Effects of perceived autonomy support from social agents on motivation and engagement of Chinese primary school students: Psychological need satisfaction as mediator

Little research has simultaneously examined the differential effects of autonomy support from parents, teachers, and peers (social agents) on students’ psychological need satisfaction, motivation, and school engagement. Drawing from Self-Determination Theory, this study examined the joint effects of perceived autonomy support from these three social agents on psychological needs, motivation, and engagement of 614 Chinese primary school students. Results revealed that perceived autonomy support from parents, teachers, and peers positively and uniquely predicted student psychological need satisfaction. The effect was strongest for parental autonomy support, although a model constraining the paths from all three social agents to be equal fit equally well. Need satisfaction predicted greater self-determined motivation and student engagement and mediated the effects of all three social agents on student motivation and engagement. The model showed strong gender invariance. The results highlight the importance of targeting all three social agents in multi-level interventions that aim to optimize student motivation and school engagement.     

Understanding how a case-based assessment instrument influences student teachers’ learning approaches

In order to stimulate student teachers to thoroughly comprehend the main variables influencing their work, teaching and assessment strategies in teacher education have changed significantly. One of the changes in the assessment of student teachers in teacher education programs is the use of case-based assessment instruments. Such instruments evaluate the extent to which student teachers are able to handle authentic problems. It is expected that implementing this mode of assessment will stimulate student teachers to adopt a deep approach to learning. In this study we examine student teachers’ learning approaches in the context of case-based assessment. Hereto, we investigated the direct effects of the student teachers’ general beliefs on the cognitive demands of assessment on their learning approaches. Also the student teachers’ perceptions of the cognitive demands of the case-based assessment instrument were considered as a mediating variable. The present study is conducted in the Netherlands, in the third year of a 4-year initial teacher training program for primary education. A case-based assessment instrument, called the OverAll Test, was implemented as the major determinate of the third-year final examination grade of the student teachers.     

The role of teachers’ cognitive support in motivating young Hong Kong Chinese children to read and enhancing reading comprehension

This study analysed the reading lessons of 35 Hong Kong Grade 2 Chinese teachers to investigate whether their instructional practices were related to their students’ motivation and reading comprehension scores. The reading lessons of the teachers were analysed according to the five dimensions of the Motivating Instructional Context Inventory. Students’ subjective reports on their motivation and their teachers’ teaching performance, and their reading comprehension scores were collected. Hierarchical linear modelling showed that students tended to have better reading comprehension scores when their teachers provided more cognitive support and used more motivating instructional practices to motivate them to read.     

Administrative support and its mediating effect on US public school teachers

This study examined the effect of administrative support on teachers’ job satisfaction and intent to stay in teaching. The study employed a path analysis to the data of regular, full-time, public school teachers from the Schools and Staffing Survey teacher questionnaire. Administrative support was the most significant predictor of teachers’ job satisfaction, while teachers’ job satisfaction was the most significant predictor of teachers’ intent to stay in teaching. It was also confirmed that administrative support mediates the effect of teaching experience, student behavior, and teachers’ satisfaction with their salary on teachers’ job satisfaction and intent to stay in teaching.     

The Relationship Between Teachers' Perceptions of Student Motivation and Engagement and Teachers' Enjoyment of and Confidence in Teaching

This paper examines teachers' perceptions of their students' motivation and engagement and their enjoyment of and confidence in teaching. Drawing on Martin's Student Motivation and Engagement Scale, 10 facets of motivation and engagement were explored amongst a sample of 1,019 teachers. These facets comprised three adaptive cognitive dimensions of motivation (self‐efficacy, valuing of school, mastery orientation), three adaptive behavioural dimensions (planning, study management, persistence), two impeding dimensions (anxiety, failure avoidance), and two maladaptive dimensions (uncertain control, self‐handicapping). Male teachers tended to report significantly higher student motivation and engagement than female teachers (though effect sizes were small) and primary school teachers reported significantly higher student motivation and engagement than high school teachers (effect sizes were moderate). Adaptive dimensions were more strongly associated with enjoyment and confidence in teaching than impeding and maladaptive dimensions. Of the adaptive dimensions, students' mastery orientation was the strongest correlate of teachers' enjoyment of teaching and students' persistence and students' planning were the strongest correlates of teachers' confidence in teaching. These associations were more marked for male teachers and relatively independent of years spent teaching. Implications for teacher education and professional development are discussed.     

Teachers’ beliefs, instructional behaviors, and students’ engagement in learning from texts with instructional pictures

This study investigated the relations between teachers’ pedagogical beliefs and students’ self-reported engagement in learning from texts with instructional pictures. Participants were the biology, geography, and German teachers of 46 classes (Grades 5-8) and their students. Teachers’ instructional behaviors and students’ engagement in learning from texts with instructional pictures were assessed by means of student ratings. Teachers’ beliefs about using texts with instructional pictures in their teaching were assessed by a self-report questionnaire. Results showed that the more teachers believed that students should be taught clear strategies on how to learn from texts with instructional pictures the more engagement was reported by their students. A multilevel mediation model showed that the association between teachers’ beliefs and students’ self-reported engagement was mediated by teachers’ perceived instructional behavior.     

Preparing teachers to remediate reading disabilities in high school: What is needed for effective professional development?

In this paper, we ask what constitutes effective professional development for teachers faced with struggling readers in high school. Metacognitive teacher training, instructional coaching, mentorship, and collaborative learning are considered. We describe a professional development model preparing high school teachers to teach PHAST PACES, a remedial reading program. A metacognitive teaching style and specific skills for teaching comprehension and decoding strategies were emphasized. Teachers provided high positive ratings regarding the usefulness of the training, and attributed to the training an increased sense of efficacy in improving student outcomes and understanding reading problems. A comparison of student outcomes for teachers’ first and subsequent classes suggested that the professional development model promotes better outcomes on more complex skills.     

“Maybe I can teach those kids.” The influence of contextual factors on student teachers’ efficacy beliefs

This study investigated student teachers’ efficacy beliefs, collective teacher efficacy beliefs, and perceived cooperating teachers’ efficacy beliefs. These student teacher beliefs were examined with the focus on context, primarily the school setting (i.e., rural, suburban, and urban), to determine whether setting played a role in the development of the student teachers’ efficacy beliefs. The research participants included 102 student teachers. All three setting groups exhibited significant increases in teachers’ sense of efficacy following student teaching. Urban student teachers exhibited significantly lower perceived collective efficacy. Perceived cooperating teachers’ efficacy was predictive of and positively related to the student teachers’ post-TSES scores.     

Disclosing biology teachers’ beliefs about biotechnology and biotechnology education

Teachers have been shown to frequently avoid addressing biotechnology topics. Aiming to understand the extent to which teachers’ scarce engagement in biotechnology teaching is influenced by their beliefs and/or by extrinsic constraints, such as practical limitations, this study evaluates biology teachers’ beliefs about biotechnology and biotechnology teaching. The findings of a survey administered to 93 secondary school teachers reveal that, in spite of holding positive beliefs about biotechnology, teachers overestimate the obstacles presented at biotechnology teaching, particularly concerning material and resource limitations. Implications of these findings for teacher training program design are discussed.     

When theory meets practice: What student teachers learn from guided reflection on their own classroom discourse

Drawing on extant theorizing and research on reflective teaching, this paper discusses the impact of an innovative methods course designed around the activity of student teachers’ reflections on their own classroom discourse, for their understandings of the connections between theory and practice. Situated in the context of foreign language pre-service teacher education in Israel, and focusing on one aspect of a larger research study on the connections that student teachers make between theory and practice, this paper presents three exemplary cases of student teachers’ learning. The connections exhibited by these three student teachers between theory (principles of pedagogy) and practice (the classroom discourse patterns that characterized their teaching) were interpreted as: (1) understanding how practice fits theory; (2) connecting theory and practice to generate grounded theories of practice; and (3) developing practical theories. We discuss these findings as related to the idiosyncratic character of students teachers’ learning and to activities in teacher education that enhance reflection on the meeting between theory and practice.     

The multidimensionality of multicultural service learning: The variable effects of social identity, context and pedagogy on pre-service teachers’ learning

Multicultural service learning (MSL) seeks to develop pre-service teachers’ capacities and commitment to teach diverse student populations. We use multiple regression analyses of survey data collected from 212 pre-service teachers engaged in 22 MSL sites to assess the effects of pre-service teachers’ social identities, MSL contexts, and university pedagogy on pre-service teachers’ awareness of cultural bias, understanding of social inequality, and commitment to teaching diverse students. We find that pedagogical engagement positively contributes to all three outcomes. Pre-service teacher’s social identities and MSL contextual factors, however, have variable effects. We explore the pedagogical and research implications of this multidimensionality.     

Working towards balance: Arts integration in pre-service teacher education in an era of standardization

Drawing on pre-service teachers’ curriculum, the promises and pitfalls of three orientations to arts integration—making, analyzing, and balancing—are described. While few pre-service teachers create balanced curriculum where students make and analyze art, even fewer implement such lessons as student teachers. By contrast, most pre-service teachers initially approach arts integration by asking students to make or analyze art. Such patterns imply teacher educators need to identify fieldwork placements supporting arts integration, frame pre-service teachers’ initial arts integration as steps to be nurtured by continuing professional development, and prepare teachers committed to the arts to resist narrow definitions of learning in a climate of standardization.     

Learning (not) to become a teacher: A qualitative analysis of the job entrance issue

Reporting on 12 case studies of student teachers, this paper examines how experiences during teacher education affect graduates’ decision on job entrance. Interpretative data-analysis reveals that powerful sources of the shift in motivation to enter teaching concern interactions in which the person of the teacher is at stake. These mainly involve student teachers’ need to develop a socially recognized sense of professional competence as well as their dealing with social and cultural working conditions in schools. These crucial determinants act as “double-edged swords”, being at the same time important sources for recognition as for self-doubts and loss of job motivation.     

Predicting teachers’ instructional behaviors: The interplay between self-efficacy and intrinsic needs

This study was conducted to extend previous research by examining the specificity of teachers’ intrinsic needs and self-efficacy, and how they interact to predict instructional behaviors. Self-reporting measures were applied to assess teachers’ self-efficacy and intrinsic need satisfaction and students rated the teachers’ instructional behaviors (cognitive activation, teacher–student relationship and classroom management). The latent moderated structural (LMS) equation analyses conducted on data collected from 155 mathematics teachers and 3483 grade 10 students in secondary schools in Germany revealed that separately both self-efficacy and intrinsic needs predicted instructional behaviors. Moreover, a significant interaction effect between intrinsic need satisfaction and self-efficacy emphasized that when need satisfaction is not provided by the school environment, a high level of self-efficacy has a negative effect on the teacher–student relationship. Our findings underline that self-efficacy and intrinsic needs have commonalities when predicting instructional behavior and the importance of addressing the interaction between personal and environmental characteristics within the learning environment. Future research on teachers’ instructional behaviors should take aspects of teacher competence beyond self-efficacy into considerations and should examine how intrinsic need satisfaction can be enhanced.     

Introducing Dialogic Teaching to Science Student Teachers

It is commonly believed that science teachers rely on language that allows only minor flexibility when it comes to taking into account contrasting views and pupil thoughts. Too frequently science teachers either pose questions that target predefined answers or simply lecture through lessons, a major concern from a sociocultural perspective. This study reports the experiences of science student teachers when introduced to the Communicative Approach to science education drawing on dialogic teacher-talk in addition to authoritative teacher-talk. This approach was introduced to the students in an interventional teaching program running parallel to the student teachers’ field practice. The practical implications of this approach during initial teacher education are the central focus of this study. The data consisting of videos of lessons and interviews indicate that the student teacher awareness of teacher-talk and alternative communicative options did increase. Student teachers reported greater awareness of the different functions of teacher-talk as well as the challenges when trying to implement dialogic teaching.     

Revealing Student Teachers’ Thinking through Dilemma Analysis

We explore the potential of dilemma analysis as an assessment tool to reveal student teachers’ thinking and concerns about their practice. For this purpose we analyze the dilemma analyses completed by 22 student teachers enrolled in our science teacher preparation program over a period of four semesters. Student teachers’ dilemmas fall into two main groups: dilemmas about student performance and dilemmas associated with instructional decisions. These dilemmas reveal a variety of concerns that student teachers have about their work. In particular, concerns about lack of student motivation and its consequences on performance and instruction play a central role in student teachers’ thinking. The recognition of common patterns of thought in our student teacher thinking has made us reflect on and re-evaluate important components of the curriculum in our science teacher preparation program.     

Student teachers’ skills in the implementation of collaborative learning: A multilevel approach

This study explores the development of student teachers’ skills in implementing collaborative learning (CL) using a multilevel repeated measures design. Participants were 105 pre-service teachers that were trained in CL implementation. The results indicate that student teachers generally perform well in implementing CL. Further, it appears that these skills increase over time, although no linear growth can be found. Student teachers’ skills development appears to be positively connected with their general feeling of teaching efficacy. Surprisingly, training and students’ pedagogical knowledge have no significant impact.     

Tracking changes in pre-service EFL teacher beliefs in Greece: A longitudinal study

This article reports on a longitudinal study that aims to investigate pre-service EFL teacher beliefs about learning and teaching in Greece. The study attempts to track possible changes in those beliefs during a 3-year teacher education program and explores the impact of teaching practice, in particular, on student teachers’ beliefs. The results indicate that while there is a gradual and sometimes significant development in student teachers’ beliefs during the program, student teachers’ engagement in the teaching practice seems to have a low impact on the development of their beliefs. Those findings are interpreted with reference to the structure and context of the specific teacher education program and can be useful for the design and development of EFL teacher education programs.