Demotivational determinants of primary school students learning activities from the perspective of their parents

Abstract

The article reveals the results of the study of peculiarities of understanding by parents of primary school students of determinants of negative-motives of children's learning activity, which along with positive motives determine the child's general attitude to learning and are extremely understudied in domestic and foreign psychology. A questionnaire was used to collect empirical data; the sample consisted of 252 parents whose children study in schools of various types from the first to the fourth grades. The results were processed and interpreted using content analysis, ranking, χ2 Pearson criterion, comparative analysis with the results of our previous studies conducted on children and teachers groups. The leading determinant of demotivation for learning activities of primary school students, according to the general sample of parents, is the complexity of the educational programme, the second and third in the ranking are the child's being fond of or misuse of gadgets and children's hobbies. The totality of demotivational determinants of children's learning activity from the parents' point of view was differentiated into groups according to the personal-social conditions. It was found that the largest group of determinants of negative-motivation of children's learning activities in the opinion of parents of primary school students is defined by deficiencies in professionalism of the teacher, as well as by his personal characteristics. This demonstrates modern parents being very particular about teachers’ professional activities, and also indicates that parents reduce their own responsibility for the development of children's academic motivation, and insufficient psychological competence of parents. The most significant demotivation determinant of learning activity for primary school students is a set of personal characteristics of students, from the teachers' point of view - the content-related aspects of education and personal characteristics of students. The low criticality of parents to family factors and personal characteristics of children as possible demotivation determinants of learning activity of primary school students was recorded. It was found that the perceptions of parents with pedagogical and/or psychological education about the importance of a number of determinants of negative-motivation in the learning activities of primary school students were statistically significantly different from the position of the rest of the sample of parents. The results of the study allowed us to determine the content-related and organizational aspects of the necessary educational and developmental work with parents of primary school students to improve their psychological and pedagogical competence in the field of motivation of child's personality, reduction of negative-motives of children's learning activity.