Midentity: Exploring the Effects of Self-Regulated Learning on Math Identity Development in a secondary math classroom.

Abstract

Looking to bridge gaps in math education for nine students in their eleventh grade year with varied levels of success in math, I based a self-regulated learning model for math study on studio art principles (Winner, Hetland, Veneema, Sheridan, & Palmer, 2008). The impact of SRL on identity as negotiated experience, community membership, learning trajectory, nexus of multimembership, and relation between the local and the global (Wenger, 1998) was examined through a case study of four students over two years through a combination of self-reports and online tools. Results indicated that while students felt more self-efficacious about process, beliefs about math-ability saw little change. Wenger’s (1998) concept of identity as learning trajectory points to the quality of content students engaged and the importance of deeper connections across the conceptual landscape of mathematics for positive identity development. Examples of student data and implications are discussed.