Different Data Collection Methods in Qualitative Research

In qualitative research the researcher directly interacts with participants in a group setting in order to get a deeper insight into the phenomena he/she is studying. Among the main methods for collecting qualitative data for there are individual/ focus group interviews, observations and written materials. Depending on the nature of the study being conducted, the most suitable data collection methods of any research varies from one study to another.    

While the ‘Unstructured interviews’ allows for an 'in depth' investigation of a topic, yet the lack of structure, as the interviewer may frame the interview questions based on the interviewee and his/her previous response, would be less planned and therefore could create a difficulty in the analysis and interpretation of the data being collected, therefore it could be better to use ‘Semi structured’ interviews in a certain research because of the fact that the researcher can plan the series of open ended questions to be based on and related to the topic areas he/she is interested to cover during the research project.

The open ended questions can help the researcher to define the topic under investigation and also can provide more opportunities for ‘in details’ discussion with the interviewees in order to cover different aspects of the topic and gain more solid interpretation for the data being collected. 

The focus group method for data collection would allow to further investigate the phenomena being studied by having a collective discussion with a group of participants to be able to understand the circumstances and opinions that can help researchers develop further insight.

As mentioned in my previous blog post, I have selected the Design-based research as an approach for my thesis in order to design a learning environment while empirically explore its effectiveness across various levels.

As a researcher I am interested in conducting a research in technology-enhanced learning within the area of learning languages in order to understand how, when, and why a technological innovation works in a pedagogically effective way.

To develop a further insight into the topic of my research I would like to mix semi structured interviews together with observations in a natural teaching/learning settings while taking lengthy and descriptive notes of what is happening. I am considering ‘observation’ after or before the interviews with the groups to be able to collect more authentic and reliable data for my research.  

Main things to consider when planning the empirical research

What are main things to consider when planning the empirical part of your research?

There are several things to consider in planning for the empirical part of any research; first, we need to decide on the nature and framework of the problem, aim, question or phenomena which we are interested in researching, that includes problem statement, benefits, challenges and procedures so that the reader can understand what is it  that we are trying to find out. and what kind of data are we going to end up dealing with.

This first step leads to understanding the type of research method we should be using for our research, whether Qualitative, Quantitative, Design of Experiment, or Mixed approach. This in turn makes it very crucial to know the differences between the Qualitative and Quantitative in order for the researcher to make a decision on which research methods to choose.

In my research I would like to use design of experiment and qualitative methods to develop effective multimedia for language learning. When it comes to data collection, different methods of data collection such as interviews, surveys & questionnaires can be integrated into cycles of design, evaluation, and redesign in order to reach the most effective model of designing instructional multimedia for language learning.

The challenge in my research is that the theories of multimedia design and use are still developing and thus it has been difficult to bridge the gap between research and practice. That is the reason why I have chosen the Design of Experiment research method as it is becoming increasingly accepted especially in the study of teaching interventions in authentic settings (Lagemann & Shulman 1999, Klahr & Li 2005). Muller, D. A. (2008).

The worldview of the researcher determines the purpose of his/her research, for example in my own research I have adopted the empiricism and determinism views in order to determine the causes and effects of what enhances learning from multimedia by designing experiments that can reveal the crucial factors behind.

After deciding on the strategy we are using in our research to gather data, that means what is the source of our data then we need to deal with the issue of sampling that is random, purpose, single case..etc. This stage is very crucial in the empirical research as it influences what comes next, namely the data collection and data analysis stages of the process.

The final stage in this complex process of empirical research is the Conclusion where we are able to describe the results and generalize the findings. Since I have never made an empirical research before using Design of Experiment so I have a mixed feeling of excitement and uncertainty towards carrying out this type of research, yet I am rather optimistic about the findings and the feeling of excitement is stronger than any doubt. So I am looking forward to getting tarted in this process of empirical research.  

SRL and teaching

Bring Your Own Device Method & Motivation 

Introduction

As learning is changing from traditional teacher and classroom centered paradigm to learning in various formal and informal situations, new questions rise up. How to support and enhance students´ informal and formal learning? What are the most applicable ways to use technology considering the differences among students?

One of the solutions for these kind of issues is Bring Your Own Device (BYOD) -method which has been hot topic among researchers for the past few years. Hopkins, Sylvester & Tate (2013, 9) introduce results which strongly recommend BYOD method to be used in various occasions e.g. in schools and in informal settings. Results introduce various positive factors regarding the topic and “students perceived their devices to be useful based on beliefs that their device would: make learning easier; help them achieve better grades; and offer advantages that outweighed any disadvantages” (Hopkins, Sylvester & Tate, 2013, 9).

However, using familiar devices in learning settings is not always guaranteed road to successful and sustainable learning. Technology may have limitations that sets restrictions to learning or it might turn students passive and this way terminate learning (Margaryan et al., 2011). It is also questionable if students have the cognitive and metacognitive skills to effectively implement technology to the educational settings. Therefore teacher should always pay attention to learning environment and monitor students´ learning process.

The key thing related to BYOD method is how it affects student´s motivation. Motivation is presumably high if given the right to choose but possible inconveniences might cause motivation to drop several levels. Although using familiar devices rule out certain difficulties in learning process, it is teacher's responsibility to ensure that motivation among students stay high to enhance learning. Emerging different technological devices into learning can have a huge positive influence over self-regulated learning processes (Laru, 2012, 95) and motivational aspects, but at the same time it can lead to shallow learning and passivate students. Considering this, teacher should always reflect on student's learning and classroom actions and make sure that focus stays on learning itself.

By: Ville Vihla 

LET Student.

Integrating SRL in Teaching

Definitely there are at least two different ways to approach Self-Regulated Learning in teaching within a Classroom environment; either to teach SRL theoretical knowledge to students directly hoping that student with figure out a way apply this knowledge or to integrate it within your lesson planning and delivery of instruction as a teacher. The first approach places SRL at the heart of the teaching as the ‘subject’ or ‘content’ of the lesson where the second approach integrates SRL as a set of strategies giving students a conscious knowledge and skills that supports the learning situation and outcomes. You can also mix both approaches but the outcomes of the teaching session will be hard to predict and assess.

The main problem with the first approach ‘Teaching SRL as the subject or content of the lesson’ is that only academic researches within the field of education and psychology might be able to understand the subject and students of any other subject will have difficulty learning about education as a non-relevant to their field. As a result integrating SRL within the classroom teaching would be the most effective strategy in supporting students learning and avoiding first of all overwhelming them with metacognition and psychology, second with the fancy terminology used in this field of study which we as researchers sometimes struggle to understand.

Before our teaching session we discussed and agreed with our teachers to teach any subject such as mathematics, history or language in a way that supports students SRL in our teaching practice, hence we selected language teaching as a subject through which we could demonstrate ‘how to support SRL in classroom teaching’ focussing on the metacognitive & motivational aspects of it. To be also more specific, I myself confirmed with the teachers that SRL is a broad subject and multifaceted area of research so we decided to tackle and focus on only one aspect of it at a time within planning & teaching - the ‘meta-cognition’ and its influence on students’ ‘Motivation’.   

‘Bottom-Up’ Strategy

Bottom-Up Self-Regulation strategies as Boaekaets & Corno explained; “When SR is triggered by cues from the environment it is bottom up. Instead of beginning work with goals that are firmly established, it is feedback from the task and classroom reward structures that help to establish work orientations and generate changes in work styles.” (Boekaerts and Corno 2005). Using this strategy we planned for our teaching session thus we did not start with goals and objectives at the beginning for the session. We hope this answer the question of our teachers ‘We did not get from the beginning of the session the main idea or topics you are presenting?’

Metacognition & ‘Bottom-Up’

We decided to choose Metacognition as an aspect of SRL to be integrated in our teaching session about languages using bottom up strategy where classroom environment triggers certain challenges in terms of metacognition and motivation as a direct result of it. The challenges were discussed at the end of the session very briefly as unfortunately due to lack of time because of the fact that our Chinese teacher got carried away in her teaching part leaving little time for the rest of the group to demonstrate the the integration part and implementation process in the lesson plan.

The following questions were supposed to support students metacognition & motivation as aspects of SRL through exploring students emotional regulation strategies and planning & organizing strategies by the end of the session so to speak ‘Bottom-Up’ Strategy;

• How do you feel about it?
• Is it really the most difficult language in the world?
• Which part was easy which was difficult to learn?
• What do you want to learn next time? & how?

Here is the integration of metacognitive and motivational aspects of SRL within the lesson planning at the stage rational/aim section within a standard Cambridge University Lesson planning template;

Stage Name & Number	Interaction Pattern	Time	Procedure	Stage Aim / Rationale
Stage 1: GI in Topic ’Motivation’	T-T T-s-s-s	1 min	Set-up Task 1. Tharwat introduces himself in Arabic saying ‘Ahlan, ana ismi Tharwat Wasfy, wenta? or Wenti?’ ·         Sophie ansers ‘ana ismi Sophie’ ·         Ercan ansers ‘ana ismi Ercan’ ·         Ville ansers ‘ana ismi Ville’ T. Explains Today we will learn how to introduce ourselves in the most difficult language in the world.. No not Chinese.. It’s Arabic … sounds exciting, right? J Hands up if you are excited? J	Generating interest in the topic in a fun and quick way. (motivation aspect)
Stage 2: Clarify Pronunciation & Meaning	T-s-s-s	2 min	Task 2 Clarification of sounds & mnemonic techniques ·         4 words to remember; (ana – ismi – wenta – wenti)   ·         Example; Ana ismi Tharat (my name is Tharwat) wenta? (and you)	Clarifying sounds and meaning. (Cognition)
Stage 3: Individual & Pair Practice ‘Students Introducing themselves…’	T-s-s-s s-s	2  min	Task 3: T. asks students to repeat ‘ahlan, ana ismi’ adding their name to it ex; ‘ahlan, ana ismi Ercan ’ Task 4: T. asks to introduce yourself upon pointing (game, unexpected selection of student…) Task5: T. asks students to look at their peer and exchange turns in introducing themselves to each other.	To make students practice & learn.   (Cognition)
Stage 4: Students Reflection ‘Metacognition & Self-Efficacy’	T-s-s-s	3 min	Task6: T. ask students, ·         How do you feel about it? ·         Is it really the most difficult language n the world? ·         Which part was easy which was difficult to learn? ·         What do you want to learn next time? & how?	To have students talk freely about the topic discussed in the lesson. (Metacognition, Self-Efficacy & emotional regulation)
Stage 5: SRL Clarification	T-T	2 min	Task 7: T. explains motivation, metacognition & emotional regulation.	To explain to peers the SRL integration into the lesson.

This is a standard Cambridge University Lesson planning template from CELTA training course.  

By Tharwat Wasfy

LET Student.  

References

Hopkins, N., Sylvester, A. & Tate, M. (2013). Motivations For BYOD: An Investigation Of The Contents Of A 21st Century School Bag.  ECIS Completed Research: Paper 183.

Laru, J. (2012). Scaffolding learning activities with collaborative scripts and mobile devices. Oulu: University of Oulu.

Margaryan, A., Littlejohn, A. & Vojt, G. (2011). Are digital natives a myth or reality? University students’ use of digital technologies. Computers & Education, 56(2), 429– 440.

Written by Ville Vihla & Tharwat Wasfy on behalf of a group of 4 students; 'Ercan, Sophie, Tharwat & Ville' at the LET group 2006.

SRL - Assignment 4 - Solo Task

My Task is to write about eight different concepts, two from each of the four articles we were assigned to read. I am determined to complete this task before deadline and definitely I believe I can do it.  

Article 1

Boekaerts, M., & Corno, L. (2005). Self-regulation in the classroom: A perspective on assessment and intervention.

Capability to Self-Regulate 

As Boekaerts and Corno (2005) explain, some researchers conceptualize SR as a general disposition that students bring into the classroom, whereas others conceive of SR as a property of the person-in situation and attend to domain-specific self-regulatory skills that develop through experience within and across situations. The two perspectives are not incompatible.

I think the two definitions are not different from each other, the ‘general disposition’ and ‘the property of the person in situation’ as they seem to be counterparts. The issue would be in having a single solid definition that might not be sufficient to cover all aspects of the concept.  

Volitional Strategies

Corno (1993) explains that volition is different from motivation as a concept and a function, that is, when motivation is necessary to set up goals and choose the appropriate strategies for attaining them, volitions comes as a necessary part to protect against the abandonment of goals and also serves to maintain learns’ efforts and persistence when competing goals arises. 

ICE Note

This is pretty much similar to the concept of ‘Will Power’ and I can relate to this concept as a learner and a teacher. I also believe that setting goals and working on accomplishing them can form habitual patterns of behavior that can be classified as volitional strategies.

Article 2

Winne, P. H., & Perry, N. E. (2000). Measuring self-regulated learning.

Self-Regulated Learning Interview Schedule (SRLIS)
It was developed by Zimmerman and Martinez-Pons to explore SRL among high school students as a theory-guided and structured interview protocol. In this type of measuring tool, data about SRL-related behaviors are elicited by having students consider a contextualized but fictitious task. This is an interesting way of getting to know learner’s SRL. I personally used this method while interviewing some multi-linguals and polyglots 2 years ago about their learning strategies and style. I had to create contextualized yet fictitious situations for my participants in order to make my question more specific and consequently get a more specific answer to my question. The more specific I was   ….

Teacher Judgments
Part of teachers’ responsibilities in classroom is evaluating and judging students interaction with and response to the learning environment, content, teacher and each other as well. As Winne & Perry (2000) explain that teachers’ judgement is based on event-related measures using trace methods and think aloud protocols. They continue explaining that this method is not very reliable in research by questioning the trustworthiness of these data, citing Hoge & Butcher (1984).  

ICE note

This brings to my mind the issue of evaluating students’ ability in classroom by teachers. To some extent I agree with Winne & Perry (2000) that in research this method is not highly reliable however we cannot ignore the fact that teachers, by experience, know their students very well since they spend considerable amount of time interacting with them regularly, hence from a practice point of view it could me more reliable compared to mere researcher’s intervention.  

So even though teachers might not be competent at distinguishing certain constructs in the academic literature yet, this in itself can be settled with an intervention from the researcher in designing the environment collaboratively and jointly. For instance, by discussing with a teacher before the experiment certain constructs such as ‘achievement’ and ‘ability’ we can make sure they have the right understanding for both. 

Article 3

Dignath, C., Buettner, G., & Langfeldt, H. P. (2008). How can primary school students learn self-regulated learning strategies most effectively?: A meta-analysis on self-regulation training programmes. Educational Research Review, 3(2), 101-129.  

Self-regulated learning amongst young students
Dignath, et al. (2008) concluded that research over the last ten years has given empirical support to the presumption that young children can and do engage in activities to self-regulate their own learning. By referring to Hattie et al. (1996) study he believes that the youngest children benefit the most from training in self-regulated learning. Then he continues to explain the major advantage of training children on how to self-regulate their learning in the beginning of their schooling as he believes that during these first crucial years, students set up learning and self-efficacy attitudes which are easier to change than when students have already developed disadvantageous learning styles and learning behavior (Citing Hattie et al., 1996).

Interventions to promote self-regulated learning
This concept implies teaching or training for learning skills in order to support students’ ‘Self-Regulated Learning’. Dignath, et al. (2008) mentions that earlier interventions to foster students’ self-regulation of learning were conducted by means of cognitive-behaviour modification programmes or by directly teaching the strategies. This approach to promoting SRL has changed later on. As Dignath continues to explain that innovations of later classroom intervention consisted of changes in traditional classroom arrangements in order to establish the responsibility and independence of the learners. So in conclusion, Dignath believes that in recent years, metacognitive intervention has changed from a strategy training approach to creating social environments to support metacognition.



ICE Note

Teaching ‘Learning Strategies’ is one of the most interesting concepts, at least to me, in this course. Knowing how to promote SRL among learners of all ages require at least knowledge of how to teach ‘Learning Strategies’. I remember during my early career as a Data & Soft Skills Trainer in 2009, I was teaching a ‘Business English’ course in Information technology Institute in Cairo Egypt and I was asked by many of my students to share with them any strategies I have or I have used successfully in the past in order to facilitate learning ‘English’ in that course.    

Even though this kind of conversations was considered non-relevant to the course by course administrators, I saw it as an essential part of my teaching sessions NOT only in my in this course but throughout my entire career of teaching and delivering and training. My experience in teaching learning strategies, even though in an informal way, enabled me to see and touch the tremendous amount of motivation it created among learners. That is why I cannot imagine learning inside classroom without ‘knowledge about learning’. To conclude, majority of learners most of the time appreciate very much teachers support in promoting learning strategies as a way for them to enhance Self-regulation of their own learning. 

Article 4

Hanna Järvenoja, Sanna Järvelä & Jonna Malmberg (2015) Understanding Regulated Learning in Situative and Contextual Frameworks, Educational Psychologist, 50:3, 204-219

Situative Perspective on Self-Regulated Learning

The essence of this concept is that learning takes place as a result of the interaction in a social environment within a certain context and with the influence of other learners as well. As Järvenoja et al (2015) explains, different components, such as a learner’s motivation, task requirements, and classroom structure, interact to form unique learning situations. 

Sociocognitive perspective on Self-Regulated Learning

This concept considers regulation of learning to be an individual process that is influenced by social aspects, as explained by Järvenoja et al (2015).  In the SRL research some models explain self-regulated learning as an individual capacity that is shaped by environmental conditions whereas sociocognitive models of self-regulation have focused on the social, interpersonal, and contextual aspects of regulated learning Järvenoja et al (2015).

This definitions takes the concept towards the boundaries of socially regulated learning where we find the influence of collaborative or cooperative learning is evident in supporting the self-regulation of learning. 

ICE note
As the previous two definitions can tell that both concepts are intertwined, that is one of them is an example of the other. The situative and sociocognitive perspectives trigger in my mind the role of a teacher in the learning situation since classroom structure is one of the components of situative SRL. 
This in turn is taking us further away from the concept of ‘Self-Regulation’ in SRL. As a result we are complicating the study of SRL by integrating various elements as part of the ‘learning situation’. As a classroom teacher I am still trying to figure out how to implement SRL in classroom situations.  


Reflection

I learned from these articles the complexity of the topic in the academic research and that one single approach or perspective is not sufficient to provide information based on which educators, administrators and policy makers can make decisions that support learners’ self-regulated learning. 

To me, I believe that even though it is very important to address the issue from multiple layers perspective and to situate learning, yet the concept SRL does not seem to be a single idea that can be defined but rather a big phenomenon which gets complex once tackled from various perspectives. 

I believe that if a teacher pays close attention to students’ motivation during the interaction in classroom and then adapts his/her instruction accordingly then learners will be able to regulate their behavior effectively and by doing this the teacher can support tremendously learners self-regulation during the process of learning.   

For example, if a teacher gave an overwhelming task to students who struggled a lot then he or she should consider re-designing the task and deliver it in a way that supports learners’ motivation rather than killing their motivation by cognitive overload. 

SRL - Assignment 3 - Solo Task

My Task is to write about 6 different concepts, two from each of the three articles we were assigned to read. My goal is to complete this highly complex task before deadline which is Tuesday 24.11.2015. I believe that I will be able to meet this deadline because of my high level of dedication and determination to this course and to the whole LET program in general. The concepts I would like to tackle in this task are; Task Interpretation, Structuring Instruction, Learning Strategies, Rehearsal Strategies, Metacongnition, SR & SRL, and Prompting & Cueing.

Enjoy the video presentation & Let me know your feedback.

SRL - Assignment 2 - Solo Task

My Task is to write about 6 different concepts, two from each of the three articles we were assigned to read. My goal is to complete this highly complex task before deadline which is Tuesday 17.11.2015. I believe that I will be able to meet this deadline because of my high level of dedication and determination to this course and to the whole LET program in general. The concepts I would like to tackle in this task are; Collaborative Emotional Regulation vs. Individual Emotional Regulation, Environmental Structuring, Self-Handicapping.   

Collaborative vs. Individual Emotion Regulation

The research by Järvenoja, H., & Järvelä, S. (2009) has concluded that students can regulate their emotions collaboratively as well as individually during the learning process, conditionally if they were made conscious of their personal differences which could lead to potential conflicts under certain circumstances.

To support this conclusion from my own experience in teaching for several years I can emphasize that a lot of students do their best in academic life to fit within the group dynamics whenever there is a situation that requires collaborative work. The peer pressure and other factors such as self-esteem during collaborative work encourages students’ positive reactions hence emotion regulation among adults, both at the individual as well as collaborative level. That is the reason why I design several collaborative activities in my classroom delivery knowing its effectiveness. 

An interesting question raised by Järvenoja, H., & Järvelä, S (2009) “Do students regulate emotions evoked by social challenges?” this question brings to light another question in mind, a question that has to do with distinguishing the emotionally intelligent and self-disciplined from the other students. Having had the experience of teaching thousands of students, it was evident to me that each one of them had a different level of emotional intelligence and self-discipline. Hence, I can answer the question by saying, I saw some students were able to regulate their emotions and some others were not and the ones who were able to do that were emotionally intelligent. As for the students who failed to regulate their emotions were trapped inside and I had to give a hand of encouragement as a facilitator to bring them out of it.

Goal Orientation

As defined by Marcou, A. (2005) 'Goal Orientation' refers to the students’ perception of the reasons why to engage in a learning task. In his study, Marcou A. made two distinctions to study the concept; intrinsic and extrinsic goal orientation. The definition seems inclusive to any reason that could be inside the learners head or outside the learner's environment.   

Intrinsic goal orientation, 

Marcou explains that concerns the degree to which a student perceives himself to be participating in a task for reasons such as challenge, curiosity and mastery, using self-set standards and self-improvement. 

To give an example, I would say that any interest from the learner's side in the task itself for the task is considered an intrinsic goal orientation. Anything that has nothing to do with the external environment of a learner. The decisive factor here is that learner is driven by his or her own inside world.

Extrinsic goal orientation 

He explains that it denotes that a student participates in a task for reasons such as grades, rewards, performance, evaluations by others and competition. 

That means anything that has to do with the external environment of a learner, anything that motivates him/her for obtaining certain rewards is considered an extrinsic goal orientation according to this definition. The decisive factor here is that learner is driven NOT by his or her own inside world but by the outside world.

Environmental Structuring

This strategy is defined as decreasing the possibility of off-task behavior by reducing the probability of encountering a distraction or by reducing the intensity of distractions that do occur. Wolters, C. A. (2003). Managing and controlling our current environment while studying or to facilitate the process of learning is essential for successful learning experience. Self-regulated learners use different ways to influence their learning environment in order to increase their motivation for achieving their goals. I remember when I was young at high school, I used to buy my younger brother a lot of chocolates and sweets so that he becomes quite in order for me to be able to study in a calm environment.  

Even though this concept is great, yet I am against using a very technical terminology related to engineering such as ‘Environmental Structuring’ to describe very primitive actions learners take to make their study place quite. Having read a lot of literature over the past three years about ‘Learning Strategies’ It seems to me that everything a learner does can be classified as a ‘Strategy’ in the literature which makes no sense as there are thousands of very simple activities and little actions than can be classified as ‘Strategies’ if we follow this approach. To me a strategy is more than simple activities or actions, it’s about goals, actions and sequence.  

Self-Handicapping

Another strategy for regulating motivation involves the manufacture of obstructions before or during a task that make performing that task more difficult. Wolters, C. A. (2003). This somewhat counter-intuitive regulation of motivation activity has been labeled “self-handicapping” (Riggs, 1992; Urdan & Midgley, 2001).  

It is interesting to get to know that putting off doing work until the last minute is classified as examples of motivation regulation strategies. To me the issue is black and white, meaning you either have a strategy or you do not. But in theory, not having a strategy is treated as a strategy in itself. What is even more interesting is to know that students gain some sort of benefits from these strategies as Wolters, C. A. claims; “The motivational benefits of using this strategy are somewhat equivocal…” 

Reflection     

This is an inspiring article that added a different aspect to my teaching experience based on which I am planning to develop a set of ‘Inductive Techniques’ as part of classroom instructional design in order to support collaborative emotion regulation. By inductive technique, I mean getting students involved in consciously regulating their own emotions during the learning process by means of ‘noticing’ instead of explaining to them what they should and should not do during collaborative work.   

“Other people can shape an individual’s engagement and regulation processes by other- or co-regulating their learning (Higgins, 2000)”, this is something that I have experienced a lot in several classroom practices and I tend to use it to support my classroom delivery through assignments of challenging tasks to the super-active students in order to support the less active ones, which in turn adds pressure on the latter to respond to the former ‘super-active’. 

The planning for this task went well, except that when I had a physical problem in my right hand and arm where I couldn't continue typing, all my motivation went really down. Another thing that killed my motivation for completing the task is the complexity and ineffective instructional design of the task. . 

Main Challenge

The main challenge I had during this task is regulating my own motivation as the expectations from these SOLO tasks seems unrealistic and exaggerated in away that seems not a 'normal' learning environment. It seems that there are academic researchers behind who are manipulating the environment this way in order to obtain certain data. So the feeling of being a subject of research during these tasks is very stressful. 

SRL- Assignment 1 - Solo Task

My Task is to write about 6 different concepts, two from each of the three articles we were assigned to read. My goal is to complete this highly complex task before deadline which is Tuesday 10.11.2015. I believe that I will be able to meet this deadline because of my high level of dedication and determination to this course and to the whole LET program in general. The concepts I would like to tackle in this task are; self-regulated self-observation, self-judgement, top-down self-regulation, bottom-up self-regulation, co-regulated and socially shared regulated learning.  

Just before I jump into concepts and explain, provide examples and criticize I would like to draw the attention of the reader to the fact that some of these concepts are merely a reproduction of other concepts or ‘just another description’. In my opinion, it is not bad to rephrase and reframe our concepts in order to isolate and study certain phenomena separately, yet it is too overwhelming to reproduce and overload concept with unnecessary variations when it is just one single idea.  

Self-Regulated Learning 

According to Zimmermann (1986), in order for a student to be classified as a ‘self-regulated’ they are required to be metacognitively, motivationally, and behaviorally active participants in their own learning process, also they are required to personally initiate and direct their own efforts to acquire knowledge and kill rather than relying on teachers, parents, or other agents of instruction. That means in order for students to self-regulate their own learning they need to take control of the whole process of learning, to be a student and a teacher at the same time, the self-discipline factors that changes the situation. This in itself requires students to actively develop certain ‘study skills’ and use certain ‘learning strategies’ to achieve good results, for example, they need to set certain goals for what they need to achieve and how to achieve it, including deadlines.

On the other hand, this definition is too rigid and strict that does not allow for those who do not have these well-developed ‘study skills’ or ‘learning strategies’ to be included in the self-regulated learners’ category. Another issue is that, it describes the self-regulation as a static and stable stage of development for learners and I believe it should be a dynamic process where learners are learning on their own how to organize their studies and achieve their goals.

Self-Observation

Social cognitive theorists discuss three subprocesses in self-regulation; self-observation, self-judgment, and self-reaction (Bandura,1986). They also assume that these subprocesses can interact with each other in reciprocal fashion to help learners regulate their learning. For me I can relate to this concept as I have been learning languages for over 12 years in my life and when it comes to learning pronunciation, I always observe the way I pronounce and compare it to the way native speakers pronounce same words then make my own conclusion on what to improve and keep motivating myself this way.  

The biggest challenge here is that these processes can apply in social sciences and humanities however in other fields like aviation and aerospace reality is different. For example the skills required to fly a helicopter does not leave any room for self-observation or self-judgements. Learning how to fly a helicopter requires strict adherence to certain procedures and action with little to do, or almost nothing to do, with reflection and improvement as one little mistake leads to life casualty and potentially death.

Top-Down Self-Regulation

The top-down self-regulation is about beginning with the end in mind; that is having certain goals to achieve as a student in order to regulate your learning effectively. Not only that, but there are other characteristics to be taken into consideration while thinking of this concept; Winne (1995) described the cognitions, feelings, and actions of top-down SR as characteristic of self-regulated learners: self-regulated learners set goals for extending knowledge and sustaining motivation. They are aware of what they know, what they believe, and what the differences between these kinds of information imply for approaching tasks. (Winne, 1995, p. 173).

While delivering language teaching classrooms, it is highly suggested by several teacher training programs to draw the attention of students, or teach them if necessary, on how to set-up learning objectives and outcomes to achieve. That in itself is a good example for applying the top-down self-regulation in classroom teaching by encouraging students to adopt goal-setting approach to their learning. The challenge is that not all students respond to this approach positively, the ones who are not proactive enough they enjoy learning to happen as a result for the interaction rather than actively and proactively setting up goals for their learning.

Bottom-Up Self-Regulation

Bottom up strategies are quite the opposite of the top-down ones, as Boaekaets & Corno explained; “When SR is triggered by cues from the environment it is bottom up. Instead of beginning work with goals that are firmly established, it is feedback from the task and classroom reward structures that help to establish work orientations and generate changes in work styles.” (Boekaerts and Corno 2005).

In my previous classroom practice often times I observed that, when giving positive feedback to the students who are goal-oriented, the other students who usually were not setting up goals for their learning started thinking about it. For some reason some of them started adopting this practice as they saw the positive response of the teacher’s reinforcement for such kind of behavior in learning. In my opinion, this is just a different motivation strategy when students learn how to self-regulate their learning from the feedback others are getting.

Co-Regulated Learning (CoRL)

In Hadwin et al. (2011), CoRL is defined as “jointly negotiated, recognizing that SRL expertize arises through interactions where each participant brings different SR challenges and expertise to the emergent regulation…” this is a very interesting approach to investigate the influence of students on each other’s SRL when co-operating & collaborating yet, how does CoRL works, there is still much room for research and investigation on how does interaction influence SR.

Socially Shared Regulated Learning (SSRL)

Socially shared regulation of learning (SSRL) is a regulatory process model of collaborative learning (Hadwin et al., 2011). Hadwin defines SSRL as “interdependent or collectively shared regulatory processes, beliefs, and knowledge orchestrated in the service of a co-constructed or shared outcome/product” (p. 69). In SSRL, learners are collaboratively planning, monitoring, and evaluating their learning together.

It seems that there is not much difference between CoRL & SSRL, as both highlight the collaboration and interaction factors.