Strengths introduction using StrengthsQuest(TM): How do high school sophomore students perceive themselves as learners

Twenty-first-century educators face the challenge of moving students into a new educational paradigm; the major challenge for a new generation of educators will be to fulfill potential, not remedy deficits. Helping students identify where they come from, who they are, and where they are going will contribute to their long-term success. Further, students equipped with specific training in strengths-based education, as identified through StrengthQuest and the school's strengths-based curriculum may have a head start in perceiving themselves as learners.;The purpose of this study was to examine a strengths-based approach to education as it relates to self-perception and self-advocacy in high school students and how the students perceive themselves as learners. I conducted my qualitative research using students at a rural Christian high school in the state of Washington. Ten participants were selected from a field of 81 sophomore high school students using stratified random and systematic sampling. Students spent a full year and a half working with StrengthsQuest(TM) and incorporating their individual strengths into various components of the English curriculum and other course work.;The study addressed three questions: 1. To what extent do the students who have engaged in StrengthsQuest perceive themselves as learners? 2. To what extent has StrengthsQuest enabled the participants to document and identify success? 3. Do students perceive that StrengthsQuest has enabled them to acquire greater personal confidence and that it has contributed to the improvement of their learning environment?;I hoped to show that identifying one's strengths played a key role in one's self-awareness and self-efficacy in learning. However, this was not clearly answered as a result of this study. Possible reasons could be associated with the age and grade level of the participants, their limited life experiences, or their exposure to the use of strengths. Further, it appeared that a limited connection between the student's strength themes and the school's strengths-based curriculum may have played a role in the inability of students to find deeper connections to their learning environment.;The study did reveal that within this group of students, a new understanding of self occurred as a direct result of working with a strengths-based curriculum. Students could self-identify strengths which they had not previously been able to name or identify a theme, but had no previous vernacular to describe themselves. The result of that connection subsequently enabled them to become more aware of their own actions and the interactions of those around them.