Dr. Paul Nolting's Academic Success Press Blog: A Publication Dedicated to Math Success |
Dr. Paul Nolting's Academic Success Press Blog: A Publication Dedicated to Math Success |
Revisiting Bloom and the Importance of Affective Characteristics in Developmental Math Courses4/9/2015 As many in the field of developmental education likely already know, psychologist Benjamin Bloom first published his famous “Taxonomy of Educational Objectives” in 1956. Within this incredibly important document (and its subsequent revisions), Bloom, among many other achievements, deconstructed the importance of learning variables and assigned them value-based percentages, which created a hierarchy of sorts for the factors involved in the learning process. According to Bloom, the major variables that contribute to academic success are: IQ and cognitive entry skills (50%), quality of instruction (25%) and student affective characteristics (25%).
For years, we at Academic Success have used these percentages in our books and multimedia. For now, they remain the standard in educational psychology. According to a new study, however, Bloom may have greatly underestimated the role of one of these variables, at least as it pertains to developmental math courses. In a study conducted in 2013, Zientek, Ozel, Fong and Griffin (2013) indicated that affective variables contribute to 41% of developmental math grade variance. According to the aforementioned authors, the following variables, among others, add up to account for over 41% of grade variance for students in developmental math courses: attendance, beliefs in resource management strategies, beliefs in motivational strategies, repeating a mathematics course, beliefs in self-regulated learning, students’ interpretations of how often teachers explained to student what will happen if they do not complete their homework, and beliefs in meeting others’ expectations. This study provides hard data for what many of us already know through our first hand experiences with students: study skills, self-efficacy and persistence are what ultimately tip the scales for students teetering on the edge of failure. This is especially true for students in non-traditional and online courses, which require students to become better independent learners. For more information on this subject—particularly the other nine variables the authors used to determine their percentages, please see: Zientek, L. R. , Ozel, Z. E. Y, Fong, C. J. & Griffin, M. (2013). Student Success in developmental mathematics courses. Community College Journal of Research and Practice, 17, 990-1010.
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AuthorDr. Nolting is a national expert in assessing math learning problems, developing effective student learning strategies, assessing institutional variables that affect math success and math study skills. He is also an expert in helping students with disabilities and Wounded Warriors become successful in math. He now assists colleges and universities in redesigning their math courses to meet new curriculum requirements. He is the author of two math study skills texts: Winning at Math and My Math Success Plan. Blog HighlightsAmerican Mathematical Association of Two-Year Colleges presenter, Senior Lecturer-Modular Reader Contributions
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