Browsing by Subject "Positiivinen psykologia"

Tiivistelmä - Referat - Abstract This study describes the perceptions of primary school teachers who participated in the strength training of the #newschool project about the development of students' self-regulatory skills and supporting development. In addition, the study examines how teachers define self-regulation skills. Self-regulation has been theoretically examined from several different starting points, which partially explains the broad definition of self-regulation and the challenges of defining the concept (Aro, 2011a, 10). The character strength classification made in the studies of positive psychology offers a new perspective on terminology in which self-regulation is seen as a strength. Strength education, which embodies positive psychology in school, in turn provides new tools to support students’ self-regulatory skills. (Peterson & Seligman, 2004, 30; Uusitalo-Malmivaara & Vuorinen, 2016, 69.) This study was conducted as a qualitative study. The material was obtained by interviewing seven teachers who actively participated in the strength training of the #newschool project. The interviews were conducted as individual interviews during March 2020. Theoretical content analysis was used as the method of data analysis. The main results of the study revealed that teachers did not have an unambiguous definition for self-regulation, rather they described it through various sub-skills and concrete examples. The socioemotional dimension of self-regulation complemented the previous definition of self-regulation by Aro (2011) in this study (Aro, 2011a, 10). In addition, the results showed that teachers' perceptions of the development of students’ self-regulatory skills include growth mindset and mixed mindset, according to Dweck’s (2006) Mindset theory (Dweck, 2006, 6). Some teachers saw self-regulation as an evolving skill, while for some it meant an innate ability, whose development can not be further influenced in school. The results show that strength education has begun to find a place in teaching and students' self-regulatory skills are supported in quite a variety of ways in everyday school life. However, teachers' mindsets still reflect mixed mindset, and more tools are needed to support, for example, educational partnerships. The special value of the research can be seen in the information it provides to trainings on how they should be further developed in the future. On the other hand, the research raises the question of how occasional trainings can have an influence on attitudes and activities. Looking to the future, the role of teacher education in embracing the growth attitude of future teachers can be assessed, and on the other hand, the potential of teacher education to provide students with better skills to support students’ self-regulatory skills can be examined.