Investigates the effects of choice and response format on children's search of informational text. Results reveal that choice of topic facilitated both performance and process measures, whereas response format affected process measures only. Prior knowledge emerged as a significant contributor to accuracy and time to locate information. (Contains…

Examines between-domain relations of self efficacy, task value, and achievement goal orientations among 424 Korean middle and high school students. Results provide strong support for the subject specificity of self efficacy, task value, and various achievement goals. Both middle and high school students expressed motivational orientations that…

Uses Dewey's concept of growth as "the ability to learn from experience" to discuss the learning histories of three male literacy learners. From this perspective, their progress toward goals, rather than achievement, is the primary focus. (Contains 30 references.) (SK)

A survey of 447 visitors to a Kansas zoo examined adult visitors' motivations for themselves and companions. In another survey, 118 zoo educators nationwide predicted visitor responses. Educators' predictions were fairly good for visitors' educational and recreational motives for attendance, less accurate for their social orientation, and poor…

This article presents a brief overview of developments in educational psychology over the last twenty-five years. It firstly presents an historical context by reviewing four basic emphases in educational psychology; cognitive psychology, behavioural psychology, social cognitive theory and humanism. The article then reviews the growth in cognitive…

Given the progressive loss of influence for the school relative to television in youngsters' everyday lives, this article describes the procedure and the results of including cartoons in the physics curriculum in secondary education. Work was carried out intensively with a small group of pupils and sporadically with a larger group. In the first…

This research attempted to discover the degree to which performance on assessments that have no direct consequences for individual students can be attributed to students' motivational states in addition to their underlying achievement in the domains measured. If such findings were reliable, it would allow us to correct underestimates of domain…

This study analyzes similarities and differences in students' motivation to learn based on nationally representative samples of 15-year-olds from 26 countries. Scales of extrinsic and intrinsic motivation proved to be equivalent across countries but there seems to be a shift in meaning at the country level. Focusing on functional relationships…

Your students can be learning over summer vacation with these fun activities from the web. School will soon be out and your students will start summer vacation. How can you minimize "summer learning loss" over those days that kids are not in school? This year, send your students home with a Learning Log to record fun summer learning. It?s…

In this article, the author discusses how to motivate students and put fun back in the classroom. Through the inservice training on a Basic Intensive Week in William Glasser's Choice Theory, he learns that human beings are motivated by five basic human needs, fun, being one of them, is the genetic reward for learning. However, what is fun for one…

This study interviewed 15 incarcerated African American males about their participation in correctional education. The data was considered in light of various motivation theories with particular emphasis on a sociocultural theory of motivation. The largest amount of data described non-educational reasons subjects participate in correctional…

This paper reports the initial results of a study that was designed to develop and test an instrument that could identify the elements of an individual's capacity for lifelong learning. We anticipated that the components of this capacity would include a complex mix of dispositions, lived experiences, social relations, values, attitudes and beliefs…

This study examined how grouping arrangements affect students' achievement, social interaction, and motivation. Students of high, average and low ability were randomly assigned to homogeneous or heterogeneous ability groups. All groups attended the same plant biology course. The main results indicate that low-ability students achieve more and are…

This article is about mainstreaming gender equality in adult basic learning and education (ABLE). Gender equality is defined as equal rights of both women and men to influence, participate in and benefit from a programme. It is argued that specific gender analyses of emerging patterns of gender relations is helpful in formulating gender equality…

To better inform and improve classroom teaching and learning, now more than ever before, educational researchers need to effectively and efficiently describe essential components of positive learning environments. In this article, we discuss how our research findings about motivation in classrooms have led to a closer examination of emotions. We…