Abstracts - Earli

Different study ways, diverse student self-imagesErzsébet Golnhofer, Eötvös Loránd University, HungaryProject objectives: 1. To get to know the student self-images of those studying at different levelsof education. 2. To understand the effect of different study experiences on the development of thestudent self-image. 3. To go beyond the self-estimation focused cognitive approach. Questionsposed: What does it mean for the student to belong to students as a category in social identity? Arethere any differences, and if so what are they, between students with different study histories? Theresearchers accepted the narrative paradigm that identity is essentially a continually re-edited lifestory.Individuals’ stories are not simply their own idiosyncratic narratives, but stories which areembedded in a common culture and rooted in shared experiences. Suppositions: a/ Students createdifferent stories about the same experiences they have gone through, but school culture"designates" the possible narrative variations. b/ The school’s internal mechanisms of selectionform different cultures, propose different career options, which offer a variety of possible drafts. Inthe project a predominantly qualitative strategy was applied. 385 students were asked to write lifestories,self-characterisations, and student metaphors. A narrative contents analysis formed part ofthe analysis, which provided an opportunity to interpret the components of student life-stories, thethemes and the quality of the stories. The following formed part of the complex analysis: - therevelation of the meaning and the coherence of student self-image; - the examination of therelationship between student self-image, academic success and background variables; - theinterpretation of the emotive fields in connection with the school. The general results of the projectwere: 1. Narrative text analysis can be effective tools in pedagogical research. 2. Individual studentstories can provide information on how school selection mechanisms influence student socialidentity.Students’ experiences with contrasting learning environments: about what students’ perceptionslearn us.Katrien Struyven, KULeuven, BelgiumFilip Dochy, KULeuven, BelgiumSteven Janssens, KULeuven, BelgiumThis study investigates the effects of two contrasting learning environments on students’ courseexperiences and compares a lecture based setting to a student-activating teaching environment.Data (N=608) were collected by the Course Experience Questionnaire (Ramsden, 1991). Resultsshow that the instructional intervention influences students’ course experiences, in oppositedirections of the assumptions though. In declining order, the following scales (5 out of 7) revealstatistically significant differences: Clear Goals and Standards; the General scale; AppropriateWorkload; Good Teaching and the Independence scale. In addition, when the assessment mode isconsidered, also the Appropriate Assessment scale demonstrates significant results. Moreover, thesame teaching/learning environments lead to diverse students’ perceptions. While the perceptionsof lecture taught students were focused and concordantly positive, students’ course experienceswith student-activating methods were widely varied and both extremely positive and negativeopinions were present. Students’ arguments in favour of the activating setting are the variety ofteaching methods, the challenging and active nature of the assignments and the joys ofcollaborative work in teams, whereas students express dissatisfaction to the perceived lack oflearning gains, the associated time pressure and workloads, and the (exclusive) use ofcollaborative assignments and related group difficulties. Note: Tables and Reference list: seeAppendix 1– 677 –