Using new technology and stimulating students' higher-order thinking: a study on primary school teachers' attitudes - PhDData

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Using new technology and stimulating students’ higher-order thinking: a study on primary school teachers’ attitudes

The thesis was published by Wijnen, Frances M., in October 2022, University of Twente.

Abstract:

Higher-order thinking skills, such as creative thinking, critical thinking, and problem solving are regarded as crucial for students to develop. Research shows that new technology can be used as a tool to support students’ higher-order thinking. To support pre- and in-service primary school teachers in their use of new technology to stimulate students’ higher-order thinking, it is important that we gain an understanding of teachers’ attitudes towards using new technology and towards stimulating students’ higher-order thinking. However, there is little research on pre- and in-service primary school teachers’ attitudes towards stimulating higher-order thinking, and we know little about teachers’ attitudes towards using new technology. Therefore, we conducted four studies to fill this void in research. In our first study, we conducted two literature reviews to (1) identify factors that make up teachers’ attitudes towards using technology and (2) to identify factors that make up teachers’ attitudes towards stimulating higher-order thinking. In our second and third study we developed two valid and reliable questionnaires to measure (1) primary school teachers’ attitudes towards using new technology (TANT questionnaire) and (2) towards stimulating students’ higher-order thinking (SHOT questionnaire). In addition to measures of attitude, we also included items to measure teachers self-reported use of new technology and teachers self-reported behaviour in stimulating students’ higher-order thinking. In our fourth study, we combined measures of teachers’ attitude towards using new technology and towards stimulating higher-order thinking to identify teacher profiles. The results of the conducted cluster-analysis revealed three profiles based on teachers’ attitudes towards using new technology and stimulating students’ higher-order thinking. The identification of these three profiles suggests that different teachers may need different forms of support to help them use new technology to stimulate students’ higher-order thinking.



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