Elementary Teachers' Perceptions of Their Students' Personality: Associations With Their Teaching Ability Beliefs and Goals

• In Event: Teacher Motivation and Implications for Teacher Outcomes: Diverse Theoretical and Methodological Approaches

Abstract

Objectives
Motivation researchers have demonstrated strong links between teachers’ perceptions of different characteristics of their students and some aspects of teachers’ motivation for teaching, such as their beliefs about their teaching skills (Tsouloupas, Carson, Matthews, Grawitch, & Barber, 2010). Researchers, however, have yet to consider how other important aspects of teacher motivation, such as their classroom goals (Meece, Anderman, & Anderman, 2006), may relate to their perceptions of students. In addition, most researchers to date have focused on teacher perceptions of students’ motivation, achievement, and classroom behavior (Pelletier & Rocchi, 2016). In the present study, we extend this work by examining how teacher perceptions of another student characteristic, personality, relates to both teachers’ beliefs about their teaching ability and their classroom goals.

Theoretical Framework
The study is based in Eccles and colleagues’ expectancy value theory (Eccles-Parsons et al., 1983; Wigfield & Eccles, in press), a prominent theory concerned with the development and socialization of motivation. In the socialization model embedded within the larger model, teachers’ motivational beliefs and behaviors in the classroom are impacted by perceptions of their students’ personalities and other characteristics. We focus on two teacher motivation constructs—(a) domain-specific beliefs about their ability to teach and (b) domain-general classroom goals—because they are known to influence teachers’ instructional strategies and students’ academic outcomes (Han & Yin, 2016).

Method
Data for this study came from the Childhood and Beyond Study in which three cohorts of students and their teachers from Southeastern Michigan were followed over many years starting in 1986 (see Eccles et al., 1993). Here we use data from 2nd and 3rd grade teachers (N=43) in wave three of the study who reported on their students’ (N=454) personality and their own beliefs about their ability to teach science, reading, and math and their mastery and performance goals for their classroom. We averaged teacher perceptions of four student personality traits (extraversion, neuroticism, conscientiousness, openness) across each student in their classroom. Then, we ran multiple regressions controlling for teacher gender, years of experience, and level of education.

Results
For teachers’ beliefs about their ability, teachers had lower ability beliefs about teaching reading when teachers perceived high levels of student extraversion (β=-.469, p=.019) and higher ability beliefs about teaching reading when teachers perceived high levels of student conscientiousness (β=.419, p=.026). We found no associations between teacher perceptions of student personality and teachers’ ability beliefs to teach science and math.
For classroom goals, teachers emphasized performance goals less when they perceived high levels of student openness (β=-.427, p=.032). In addition, there was a near-significant association between neuroticism and performance goals (β=.348, p=.073). We found no associations between teacher perceptions of student personality and mastery goals.

Significance
With the growing interest in increasing both student and teacher motivation, it is imperative to broaden our understanding of what student factors can relate to teachers’ motivation. These findings help provide a roadmap for future research to explore if teachers’ perceptions of student personality matter for other classroom practices such as teachers’ instructional strategies.

Authors

• Alyssa Parr, University of Minnesota - Twin Cities

• Jessica R Gladstone, Virginia Commonwealth University

• Lara Turci Faust, University of Maryland - College Park