Self-Regulation in a BYOD class: a study of the enablers and barriers to students’ self-management

Abstract

Schools throughout New Zealand are adopting digital technologies as a mechanism to enhance students’ learning and to facilitate the advancement of 21st century literacies. The development of digital literacies and future focused learning for all students, is a vision New Zealand’s Ministry of Education holds firm. The successful implementation of learning via the utilisation of digital devices remains a major priority throughout New Zealand schools (Ministry of Education, 2015). Despite the assumption that students learning with their own digital device will promote individualised, independent learning; research focusing on the factors that affect students’ efficient use of digital technologies has largely been limited to the employment of specific software applications, teacher adoption and the support of a technology efficient school infrastructure. According to some researchers, students’ ability to self-regulate is of paramount importance in order to be able to use digital technologies effectively for learning. This study aims to address an important gap that currently exists within supporting literature, by using a self-regulation lens to explore students’ self-management when learning with their own digital device. To answer the research questions this study has explored the perceptions of students, teachers and parents to identify enablers and barriers to students’ self-management in a Bring Your Own Device class. The context for this study is a Year 10 class at a secondary school in the far north of New Zealand. Utilising a mixed methods approach involving surveys and interviews, the resulting data highlighted three dominant themes: the importance of task relevance to students to enable intrinsic motivation, the need to develop parent/teacher relationships to support students’ self-management and the need for ongoing professional development for teachers that specifically focuses on digital integration and student centred learning. In addition, there was a perceived need to develop a shared language between students, teachers and parents that related to the key competency of Managing Self which would enhance the overall interpretation and acquisition of effective self-management in such a BYOD class.