experience difficulties and sometimes failure in situations where they had previously experienced success. Using a sample of college freshmen who had earned academic warnings or had been placed on academic probation, this research examined each individual and his or her causes of underachievement. Participants attributed their high school successes to minor efforts. Not needing to do much to earn the success they wanted, these students were never taught, nor ever taught themselves, how to work through challenging issues. When these participants encountered challenging coursework in college, they were unprepared to deal with it. Additionally, several other aspects of participants’ experiences contributed to their college underachievement: inadequate study skills, poor time management, and internal versus external motivation. Participants felt that the intervention that would best reverse college underachievement was improving their own attitudes and behaviors. Through counseling and other means, gifted students need to learn how to motivate themselves to work when grades do not come easily. Colleges should be aware that even their high-achieving applicants may lack the skills necessary to succeed. In addition to offering study skills courses to underachieving students, colleges should include preemptive strategies for all incoming freshmen, including motivational and time management strategies.

When ‘literacy is a bennie’: researching contested literacies in bilingual youth radio

This paper presents findings from an innovative school-based youth radio project for Mexican immigrant students. We draw on ethnographic and discourse data collected over an academic year, including multiple data representations from video and audio recordings, radio production artefacts, interviews, and still images. We begin our discussion with a close analysis of a rich moment in the project brought-on by the collision of divergent and contested models of literacy. We then follow the thematic development of literacy across chains of events and contexts to understand how literacy was constructed and enacted in relation to language, identity, empowerment and voice. The findings suggest that although school–community linked collaborations can give rise to contradictions and disturbance, such collaborations have the potential to become productive learning contexts for disaffected and underachieving students and their teachers.

Merging Mathematics Education with Cognitive Restructuring

Cognitive Restructuring offers mathematics teachers a foundation and working philosophy for helping underachieving students. The philosophy centers on helping students become aware of and break out of a failure syndrome. Inability is not considered the reason for underachieving. This philosophy, shared by the developmental mathematics teachers at a four-year university in North Carolina, has yielded 80% success over the last 25 years. The intent of this paper is to discuss the failure syndrome, to define cognitive restructuring, to demonstrate its use in mathematics instruction, and to give dialogue and case studies taken from work with students. Using cognitive restructuring allows mathematics educators to focus on the evolving selfdevelopment of students as a co-objective with teaching mathematics.

Comprehensive post‐primary schooling in New Zealand: 1935‐1975

In light of contemporary critiques of New Zealand comprehensive schooling published mainly in the popular press, it is timely to re‐examine the origins of and the rationale for the widespread adoption of this model of education. The comprehensive schooling philosophy, it was recently alleged, has produced a situation in which ‘as many as one in five pupils in the system is failing’ and where ‘there is a large group at the bottom who are not succeeding’. This group was estimated to include some 153,000 students out of the total current New Zealand student population of 765,000. In this context, however, Chris Saunders and Mike Williams, principals of Onehunga High School and Aorere College in Auckland respectively, have noted that having underachieving students in secondary schools in particular is not a recent phenomenon. A large ‘tail’ of poor performing high school students has long been a cause of concern, Williams suggests.

College Rules: How to Study, Survive and Succeed in College (2nd edition) (review)

Reviewed by: College Rules: How to Study, Survive and Succeed in College(2nd edition) Wilfred M. Manyango College Rules: How to Study, Survive and Succeed in College (2nd edition) Sherrie Nist-Olejink and Jodi Patrick Holschuh Berkeley, CA: Ten Speed Press, 2007, 304 pages, $14.95 (softcover). A great deal has been written from different perspectives about student success and survival in college. Kuh, Kinzie, Schuh, Whitt, and Associates (2005) explore the roles of the institution in helping student succeed, in Student Success in College: Creating Conditions that Matters. In The C Student Guide to Success, Ron Bliwas (2007) addresses strategies to help underachieving students succeed. Donna Goldberg and Jennifer Zwiebel (2005) take this even further. In their book, The Organized Student: Teaching Children the Skills for Success in School and Beyond, they explore strategies that will take students through K-12 and college. Cal Newport (2005) provides testimonials of top students on succeeding in college in is book, How to Win at College: Surprising Secrets for Success from the Country's Top Students. There is no doubt about it—student success is crucial to institutional success. If a student succeeds in college, the institution and society benefit. More important is the academic success of the student. An academically successful student not only increases his or her potential for a good job, but the college dropout rate decreases and institutional stakeholders are happy. Academic success, however, is not automatic. Students have to develop certain habits, change attitudes, and perform tasks that will help them become academically successful. Research (e.g., Pascarella & Terenzini, 2005) has shown that students who utilize campus resources are the most likely to have academic success. To aid in this endeavor, institutions have created tutoring programs, learning centers, and other activities to enhance students' academic success. A major component, however, of student success is the student himself or herself. The student will have to be engaged in order to succeed. It takes a concerted effort on the part of the student who wants to succeed. In high school, many students are surrounded by a safety net of teachers and counselors who readily provide the needed assistance to enable the student to succeed (Nist-Olejink & Holschuh, 2007). However, in college students are often expected to be more independent and to develop the skills needed to be successful. Many students, however, do not know how to proceed. A new addition to current literature on student success in college is College Rules! How to Study, Survive and Succeed in College, 2nd edition, by Sherrie Nist-Olejnik and Jodi P. Holschuh. This book seeks to educate students in a "thorough and humorous way" about surviving in college. Nist-Olejink and Holschuh provide insights on how to deal with homework, study for tests and exams, reading and remembering, writing research papers, etc. Basically, it is a manual of how to survive in college, written in a language to which students can relate. The book has some unique features and sidebars. Besides addressing the different issues students face in college (studying, writing papers, etc.), the book is organized using short chapters, each with an easy to read format. Each chapter begins with a question to stimulate the thinking of the reader. The reader has an opportunity to relate the contents of each chapter to famous quotes, humorous highlights, and true stories. At the end of each chapter, the authors summarize the contents in few sentences. The book, containing 24 chapters, addresses every aspect of the college student's life. In [End Page 157] sections on selecting classes, deciding on a major, making an appointment to speak with a professor, time management, developing study habits, writing research papers, and avoiding plagiarism, the authors attempt to provide the student with a road map to succeeding in college. This book appears to be specifically geared towards the undergraduate college student, though professors, graduate students, and others might benefit. It could also serve as a great resource for parents. It might give them a glimpse of what their children are going through and that might help them as they seek to offer pieces of advice to their students. Students in every stage of their academic career can...

Pedagogic Thinking That Grounds E-Learning for Secondary School Science Students in New Zealand

Course designers adopted a language-learners approach to the online teaching of New Zealand secondary school students in the subject of astronomy. This was possible because the curriculum for astronomy that was in 2004 established as a part of New Zealand's national curriculum was specifically designed to engage underachieving students in science and technology. A criterion-referenced assessment regime was established and an Internet platform was built specifically to facilitate this form of assessment. This platform contrasts with the norm-referenced assessment programmes that are most frequently used with online instruction. In this situation – where the essential task is to reward students for learning basic vocabulary and to motivate them to further study – the theory of psychologist William James assisted the teachers to develop their online pedagogy. The article concludes with a comparison of the advantages and disadvantages of using the Internet to deliver science courses to secondary school students.