Pakistani High Performing and Low Performing Secondary School Science Students’ Beliefs About Ability to Learn Science

Abstract

Beliefs of ability to learn are identified as a key dimension of students’ epistemological beliefs. These beliefs can range from the ability to learn is innate, unchanging to the ability to learn is not innate, changing and improvable. These beliefs are acknowledged as the principal predictor for students’ effort to learn, learning strategies and motivational behaviour in school learning. The current study discovered the nature of Pakistani science students’ beliefs about ability to learn. The qualitative approach was chosen and students were purposefully selected from two sections of 9th grade of a public secondary school for focus group interviews. These students were identified as above average and below average performing students. Students’ excerpts about their beliefs of ability to learn revealed noticeable differences in students’ beliefs of ability to learn with regard to their association with above average and below average performing students’ groups. The patterns visible in opinions of students from below average performing group were naive beliefs of ability to learn. The results are discussed in perspective of sampling characteristics and there are recommendations suggested to improve teaching learning situations in Pakistani schools.