Background/purpose: Mathematics education develops critical thinking and problem-solving skills, yet middle school students often face challenges, including didactical, epistemological, and ontogenic obstacles, that influence their academic orientation. This study investigates how Self-Organizing Maps (SOMs) can address these challenges by…

The goal of this study was to examine how two groups of middle school students' self-efficacy, interest, goal orientation, and prior experience related to evidence of their building upon existing ideas and code in digital artifacts they created using MIT's App Inventor, a computational practice that Brennan and Resnick (2012) identified as…

We employed a mixed methods research design using survey data to examine gifted students' perceptions of implicit theories of intelligence, giftedness, need for cognition, and goal orientations. Eighty-one gifted middle-school students completed the Mindset Assessment Profile (MAP) plus open-ended questions concerning giftedness, expectations,…

Informal programs provide multiple pathways to STEM degrees and careers and support students' interest, engagement, attitude, motivation, and academic achievement in STEM. Examining high-achieving rural students' profiles in informal STEM settings using their cognitive and psychosocial characteristics is crucial to understanding and supporting…

The Professional Learning Department hosts an annual week-long orientation for various staff (e.g., teacher, elementary counselors, librarians) who are new to Austin Independent School District (AISD) as part of the Teacher Induction Program (TIP). This report summarizes survey results from staff who attended the Fall 2019 TIP orientation week.

Interpersonal relationships are central to adolescent well-being. The current research investigates interpersonal goal setting among a general sample of adolescents following a growth mindset intervention. This study qualitatively explores what interpersonal goals adolescents set, outcomes they aim to achieve, obstacles they perceive, and actions…

This study explored teachers' perceptions of their experiences participating in self-directed learning (Knowles, 1970, 1975). The teacher participants (n = 127) were guided through a self-directed learning framework for professional learning and reflected on their experiences. Findings indicate teachers reporting increased autonomy and…

Students' motivation plays an important role in successful science learning. However, motivation is a complex construct. Theories of motivation suggests that students' motivation must be conceptualized as a motivational system with numerous components that interact in complex ways and influence metacognitive processes such as self-evaluation. This…

This study applies latent profile analysis to identify profiles of adolescents differentiated on levels of relational aggression (RAgg), self-esteem, and narcissism. To understand the social aspects of these profiles within the adolescent peer context, we compare them to their reported social goals of dominance, popularity, and intimacy. Greek…

Goal orientation beliefs, self-efficacy, and beliefs about the role of the teacher in mathematics learning have been known as important factors in promoting students' success in mathematics. Beliefs can be shaped through four principles: mastery experience, vicarious experience, social persuasion, and physiological state. This study examined the…

In the classroom setting, social context and self-systems affect student engagement for school success. Students' perceived goal orientation of their teachers and grit influence their engagement in academic learning. However, adolescents' efforts for academic success related to teachers' goal orientation and grit remains under-researched in the…

Digital self-harm, the anonymous online posting, sending, or otherwise sharing of hurtful content about oneself, has not received the same amount of scholarly scrutiny as other forms of self-directed abuse. In the current paper, we analyze three independent national surveys of U.S. teens (aged 13-17, M = 14.96) in repeat cross-sectional studies…

Background: Students' social emotional competencies (SECs; also known as non-cognitive skills) are the skills or knowledge that allow them to successfully navigate social and academic environments such as self-management, social awareness, and relationship skills. Research has established cross-sectional associations between SECs and student…

Grade retention is one of the most discussed and controversial educational measures, and yet, it is still widely applied in many countries. Research investigating the effects of grade retention on students' psychosocial variables presents mixed findings, partly due to the variables assessed, methodological issues, and the length of the studies.…

The aim of the present cross-sectional study was to investigate the relationship between academic self-efficacy, life goals and subjective well-being of middle school students. The study group for the research comprised 434 middle school students. According to the findings, subjective well-being was correlated at a significant level with academic…