Determining learning stratagies and motivation level of students in primary schools’ second level and high schools according to course and class level

Abstract

Academic motivation and learning strategies are important factors to be successful in formal education process. Students who are motivated and select and use appropriate learning strategies be able to be successful in formal education process and life long learning. For this reason, investigating the students’ motivation and learning strategies subscale scores according to course types and class levels are very important. The purpose of this study was to reveal primary and secondary school students’ positions relating to expectancy, value and affect as motivational factors and cognitive, metacognitive and resource management as learning strategies factors. Two subscales of expectancy components are students’ perceptions of self efficacy and control beliefs for learning. Three subscales measuring the value beliefs are intrinsic goal orientation, extrinsic goal orientation and task value. The third motivational construct is affect, and it is measured by scale of test anxiety. The scales measuring use of cognitive strategies are rehearsal, elaboration and critical thinking. The second general category is metacognitive strategies which are measured by one subscale concerning the use of strategies that help students control and regulate their own cognition. The third general strategy category is resource management which includes managing study environment and time, effort management, peer learning and help seeking. The sample of the study was 12-18-year-old students in Ankara with three primary schools and three secondary schools. Secondary schools were limited with general high school, Anatolian high school and science high school. The scale was administrated to 1150 students and analysis was done on valid data of 792 students for motivation subscale and 1110 students for learning strategies subscale. Motivated Strategies for Learning Questionnaire which was originally developed by Pintrich, Smith, Garcia and McKeachie (1991), adopted into 12-18 year old students by Büyüköztürk, Akgün, Karadeniz, Kılıç and Demirel (2007) was used for collecting the data.  According to results, students’ motivational factors and level of learning strategies generally decrease by increasing class levels.