Research manuscript 3: Why students behave

In 2015, authors Fogelgarn and Lewis posed an article which set out to understand the
difference between children acting responsibly and being responsible in the absence of
external constraints at school. The authors set out to find the difference through performing
their own qualitative research, discovering that most of the time, younger primary school
children tend of obey school rules rather than comply because of school punishments and
reward systems. However the older children get, the more they are inclined to comply
through internalised compliance. This article presented interesting ideas as to how and why
children internalise good behaviour, however it is evident there were gaps in the article that
demonstrate lack of diversity, inconsistency and some bias. Through analysing this piece, it
was understood that even scholarly articles require critique and further research.

Initially, the abstract of this article ‘Are you being your best?’ Why students behave
responsibly (2015) provides the reader with a brief outline of understanding why students
would behave without external constraints. The abstract clearly states how many schools
were involved in this research, and that the article does provide research through qualitative
data. The authors discuss their hypothesis in the abstract that there is a difference between
student acting responsible and being responsible. The abstract is clear and to the point
(Hittleman & Simon, 2006). Authors Fogelgarn and Lewis both have education backgrounds,
which is why there was motivation for this topic as the authors aim discover new ideas and
expand on these ideas and practices (Hittleman & Simon, 2006). As discussed in research
aims and questions, the motive for the authors is to further explore what factors are associated
with the internalisation of morals and values in schools when external constraints such as
punishments are taken out (Fogelgarn & Lewis, 2015). The authors aim to explore children’s
capacity to behave in the right way. This was completed through qualitative research of 10
out of 300 schools that participated in the professional development activity in Australia.
These schools were randomly selected by the researchers, however there is no indictor if the
research was exclusive to a particular state or region. The choice of qualitative study meant
that the investigation would involve a few student interviews in depth rather than many
subjects, however the results of the subject are central to the findings of the article
(McMillan, 2012). The article does not reveal what schools participated in the sample, nor the
conditions of the students; this leaves the audience to wonder if the findings would vary if the
sample was conducted in rural or disadvantaged areas. Interviewing special education
children or culturally diverse students could have altered the results, and furthermore,
interviewing high school students could have further deepened the analysis of obedience vs
compliance. The researcher must learn as much background information on the subject to
create a correlation between subject and findings (Zemlinasky, 2013). Due to the lack of
diversity around the sample selection, the results may not be adequate because as researchers,
it is important to not only randomly select, but to specify the diversity within the sample to
conclude with a more well-rounded analysis on the topic. Although the author’s do
acknowledge in study limitations that to give greater justice to the topic, it would require a
sample of interviews from diverse year groups and genders (Folgelgarn & Lewis, 2015), the
article does not provide a well-rounded adequate scope, thus being a fatal flaw in this piece of
research.

With the research being conducted, the researchers utilised experimental qualitative data to
compare being and acting responsible from student’s point of view (Parada, 2018). The
researchers interviewed student’s from different year groups in primary school to determine
why children behave, and if they would behave if punishment in schools no longer existed.
Presenting data and figures to the reader provides a clear picture of the of the key variables in
this sample (Brown, Pringle & Shank, 2014). However, upon analysis on the data findings,
the researchers displayed percentages on how many students were involved in the research
process. Upon calculating, it was recognised that the overall amount added to 56%, providing
great inaccuracy in data. However, the responses to why student behave responsibly was
rounded to 100%, displaying accuracy in this aspect, however overall inconsistency in the
findings throughout the paper.

Upon reading the article and recognising the motive of the researchers, it became evident that
the intention of the study was to prove that students can internalise morals and values.
However, the article displayed some arguments that were not adequately supported. Through
interviewing the students, the researchers recognised that rewards motivate students to do the
right thing, and develops their interest in receiving something valuable in return for good
behaviour (Foglegarn & Lewis, 2015). However, for positive behavioural
changes/maintenance to last, the rewards must be continuous, as they best work short term
(Alfie, 1993). The researchers placed a lot of emphasis on the teacher’s role to create
behavioural management strategies that should no longer require reward systems, however,
further research was needed to support this argument. For example, when dealing with
special need children, it is difficult to put in place punishment and reward systems that are
equal to each child in the classroom. With special need children, teachers need to take extra
caution in the classroom, and try de-esclating dangerous or aggressive behaviours (Edwards,
Ford, Gardner, Hansford, Hays & Nye, 2016). Therefore, behavioural management is
dependent on the classroom and the student/s.

Throughout the research, literature was used to support arguments and ideas of the
researchers. The authors use the work of Noddings teacher-modelling as a way of instilling
morals in students (Foglegarn & Lewis, 2015; Noddings, 2010). The work of Kholberg’s
moral development (1975, 1997) is also referenced to support the researcher’s discussion on
how student’s internalise and develop morals. The authors use credible educational resources
to support their work, however these references go as far back as 1956. The references are
quite outdated, which can be critiqued as using dated theories and ideas that may not apply to
contemporary schooling.

Overall, the article provides a good discussion and analysis, however there are some holes in
the methodology that limited the diversity of age, culture, location. The article focused on
approaches that they believed would fix behavioural management, but failed in the aspect that
for diverse classroom, there is a requirement for diverse strategies. Furthermore, outdated and
educational references only limited the research and didn’t allow to reach a greater scope for
research. The research had some bias by concluding that student’s can attain morality through
behaviour management and pedagogy, however ended that more research was necessary for
this.

Word count: 1109

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