Individual interest and learning in secondary school STEM education

Abstract

<jats:p>Interest research offers different hypotheses about the association between interest and learning outcomes. The standard hypothesis proposes that interest predicts learning outcomes: people acquire new knowledge about a topic they find interesting. The affective by-product hypothesis assumes that learning predicts interest: by learning something, people develop an interest in this topic. Finally, the reciprocal hypothesis states that interest and learning covary. This longitudinal study aimed to test the predictive validity of these three hypotheses in the context of secondary school STEM education. The participants were 104 Finnish 7th grade students aged 12-14. Data were collected at three times during the school year through questionnaires and grade evaluations in mathematics and biology. A partial least squares (PLS) path modeling approach was used to determine the relationships between interest and course grades across the three measurement points: at the beginning of the autumn semester, at the beginning of the spring semester, and after the spring semester at the end of the school year. The results differed between the autumn and spring semesters: During the autumn semester, students’ interest predicted their grades, whereas during the spring semester, grades predicted their interest. These findings indicate that the relationships between students’ individual interest towards science and mathematics with learning vary. As a practical implication, more focus should be put on when and what type of performance feedback is given to students with differing interest profiles. </jats:p>

Closing the Gap: Potentials of ESE Distance Teaching

“…Students showed high fascination scores with a mean score of 3.5 on a 5-point Likert scale. This is in line with other studies regarding individual interest levels in ESE [59,78]. It was, however, expected that students who had spent considerable time in distance teaching were detached from nature and thus not as interested in it.…”

“…Students scored high on both interest and nativity. The positive influence on learning progress as shown by SEM analysis falls in line with previous research on the relationship between individual interest levels and knowledge acquisition [59,60,78]. The model also shows high correlations between both values and knowledge gains.…”

“…As the Fascination scale is quite extensive, only one of the seven subscales was used-specifically, the one in line with the content of the intervention unit. Because no significant changes occurred in other fascination studies, the FBio questionnaire was applied once [59,60]. For both DNAS and FBio some items were reversed (=reworded for the opposite meaning) for data collection and then reversed again for data analysis.…”

Perusing the Past to Propel the Future: A Systematic Review of STEM Learning Activity Based on Activity Theory

“…However, it is important but challenging to sustain students' interest and positive emotions towards STEM learning and career. Designing activities based on content and pedagogy can be a challenging task, as determining the right materials to help students solve real-life problems [16], and the activity design process is sometimes time-consuming [17]. However, this is dependent on the availability of teaching and learning materials, student levels, and the goals of the STEM activity.…”

Penggunaan Media Salindia Interaktif Untuk Menarik Minat Belajar Siswa Sekolah Dasar Dalam Pembelajaran Daring

“…Keterlibatan siswa dapat berupa memberikan pertanyaan, menjawab pertanyaan, menyampaikan pendapat maupun menyuarakan perasaan selama proses belajar. Hal tersebut timbul karena siswa meminati pembelajaran dan dapat terhubung dengan materi yang dipelajari lalu mulai dapat menyusun strategi yang tepat dalam belajar sehingga menimbulkan rasa ingin tahu yang tinggi [4].…”