Tag Archives: SRL

03/19/14

SRL and The Physical Space

In speaking with practicing teachers, and in my own experience as well, I have come to understand that one very powerful way to encourage community and engagement in the classroom environment is to encourage that the students take ownership of their space. The classroom is their class. As a side benefit to encouraging closeness and community, this also is a great technique for keeping the physical space and materials in order. When students feel that they own their space, that they belong in it, I have come to believe that this will predict engagement, good peer relationships, and greater motivation to learn. I can encourage my students to take ownership in this way through a class constitution, daily jobs, and by making space for each student to work, and to have their work displayed. As well, the prepared environment is crucial, particularly in a Montessori context where students are working so independently of the teacher. Creating an inviting classroom full of materials and things to explore will encourage students to make choices for their learning, rather than the choice to disengage.

I’m of the mind that a good physical space will support learning, be that related to choice, to social and emotional needs, or simply by minimizing distractions. As well, what is essential for one may be good for all when it comes to student needs.

The Alberta Government has put together a wonderful go-to environmental checklist for classrooms. I was asked to complete one on two occasions during observations, and I found it to not only be potentially very useful to the teacher of a classroom, but also to guide my observation to details I may have overlooked.

The checklist can be found here, and asks crucial questions such as “Are signs and pictures at the eye level of students?”, and “Is a private, secluded space available where students can work quietly by themselves or use as a safe place to calm down?” I will definitely be referring to this checklist when I am setting up my classroom(s) in the future.

03/19/14

Self-Regulation Empowerment Program

Cleary, T. J., & Zimmerman, B. J. (2004). Self-regulation empowerment program: A school-based program to enhance selfregulated and self-motivated cycles of student learning. Psychology in the Schools, 41(5), 537-550.

This article discusses the implementation of an SRL empowerment program in which students were provided with strategies to help with self-regulation. The program tries to focus on supporting autonomy and SRL through support of self-efficacy. Examples are given of using evidence to prove to students that they are capable, with the right strategies, of success. In this way students come to believe themselves capable, and in turn become more successful.

03/19/14

Where Self-Regulation and Self-Efficacy Intersect

I am coming to realize that simply creating space for autonomy in the classroom is not sufficient for the development of it, or the subsequent benefits of it. I can provide choice to my students, but without sufficient scaffolding, those students may not experience success in their tasks. Cleary and Zimmerman describe the Self-Regulation Empowerment Program (SREP) which tries to nurture autonomy from a self-efficacy perspective (Cleary and Zimmerman, 2004). It is also becoming evident to me that choice and self-efficacy form a loop, for while success in tasks that involve choice require self-efficacy, self-efficacy is developed best by giving students the opportunity to succeed in tasks that involve choice. We are told that students who are not given sufficient academic and personal choices “may develop self-defeating cycles of self-motivational beliefs” (Eccles et. al., in Cleary and Zimmerman, 2004: 537). Ana is a student in the case-study outlined in this article. It is first established that Ana fits into the normal range in terms of her intellectual potential but that she had been using poor strategies (Cleary and Zimmerman, 2004: 545). Through the SREP, Ana graphs her grades and comes to understand that her success is determined by the ineffective strategies she had been using “rather than uncontrollable factors such as her ability, teacher difficulty, or test difficulty.” (Cleary and Zimmerman, 2004: 547) This graphing process strikes me as a particularly powerful tool because it attempts to prove to the student that they are capable without belittling them with meaningless (or possibly detrimental) praise. It gets to the core and with any luck influences the self-talk of the student. As well, this strategy puts control squarely back in the hands of the student: There is a solution to this problem, and it is within your [the student’s] power. It simultaneously promotes self efficacy and demands autonomy, tying the two together very tidily.

Along a similar thread, we look at how self-regulation and social-emotional learning in general are connected. Self-efficacy seems to me to be intricately connected to relationships and surrounding social conditions for many children. One interesting perspective on this topic that I have been reading about is that of Attachment Theory. Christi and David Bergin provide a highly informative and practical approach to supporting strong attachment in the classroom. While there is no way of ensuring that students develop attachment to you as a teacher, similar attachment encouraging behaviours can be used by the teacher to promote strong relationships that will encourages student well-being and success (Bergin & Bergin, 2009). Yet again, these authors demonstrate how important autonomy is in student learning, emphasizing that overbearing and controlling adult figures are counter-productive to strong attachments with children (Bergin & Bergin, 2009). On the flip side, secure attachment is associated with less dependency and children who are more willing to explore their environments, thus indulging their natural curiosity and learning on their own (Bergin & Bergin, 2009).

So. Take away message: Social-emotional learning matters. Feeling competent and feeling safe are also important in student engagement. Maybe choice isn’t all there is to it?

02/3/14

Do You Let Kids Fail?

This is one case from a book of case studies on co-operative learning. A chemistry teacher split her students into groups and had each group be responsible for one section of a unit in chemistry. When students were stuck or needed help she would not directly answer questions for them, but rather guided them with more questions. All but one of the groups succeeded in the task. The teacher did not step in to teach their section but rather had a class discussion about what could be done when a group didn’t get along. She let the students fail not only the project, but fail their colleagues who were still responsible for learning the material that they were supposed to teach.

Lotan, R. A., Shulman, J., & Whitcomb, J. A. (1998). Chapter One-Case Four: Do you let kids fail? In Groupwork in diverse
classrooms: A casebook for educators (pp. 24-29). New York: Teachers College Press.