Students’ Agency Experiences and Perceived Pedagogical Quality in University Courses

Author(s):

Päivikki Jääskelä(presenting / submitting)Kati Vasalampi Päivi Häkkinen Anna-Maija Poikkeus Helena Rasku-Puttonen

Conference:

ECER 2017

Network:

22. Research in Higher Education

Format:

Paper

Session Information

22 SES 09 C,

Paper Session

Time:

2017-08-24

13:30-15:00

Room:

K5.09

Chair:

Jaakko Kauko

Contribution

Fostering agency as a core component of professionalism is seen as an important task and challenge of higher education. Studies on work-related learning (e.g. Littleton, Taylor & Eteläpelto, 2012; Paloniemi & Collin, 2012; Tynjälä, 2010) emphasise the meaning of agency in expert work with increasing call for creativity, collaboration and dynamism. Agency has a key role in lifelong learning and in coping with uncertainty and changes in working life (Su, 2011). Existing literature (Barnett, 2009; Trede, Macklin & Bridges, 2012), however, claims that universities typically focus on content-based knowledge construction of individual learners and do not prepare students for engaging purposively with the complex world and dealing with pressures of power relations and external influences. Rather than a stable state, agency is conceived as dynamic and contextual in nature (cf., Emirbayer & Mische, 1998), and it has been suggested that agency could be supported by reciprocal and dialogic relations between the teacher and students (Greeno, 2006; Lipponen & Kumpulainen, 2011), learners’ mutual power relations (Eteläpelto et al., 2005), their capacity to work together (Edwards, 2005), and opportunities to make choices, to influence and to participate (Eteläpelto et al., 2005; Lipponen & Kumpulainen, 2011). There is a need for research on students’ experiences of agency in order to develop pedagogy and guidance practices that support students’ agency construction. In addition, deeper understanding is needed of university courses as learning environments (e.g. in terms of pedagogy and tools for learning). Recent theoretical approaches on learning emphasise meaningful learning environments in which students can get engaged in solving authentic, ill-structured and complex problems fostering deep, inquiry-based learning (Bransford et al., 2006). The prerequisites for deep learning include individual learning skills (Zimmerman & Schunk, 2011) and collaborative knowledge construction (Roschelle, 2013).

Recently the authors (Jääskelä, Poikkeus, Vasalampi, Valleala & Rasku-Puttonen, 2016) developed a model and a quantitative assessment instrument focusing on university students’ agency. In the model agency in higher education is defined “in terms of access to (and use of) resources for purposeful action in study contexts, i.e. personal, relational (i.e., interactional), and context-specific resources to engage in intentional and meaningful action and learning, as experienced or interpreted by students. The instrument conceptualise agency as students’ perceptions of personal, relational and participatory resources and opportunities for practicing agency in the courses. Personal resources capture aspects of efficacy and competence beliefs. Relational factors comprise, in particular, power relations between the teacher and students, and experiences of trust and support in the learning situations. Participatory resources refer to factors such as teacher’s pedagogical choices, student interest, and available peer resources facilitating reciprocity and dialogue, and equal opportunities for participation, and making choices and influencing.

The present study investigates university students’ experiences of agency in a set of higher education courses and seeks to identify agency profiles among students. We are also interested in how the pedagogical quality of the courses, as perceived by students, contributes to students’ agency experiences. Thus, the following research questions were set:

1. What kinds of agency profiles emerge among students?

2. To what extent are students’ agency experiences associated with student-perceived pedagogical quality of the courses?

Method

The data were collected using the Agency of University Students (AUS) Scale (Jääskelä et al., 2016). The original AUS scale with 10 dimensions and 54 items was modified by adding some items, thus, constituting a total of 60 items. Each dimension included three to seven items rated using a five-point Likert scale (1 = fully disagree, 2 = partly disagree, 3 = neither agree nor disagree, 4 = partly agree and 5 = fully agree). In addition, students were asked to respond to 12 items concerning pedagogical quality of the course using a four-point Likert scale (1 = not at all, 2 = rarely, 3 = sometimes and 4 = a lot). Items constituting student ratings of pedagogical quality were created based on recent theoretical emphases regarding optimal learning environments, and they measured the extent to which certain learning elements were included in the course. A total of 270 university students, who participated in courses at the University of Jyväskylä, filled in the questionnaire at the end of their course. The respondents represented natural sciences, education, humanities, sport and health sciences. Student ratings of pedagogical quality of the courses were analysed using mean values of the aggregated scale. CFA analysis was conducted to examine the factor structure of student ratings of agency in the present data. CFA using 11 factors (set a priori, residuals allowed to correlate) resulted in an acceptable model fit (χ2(1529; n = 270) = 2527.96, p<.001; CFI = 0.860; TLI = 0.849; RMSEA = 0.05; SRMR = 0.071). Newly added items were examined and preliminary reliabilities for the scales based on 58 items were determined. The final model consists of the following three domains of agency, and their respective dimensions: personal resources (2 dimensions; Self-efficacy, and Competence beliefs); relational resources (3 dimensions; Equal treatment, Teacher support, and Trust); and participatory resources (5 dimensions; Participation activity, Opportunities to influence, and Opportunities to make choices, Interest, and Utilisation of peer resource). Next, latent profile analysis was conducted to identify different profiles of agency. For choosing the best fitting model, the Bayesian information criterion (BIC), Vuong-Lo-Mendell-Rubin (VLMR) and adjusted Lo–Mendell–Rubin likelihood ratio tests were used as the statistical criteria. One-way ANOVAs were conducted in order to validate the emergent profiles by comparing them on various criterion variables. Finally, Pearson’s correlation analysis were utilised to examine relations between the agency dimensions and the pedagogical quality of the course.

Expected Outcomes

Four profiles emerged showing variation with respect to agency. Profile 1 represented a generally low level and Profile 4 a generally high level of agency compared to the other profiles. Statistically significant differences were found between Profiles 2 and 3: students in Profile 2 reported a lower level of relational resources of agency (the dimensions of Equal treatment, Teacher support, and Trust), but a higher level of participatory resources of agency (the dimensions of Participation activity, Interest, Opportunities for Influence, and Utilisation of peer resources) than students in Profile 3. Within all profiles, the lowest levels emerged in participatory resources of agency, regarding the dimensions of Opportunities to make choices, Opportunities for influence and Participation activity. Correlation analyses showed significant associations between student-perceived pedagogical quality of the courses and most of the factors of agency. The highest positive correlations were found between pedagogical quality and Opportunities for Influence (r = .64), Participation activity (r = .67), Interest (r = .56), Utilisation of peer resources (r = .52), and Ease of participation (r = .48), which all represent participatory resources of agency. The results suggest that students who perceived the quality of the course environment as high, experienced that they could influence the course, they play an active role in learning situations, and found the other students as supportive in learning. In order to foster students’ agency, pedagogical practices are needed which engage students in active participation, facilitate collaboration with peers and allow them to influence the course. Furthermore, it would be important to increase students’ awareness of their own agency during studies. Thus, there is a need to develop tools for assessing student agency, collecting and analysing the data on agency profiles to inform and aid in development of pedagogical practices, as well as providing feedback to the students themselves.

References

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