Thesis (M. Com. (Accountancy))--University of the Witwatersrand, Faculty of Commerce, Law and Management, School of Accountancy, 2014. / This paper reports the findings of an action research intervention designed to explore the student experiences of a lecturer’s role-modelling specific cognitive self-regulated learning (SRL) skills on third year Financial Accounting students’ motivation and strategies for learning. The intervention involved a series of enrichment tutorials with a pilot group of Financial Accounting III students at the University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg. A mixed methods research approach was used in the study. Qualitative data was collected in the form of verbal and written feedback from group participants and the lecturer’s research diary. Quantitative data was gathered by means of the Motivated Strategies for Learning Questionnaire (MSLQ), which was used to measure the students’ motivations and strategies for learning before and after the intervention. The intervention involved a lecturer role-modelling specific learning skills through the use of active learning activities. The skills role-modelled focussed on the following MSLQ learning strategies: rehearsal, organisation, elaboration, critical thinking, meta-cognitive self-regulation, and time and study environment management. Results suggest that role-modelling in an active learning environment does help students to implement SRL skills and experience the value of using the skills. Students reported making changes to their learning approaches to Financial Accounting III as a result of the intervention. Additionally the study identified the need for students to be taught the academic discourse of financial accounting within the course content.

Abstract This study focuses on the process of self-regulated learning by investigating in detail how learners engage in self-regulated and strategic learning when studying in g/nStudy learning environments. The study uses trace methods to enable recognition of temporal patterns in learners’ activity that can signal strategic and self-regulated learning. The study comprises three data sets. In each data set, g/nStudy technology was used to support and trace self-regulated learning. In the analysis, micro-analytical protocols along with qualitative approach were favoured to better understand the process of self-regulated and strategic learning in authentic classroom settings. The results suggested that the specific technological tools used to support strategic and self-regulated learning can also be used methodologically to investigate patterns emerging from students’ cognitive regulation activity. The advantage of designing specific tools to trace and support self-regulated learning also helps to interpret the way in which the learning patterns actually inform SRL theoretically and empirically. Depending on how the tools are used, they can signal the typical patterns existing in the learning processes of students or student groups. The learning patterns found in the students’ cognitive regulation activity varied in terms of how often the patterns emerged in their learning, how the patterns were composed and when the patterns were used. Moreover, there were intra-individual differences – firstly, in how students with different learning outcomes allocated their study tactic use, and secondly, how self-regulated learning was used in challenging learning situations perceived by students. These findings indicate log file traces can reveal differences in self-regulated learning between individuals and between groups of learners with similar characteristics based on the learning patterns they used. However, learning patterns obtained from log file traces can sometimes be complex rather than simple. Therefore, log file traces need to be combined with other situation-specific measurements to better understand how they might elucidate self-regulated learning in the learning context. / Tiivistelmä Tässä väitöskirjassa tutkitaan oppilaiden itsesäätöisen ja strategisen oppimisen ilmenemistä oppimisprosessin aikana. Tutkimuksessa hyödynnetään g/nStudy- oppimisympäristöä, jonka avulla on mahdollista tukea ja jäljittää oppimisen strategista toimintaa. g/nStudy-oppimisympäristö tallentaa lokidataa, joka on tarkkaa ajallista informaatiota siitä toiminnasta, jota oppilas tekee työskentelynsä aikana. Toisin sanoen, lokidatasta on mahdollista jäljittää ne tiedot, jotka reflektoivat strategista – ja itsesäätöistä oppimista. Erityisenä mielenkiinnon kohteena oli selvittää miten lokidatasta voi löytää strategisia oppimisen toimintamalleja, ja miten nämä strategiset oppimisen toimintamallit vaihtelevat oppilaiden, oppilasryhmien ja erilaisten oppimisen tilanteiden aikana. Väitöstutkimus muodostuu kolmesta erillisestä tutkimusaineistosta. Jokaisessa kolmessa aineistossa on hyödynnetty g/nStudy-teknologian mahdollisuuksia tukea ja jäljittää itsesäätöistä oppimista. Tutkimusaineiston analyysissä hyödynnetään mikroanalyyttista lähestymistapaa sekä laadullista tutkimusotetta. Tutkimuksen analyyttinen lähestymistapa antaa mahdollisuuden ymmärtää itsesäätöisen- ja strategisen oppimisen ilmenemistä aidossa oppimistilanteessa. Tutkimustulokset osoittavat, että oppimisympäristöön sisällytettyjä teknologisia työkaluja voidaan käyttää tukemaan itsesäätöistä ja strategista toimintaa. Sen lisäksi samoja työkaluja voidaan käyttää myös menetelmällisenä välineenä tutkittaessa itsesäätöistä – ja strategista toimintaa erilaisissa oppimistilanteissa. Tutkimus -tulokset osoittavat, että oppimisen strategiset toimintamallit vaihtelivat oppilaiden – ja oppimistilanteiden välillä. Oppimisen strategisissa toimintamalleissa oli myös laadullisia eroja sen suhteen, miten usein ne ilmenivät oppimisprosessin aikana ja mistä strategisista toiminnoista ne koostuivat. Johtopäätöksenä voi todeta, että lokidatan käyttäminen tutkimusmenetelmänä edesauttaa paljastamaan opiskelun strategisia toimintamalleja oppilaiden – ja oppilasryhmien välillä. Tutkimuksen perusteella voidaan todeta, että strategiset toimintamallit voivat olla hyvinkin monimuotoisia. On tärkeää tunnistaa, missä tilanteissa ja milloin näitä toimintamalleja käytetään ja erityisesti mikä on niiden vaikutus oppimisen laatuun.

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Metacognition is one of the aims of the Swedish curricula in language teaching. This pilot study focuses on the implementation of this aim in a Swedish high-school. The teachers’ and the pupils’ attitudes towards the pupils’ metacognitive learning strategies and the reasons underpinning these attitudes are examined. The material finding of nine semi-structured interviews, held in a Swedish high-school in language teaching classes of Spanish, French and German, is analyzed with a qualitative method to get an understanding of the situation.The theoretical framework gives an introduction and overview of the actual research on the two key notions for this study: learning strategy and metacognition and related main concepts like cognitive and socio-affective strategies. The literature review shows that metacognitive learning strategies promote the pupils’ autonomy and responsibility in learning a foreign language in a more effective way.The analysis of the empirical material indicates that metacognition is a marginalized topic, although, after explaining them its meaning, both the teachers and the pupils think that it would be important to promote the pupils’ metacognitive learning strategies. However, the teachers emphasize more indirectly and unconsciously on offering different choices to accomplish an exercise than on consciously promoting metacognitive strategies. The main reasons for this were: the lack of time due to large and heterogeneous classes and doubting that most of the pupils could be responsible for their own learning.In cases where pupils had used learning strategies that worked best for them, they had developed these on their own and rarely reflected on them. The work with self-evaluative material like the European Language Portfolio was thought to be a good idea by both teachers and pupils but was not used at this particular school.