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Virtual school teacher's science efficacy beliefs| The effects of community of practice on science-teaching efficacy beliefs

<p> The purpose of this study was to examine how much K-12 science teachers working in a virtual school experience a community of practice and how that experience affects personal science-teaching efficacy and science-teaching outcome expectancy. The study was rooted in theoretical frameworks from Lave and Wenger's (1991) community of practice and Bandura's (1977) self-efficacy beliefs. The researcher used three surveys to examine schoolteachers' experiences of a community of practice and science-teaching efficacy beliefs. The instrument combined Mangieri's (2008) virtual teacher demographic survey, Riggs and Enochs (1990) Science-teaching efficacy Beliefs Instrument-A (STEBI-A), and Cadiz, Sawyer, and Griffith's (2009) Experienced Community of Practice (eCoP) instrument. </p><p> The results showed a significant linear statistical relationship between the science teachers' experiences of community of practice and personal science-teaching efficacy. In addition, the study found that there was also a significant linear statistical relationship between teachers' community of practice experiences and science-teaching outcome expectancy. The results from this study were in line with numerous studies that have found teachers who are involved in a community of practice report higher science-teaching efficacy beliefs (Akerson, Cullen, &amp; Hanson, 2009; Fazio, 2009; Lakshmanan, Heath, Perlmutter, &amp; Elder, 2011; Liu, Lee, &amp; Lin, 2010; Sinclair, Naizer, &amp; Ledbetter, 2010). The researcher concluded that school leaders, policymakers, and researchers should increase professional learning opportunities that are grounded in social constructivist theoretical frameworks in order to increase teachers' science efficacy.</p>

Identiferoai:union.ndltd.org:PROQUEST/oai:pqdtoai.proquest.com:3646176
Date24 December 2014
CreatorsUzoff, Phuong Pham
PublisherPepperdine University
Source SetsProQuest.com
LanguageEnglish
Detected LanguageEnglish
Typethesis

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