Students’ self-regulated learning at home during pandemic-related school closures

• Applicant: Dr. Ilka Wolter
• Subject Area: Developmental and Educational Psychology ; General and Domain-Specific Teaching and Learning
• Term: from 2021 to 2023
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 470282638

Students, families, and teachers were facing manifold demands to reorganize learning at home under varying supervision due to the pandemic-related school closures. Not only teachers but also parents were confronted with challenges and were sometimes struggling with adequately supporting children. Students often had to self-organize and self-regulate their learning in these times, yet success in coping with learning at home was not always achieved. For the planning and implementation of further measures and support it is therefore important to contemplate the conditions for successful learning and to identify students who are struggling under these circumstances. Given the long period of solo learning at home with huge variations in students’ characteristics, families’ support, teachers’ specifications, and the nature of the (digital) material and tools, it seems of utmost importance to reflect on necessary support and structure for the self-regulated learning process and to emphasize the quality of learning materials and instruction.The project aims at:1) Comparing primary and secondary school students' coping with learning at home as well as their parents’ reports of ways of communication with school, (digital) learning activities, and satisfaction with learning material in relation to two periods of learning at home in 2020, and about one year later in 2021;2) Placing special emphasis on students’ willingness to exert effort and learning enjoyment before, during, and eventually after the nationwide school closures and in relation to potential effects of learning contexts, and school-related factors;3) Identifying students at risk for struggling with learning at home considering socio-economic background, gender, prior performance, and motivation.Analyses will be based on longitudinal data from the German National Educational Panel Study (NEPS; Blossfeld, Roßbach & von Maurice, 2011) with two cohorts of students who were either in primary school or secondary school during the pandemic-related school closures. Since the information was gathered before and during the pandemic, we substantially expand our knowledge on prerequisites of different levels for successful learning at home and we will be able to identify students at risk. We will examine students’ willingness to exert effort and their learning enjoyment as well as individual characteristics as indicators of coping with challenges and of motivation to learn during periods of learning at home. Moreover, our project includes prerequisites of individuals as well as characteristics of families, and (to a certain extent for these cohorts) of schools and teaching to enhance our understanding of individuals’ learning processes in the pandemic. To that effect, the project focuses on the relevant factors for self-regulated learning with the goal to reflect on pedagogical implications for teachers and parents.

• DFG Programme: Research Grants