Page 246 - Secondary school students’ university readiness and their transition to university Els van Rooij

Some students simply do not use or need to use learning strategies in secondary school. It is doubtful if they can also survive university without these skills, so it is important that these are explicitly taught and modelled. Over time, instruction and modelling can be faded away, so that the regulation of the learning process shi s from teacher to student, and it turns into self-regulation.
Both curiosity and self-regulation can be further improved by inquiry-based learning assignments where students can choose a topic that interests them and are forced to use self-regulation skills by going through a process of authentic inquiry by themselves, with the teacher in a facilitating and coaching role. e research project in the nal year of secondary school can be seen as such an inquiry-based learning assignment and should be utilised as a project that mirrors a university research project and that aims to evaluate to what extent students are ready for university.
8.6.3 Final remarks
ese suggestions all sound easier said than done and it seems like we dismiss the daily school practice where many students just do not want to exert any e ort at all in school-related things, regardless how hard teachers try to make their lessons and assignments interesting. Many of these students will fall into the category of students who score low on curiosity, e ort, and learning strategy use or into the category of students with very low curiosity. Not surprisingly, these students are likely to adapt least well to university and perform the worst. Consequently, these students are – at least in their current behaviour – at risk of a di cult transition to university and should be advised to consider a professional education degree (if they do not already consider this) or be made aware what is needed to be a successful university student.
Last, as a general point of attention, the measures currently set into motion 8 by the government to increase the number of university-educated teachers are
very important for university preparation in secondary school: Having graduated
from university themselves will put teachers in a better position to prepare
students for the university environment. Furthermore, a reboost, or at least a
critical examination of, the economics and society and culture and society tracks
in secondary education is needed, to get rid of their inferior image of only being
an attractive option for students who (think they) are not good enough for science
coursework and instead make them more rigorous and make them connect
more with the academic elds of the humanities and social sciences. In that way
also these tracks can do what they are meant to do, namely prepare students for
humanities and social sciences university degrees.
Conclusion and discussion
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