Lisa BirnbaumElisabeth M. SchüllerStephan Kröner

Beliefs about leisure time writing of elementary school children

Shortlink: https://www.waxmann.com/artikelART102946

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Abstract

When elementary school students write in their leisure time, they acquire competences. Moreover, writing is a cultural activity with value in itself. However, there are only few studies regarding determinants of children’s leisure time writing. Therefore, a questionnaire based on the theory of planned behavior (Ajzen, 1991) was developed to examine the determinants of leisure time writing in elementary school students. Departing from a qualitative and a quantitative pilot study, items were generated and used in a study with N = 244 children. Beliefs concerning congruent consequences, beliefs concerning incongruent consequences, controllability, and intrinsic value proved to be statistically significant predictors of writing frequency, writing time, and produced amount of text. The intrinsic value mediated the effects of the other predictors. Overall, the scales explained 42 % of the variance in each of the three criterion variables. The questionnaire’s construct validity is supported by the boy’s lower values in several predictors compared to the girl’s values. Perspectives for further research are discussed.

Keywords
Elementary school children, Writing, Leisure time activity

APA citation
Birnbaum, L., Schüller, E. & Kröner S. (2019). Überzeugungen zum freizeitlichen Schreiben bei Grundschulkindern. Journal for Educational Research Online (JERO), 11(2), 5-36. https://www.waxmann.com/artikelART102946