Motivating students with optimal challenge in an open learning environment

Educational programmes strive to bridge the gap between university and the labour market and to prepare students for their future work. Open learning environments (OLEs) mirror the demands of the labour market. Students learn in a self-directed way from ill-structured problems, which helps them to become prepared for their future work. The assumption of OLEs is that they generate motivation for learning because the perceived challenge level exceeds students' ability level. In the current study, we investigated to what extent an OLE contributed to students' perceived challenge, ability, and motivation for learning. A storyline method was used to gather data from three student cohorts of a honours programme. During the programme, students rated the learning activities based on how much they felt challenged, how able they felt to perform the tasks, and how motivated they felt. In addition, they explained their ratings. We found that students' motivation for learning was high although their ability level exceeded the challenge level. The assignments, work process, and group dynamics were determining factors for students’ motivation for learning, and are therefore important to consider in (co-)designing OLEs.