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Preservice teachers’ belief about parental involvement: A cross-sectional perspective Andrew S. Wilkins & Joan M.T. Walker Vanderbilt University http://www.vanderbilt.edu/Peabody/family- school/

Preservice teachers’ beliefs about parental involvement: A cross-sectional perspective

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Preservice teachers’ beliefs about parental involvement: A cross-sectional perspective. Andrew S. Wilkins & Joan M.T. Walker Vanderbilt University http://www.vanderbilt.edu/Peabody/family-school/. Background. - PowerPoint PPT Presentation

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Page 1: Preservice teachers’ beliefs about parental involvement: A cross-sectional perspective

Preservice teachers’ beliefs about parental involvement: A cross-sectional perspective

Andrew S. Wilkins &

Joan M.T. Walker

Vanderbilt Universityhttp://www.vanderbilt.edu/Peabody/family-school/

Page 2: Preservice teachers’ beliefs about parental involvement: A cross-sectional perspective

Background Advanced Pre-Service Teachers

(PSTs) have more positive beliefs about parents than peers with less coursework experience (McBride, 1991, Tichenor, 1997).

Instruction dedicated to parental involvement has been positively associated with more positive beliefs about parents’ and PSTs’ abilities to involve parents (Evans-Schilling, 1999; Morris et al., 1996).

PSTs often have high of self-efficacy despite a lack of practical teaching experience (Easter et al., 1999; Pang & Sablan, 1998; Weinstein, 1988).

Page 3: Preservice teachers’ beliefs about parental involvement: A cross-sectional perspective

Self-efficacy theory

High self-efficacy is helpful when facing difficulties; Bandura, 1986; 1997) but does high self-efficacy prepare PSTs for dealing with families?

High efficacy for involving parents may not encourage PSTs to optimize their training experiences: they may underestimate the

complexities of working with families.

when difficulties arise they may not persist or ask others for help.

Page 4: Preservice teachers’ beliefs about parental involvement: A cross-sectional perspective

Purpose of the study

To learn more about the development of PSTs’ beliefs about parental involvement we asked three groups of students about:

The importance of various teacher practices for parental involvement,

The importance of various parent involvement practices,

Their self-efficacy for involving parents, and

Their beliefs about parents’ abilities to be successfully involved.

Page 5: Preservice teachers’ beliefs about parental involvement: A cross-sectional perspective

Hypotheses

More advanced PSTs would have higher ratings of the importance of teacher and parent practices for involvement.

More advanced PSTs would have more positive beliefs about their own abilities and the abilities of parents.

Page 6: Preservice teachers’ beliefs about parental involvement: A cross-sectional perspective

Participants

The study was conducted at the end of the spring 2002 semester.

120 students participated 70 first-year education majors 23 mid-level students 27 student teachers

89% were female

Several majors were represented 22% early childhood education 32% elementary education 24% secondary education 22% other (e.g., special education, child

development)

Page 7: Preservice teachers’ beliefs about parental involvement: A cross-sectional perspective

MeasuresStudents completed questionnaires assessing their:

Beliefs about the importance of teachers’ parental involvement practices (alpha = .87), e.g., “I think it is important for teachers to conduct conferences with parents at least once a year.”

Beliefs about the importance of parents’ involvement practices (alpha = .91), e.g., “I think it is important for parents to attend parent-teacher conferences at least once a year.”

Response Range: 1 = least important, 4 = most important

All measures were adapted from Hoover-Dempsey et al., 2002; Tichenor, 1997

Page 8: Preservice teachers’ beliefs about parental involvement: A cross-sectional perspective

Measures (cont’d)

Self-efficacy for involving parents (alpha = .85), e.g., “I believe that I will be able to successfully conduct conferences with parents at least once a year.”

Beliefs about parents’ efficacy for involvement (alpha = .91), e.g., “I believe parents will successfully attend conferences at least once a year.”

Response range: 1 = disagree, 4 = agree

All measures were adapted from Hoover-Dempsey et al., 2002; Tichenor, 1997

Page 9: Preservice teachers’ beliefs about parental involvement: A cross-sectional perspective

ResultsAs expected, first-year PSTs’ beliefs about the importance of teachers’ parental involvement practices were less positive than midlevel students and student teachers (* = p<.002).

Beliefs about the importance of teacher practices for involvement

1.0

1.5

2.0

2.5

3.0

3.5

4.0

First-Year (n=70) Midlevel (n=23) Student Teachers (n=27)

*

Page 10: Preservice teachers’ beliefs about parental involvement: A cross-sectional perspective

Results (cont’d)

First-year PSTs reported less positive beliefs about the importance of parents’ involvement practices than did student teachers (* = p<.000).

Beliefs about importance of parents' involvement practices

1.0

1.5

2.0

2.5

3.0

3.5

4.0

First-Year (n=70) Midlevel (n=23) Student Teachers (n=27)

*

Page 11: Preservice teachers’ beliefs about parental involvement: A cross-sectional perspective

Results (cont’d)

First-year PSTs reported lower self-efficacy for involving parents than did midlevel students (* = p<.047).

Beliefs about self-efficacy for involving parents

1.0

1.5

2.0

2.5

3.0

3.5

4.0

First-Year (n=70) Midlevel (n=23) Student Teachers (n=27)

*

Page 12: Preservice teachers’ beliefs about parental involvement: A cross-sectional perspective

Results (cont’d)

All groups reported similarly limited beliefs about parents’ efficacy for involvement.

Beliefs about parents' efficacy for involvement

1.0

1.5

2.0

2.5

3.0

3.5

4.0

First-Year (n=70) Midlevel (n=23) Student Teachers (n=27)

Page 13: Preservice teachers’ beliefs about parental involvement: A cross-sectional perspective

Data Analyses (cont’d) Given that PSTs reported high self-

efficacy but low beliefs about parents’ efficacy, we conducted paired t-tests for each group.

Paired t-tests for all groups were significant (p< .000).

Comparison between self-efficacy and parents' efficacy for involvement

0.0

0.5

1.0

1.5

2.0

2.5

3.0

3.5

4.0

4.5

First-year (n=70) Midlevel (n=23) Student Teacher (n=27)

Beliefs about PSTs' abilities to involve parents

Beliefs about parents' abilities to be involved

***

Page 14: Preservice teachers’ beliefs about parental involvement: A cross-sectional perspective

Discussion

Between-group differences suggest that PSTs’ beliefs about parental involvement change over time.

This suggests that as PSTs move from their first year in the teacher education program, their beliefs about the importance of teacher and parent involvement practices and their efficacy for involving parents increase.

Page 15: Preservice teachers’ beliefs about parental involvement: A cross-sectional perspective

Discussion (cont’d)

PSTs’ beliefs about parents’ efficacy do not appear to change.

Suggests further coursework and involvement experiences are needed to educate PSTs that, when invited, all parents can be successfully involved (Epstein, 1992; Hoover-Dempsey et al., 1995).

Page 16: Preservice teachers’ beliefs about parental involvement: A cross-sectional perspective

Future Directions

Track PSTs across their education and into the first years of teaching.

Develop an objective measure of PSTs’ abilities to involve parents.

Collect other forms of data, including observations, interviews, assessment of course experiences.

Assess PSTs’ beliefs across several teacher training programs.