How Self-Efficacy, Perceived Collective Responsibility, and Feedback Predict Beginning Teachers’ Enactment of Ambitious Mathematics Instruction

• In Event: Agency and Voice in the Math Classroom

Abstract

This mixed-methods study examined associations between 80 beginning teachers’ mathematics teaching self-efficacy and perceived collective responsibility and their enactment of ambitious mathematics instruction. We also investigated associations between feedback that novices received on mathematics instruction from coaches, mentors, and principals, and the same outcome. We used the Mathematics Scan classroom observation instrument to assess novices’ mathematics instruction. We found a significant positive association between mathematics teaching self-efficacy and collective responsibility, on the one hand, and novices’ enactment of ambitious mathematics instruction. However, feedback had a significant negative association with this outcome. Analysis of interview data with 18 of the 80 beginning teachers suggested that novices who struggled to enact ambitious mathematics instruction received feedback focused on addressing classroom management challenges.

Authors

• Peter A. Youngs, University of Virginia

• Spyros Konstantopoulos, Michigan State University

• Dorothea M. Anagnostopoulos, University of Connecticut

• Jillian M. Cavanna, University of Hartford

• Tutita M. Casa, University of Connecticut

• Holly Henderson Pinter, Western Carolina University

• Corey Drake, The Math Learning Center