Readiness to Learn: First-Year Biology Students’ Outlook on the Study Process in Higher Education

Author(s):

Rita Birzina(presenting / submitting)Dagnija Cedere

Conference:

ECER 2016

Network:

11. Educational Improvement and Quality Assurance

Format:

Paper

Session Information

11 SES 13, Paper Session

Paper Session

Time:

2016-08-26

13:30-15:00

Room:

OB-E2.14

Chair:

Samuel Gento

Contribution

The most popular fields of education chosen by new entrants into tertiary programmes are social sciences, business and law in all OECD countries. Science-related fields, which include science and engineering, manufacturing and construction, are less popular. On average, only a quarter of all students enters these fields (OECD, 2013, p. 330, 335). There is an importance to promote students' studies in these fields. Statistical data shows that there are a large number of dropouts, especially from science programmes. The variation between countries is huge. In Italy, every third adult who enrolled in tertiary education dropped out compared to just every sixth adult in Germany and the UK. Countries like Poland, Sweden and Ireland meet the country average with every fifth person having dropped out of tertiary education (Schnepf, 2014, p.11). Especially topical dropout problem is directly of the first year students, so it is important to find out how prepared are students for higher studies.

The significant decrease in the number of students has lately caused additional problems in Latvia, therefore, higher education institutions face less prepared students than before. This results in the fact that great differences in terms of prior knowledge and learning skills are observed in the first year of studies, which hinders considerably the implementation of a unified study process. Many first year students are unable to adapt to studying in higher education institutions. This study year approximately 22% of the future biologists dropped the faculty. In order to ensure studies at the Faculty of Biology it is important to find out reasons why students fail to cope with the study objectives (Birzina & Cedere, 2015).

The present paper reveals the first year students’ readiness for studies in the context of three learning dimensions: content, incentive and interaction. As K. Illeris (2007, 2009) points out all learning always includes three dimensions: (1) the content dimension of knowledge, understandings, skills, (2) the incentive dimension of emotions, feelings, motivation and volition, and (3) the social dimension of interaction, communication and cooperation.

In the current paper, the authors analyse knowledge and skills, which contribute to building up the learner’s understanding. The emotional or incentive dimension described in terms of emotions, feelings and motivations, and the social dimension linked to external interaction such as participation in actions, communication and co-operation.

These three learning dimensions are seen in a holistic view - as unified analysis of the learning process from school to university studies.

The purpose of the study is to explore how ready first year students for studies are. The following research questions were put forward:

What are the factors of school learning process which helps students adapt to studying more easy?
Which factors during school years have created problems for getting ready to studying?

Method

The present research was conducted during the implementation of the studies in year 2015 at the Faculty of Biology, University of Latvia. The sample comprised the first year students of the Bachelor programme: 35 students of the course Introduction into Studies and 27 students of the course Chemistry. Students were divided into 6 groups according to the school final examination assessment in biology and chemistry. Out of 35 students 6 were male and 29 – female, but out of 27 students 7 were male, 20 – female. The data have been obtained in written structured interviews applying an open questionnaire as a tool. The method of obtaining qualitative data was selected because qualitative research is a holistic approach that involves discovery (Creswell, 1994) and social phenomena are investigated from the participants’ viewpoint. While the quantitative method provides an objective measure of reality, the qualitative method allows the researcher to explore and better understand the complexity of a phenomenon (Williams, 2007). K. Illeris’s (2007, 2009) three dimensions of learning: Cognitive (knowledge, understanding and skills), Emotional (volition, feelings and motivation), and Social (types of interaction: participation as action, communication and co-operation) for theoretical background were used. Based on these insights, the authors develop a code system. The program AQUAD 7.0 was used for processing of qualitative data. After coding the qualitative data they were converted into quantitative considering the coding system developed. A Kruskal-Wallis nonparametric test was conducted to discover statistically significant differences among six students’ groups in the three learning dimensions. For finding of differences among students’ groups the Test Statistics presented the Chi-square value (Kruskal-Wallis H), the degrees of freedom and the significance level was used.

Expected Outcomes

The following conclusions based on the theoretical findings and data obtained can be drawn. Students’ understanding of learning in context of three learning dimensions – cognitive, emotional and social, as well as their prior knowledge in biology and chemistry demonstrates their readiness to study. There are statistically significant differences among various students’ groups in all the three learning dimensions – Content, Incentive and Interaction. The most significant differences are as follows: students’ comprehension of knowledge acquisition process (p=0.00), insufficiency of prior knowledge (p=0.033) in chemistry, students’ motivation (p=0.002) to acquire the exact science (biology, not chemistry) and positive emotions (p=0.002), as well as previous negative collaboration (p=0.002) with teacher has a significant impact on student, both in cognitive and emotional sphere. Students who have had higher assessment in final examinations have expressed interest in biology during the school years and have learned it additionally have sufficient knowledge in biology to start successfully their studies at the Faculty of Biology. The problem is that during the first year studies, students also have to acquire chemistry, physics and mathematics and part of students have poor prior knowledge in these subjects. It is especially problematic for students who have had lower assessment in chemistry at school (5–7 grades). Key factors that determine successful studies are personal interest related to liking of learning biology as students chosen speciality as well as purposeful action already during the school years acquiring biology additionally, participating in the subject Olympiads. The teacher’s role is also emphasized. Factors hindering the studies are unsuccessful learning experience and the attitude to learning – pupils often had been lazy to learn. One of the negative factors is the communication with classmates who had been unwilling to learn biology and chemistry therefore there had been discipline problems in the class.

References

Birzina, R. and Cedere, D. (2015). The 1st Year Students' Readiness for Studies: the Case of the Faculty of Biology at University of Latvia. 1st International Baltic Symposium on Science and Technology Education (BalticsSTE2015) "State-of-the-Arts and Future Perspective", Šiauliai, 15-18 June, 2015: proceedings Šiauliai: Scientia Socialis, 2015 P.17-19. ISBN 9786099551326. Creswell, J. W. (1994). Research design: Qualitative and quantitative approaches. Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE Publications. Illeris, K. (2007). How We Learn: Learning and non-learning in school and beyond. London / New York: Routledge. Illeris, K. (2009). A comprehensive understanding of human learning. In Contemporary theories of learning: learning theorists — in their own Words. London / New York: Routledge. OECD (2014). Education at a Glance 2014: OECD Indicators, OECD Publishing. http://dx.doi.org/10.1787/eag-2014-en Schnepf V. S. (2014) Do Tertiary Dropout Students Really Not Succeed in European Labour Markets? IZA Discussion Paper No. 80 15 March 2014 (revised October 2014) Bonn: Joint Research Centre, European Commission, University of Southampton and IZA Williams, C. (2007). Research Methods. Journal of Business & Economic Research, 5(3), 65-71.

Author Information

Rita Birzina (presenting / submitting)

University of Latvia

Institute og Pedagogical Sciences

Riga

Dagnija Cedere