Investigating Contexts for Learning: How Deeper Learning Schools and Strategies Shape Students' Motivation and Achievement Outcomes

• In Event: 34.018 - Excellence in Education Research: Early-Career Scholars and Their Work

Abstract

The evolving economic landscape of the 21st century demands graduates who
possess competencies aligned with deeper learning (Finegold & Notabartolo, 2010).
Originally conceptualized by Marton and Säljö (1976), deeper learning strategies
include critical thinking skills, metacognition, and collaboration skills and are associated
with a number of adaptive educational and social outcomes (Entwistle & Ramsden, 1983;
Drew & Watkins, 1998; Zeiser, Taylor, Rickles, Garet, & Segeritz, 2014). Despite
the demand for students who possess these profiles and the positive outcomes they
predict, there is relatively little work that examines the mechanisms through which
deeper learning predicts achievement, and none that use large, contemporary samples of
high school students.
The current study draws on work from the fields of learning and cognition and
motivation to investigate the connections among deeper learning contexts and strategies,
motivation, and achievement outcomes. Foundational work (e.g., (Entwistle, Thompson,
& Wilson, 1974; Entwistle & Wilson, 1977), has found associations between deep
approaches to learning and intrinsic motivation, or the motivation to pursue an academic
activity for its own sake (Ryan & Deci, 2000). Other researchers have documented
connections between other aspects of motivation (e.g., self-efficacy) and deeper learning
strategies (e.g., Liem, Lau, & Nie, 2008; Moneta, Spada, & Rost, 2007; Vos, van
der Meijden, & Denessen, 2011). Studies by motivation researchers draw similar
conclusions and also emphasize the role of student’s perceptions of the broader academic
context in the connections among learning, motivation, and achievement (Anderman
& Midgley 1997; Meece et al., 1988; Urdan, 2004).

Author

• Charlotte A. Agger, Indiana University - Bloomington