High Achiever Students’ Self Regulated Learning Strategies, Motivation towards Mathematics, and their Thinking Styles

Abstract

The purpose of this study is to investigate high achiever students’ self-regulated learning strategies, motivation towards mathematics, thinking styles, and the dynamics amongst those variables. For this purpose, 63 high achiever high school students were selected on the basis of a special exam which was administered throughout Turkey. The measurement tools were “Competence of Self-Regulated Learning Scale”, “Holistic and Analytic Thinking in Problem Solving Scale”, and motivation towards mathematics form. According to the findings, high achiever students tended to use more cognitive regulated learning strategies compared to other strategies. In addition to this, they had intrinsic motivation towards mathematics. It was found that there is no dominant thinking style for the students in this study group. Furthermore, no significant relationship between self-regulated learning and thinking strategies was found. It is known that high achiever students form a very special group, hence it is suggested to conduct case studies to understand their metacognitive skills in regards to mathematical learning.