Learner Assessment through Subjective Theories and Action Research

ABSTRACT

This paper deals with students’ and university teachers’ self‐concepts on the basis of subjective theories: It is proposed to show how students and teachers are guided in university classes by their self‐images and how these determine their behaviour in such sessions. In a project carried out with students in the summer of 1997 in a literature course, subjective theories were connected with action research. Students and teachers collected data that helped them reflect on their behaviour, especially their own participation during sessions (from the students’ side) and on teacher control and dominance (from the teacher's side). Student diaries, video documentation of some of the sessions and interviews with students at the end of the semester were analysed with regard to learning processes and respective insights into students’ and the teacher's subjective theories.