Study On Pre-service English Teachers' Self-efficacy

Teachers' self-efficacy refers to the subjective evaluation and cognition of teachers on whether they can successfully achieve the teaching goals in a specific teaching environment,effectively complete teaching tasks,and promote the improvement of students' learning ability,as well as their adherence to beliefs.It not only greatly affects the professional development of teachers,but also becomes an important predictor of the improvement of students' academic performance.Studies on teacher efficacy in foreign countries have a history of nearly 50 years.In the 1990 s,domestic scholars began to engage in research on teacher efficacy,mainly discussing the effects of in-service teachers' language level,teaching age and other factors on teachers' self-efficacy.Research on pre-service English teachers' self-efficacy is relatively rare in normal universities.This article takes pre-service English teachers as the research subject,and focuses on two research questions:(1)What is the general situation of self-efficacy of pre-service English teachers?(2)What are the factors that affect pre-service English teachers' self-efficacy? Through investigating the three variables of instructional strategies and skills,classroom management and student engagement,the author has found that the pre-service English teachers' self-efficacy is closely related to their future teaching career development.According to a survey of 49 pre-service English teachers in a normal university in Hunan,the main results of this study are as follows:(1)The pre-service English teachers' self-efficacy is at a relatively middle level(The mean of the three variables is 3.66,3.56 and 3.42).The overall classroom management efficacy of 49 pre-service teachers is slightly higher than that of the other two variables.There is a certain difference in the efficacy of different pre-service teachers;(2)The pre-service English teachers have different levels of self-efficacy,which are caused by external factors such as teaching experience,practice school environment,relationship between colleagues,comment from others,and internal factor such as different pre-service teachers' understanding of the source of efficacy.This article makes the following suggestions:(1)Pre-service English teachers should have a positive sense of teacher responsibility when participating in education internships,be brave to face difficulties in teaching,and maintain close contact with instructors in practice school.(2)Pre-service English teachers should continue to strengthen the cultivation of teacher quality at the school learning stage,and strengthen the employment of instructional strategies and skills to improve students' classroom engagement;(3)Normal universities should provide pre-service English teacher with high-quality practicum schools which have good school atmosphere.