Category: Secondary School Education

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Programme Evaluation Secondary School Education

Teaching Quality in STEM Enrichment Programs: Gifted Students’ Perceptions of In-School and Out-of-School Learning Environments

Jaggy et al. (2025) investigate how gifted students perceive teaching quality in specialized STEM enrichment programs compared with their regular school classrooms. Previous research has shown that high-ability students often experience learning environments differently from their peers, yet little is known about how participation in extracurricular enrichment programs influences students’ evaluation of teaching quality in both in-school and out-of-school settings. To address this gap, the study examines students attending the Hector Seminar, a specialized STEM enrichment program for gifted secondary school students in Germany and compares their perceptions of teaching quality across learning contexts.

The study uses cross-sectional data from a large-scale talent development project including academically advanced sixth- and seventh-grade students in the German state of Baden-Württemberg. Teaching quality was assessed using student reports on six indicators derived from the three-basic-dimensions model of instructional quality: effective classroom management, cognitive activation, student support, adaptivity, interestingness, and motivational climate. Two research questions guided the analysis: whether gifted students evaluate teaching quality in the enrichment program higher than in regular school classes, and whether students attending the program perceive regular classroom teaching differently from comparable students who do not participate in the program.

Results show that students attending the specialized STEM enrichment program rated teaching quality significantly higher in the program than in their regular school classes across most indicators, particularly in interestingness, motivational climate, and adaptivity. These findings suggest that enrichment programs provide highly stimulating and supportive learning environments for gifted students. Importantly, however, participation in the enrichment program did not lead students to evaluate their regular school teaching more negatively compared with non-participants, indicating that potential reference effects between learning contexts were limited.

Overall, the study highlights the importance of specialized enrichment programs as high-quality learning environments for gifted students while showing that such programs do not necessarily undermine students’ perceptions of regular classroom instruction. The findings contribute to research on gifted education and teaching quality by demonstrating that macro-level adaptations, such as structured STEM enrichment programs, can enhance learning experiences without producing negative comparison effects. The results also underscore the need for teacher professional development and more individualized instruction to better support diverse student needs across learning settings.

 

Source (Open Access): Jaggy, A. K., Wagner, W., Fütterer, T., Göllner, R., & Trautwein, U. (2025). Teaching quality in STEM education: Differences between in-and out-of-school contexts from the perspective of gifted students. International Journal of STEM Education, 12(1), 53.

https://doi.org/10.1186/s40594-025-00576-w… Read the rest

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Effective Teaching Approach Secondary School Education

LLM-Based Collaborative Programming: Effects on Computational Thinking and Self-Efficacy

Yan et al. (2025) examine whether integrating large language models (LLMs) into collaborative programming can enhance students’ computational thinking, self-efficacy, and learning processes. Recognizing that traditional collaborative programming is often constrained by uneven skill levels among students, the study proposes an LLM-supported collaborative framework in which AI acts as a learning partner, transforming the conventional human–human interaction into a human–human–AI collaboration model. A quasi-experimental design was conducted with 82 sixth- and seventh-grade students in China, who were randomly assigned to either an LLM-supported collaborative programming group (experiment group) or a traditional collaborative programming group (control group).

The intervention lasted five weeks and included 12 programming sessions (90 min each) using C++ as the instructional language. Students in both groups worked in teams, but the experimental group used an LLM-based platform that provided structured, problem-based, and knowledge-based scaffolding throughout the programming process, including problem analysis, coding, debugging, and evaluation. Pre- and post-tests measured students’ computational thinking and self-efficacy, while cognitive load was assessed through questionnaires, complemented by semi-structured interviews.

Results indicate that students in the LLM-supported collaborative programming group achieved significantly higher gains in computational thinking compared to those in the traditional group, though the effect size was relatively small. In addition, students in the experimental group reported significantly lower cognitive load, particularly in mental load, suggesting that LLMs can reduce the cognitive burden associated with complex programming tasks. However, no statistically significant differences were found in self-efficacy between the two groups. Both groups showed a decline in self-efficacy over time, likely due to the transition from graphical programming to more abstract text-based coding, though the decline was less pronounced in the LLM-supported group.

Qualitative findings further reveal that LLM integration enhanced students’ learning experiences by increasing interest, improving problem-solving efficiency, and supporting collaboration. Students reported that LLMs provided immediate feedback, multiple solution strategies, and personalized guidance, enabling more effective engagement in programming tasks. Overall, the study demonstrates that LLMs can function as effective scaffolding tools in collaborative learning, reducing cognitive load and enhancing higher-order thinking. While their impact on self-efficacy remains inconclusive, the findings highlight the potential of AI-supported collaborative learning environments as a promising approach for programming education in K–12 contexts.

Source (Open Access): Yan, Y. M., Chen, C. Q., Hu, Y. B., & Ye, X. D. (2025). LLM-based collaborative programming: Impact on students’ computational thinking and self-efficacy. Humanities and Social Sciences Communications, 12(1), 149.https://doi.org/10.1057/s41599-025-04471-1… Read the rest

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Primary School Education Secondary School Education Social and Motivational Outcomes

Teachers’ Teaching Emotions, Teaching Mindset, and AI Readiness

Ti and colleagues employed a cross-sectional survey design with hierarchical regression and moderation analyses to examine how in-service teachers’ teaching emotions and teaching ability mindset predict their AI readiness, and whether mindset moderates the relationship between emotions and AI readiness. The study included 424 in-service teachers in China (mean age = 38.76 years) from both primary and secondary schools. AI readiness was measured using Wang et al.’s (2023) four-dimensional framework, including cognition, ability, vision, and ethics. Teaching emotions were categorized into positive and negative emotions, and teaching mindset was classified as growth or fixed. Gender and social desirability bias were controlled in the analyses, and interaction effects were tested using the PROCESS macro.

The results showed that positive teaching emotions significantly and positively predicted all four dimensions of AI readiness (B ≥ .48, p < .001), whereas negative emotions did not significantly predict any dimension (|B| ≤ .06, p ≥ .309). Regarding mindset, a growth teaching mindset had significant positive effects on cognition, ability, vision, and ethics (B ≥ .18, p < .01), indicating that teachers who view teaching ability as developable are better prepared to respond to AI-related educational change. Interestingly, a fixed teaching mindset did not uniformly produce negative effects; instead, it positively predicted the cognition and ability dimensions (B ≥ .17, p < .01), although it was not significant for vision and ethics. Overall, the inclusion of emotions and mindset in the models yielded medium to large effect sizes (.28 ≤ f² ≤ .36), suggesting substantial explanatory power.

Moderation analyses further revealed that a growth teaching mindset strengthened the positive relationship between positive emotions and AI cognitive readiness (B = .11, p < .05). In other words, teachers with both high positive emotions and a strong growth mindset demonstrated higher levels of understanding regarding AI roles and functions. In contrast, a fixed teaching mindset moderated the relationship between negative emotions and the cognitive dimension (B = .10, p < .05). When fixed mindset was low, negative emotions significantly reduced cognitive readiness (B = –.18, p < .05), whereas this effect was not significant when fixed mindset was high. Notably, moderation effects were observed only for the cognition dimension, suggesting that the cognitive aspect of AI readiness is particularly sensitive to the interaction between emotional and mindset resources.

Overall, this study indicates that teachers’ readiness for AI integration in education is influenced not only by technical training or institutional support but also by their emotional experiences and beliefs about the malleability of teaching ability. Positive emotions and a growth teaching mindset serve as important psychological resources that enhance AI readiness, especially in shaping teachers’ cognitive understanding of AI. The authors recommend that AI-related professional development initiatives incorporate emotional regulation support and mindset cultivation to foster more comprehensive and sustainable AI readiness among teachers.

Source (Open Access): Ti, Y., Sun, Y., & Li, X. (2026). Predicting in-service teachers’ AI readiness from emotions in teaching and mindsets about teaching ability: Testing the direct and moderating effects. Teaching and Teacher Education, 175, 105433.

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.tate.2026.105433… Read the rest

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Primary School Education Secondary School Education Social and Motivational Outcomes

The Relationship Between Teachers’ Character Virtues, Engagement, and Well-Being

Angelini and colleagues employed a cross-sectional survey design combined with path analysis to examine how three teacher character virtues—caring, inquisitiveness, and self-control—influence teachers’ work engagement and overall well-being, and to further test the mediating roles of burnout and teacher self-efficacy. The study involved 339 in-service teachers in Italy from both primary and secondary education, and collected data on character virtues, burnout, self-efficacy, work engagement, and psychological well-being to examine both direct and indirect relationships among these variables.

The results showed that the three character virtues exerted significant overall positive effects on teachers’ engagement and well-being. Correlational analyses indicated that inquisitiveness, caring, and self-control were all positively associated with self-efficacy, work engagement, and well-being, and negatively associated with burnout. Path analysis further revealed that inquisitiveness and self-control significantly reduced burnout (β = –.142, p < .05; β = –.235, p < .001, respectively) and enhanced teacher self-efficacy (β = .206, p < .01; β = .191, p < .01). Caring, by contrast, mainly influenced outcomes through increasing self-efficacy (β = .171, p < .01) and did not directly reduce burnout. Burnout had strong negative effects on work engagement (β = –.528, p < .001) and well-being (β = –.324, p < .001), whereas self-efficacy significantly increased engagement (β = .212, p < .001) and well-being (β = .219, p < .001), highlighting their central mediating roles in the model. Overall, the model explained 35.6% of the variance in work engagement and 45.7% of the variance in well-being.

Notably, the mechanisms through which different character virtues operated were not identical. Inquisitiveness had direct effects on both work engagement (β = .095, p < .05) and well-being (β = .122, p < .05), as well as significant indirect effects through burnout and self-efficacy. Caring primarily affected well-being (β = .184, p < .001), with its influence on work engagement largely mediated by self-efficacy. Self-control did not directly predict engagement or well-being, but indirectly promoted both outcomes by reducing burnout and enhancing self-efficacy. These findings suggest that teacher character virtues influence professional functioning through multiple psychological and occupational pathways rather than a single uniform mechanism.

Overall, this study demonstrates that teachers’ character virtues constitute important personal resources for fostering professional engagement and psychological well-being, with burnout and self-efficacy serving as key mechanisms linking character to well-being. The authors emphasize that teacher well-being and burnout should be viewed as two ends of the same continuum, and recommend that future teacher support and professional development programs incorporate character-based interventions to simultaneously reduce burnout risk and enhance teachers’ professional vitality and overall well-being.

Source (Open Access): Angelini, G., Mamprin, C., Buonomo, I., Benevene, P., & Fiorilli, C. (2026). Virtues, engagement, and well-being in teachers: Associations with burnout and self-efficacy in a path analysis model. Teaching and Teacher Education, 169, 105284.

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.tate.2025.105284… Read the rest

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Achievement Maths and Science Learning Secondary School Education

Flipped Classroom vs. Traditional Teaching in Enhancing Mathematics Achievement and Interest Among Secondary School Students

Using a quasi-experimental non-equivalent pretest–posttest control group design, this study investigated how a flipped classroom learning approach influences mathematics achievement and interest among senior secondary one students learning circle theorems in Igbo Etiti, Enugu State, Nigeria. It evaluated changes in mathematics achievement and mathematics interest among 86 students drawn from a population of 673 students in 15 public secondary schools, with 45 students in classes assigned to the flipped classroom condition and 41 in classes taught with the conventional method. Intact classes in two schools with functional ICT facilities and reliable electricity were randomly assigned at the class level to the experimental or control condition, and students completed a 20-item Mathematics Achievement Test and a 20-item Mathematics Interest Inventory, both validated and reliable, before and after a four-week instructional unit on circle theorems. Statistical analyses included descriptive statistics and analysis of covariance with pretest scores as covariates to examine the effects of instructional approach and gender on posttest achievement and interest.

The results indicated that the flipped classroom produced substantially greater gains in mathematics achievement than the conventional method: the experimental group’s mean achievement scores increased from 60.8 to 86.1, compared with an increase from 62.0 to 64.7 in the control group, and the treatment effect was significant with a large effect size (partial eta squared = 0.585) and no significant main effect of gender. For mathematics interest, the flipped classroom group’s mean scores rose from 58.7 to 68.4, whereas the control group remained virtually unchanged (57.8 to 57.6), with a significant treatment effect and a large effect size (partial eta squared = 0.419) and no significant main effect of gender. Within the flipped classroom group, both male and female students improved in achievement (from 63.2 to 84.9 for males and from 58.8 to 87.2 for females) and in interest (from 57.5 to 68.9 for males and from 59.8 to 68.0 for females), and analysis of covariance showed no significant gender differences in posttest scores on either outcome. These findings show that the flipped classroom approach outperformed conventional teaching in enhancing both mathematics achievement and interest without creating gender disparities.

The findings suggest that providing video-based pre-class instruction combined with interactive, activity-oriented in-class learning enables students to engage more deeply with circle theorems, thereby improving both their performance in mathematics and their interest in the subject. The authors conclude that mathematics teachers should adopt the flipped classroom approach, especially for geometry topics such as circle theorems, and that educational authorities and professional bodies should organise workshops, seminars and in-service training to build teachers’ capacity to design and implement flipped instruction. They further recommend that school principals ensure adequate ICT resources and reliable power supply so that flipped classrooms can be implemented effectively to enhance students’ mathematics achievement and interest.

 

Source (Open Access): Egara, F. O., & Mosimege, M. (2024). Effect of flipped classroom learning approach on mathematics achievement and interest among secondary school students. Education and Information Technologies, 29(7), 8131-8150.

https://doi.org/10.1007/s10639-023-12145-1… Read the rest

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Educational Administration and Leadership Secondary School Education

Vocational–General Pathways and Student Futures: Evidence from England’s UTCs

Using a two-stage least squares (2SLS) causal inference design with linked administrative and tax data, Machin and colleagues (2025) evaluate the effects of University Technical Colleges (UTCs) on student achievement, higher education enrolment, and labour market outcomes in England. UTCs, introduced in 2010, combine academic and vocational curricula and allow entry at ages 14 or 16, creating a natural contrast for studying the timing of specialization.

The findings show starkly different consequences by entry age. Students joining UTCs at 14 perform substantially worse in GCSE exams, particularly in English, maths, and science, leading to projected lower lifetime earnings. By contrast, students entering at 16 benefit from stronger vocational outcomes, a higher likelihood of pursuing STEM university degrees, and improved early employment rates and earnings. This divergence highlights the risks of premature specialization and the advantages of aligning vocational opportunities with natural transition points in the education system.

The study contributes to the debate on hybrid schooling models by showing that while early diversion harms academic progression, later vocational engagement can enhance STEM capacity and labour market matches. Policymakers are advised to design vocational routes with caution, ensuring pathways support both academic progression and technical skill development.

 

Source (Open Access): Machin, S., McNally, S., Terrier, C., & Ventura, G. (2025). Closing the Gap Between Vocational and General Education?: Evidence from University Technical Colleges in England. Journal of Human Resources.

https://doi.org/10.3368/jhr.0223-12768R1… Read the rest