Students' experiences of learning in a third-year management accounting class: Evidence from New Zealand

Abstract

An extensive body of literature in higher education (for example, Marton and Säljö, 1984; Prosser and Trigwell, 1999) explores learning from the perspectives of students. Säljö (1979) formed the basis of Sharma's (1997) first study exploring accountancy students' conceptions of learning. Using an open-ended questionnaire administered to third-year management accounting students, this paper investigates accountancy students' conceptions of learning, and extends Sharma's (1997) study by examining the relationship between conceptions of and approaches to learning, and more specifically students' contextual experiences of learning in lectures and tutorials. Findings indicate that, while some students seek understanding as an outcome of their learning, the majority perceive learning quantitatively in terms of knowledge acquisition, reproduction and application. A new classification of the locus of responsibility for learning as perceived by students suggests that a more distributed concept of responsibility might result in enhanced learning outcomes.

Keywords:

• Learning conception
• lectures
• learning approach
• deep/surface learning
• responsibility
• teaching method
• role of lecturer

Acknowledgments

The authors are grateful: to Carol Bond, for providing the impetus to carry out this study; to participants in the 3rd Annual Conference of the Asian Academic Accounting Association, Nagoya 2002 and the 9th World Congress of Accounting Educators, Hong Kong 2002, for insightful comments on an earlier version of the paper; and to the Editor, Associate Editor and two anonymous reviewers, for their perceptive comments and many suggestions, which have improved the paper considerably.