Poster #78 - Latinx Children’s Beliefs about Learning: Findings from Three US Classrooms

• In Event: 2-055 - Poster Session 06
  In Poster Session: PS 06 Section - Education, Schooling

Integrative Statement

Over the past twenty years, researchers in child development and early childhood education have explored young children’s beliefs about learning, but the body of literature remains small. The few existing studies focus on when and how young White, middle class children are first able to articulate their beliefs about learning and how those beliefs develop through the early years (Sobel, Li, & Corriveau, 2007; Lecce, Caputi, & Pagnin, 2015) but no research looks at learning beliefs among Latinx populations of young children nor examines how children’s cultural contexts and lived experiences shape their beliefs about learning.
This study investigated young children from Latinx immigrant families’ beliefs about learning and how their classroom learning experiences may shape those beliefs. Data collection and analysis was informed by Gutiérrez & Rogoff (2003) and Gonzalez, Moll & Amanti’s (2006) interpretations and application of Sociocultural Learning Theory. Participants included four teachers and thirty students in three first grade classrooms at three schools serving children from Latinx immigrant families. To measure children’s learning activities and developing beliefs about learning in context and in relation to one another, we conducted ethnographic classroom observations and video-cued interviews (Tobin et. al., 1989). We conducted qualitative data analysis informed by grounded theory (Corbin & Strauss, 2008) using open and axial coding within classrooms to analyze fieldnotes, child, and teacher interviews, as well as across classrooms to conduct a comparative analysis.
Six domains (processes of learning, environmental factors that influence learning, social aspects of learning, enjoyment and learning, importance of learning, behavior and learning) and nineteen themes emerged across the thirty first grade student interviews about their beliefs about learning. One of the most prominent domains, and one in which children expressed nearly uniform beliefs across schools, was the social aspects of learning. The most robust theme in this domain was students’ belief that they can learn with and from their peers. All students interviewed believe that they can learn from their peers as well as help their peers learn. For example, a student at school two shared, “I help them so they can do it, to grow…so that they know what to do in second grade.”
Another prominent domain was enjoyment and learning, and unlike the previous domain, students expressed a wide variation of beliefs across classrooms, particularly in regard to the relationship between play, fun, and learning. Students at the first school believe that the process of play is always distinct from the process of learning and that experiencing fun is a signal that learning is not taking place. When I asked one student what would happen if there was not teacher in his class, he responded, “We wouldn’t learn anything. We would just have fun, but fun isn’t learning.” Students at the second and third school, however, believe that play, fun, choice, and learning can and often connect and overlap.
Findings from this study may help education stakeholders consider how curricular and pedagogical decisions shape young children’s developing beliefs about central the psychological process in education - learning.

Authors

• Molly E McManus, The University of Texas at Austin
  Presenting Author

• Marie-Anne Suizzo, The University of Texas at Austin
  Non-Presenting Author