Effects of a classroom discourse intervention on teachers' practice and students' motivation to learn mathematics and science

Student interest and motivation in STEM subjects has dropped significantly throughout secondary education, for which teacher-student interactions are named as a central reason. This study investigated whether a video-based teacher professional development (TPD) intervention on productive classroom discourse improved students' learning motivation and interest development over the course of a school year. The teachers' intervention group (IG; n=6) was compared with a control group (CG; n=4) who participated in a traditional TPD programme on classroom discourse. The teachers showed a significant increase in constructive feedback and decrease in simple feedback as a function of the treatment. Pre- and post-tests revealed that students in the IG (n=136) significantly increased their perceived autonomy, competence and intrinsic learning motivation as compared with those in the CG (n=90). They also showed significantly greater interest changes in the subjects compared with their peers in the CG.