Encouraging a deep approach to learning through curriculum design

Abstract

Accounting educators are concerned by research suggesting that accounting students frequently adopt a surface approach to learning given that this approach has been shown to result in undesirable learning outcomes (Eley, 1992; Booth et al., 1999). Despite mixed empirical evidence, the possibility of encouraging students to adopt a deep approach to learning through interventions in the learning context is suggested by the approaches to learning and metacognition literatures. Functional Linguistics (Halliday, 1985) provides principles upon which such interventions might be based. This paper, first, provides a rich description of an intervention in an introductory accounting course to encourage a deep approach to learning by improving students' written communication skills. Second, the effectiveness of the intervention is examined by comparing students' approaches to learning, using Biggs' (1987a) Study Process Questionnaire, with those at another leading Australian university offering a more ‘traditional’ course. The findings broadly confirm the effectiveness of the intervention, both in encouraging a deep approach, and in improving overall course results.

Keywords:

• approaches to learning
• functional linguistics
• study process questionnaire
• deep approach to learning
• writing and curriculum design
• introductory accounting

Acknowledgments

The authors would like to thank Ursula Lucas and two anonymous reviewers for their very helpful comments on earlier drafts of the paper.

Notes

The material in this section of the paper relies heavily on English et al. (1999, pp. 230–239). The interventions to improve students' writing were supported by intervention to facilitate the development of oral presentation skills (Jones et al., 1995) and team skills (Bonanno et al., 1998).

The mission of the Learning Centre is to improve the quality of students' learning. The primary role of the centre in pursuing this objective is to develop in students those skills necessary for the acquisition and communication of knowledge and ideas in a university setting. The dual concerns of the centre are to equip individual students with skills and attributes that will enable them to learn and communicate effectively at university and beyond; and to facilitate improvements in learning environments within which these enabling skills and attributes can be fostered.

The 5 points represented the following: 5 = this item is always or almost always true of me, 4 = this item is frequently true of me, 3 = this item is true of me about half the time, 2 = this item is sometimes true of me, 1 = this item is never or only rarely true of me.

A comparison of USYD pre-test and post-test scores is somewhat problematic given the pre-test scores represent students' general orientations to learning and the post-test scores represent students' learning in an accounting context. However, there are a number of possible explanations for why students' scores on the deep approach scale are lower at the end of the year than at the beginning of the year. First, longitudinal studies of students SPQ scores show ‘…an increasing disposition for a surface approach (Biggs, 1987a; Gow and Kember, 1990; Stokes Balla and Stafford 1989; Watkins and Hattie 1985)’ (Biggs 1993, p. 10). In accounting, Gow et al. (1994) reported that students’ enthusiasm for a deep approach to study declined from the first year to the second year of the course. Given this trend, the USYD intervention appears to have mitigated the downward trend to some extent when one compares the change in USYD (44.73 to 43.51) and UNSW scores (44.76 to 41.87). Second, Meyer and Eley (1999 p. 198) argue: ‘…that individual students might well adopt differentiated patterns of learning behaviours that are attributable to the learning contexts shaped by different subjects. That is, perceptions and experiences of learning contexts might be shaped also by the epistemology of a discipline and they might therefore vary considerably from one discipline to another.’ Thus, students might adopt quite different approaches in their accounting course when compared with subjects such as biology, art mathematics, English, history etc. studied at secondary level.

For the majority of students their most recent studies would include the subjects studied at secondary school which could include any combination of the following areas: mathematics, English, history, economics, geography, art, biology, chemistry, media studies, drama, etc. Some students complete an introductory business studies subject at secondary school which would provide them with some experience of an accounting learning context. However, most of the subjects completed at secondary school are not similar/related to the accounting context of learning which students experience at university.

The results may have been mitigated by the high workload of the intervention. Feedback mechanisms at USYD, indicated that the workload was perceived by students as being very high (English et al., 1998). Further, in the questionnaire, students were asked to rate the workload in their accounting course relative to other subjects. A significant difference was found between the institutions (means: USYD = 3.81, UNSW = 3.64, t = 3.161, p = 0.002). Thus the perceptions of workload were higher with USYD students. High workload is a factor recognised as contributing to a surface approach to learning in the literature (Ramsden and Entwistle, 1981; Gow et al., 1994).