Beliefs underlying what Brazilian

teachers think of grade retention

Marcel Crahay, Vanda Ribeiro, Paula Kasmirski, Márcia Jacomini, Antônio Gomes Batista, Christian

Monseur

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Cenpec

• Founded in 1987, the Centre for Studies and Research on Education, Culture and Community Action (Cenpec) is a Brazilian civil society organization (non-governmental organization), aimed at developing projects and research programs in order to improve the quality of public education and to promote participation in public policy.

• Cenpec is funded by a wide range of partners such as governmental agencies, multilateral agencies, and corporate foundations.

• In 2011, Cenpec founded the Coordination of Research Development. Its research areas involves curricula, education in vulnerable neighborhood and equality.

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• Some data about Brazil

• Brazil area is 8,515,767 km2

Context

Characteristic 2001 2013

Population 172,742,000 201,467,000

GNI per capita (PPP US$)

8,860 15,790

Gini Index* 0.611 0.575Source: IBGE, World Bank.*Gini Index refers to 2000 and 2010.

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Context

• Brazil is a tripartite federation with three levels and almost 6 thousand educational systems

• There are almost 45 millions students, where 82% are in the public system

• In the last Pisa (2012), Brazil’s average mathematics performance was 391; average OECD was 494

• Repetition rates in 2014 – public schools (Inep):– Fundamental education: 9.6– High school: 13.1

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• Estimate and analyse beliefs concerning grade repetition, learning, intelligence, assessment and justice principles– Are beliefs coherent?– Do beliefs about learning, intelligence,

assestment and justice principles explain grade repetition belief?

• Verify if knowledge of research results influences the concordance degree with repetition

Objectives

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• Belief coherence

Theoretical Framework

Schommer (1990)Schommer-Aikins (2002, 2004)Beliefs are independent

Green (1971)Beliefs are certain coherent inside clusters,but they can be independent or even contraditory

Abric (1989)More coherence assured by the core beliefs and maleable periferical beliefsRokeach (1976)More coherence assured by central beliefsFor both authors beliefs are hierarchical

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  Theme Source Item number1 Grade repetition Boraita & Marcoux (2013) 472 Research knowledge Boraita & Marcoux (2013) 83 Intelligence Issaieva & Crahay, (2014) 414 Learning Issaieva & Crahay (en

préparation)28

5 Assessment Issaieva & Crahay, (2010) 146 Justice principles Crahay, non publié 157 Heterogeneity

managementWanlin, (2011) 15

8 Learning and class management

Wanlin, (2011) 21

  Total 189

Questionnaire

• 189 itens with Likert scale to measure perceptions

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• Exploratory factor analysis to check if the data meet conceptual structure of questionnarie– Principal component extraction in SAS– Oblique rotation

• IRT to estimate beliefs (because of missing data)

• Regression analysis

Methodology

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Population

• The population is composed of 94,954 public school Portuguese teachers that participated in 2014 Portuguese Language Olympics (PLO).

• The PLO is a voluntary training program with focus in reading and writing for public school teachers from all over the country.

• In 2014, FE-5th grade to HE-3rd grade teachers and students could participate in the competition.

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Sampling

• Convenience sample– We sent an email to the population’s

teachers asking their voluntary participation in the research

– To increase the answer’s odds, we offered Cenpec kits, that contained books and DVDs, to the first 100 respondents

• 6,074 submissions• 5,493 PLO teachers

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Sampling

Characterist Population Sample

Public school teachers that

teach portuguese in the OLP grades

- 2014

All public school teachers - 2014

Average age 40.2 40.1 41.2 40.5

Woman 86.9 84.4 85.8 80.1

Live in state capital*

12.0 15.0 16.5 17.6

Incomplete higher education

7.7 2.7 13.5 18.9

Complete higher education

39.4 32.7 37.7 33.98

Graduate school 52.9 67.3 48.7 47.1

Average number of students

126.2 157.3 139.9 134.7

Federal school 0.5 2.7 0.5 1.5

State school 43.9 55.8 52.5 41.8

Municipality school

55.6 54.3 60.9 63.8

Also works in private school

- 9.6 6.9 5.2

Average experience in teaching

13.9 14.3 - -

Total 94954 5493 316935 1787410Source: PLO, Inep.

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• Teacher use of internet

Sampling

CharacteristAll teachers Use internet Do not use internet

Average or % SE

Average or % SE

Average or % SE

Age 40.30 0.32 39.98 0.33 45.32 1.51

Monthly household income per capita 1972.8457.00 2016.14

60.74 1314.65 85.43

Woman 72.93%1.27% 72.66%

1.32% 77.12%

6.46%

High school 1.72%0.42% 1.64%

0.44% 3.04%

0.14%

Incomplete higher education 8.91%0.83% 8.88%

0.84% 9.44%

5.12%

Higher education 89.36%0.89% 89.48%

0.92% 87.51%

5.09%

Used internet in the last three months 93.96%0.66% - - - -

Used internet in the last year, if did not use in the last three months

24.42%6.98%

- - - -

Source: Pnad/IBGE 2013.

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• Beliefs about repetition– There are three beliefs– Most sample Brazilian teachers do not have a

clear position with respect to repetition practice, its effects on self-steem and if it should occur early in children’s school life

– Half of teachers know research results about grade repetition

– Correlations between these factors and also with research knowledge are coherent

Results

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• Example of belief about repetition

Results

Grade repetition has negative social affective effects on students (Alpha = 0,74)

Agree

+/-Disagree

Grade repetition affects student self steem. 48,9 33,8 17,2Repetition damages student self-image 38,1 36,3 25,6Repetition influences negatively student confidence in his/her competence

35,6 38,8 25,6

 Correlations F1 F2 F3Positionnement général face au redoublement (F1)

1,00    

Le redoublement a des effets socio-affectifs négatifs (F2)

-0,35 1,00  

Le redoublement précoce est particulièrement efficace (F3)

0,58 -0,23 1,00

Connaissance des recherches sur les effets du redoublement (F4)

0,60 -0,54 0,43

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• Beliefs about assessment– Sample teachers differentiate the three types

of assessment investigated– Teachers are favorable to formative and

somative assessment– Correlation between these two factors are

positive– Normative assessment correlates positively

with repetition adhesion and with the belief that children should repete earlier

Results

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• Correlations between repetition factors and assessment factors

Results

  Repetition concordance

Negative social affective effets

Earlier repetition

Evaluation formative (F1) 0.09 0.16 0.09Evaluation sommative critériée (F2)

0.18 0.14 0.16

Evaluation normative(F3) 0.43 0.01 0.33

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• Beliefs concerning justice principles– There are three conceptions of education’s

role: an elitist one; a compensatory one; and equality of treatment

– Teachers adhere to equality of treatment and compensatory perspective

– Elitist conception correlates positively with repetition belief and earlier repetition

Results

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• Correlations between repetition factors and justice principles factors

Results

  Repetition concordance

Negative social affective effets

Earlier repetition

Perspective élitiste

0.30 0.02 0.24

Perspective compensatoire

0.12 0.22 0.13

Egalité de traitement

0.03 0.12 0.07

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• Linear regressions to explain repetition belief reveal that teachers more favorable to it are:– Older– Black– With master and doctorate degree (relative to

higher degree)– More experient– Know less the research– Live in South (relative to Southeast)

Results

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• Linear regressions to explain research knowledge reveal that teachers who know it more are:– Older– Have kids– Have mother more educated– Less experient– Have repetead at least once– From North and Center-West (relative to

Southeast)

Results

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E-mails of researchersvanda.ribeiro@cenpec.org.br

paula.kasmirski@cenpec.org.br

Coordination of Research Development website

www.cenpec.org.br/pesquisa

Tkank you

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• Abric, J.C. (1989). « L'étude expérimentale des représentations sociales ». In D. Jodelet, Les représentations sociales. Paris : Presses Universitaires de France, p. 189-203.

• Green, T. (1971). The activities of teaching. New York : McGraw-Hill.• Rokeach, (1976). Beliefs, attitudes and values: A theory of organization and change. San Francisco : Jossey-Bass.• Schommer, M. (1990). « Effects of beliefs about the nature of knowledge on comprehension ». Journal of

Educational Psychology, vol. LXXXII, n° 3, p. 498-504.• Schommer-Aikins, M.(2002). « An evolving theoretical framework for an epistemological belief system ». In B.K.

Hofer & P.R. Pintrich, Personal epistemology : The psychology of beliefs about knowledge and knowing. Mahwah : Erlbaum, p.  103-118.

• Schommer-Aikins, M. (2004). Explaining the epistemological belief system : Introducing the embedded systemic model and coordinated research approach. Educational Psychologist, vol. XXXIX, n° 1, p. 19-29.

• Boraita, F. & Marcoux, G. (2013). Adaptation et validation d’échelles concernant les croyances des futurs enseignants et leurs connaissances des recherches à propos du redoublement. Mesure et Evaluation en Education, 36(1), 49-81.

• Issaieva, E. & Crahay, M. (2014). Conceptions et postures des enseignants du primaire à propos de l’intelligence. La Revue des Sciences de l’Education, Québec, Vol. 40, n°1.

• Issaieva, E. & Crahay, M. (en préparation). Les enseignants primaires en formation et en exercice face à l’apprentissage scolaire» : structuration de leurs conceptions et prises de position

• Issaieva, E., & Crahay, M. (2010). Conceptions de l’évaluation scolaire des élèves: quelle rôle jouent les perceptions des élèves à propos des conceptions des enseignants? Étude corrélationnelle auprès d’élèves et d’enseignants en fin d’école primaire en France. Mesure et évaluation en éducation, 1, 31-62.

• Wanlin, Ph. (2011). Élèves forts ou faibles : qui donne le tempo ? Université de Liège, Thèse de doctorat non publiée• http://data.worldbank.org/indicator/• http://www.ibge.gov.br/home/• http://portal.inep.gov.br/• https://www.escrevendoofuturo.org.br/

References