Investigating The Relationships Among Perceived PBL Environment,EAP Learners' Self-efficacy,Engagement And Individual Academic Performance

Studies on factors affecting students' academic achievement have been the research priority in educational field.In addition,project-based learning(PBL)has received extensive attention of educators with the deepening of College English Curriculum Reform.The major objectives of this research were to examine how EAP learners' perceptions of the PBL environment,self-efficacy and engagement were related to their individual academic performance,to propose a hypothesized model including these four variables based on previous studies and to test this model through structural equation modeling(SEM).This study concluded both quantitative and qualitative data.The quantitative study was aimed at investigating the interrelationships among the above four variables.To this end,a questionnaire and a test of individual academic performance were designed based on the theoretical studies in relevant literature,the characteristics of PBL,and the first-hand information from subjects' feedback.Altogether 309 second-year students from a university of science and technology in Shanghai,China responded to the questionnaire.The data collected was then analyzed using SPSS 19.0 and AMOS 17.0.The qualitative study consisting of retrospective journal and curriculum experience descriptions was conducted to further analyze the results of the quantitative study.The major findings were:1)The reliability coefficients of the scales were greater than 0.75;the total variance accounted for by each scale was above 60%;and factor loading for each item reached the suggested threshold of 0.30,providing support for the reliability and validity of the questionnaire designed.2)The overall conditions of students' perceptions of PBL environment and their engagement were relatively positive with some differences in specific dimensions,while their self-efficacy beliefs were relatively low.3)The final model found significant positive correlations among four variables;moreover,both self-efficacy and engagement partially mediated the effects of learning environment perceptions on academic performance;meanwhile,self-efficacy was also validated as the mediator between learning environment perceptions and engagement,and engagement was found the mediator between self-efficacy and individual academic performance.This research had both theoretical and practical values by testing out a comprehensive conceptual model in EAP learning environment and providing guidance to educators to make instructional decisions regarding improving teaching quality.