Students’ views on competence and other factors affecting motivation

In this blog, I will briefly outline what students said about competence in relation to target grades and other factors.

Please note that student names have been changed for anonymity.

Target grades don’t match perceived competence

At several points through the focus group, students identified that there was a disparity between their target grades and their own personal goals. For example, Kyle commented that he thought his target grades were too high, whereas Eric said he thought that some of his target grades were too low. Stan later then supported this by saying he knows others who are both encouraged and discouraged by their target grades, for the reasons that the others had mentioned. If, as Kyle and Stan suggest, some students are discouraged by what they see as exceedingly high target grades, they are regularly told they’re not working hard enough or performing well enough to achieve their target grade, then this may lead to a culture whereby students don’t believe their competence can ever meet expectations. Conversely, if students perceive their target grades to be too low and are led to believe that they cannot exceed these, then one could argue this is more detrimental than helpful to the attainment of the students.

Relatedness for competence-building

Two of the key pillars of self-determination theory are relatedness and competence. Kyle and Heidi agreed that being in an ability group or in the proximity of competent students, then they felt they pushed themselves harder to build their own competence to “keep up with them” (Kyle). This may be aided in part by students supporting each other, as discussed by Wendy and Eric. Wendy acknowledged that she (and others) have areas of strength and weakness across the curriculum, and so help each other where possible. The relatedness in terms of classroom experience and tasks set, in these cases, have directly led to students building their own competence and confidence.

Time availability and academic competence

Four of the five students in this focus group highlighted difficulty in managing their time, and the negative effect this could have on their academic competence. As a result of playing sport (for three students) or playing multiple musical instruments (for the fourth), students pointed out their reduced potential time allocation for completing schoolwork outside the classroom, including homework and independent study. The students continued to discuss that they still tried to complete their work as set, however they perceived that they had less time to build their competence compared to their peers since they more frequently found themselves “cramming” (Eric and Kyle).

This point builds on what students said earlier in the focus group about autonomy in time-management, which you can read more about here.

Competence fluctuation within and between subjects

This happens as a result of students struggling with foundational concepts and therefore can’t build competence with reliant concepts. Responses throughout the focus group give indications as to why this may be the case, including teaching style, inherent interest in the topic (or lack thereof), as well as external factors such as provision of a workspace at home or support from peers. This may help to explain why students put ‘competence’ as their least important factor for motivation to study compared to other factors mentioned during focus group; extreme variation means it cannot be relied on for motivation. Clear that it was the least important but not unimportant.

More to come in all of these themes…