| A high percentage of children who have experienced environments with substantial risk factors exhibit externalizing and internalizing behavior symptoms of which teachers report they are ill equipped to address alone. Thus, the range of interventions for at-risk children should include interventions that target the care-taking systems inclusive of teachers and school classrooms in which such children spend a good deal of their time. One possibility for intervention is for teachers to enter into partnerships with mental health agencies that could offer training and support through collaborative consultation services. To ensure teachers begin to feel adequately prepared to meet the behavior needs of children with special challenges, their beliefs in their level of preparedness should also be addressed. The purpose of this study was to explore early childhood teachers' perception of a collaborative consultation process between themselves and early childhood mental health clinicians in which their self-efficacy was affected. 24 teachers from 8 Head Start and Child Care centers located in Metro Denver participated in the study. Analysis of 24 interview transcriptions revealed that collaborative consultation services could both increase teachers' knowledge and skill level and positively impact teacher self-efficacy to address children's socioemotional needs, currently and in the future. An emergent model of change is presented that outlines components within collaborative consultation services that facilitated knowledge acquisition, skill development, and teacher self-efficacy gains. Findings suggest that in order to increase teacher self-efficacy within a collaborative consultation model of services, attention should be given equally to developing good relationships with teachers and to treating teachers as adult learners. |
