What do pre-service teachers know and believe about motivating students? A look at their motivational styles, strategies, and efficacy beliefs

The purpose of this series of studies was to investigate pre-service teachers’ (PSTs) motivational frameworks for engaging students in learning, and their efficacy for doing so. The participants (N = 385) were at either the beginning or the end of a University-based teacher education program (U-TEP) at a large research university in the Midwest. The first study involved investigating the factor structure of the Teachers’ Sense of Efficacy Scale (TSES; Tschannen-Moran & Woolfolk Hoy, 2001) with PSTs. Confirmatory factor analyses were conducted with the PSTs’ response scores. Analyses showed that the TSES had good psychometric properties and the inferences made from the scores were valid. The study’s results support the use of the total TSES score and also the use of the sub-scale scores. Recommendations are that the total score be used to infer PSTs’ teacher efficacy if a general, overall measure is most appropriate to address the research questions. However, when researchers wish to infer efficacy for specific aspects of teaching (classroom management, student engagement, using effective instructional strategies), scores from the sub-scales are appropriate. The second study focused on the types of knowledge PSTs have for motivating students, their perceptions of themselves as teachers (i.e., teacher efficacy beliefs), and their personal orientations for motivation (i.e., motivating styles). To measure knowledge about motivating students, PSTs created instructional agendas to meet the motivational needs of students exhibiting one of two types of behaviors (disengaged or engaged). Findings suggest that PSTs in both stages (i.e., beginning and end) of teacher development have a great deal of declarative knowledge about strategies that teachers may use to motivate students; these strategies range in terms of their effectiveness. The strategies suggested most frequently by PSTs (i.e., showing personal interest, designing stimulating instruction) are relatively congruent with current recommendations by motivation researchers. Of some concern, however, was the frequent suggestion for using task-extrinsic rewards to maintain or increase motivation of students who exhibit behaviors that indicate task-engagement. Based on the motivational strategies that PSTs suggested, they were classified in terms of their motivating styles. The PSTs varied in their motivating styles, with some being purely autonomy-supportive and others being purely controlling. Over half of the PSTs were classified as having a mixed motivating style (i.e., suggested both autonomy-supportive and controlling strategies). PSTs’ scores on the TSES indicated that those at the end of the U-TEP reported higher levels of teacher efficacy in general, as well as efficacy for managing the classroom and implementing instructional strategies, than did PSTs at the beginning of the U-TEP. No differences were found between the two groups of PSTs (i.e., beginning and ending) for efficacy in engaging students. In addition, no differences were found in teacher efficacy beliefs based on PSTs’ motivating styles