Constructing Self-Efficacy in Social Studies: A Framework for Preservice Programs

• In Event: But What the Heck Is a Theoretical and Conceptual Framework?

Abstract

Many undergraduate programs are designed to meet their students' pedagogical and discipline-specific needs. However, pre-service teachers' self-efficacy evaluations from different scales and surveys indicate that these programs fail to build their self-efficacy in content areas (Tschannen- Moran & Woolfolk Hoy, 2001; Pendergast, Garvis, & Keogh, 2011). Self-efficacy is the belief that a teacher who enters a classroom can generate learning that produces identifiable knowledge. While research seeks to evaluate pre-existing self-efficacy, they have not critically examined how pre-service teachers can build self-efficacy within education programs. The dearth of research on discipline-specific self-efficacy informed the development of this framework for social studies education.

Author

• Laura Ashley McNeice, Baylor University