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The relation between teachers' personal teaching efficacy and students' academic efficacy for science and inquiry science
Abstract
The purpose of this study was to examine the relation between middle school teachers' personal teaching efficacy and their students' academic efficacy for science and inquiry science. Teachers can create classroom environments that promote the development of students' science self-efficacy (Britner & Pajares, 2006). Teachers who are efficacious and believe they are able to effectively teach science are more comfortable teaching science (Plourde, 2002) and more likely to commit classroom time to teaching science. Additionally, they are better equipped to challenge and support students as they develop their science skills and efficacy beliefs. Therefore, it was expected that teachers' personal teaching efficacy for science would be related to their students' science efficacy. Similarly, it was predicted that teachers' personal teaching efficacy for inquiry science would be related to their students' inquiry science efficacy. It was expected that the relation between teacher and student efficacy would not differ by students' gender. Data was collected from 26 middle school science teachers who were participating in a professional development program and 660 students from their classes. Hierarchical Linear Modeling (HLM) analyses were completed to evaluate the relation between teacher and student efficacy for science and inquiry science. Planned analyses revealed no significant predictors of students' science and inquiry science efficacy. Exploratory analyses were then conducted which added student grade and a measure evaluating the quality of teacher-student relationships to the original HLM analyses. Results indicated a significant interaction between the quality of teacher-student relationships and student grade on the prediction of students' science and inquiry science efficacy. A discussion of the results along with limitations of the study and avenues for future research will be provided.
Subject Area
Educational psychology|Science education
Recommended Citation
Kurien, Sarah Anjali, "The relation between teachers' personal teaching efficacy and students' academic efficacy for science and inquiry science" (2011). ETD collection for University of Nebraska-Lincoln. AAI3466572.
https://digitalcommons.unl.edu/dissertations/AAI3466572