Classroom Factors Affecting Students’ Self-Evaluations: An Interactional Model

Abstract

This paper presents a complex interactional model of classroom factors that contribute to the development of students’ self-evaluations. This model integrates previously investigated factors, suggests the operation of additional factors, and extends the notion of the operation of classroom factors to account for the possibility that certain factors may compensate for or negate the effect of otherwise crucial factors in influencing students’ interpretations of and reactions to classroom events. Described are (a) task structure, (b) grouping practices, (c) feedback and evaluation procedures and information about ability, (d) motivational strategies, (e) locus of responsibility for learning, and (f) the quality of teacher-student relationships. This notion of compensating and negating features within the classroom environment can be applied to understanding other student outcomes as they are influenced by teaching processes.

Student Views About Learning Math and Social Studies

“…Instruction in school settings provides one very important and regularly experienced context in which ideas and perceptions about subject matters, as well as other cognitive and affective outcomes (e.g., Anderson, Stevens, Prawat, & Nickerson, 1988;Marshall & Weinstein, 1984), can be shaped. The way a subject is presented over the years of schooling is likely to affect the way students perceive and relate to it.…”

School Influences on Children's Development

“…There are many individual differences in the accuracy of assessment, although most can be shaped by different types of evaluative feedback (Marshall & Weinstein, 1984;Pintrich & Blumenfeld, 1985). Working class children are slower to develop accurate assessment (Eshel & Klein, 1981) and there is some evidence from Blatchford (1992) that black girls may continue to over-rate their ability in reading, even towards the end of primary school while self assessment in black boys tended to drop dramatically between 7 and 11 years.…”

“…Children were near or at the end of primary schooling and their academic self concepts were compared to school attainment tests. Marshall and Weinstein (1984) reviewed a host of studies on school factors affecting students' self evaluation. Tests, school climate and teacher evaluations all had a significant effect on self esteem but grades were the most powerful predictor for self concept in particular school subjects.…”

Student Perceptions of Teachers’ Mindset Beliefs in the Classroom Setting

“…Marshall and Weinstein (1984) noted that classroom environments were interpreted differently by high achieving versus low achieving students noting considerable within class variability in how students perceive teacher feedback and classwork. Albert Bandura eloquently stated, "People's level of motivation, affective states and actions are based more on what they believe than what is objectively true" (Bandura, 1997, p. 2).…”