What does a successful self-regulated learner look like? A case study of more able students victoria.stone@education.ox.ac.uk victoria.stone@thebicesterschool.org.uk

School Context Mixed, comprehensive 11-18 school, which is part of a MAT. Identified as “good” by latest Ofsted result Maths department has a particular focus on closing the attainment gap for more able/pupil premium students not MA, PP MA or MA/PP Year 7 29% 31% Year 8 6% Year 9 30% 10% Year 10 15% 18% Percentage of students underachieving in last summative test (March 2018)

Self-regulated learning There is a lot of literature on self-regulated learning and the skills this encompasses. Planning Monitoring Acting “Learning” Definition of SRL: active participant, metacognitively monitoring, regulating and controlling their motivation and behaviour in the process of learning while working towards a measurable goal (Zimmerman,1989) Evaluating Zimmerman, 1989; Paris & Paris, 2001; Pintrich, 2004

Research Questions Which self-regulated learning strategies do (successful/underachieving) MA students use in class? How do (successful/underachieving) MA students perceive their approach to work? Where do they acquire their approaches? How do (successful/underachieving) MA students perceive homework in relation to their learning?

Methodology Limitations Observations of 3 students from year 7 and 3 students from year 10 Interviews with all six students Limitations Year Student FFT Assessment 1 2 3 4 7 A 8 B 9 C 5 6 10 X Y Z

Results Observations

Results Observations

Which self-regulated learning strategies do (successful/underachieving) MA students use in class? few opportunities for “planning” strategies successful MA students use “monitoring” and “evaluating” strategies, especially involving marking and error-correcting underachieving MA students use fewer “evaluating” strategies differences in year groups: successful MA students in year 10 act spontaneously as a result of monitoring or evaluation

How do (successful/underachieving) MA students perceive their approach to work? MA students use a variety of self-regulation strategies and can explain articulately what these are, but not where they acquired them Successful MA students are aware of why they use different self- regulated approaches to learning Successful MA students prefer to work independently, using self- regulation strategies before seeking help MA students do not evaluate the approaches themselves, which might contribute to underachievement in some pupils Successful MA Year 10 students are more likely to use monitoring strategies than underachieving MA year 10 students or successful MA year 7 students Students recognise their confidence may result in less effective self- regulation (negative evaluative feedback)

How do (successful/underachieving) MA students perceive homework in relation to their learning? All MA students self-regulate while doing homework, but do not recognise this Year 7 MA students’ parents reduce the use of self-regulation at home Year 7 MA students feel homework contributes to their learning as they get to practise topics Year 10 MA students feel homework in general is unhelpful as it prevents them from focusing on topics or subjects they struggle with or want to work on independently Year 10 MA students regard homework and revision as distinct

Final thoughts Developing use of self-regulation strategies without overconfidence Providing opportunities for the use of planning and monitoring strategies Homework

(some) References