SelfDefeating Student Behaviors

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Self-Defeating Student Behaviors

• Baker College
• Effective Teaching and Learning

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Force Field Analysis

• Locate the flipchart for the course(s) that you
  teach
• Write down the self-defeating behaviors that you
  see your students exhibit in your classes during
  the following events
• Activities
• Homework
• Tests

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Objectives

• Describe student views about ability
• Discuss learned helplessness in students and
  provide strategies for combating it
• Determine the difference between
  self-handicapping and defensive pessimism in
  students
• Identify ways to combat self-handicapping
  behaviors

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Ability Entity vs. Incremental

• Entity view of ability
• Ability is fixed, stable, and unchanging
• Ability and/or intelligence does not increase
  with time and effort
• Develops around 10-12 years of age
• Incremental view of ability
• Ability and intelligence change and increase
  with experience
• -Pintrich Schunk, 2002

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What can instructors do?

• Position yourself as a resource person (Brophy,
  1998) in the classroom
• Ensure your students are focusing on their
  processes during learning rather than outcomes
• De-emphasize grades when possible
• Try to get students to consider errors as
  learning tools
• Focus on effort rather than ability
• -Brophy, 1998

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Learned Helplessness

• Can also be described as students with Failure
  Syndrome (Brophy, 1998)
• Appear in classrooms as students who
• Rely on teacher for attention
• Give up early in assignments when facing
  difficulty
• Have low expectations for their success
• Believe they lack ability for success
• Believe in luck or external factors

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Role-Play

• Need 2 volunteers
• While the volunteers are preparing, consider the
  following questions as you watch the role-play
• What did the instructor do well?
• What could the instructor have done differently?
• What are other solutions to this issue?

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Strategies to Combat Learned Helplessness

• Attribution Retraining
• Focus students on appropriate strategy selection
  and success methods
• Plan small successes in larger assignments
• Analyze failures and determine causes related to
  items OTHER than ability
• Efficacy Training
• Help students set realistic goals related to
  effort
• Strategy Training
• Give students ideas about what they can do
  differently

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Research Says To

• Pay attention to the classroom environment
• Provide detailed feedback
• Avoid public performances if possible
• Not always an option
• Arrange your test items carefully
• Consider the fact that the mere anticipation of
  failure can affect those with learned
  helplessness
• Place factual items before conceptual ones (or,
  go from the easier to the more difficult
  questions on the test)
• -(Firman Hwang, et al, 2004)

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Discussion

• How can instructors contribute knowingly or
  unknowingly to learned helplessness in their
  students?
• What other strategies can instructors use to
  combat learned helplessness in students?

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Self-Handicapping

• Defined as the creation of barriers by the
  student to prevent success
• In this way if the student does not succeed, the
  lack of success can be blamed on the barriers.
• If the student does succeed, then the success
  will be attributed to the students exceptional
  ability.
• Garcia et al. (1996)
• Performed in anticipation of evaluation event

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Defensive Pessimism

• Described as the exceptionally low expectations
  set by students for performance
• Attempt to prepare for potential failure in
  evaluative situations
• Used as a way to motivate themselves to work
  harder in high pressure situations and avoid that
  potential failure
• -Garcia, 1995

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Why Do Students Self-Handicap?

• The affective consequences of evaluation are
  powerful success leads to a joyous sense of
  competence, whereas failure translates to a
  humiliating sense of inadequacyEffort paired
  with success is a laudable combination, but
  consider implications of low ability and
  incompetence.
• - Garcia et al., 1996

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Why Are Students Defensive Pessimists?

• Another anticipatory behavior
• Actually a positive way to deal with anxiety over
  an evaluation situation
• Gives the student some power over the evaluation
  situation
• Has allowed the student to potentially see how
  he/she would feel if the failure actually occurs
• Motivates the student to work hard to avoid the
  failure

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Forms of Self-Handicapping

• Withdrawal of effort including
• Procrastination
• Not preparing for tests
• Not following directions on major assignments
• Taking on too many projects (classes) at once
• Different aspects for adult and working students?
• Addition of family/life/work responsibilities

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Fish Bowl Exercise

• Three volunteers needed
• Discuss the following question What do you do
  when students tell you that they have not
  completed the necessary preparations for a test?
• Discuss for three minutes

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Force Field Analysis

• Go back to the sheet for the course you teach
• Write down at least one strategy that you can use
  to combat some of the behaviors you identified in
  any of the following instances
• Activities
• Homework
• Tests

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How Will My Teaching Change?

• Take the handout from the facilitator
• Write down the two or three strategies from the
  ones on the wall that you found most helpful to
  take with you on the top section of the form.
• Identify two or three ways that your teaching
  will change as a result of attending this session
  on the bottom portion of the form.

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Questions and Comments