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No description available.

No description available.

No description available.

The purpose of this study was to examine the relationships among high school teachers' self-reported social and emotional competencies (SECs), social interaction teaching practices, and instructional interaction teaching practices. Yoder's (2014) research suggests to successfully implement social-emotional learning (SEL) practices, teachers must have strong social and emotional competency skills (Brackett et al., 2009; Jennings and Greenberg, 2009). This study included a quantitative descriptive method to examine the anonymous survey data collected. Additionally, the data were examined for possible correlations between social, and instructional interaction teaching practices to identify areas of strength or weakness and suggest professional learning options for teachers related to their scores. This study sought to answer the following research questions: 1. What is the relationship among high school teachers' self-reported social, and instructional interaction teaching practices that influence students' social, emotional, and academic skills? 2. What is the relationship between educators' self-reported self-efficacy of their social and emotional competence and how it influences their ability to implement social, and instructional interaction teaching practices? 3. What is the relationship between teachers' overall social interaction score and their overall instructional interaction score? 4. What do the scores from the overall social interaction score and the overall instructional interaction score suggest about the professional learning needs of the participating high school teachers? High school teachers in this study who reported a higher self-efficacy in positive social interactions had a higher self-efficacy in social interactions influencing students' social, emotion, and academic skills. High school teachers with a high self-efficacy in Teacher SEC: Social Interaction Teaching Practices strongly correlated to a higher self-efficacy of Teacher SEC: Instructional Interaction Teaching Practices. Furthermore, high school teachers with a higher self-efficacy in their Overall Social Interaction to that of their self-efficacy of their Overall Instructional Interaction also strongly correlated. Conversely, high school teachers who reported higher self-efficacy with instructional interaction did not report the same level of self-efficacy of their social interaction, albeit the finding was deemed small. The study suggests division and school leaders could prioritize supporting teachers' development of their self-efficacy of their social and emotional competence. / Doctor of Education / The purpose of this study was to examine the relationship among high school teachers' self-reported social and emotional competencies (SECs), social, and instructional interaction teaching practices. The study examined the possible correlations between the self-efficacy of social, and instructional interaction teaching practices to identify areas of strength or weakness and to identify and differentiate the professional learning needs of teachers related to their scores. This study included High School teachers from one school division in Virginia. The high school teachers participated in a pre-published survey from Yoder, 2014a (see Appendix A). The findings suggest teachers with a higher self-efficacy in their SECs were more likely to implement them in their teaching practices. Whereas high school teachers that had a higher self-efficacy in their Instructional Interactions practices did not have a statistically significant higher self-efficacy in their Social Interaction practices. Future actions could include building leaders can provide on-going professional learning to improve the self-efficacy of teachers' SECs and implementation of school-wide practices. Additional implications and future study suggestions are shared.

The research presented in this study investigates the effect of the COVID-19 pandemic on teacher self-efficacy with delivering design-based learning to elementary students and identifies what resources and support teachers need to administer online or blended learning delivery of design-based learning with elementary students in the current environment. The population was elementary teachers teaching STEM content and this study included a sample of four elementary STEM teachers teaching in rural and suburban communities. Each participating teacher completed the Teacher Efficacy and Attitudes Toward STEM Survey (T-STEM) (Friday Institute for Educational Innovation, 2012) to reveal their overall self-efficacy with delivering STEM content, followed by participating in a semi-structured interview consisting of queries targeting both research questions. This qualitative analysis revealed a temporary decrease in teachers' self-efficacy at the beginning of the shift to a virtual environment. A lack of student access to resources at home, the teachers' lack of control and support for the student in a synchronous manner, and a change in STEM education as a priority were revealed as contributors to this temporary decrease in the teachers' self-efficacy. To remediate this, teachers reported condensing activities and the Engineering Design Process to accommodate the virtual environment for a traditionally hands-on instructional strategy. Teachers cited fellow educator support, previous coursework, additional time, and access to teacher resources as resources and support that would be beneficial in the current environment. / Doctor of Philosophy / The research presented in this study investigates the effect of the COVID-19 pandemic on teacher self-efficacy, or confidence, in using an instructional approach to STEM education with elementary students and identifies what resources and support teachers need to use this instructional strategy online or in blended learning settings, a combination of both online and in-person education. The instructional strategy, design-based learning, allows students to use design-thinking to apply the knowledge they are learning to a construct (Doppelt et al., 2008). This study included a sample of four elementary STEM teachers teaching in rural and suburban communities. Each participating teacher completed the Teacher Efficacy and Attitudes Toward STEM Survey (T-STEM) (Friday Institute for Educational Innovation, 2012) to reveal their overall self-efficacy with delivering STEM content, followed by participating in an interview. Prominent topics, or themes, revealed from the interviews revealed a temporary decrease in the teachers' self-efficacy at the beginning of the shift to a virtual environment at the beginning of the global pandemic. A lack of student access to resources at home, the teachers' lack of control and support for the student in a real-time manner, and a change in STEM education as a priority were revealed as contributors to this temporary decrease in the teachers' self-efficacy. To address this, the teachers reported condensing activities and the Engineering Design Process to accommodate the virtual environment for a traditionally hands-on instructional strategy. Teachers cited fellow educator support, previous coursework, additional time, and access to teacher resources as resources and support that would be beneficial in the current education system.

This study examined the degree of perceived teacher self-efficacy between early childhood preservice teachers and elementary education pre-service teachers. There were 88 participants: 44 elementary education pre-service teachers and 40 early childhood pre-service teachers. Participants were mostly white, female pre-service teachers enrolled at East Tennessee State University. Using Bandura's 30-item "Teacher Self-Efficacy Scale" pre-service teachers rated their perceived self-efficacy on 7 subscales: decision-making, influence on school resources, instructional efficacy, disciplinary efficacy, enlisting parent involvement, enlisting community involvement, and creating a positive school climate. Significant differences were found between groups for 3 of the 7 subscales. Early childhood education pre-service teachers reflected higher levels of efficacy in influencing decision making, t(86)=3.36, p<.001; enlisting parental involvement, t(86)= 2.14, p < .05; and creating a positive school climate, t(86) = 3.01, p < .01. No significant differences between groups were found in overall perceived teacher self-efficacy, t(86)=1.44, n.s.

High school writing teacher self-efficacy has suffered because the workload and emotional energy of grading papers is arduous, and despite their efforts to provide formative written feedback, many teachers believe students ignore or misunderstand it. Although audio feedback holds promise for improving the clarity of instructor feedback and the self-efficacy of writing instructors in higher education, its usefulness for improving high school teacher self-efficacy has remained unexplored. This multiple case study investigated how high school teachers believed Kaizena, a digital audio feedback technology, influenced their writing instruction and self-efficacy. Participants, who were drawn from the global Kaizena user base, included a user group of 3 United States teachers and a user group of 3 international teachers to determine how both groups used Kaizena and whether differences in use occurred in either environment. Data sources included individual teacher interviews, participant journals, and artifacts such as teacher-created writing assignments and rubrics. Data analysis included both single case and cross case analyses. Single case analysis included coding and categorizing of interview and participant journal data and content analysis of artifacts. Cross case analysis included identifying emerging themes and discrepant data. Results indicated that all 6 teachers both believed they gave more high quality, personalized feedback to students in less time with the audio feature of Kaizena than with written feedback and did, in fact, provide documents confirming this higher quality. As a result, using Kaizena positively influenced their self-efficacy. This study contributes to positive social change by providing insights into a feedback tool that could improve high school writing instruction.

Assessment scores indicated students with severe disabilities (SWSD) have not been performing to their maximum potential, which may lead to lower quality of life after graduation. Teacher efficacy has been shown to impact student achievement; thus, this study involved exploring the teacher efficacy of the teachers of SWSD. Tschannen-Moran, Woolfolk Hoy, and Hoy's teacher efficacy conceptual framework guided this nonexperimental correlation study to investigate if levels of self-efficacy, years of overall teaching experience, and years of teaching experience with Grade 3 to 8 SWSD were predictors of student reading achievement in a New York City school district. Two open-ended questions were added to explore challenges teachers of SWSD encounter. Student New York State Alternate Assessment (NYSAA) scores were collected from all classroom teachers of students who participated in the 2014-2015 NYSAA at the study site. A regression analysis indicated no significant relationship between teachers' sense of efficacy and the achievement of SWSD in the area of literacy. TSES responses were triangulated using data from 2 open-ended questions, which revealed that teachers face specific challenges when educating students with severe disabilities. At the organizational level, changes to address the needs of teachers could be made to address the challenges found in this study. Positive social change will occur by helping to inform new policies that will reduce challenges indicated by teachers of SWSD and address the needs of teachers to improve the education of SWSD.

There is a lack of understanding of how teachers in Early Care and Education (ECE) work to overcome occupational stress and burnout. Many investigators have documented the stress and burnout that often result in high levels of attrition in ECE teachers. The purpose of this study was to determine to what degree a teacher's protective factors help in mitigating the experiences of stress and burnout often associated with working as a teacher in the field of ECE. Guided by Werner's theory of resilience, which highlights the importance of protective factors as a means of overcoming risk factors, the research questions examined strategies that help promote resilience and mitigate stress and burnout among preschool teachers. The methodology was a qualitative, case study research design. Data were collected via in-depth, semi-structured interviews with 16 ECE teachers and analyzed using thematic analysis, which identified 3 categories of protective factors: family supports, workplace supports, and positive individual characteristics. Additionally, the study revealed that teachers did utilize particular protective factor strategies to help mitigate risk, stress, and burnout, such as family and friends serving as a positive support system, faith, prayer, and belief in a higher being. A recommendation is that teachers participate in an eLearning course developed to introduce protective factors teachers can use to increase levels of resilience. Positive social change may result from this study because it advocates for the support, promotion, and attention to the mental health and well-being of teachers in ECE. This eLearning course will promote teacher well-being, which can have a direct positive impact on the care of young children and the effective facilitation of curriculum and instructions within school systems.