• Nem Talált Eredményt

the learning of students, and how did we develop the introductory, learning support course?

The fi ndings of our research demonstrate that students enter the training programme with rather positive sentiments towards learning, and anxiety, boredom and apathy are less characteristic of them. Their approach to learning is one that aims at application (the conception of knowledge application). They do not fi nd the regulation strategies of learning so relevant at the beginning of the training programme; the mean values for these scales are low. Nevertheless, in terms of the formation of the regulation strategies we found that strengthening the conception of knowledge construction is a key factor, as a) the conception of knowledge construction is related to the uncertainty of regulation which means that students realise the problems that emerge in terms of regulation at the beginning of the training programme;

b) only the conception of knowledge construction is positively related to self-regulation. Based on all this, in the framework of the Effective learning course 1) we made an effort to provide personalised support to the small number of students who could be characterised by anxiety or apathy, and formed the most risky group in terms of the continuation of studies; 2) in connection with the problems emerging in the fi eld of self-regulated learning we gradually chose less and less complex learning activities that could be more easily grasped by the incoming students; and fi nally, 3) for the sake of the indirect support of self-regulated learning we also strengthened knowledge construction learning activities, e.g. by elaborating the aspects of refl ective, self-evaluating learning activities, by collecting learning methods for the comprehensive reading of professional literature.

In addition, the fi ndings of the Learning pattern questionnaire also demonstrate that the role of peers in terms of learning conceptions is undifferentiated, i.e. the students do not isolate behaviours when their peers play a role in knowledge construction, in interaction or as external aid.

As this fi eld has a fundamental connection to the output competencies of students and their learning activity throughout the training programme, on the Effective learning course we provided more and more learning activities, content and professional literature in support of making students conscious of, and practice for cooperative learning. Even though during the next phases of the training programme they gave account of a sense of success in terms of activities where cooperation was necessary, we think that it would

be important in the programme to plan the role of peers in learning more consciously and refl ectively (e.g. in a way that the activities that require cooperation gradually become more diffi cult and build on the preceding one), mainly because in the case of such activities students do not feel that they receive substantial support.

In summary, we think that the questionnaire based research of the students provided aspects that are well interpretable and useful for the prompt reactions, development and reconsideration of the bachelor introductory course, however, this very focus may have made developments more diffi cult. Especially as we attempted to solve problems in the framework of the introductory course which were beyond its scope (e.g. supporting self-regulated learning).

3.2. What kind of lessons can be drawn from the aspect of developing the programme?

Based on the questionnaire-based research and the results of the continuous development of the course we conceive that it is necessary to reconsider the functions of the introductory course(s)10 in the training programme.

Our introductory course mostly paid attention to the previous educational experience of the incoming students, and focused on making students aware of the tensions between higher education and their previous learning experience. In the light of this the course sought connections with other introductory courses (e.g. Library-informatics and statistics; Learning, communication, society), making an effort to support the introductory phase of university studies as complete and coherent as possible. However, the introductory phase received few conscious and systematic feedbacks from the next phases of studies, and unfortunately we did not transmit our results either to the teachers of the courses in the upper years. All in all, we still think that it is highly important that in higher education there ought to be a kind of introductory phase which comprises several courses and activities, and supports the learning of students by raising awareness of and refl ecting upon the learning characteristics of the given course, in addition, it supports and makes students practice these new types of learning activities. On the other hand, it is necessary to directly build on this introductory phase during the subsequent studies, otherwise this introductory phase does not become an organic part of the training programme. Today we think that this tighter relationship can be strengthened by further accumulation and interpretation of data in connection with students’ learning characteristics

10 During the reconsideration of the content and subject structure of the training programme the Effective learning course itself melted into other courses, into the Introduction to higher education studies on the one hand, and Education experience and conceptions on the other hand. For more details, see Chapter 8.

and communicating results to the teachers in the next phases of university studies, and also, if we connect the fi elds developed by the introductory phase more organically to the output competencies of the major. That is if we connect such key competencies as the ability to learn or cooperation in a targeted and well-elaborated manner, and if we build on one another by the development of the competencies of the major.

We consider it as a further result of the development connected to the introductory phase that we regularly collected data on the learning of incoming students, which can be utilised for the well-grounded development of the training programme. According to our results, in the consecutive years (the two examined years) the affective and metacognitive characteristics of the students entering the bachelor training programme in Education did not differ signifi cantly, which means that the programme can base its developments on relatively constant learning characteristics. On the other hand, the results justifi ed that the training programme could react to the learning experience of students in a fl exible and adaptive way: the second year sensed more success in connection with writing self-refl ection and creating the portfolio, which indicates that the training programme reacted effectively to the initial problems of the fi rst year, as we made an effort to support these apparently critical activities in the case of the second year.

Nevertheless, we could detect this prompt reaction only in connection with some critical learning assignments which can be explained by several factors. On the one hand, we did not collect such comprehensive set of data on the students’ learning experience as we did in the case of initial learning characteristics; on the other hand, the research results were not thoroughly and widely discussed, which was benefi cial as we could implement changes in the case of problems that could be grasped clearly and solved easily. We think that now there should be another way of obtaining information about students’ learning experience in the training programme, as such more diffi cult learning organisational problems like supporting self-regulated learning or planning the interrelation of key competencies and learning results cannot be investigated with the help of the present questionnaire (SQ-4). We continue the research in connection with learning characteristics in the framework of the training programme, this way we are going to have results about every year and about the possible differences between years, which would be worthwhile to share with members of the Institute, and also to suggest that on the institute meetings about training and education we may build on these results.

Although now we think that our investigations could have been incorporated more fi rmly in the development of teaching at the bachelor training programme in Education, the course-level developments we provided as an answer to the research results are pioneering and well-grounded in our

opinion. As the course-level prompt changes and reactions could test such directions and practices on a small scale, that, in case they work out well, can be extended to the whole training programme (e.g. the constructivist learning theory approach to reading professional literature; assessing, refl ecting on learning). Nevertheless, there are such fi elds of student support (e.g. self-regulated learning, supporting cooperative learning) the success of which was weakened by being attached to the introductory course, and it would have been worthwhile to reconsider the whole training programme in the framework of a comprehensive learning support system in the very beginning. Without that, the individual course-level developments remained incidental, they did not support one another, they did not interconnect and did not jointly build on the fi ndings of the research.

We supported the students’ self-regulated learning on the introductory course by learning methods, by providing aspects for self-assessment and by discussing these together, but we failed to aid the students in the gradual process of becoming more autonomous in planning their learning, as that exceeded the limitations of the half-year course. On top of that, with the implementation of the training programme several intentions emerged in the fi rst hand that focused on self-regulated learning: e.g. the mentor system, supporting the creation of the portfolio, the recurring clarifi cation and interpretation of the concept, purpose and content of refl ection on several courses. Moreover, it also appears to be a step ahead that students experienced the most support from the teachers in terms of assignments that can aid self-regulation: research planning, fi eldwork planning, organising, writing self-refl ection. But these good practices did not build on one another, and thus one of the basic conditions for successful learning in higher education, which is supporting self-regulated learning, could not become a structural-level strategy.

Finally, in terms of the introductory learning support programmes we cannot neglect the aspect of extending support to every student, and parallel to this the aspect of personalisation. The support programmes of the introductory phase appeared in higher education in order to support every student so that they do not drop out from the training programme. For this reason, for the students, who arrive with various learning experience and characteristics, besides providing support in becoming more conscious in their learning, in the development of their self-knowledge, we provided personalised feedback in connection with their learning (e.g. discussing questionnaires, written assessments). However, we should have traced the members of the most risky group of students (e.g. students feeling anxiety or apathy) for a longer period of time, even beyond the course. But for such a long term, personalised support, a consciously constructed, programme-level strategy is needed, which can be initiated mainly along the mentor

system, the support of the creation of the portfolio and the harmonisation of the introductory courses.

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“I had the impression that the Education majors entering the training programme are curious and scared. I held one of the fi rst courses titled:

Learning, communication, socialisation with two of my colleagues. We were all beginners in the new Bachelor training programme in Education. In the course of planning the training programme we paid special attention to make sure that the course functions well in terms of shaping the approach of students, and that by building on the prior experience of students we can shape their personal and emerging professional convictions to a more conscious level. The introductory course appeared to be a perfect setting for this, as we elaborated on the most important concepts determining Pedagogy with the intention of approaching the professional terminology from a student perspective. There were diffi culties in starting up the conversation. They were sitting neatly in rows, ready to take notes and I had the feeling that they were really looking forward to learning Pedagogy but they did not understand what we were talking about had to do with science. Similarly, they did not understand that their own knowledge was going to be the most important starting point.” (Personal experience of a teacher)

1. THE CONTENT JUNCTIONS OF THE CHAPTER

In this chapter we present three of the inquiries we made in the framework of the action research. What they have in common is that all three place students in the centre of attention. Although these three parts could make separate chapters, we handle them together as each inquiry follow a logical line starting from the prior expectations of students, through the diffi culties they have in connection with learning, to the subjective feelings and status (well-being) they experienced at the training programme. The research team clearly focused on the opinions of students in connection with the training