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This exploratory, retrospective study, which focuses on the needs, attitudes, and emotions of learners attending English as a foreign language courses at the Open University of the University of Warsaw is part of a larger scale project which aims at answering calls voiced, among others, by Boulton-Lewis (2010) to gather more data from older adults and investigate their attitudes to learning; by Storm and Storm (2015) who highlight the importance of understanding the needs of retirees; and of Yates and Kozar (2015), who say that current research into age effects tends to remain without translation into practical teaching. Fifty-four learners enrolled in English as a foreign language courses were asked to fill in a questionnaire and 16 of them were asked to take part in a semi-structured interview. The analyzed data allow us to point to needs, attitudes, emotions, and challenges of those learners and the need to further explore them in order to offer better tailored courses and to equip teachers with the knowledge and skills necessary to support older adult learners.

This study reports relationships between general academic self-concept and achievement in grade 3 and grade 5. Gender-specific effects were investigated using a longitudinal, two-cycle, 3-year autoregressive cross-lagged panel design in a large, representative sample of Polish primary school pupils (N = 4,226). Analysis revealed (a) reciprocal relations between general academic self-concept and achievement over time but the influence of prior achievement on self-concept was stronger; (b) on average, levels of both constructs declined over time; (c) gender differences were not observed in longitudinal relations (i.e. cross-lagged, autoregressive and intra-wave correlations); (d) girls demonstrated higher mean levels of academic achievement at both grades; and (e) average level of general academic self-concept was not gender differentiated in grade 3 but decreased more for girls. These results are discussed in the light of the theoretical and practical implications.