The value and importance of play for children's well-being, learning and development is evidenced by its inclusion within the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, and its increased policy and research presence on a national and international stage. However, with a need for educators and pupils to navigate a range of implicit tensions in…

Science learning takes place not only in the context of science class but also after class. Students' internal forms of motivation, such as curiosity and interest, affect the entire science learning process in both in-class and after-class contexts. In addition, both stable existing learner characteristics, such as science curiosity and interest…

As student enrollment in colleges across the United States continues to diversify, teaching and learning practices must keep pace with demographic shifts. The growing majority of today's college student body, dubbed post-traditional learners, is older, racially and ethnically diverse, more experienced in work and life, and stretched by competing…

In this dissertation, I will present social-cognitive frameworks that support the use of mental imagery for possible self enhancement; and articulate and evaluate a pedagogical intervention designed for the foreign language class. This intervention will allow students to explore and develop prominent and vivid mental representations (self-schemas)…

We acknowledge the existing educational inequalities that South Africa faces as a result of differences in developmental and equal educational opportunities. The aim with this study was to investigate the role of non-cognitive learning performance variables that affect the learning performance and success of secondary-school learners. Data were…

The research in this volume takes account of the context of policy promoting Chinese as a second language (CSL) in several countries and regions, (Australia, East Asia and South-East Asia), and the wider social context of multilingual and multicultural societies. Furthermore, this book reports results of two research studies which investigated how…

Research into second language acquisition (SLA) has shown that individual difference (ID) variables can be strong predictors of language achievement (e.g., Dornyei, 2003; Skehan, 2003). Traditionally, this research conceptualized ID variables as static and monolithic variables (e.g., Dornyei, 2010). More recently scholars have questioned this…

The exit examination from upper-secondary school represents an essential part of the educational trajectory. However, the transition to the labour market or higher education can be complicated by failure. The qualitative study deals with repeatedly unsuccessful students who have struggled to pass the Czech exit exam called the Matura examination.…

The aim of this study was to adapt the Tuckman Procrastination Scale for use with Azerbaijani adolescents and explore the relationships between procrastination, academic motivation and self-efficacy. Data were obtained from 718 adolescents in Azerbaijan whose ages ranged from 10 to 18 years (M = 13.61, SD = 1.86) through convenience sampling. As…

COVID-19 reveals the way single causes have multiple effects on children. Proponents of evidence-based education, like their colleagues in medicine, need to attend to the inevitable side effects produced by programs and policies. I explain why continuing motivation to learn is one outcome that no responsible evaluation should omit.

Undergraduate science students face immense pressure, both internally and externally, to achieve certain grades. Grade-focused interactions between students and instructors have anecdotally been reported to be increasing. However, no empirical study has yet evaluated students' grade perceptions or the prevalence of these interactions. If we want…

The Rasch/Guttman scenario (RGS) measurement approach is a promising test development methodology. The purpose of this study is to compare the RGS measure of primary school students' motivation against more traditional self-report scales. The Scenario Scale of Extrinsic Motivation toward Math (SSEM-M) and its traditional counterpart were…

Beyond the classroom experiences are useful learning endeavors designed to help students connect classroom learning to the real world (Kilgo et al., 2015). The purpose of this action research was to evaluate the effect of a technology-based blended learning system on student motivation and interest in participation in beyond the classroom…

Service-learning and undergraduate research experiences are high-impact practices that have become more common in the sciences, but the benefits of short-term experiences have not been thoroughly investigated. The purpose of this study was to compare within-semester gains for students in a short-term service-learning (SL) or short-term research…

Informed by a mixed methods research design, the study investigates the interrelations between students' attitudes toward English learning, English-medium instruction (EMI), and the use of their first language (i.e. code-switching) in relation to a range of biographic and contextual factors in their situated EMI programmes. The quantitative…