CDOIL Inc. offers Educational Research explaining the illusive theory of interest and the complementary connections between students’ interests and learning activities.
Dewey (1934) described educators as advocates of effort or autonomy based on their approach to students’ interests, noting that advocates of effort often impose tasks upon students, while advocates of autonomy tend to sugarcoat tasks for them. He argued that neither approach promotes student progress. Renninger & Hidi (2012) highlighted the significant gap in learning psychology stating that the gap is due to an absence of an adequate theory of students’ interest, and echoing Allport’s (1946) concerns about the misinterpretation of student interests. As of this writing, in 2024, we still do not have an adequate theory of interest. Many teachers still do not deliberately structure lessons to reflect or address student interests or help them to learn effectively resulting in a weakened and/or unstable society.
Just like Jackson (2018), many educators assume that one has an interest in a task when one feels pleased or pleasured by the task; therefore, one seeks and engages the task to maintain related pleasure. Jackson (2018) indicated that there is nothing like an interesting task. Our research on students’ interests explains (a) what is interest, (b) how might interest arise, and (c) how does it affect students’ learning achievements.
Research Products/Activities
(1) CSCTL Publications – Books and Journal Articles.
(2) Research Activities.
