A JOURNAL SUMMARY (10)

Pre-service teachers’ self-efficacy perceptions on Web pedagogical content knowledge

Suzan Kavanoza, H. Gülru Yüksel, and Emrah Özcan

An International Journal of Computer and Education Volume 85, July 2015, Pages 94-101 Elsevier

The important characteristics for effective and successful use of technology in the classrooms depend on the pedagogical and personal beliefs of the teachers. Identification and development of pre-service teachers’ beliefs is essential during teacher preparation because their self-efficacy and beliefs are the strongest predictors in the use of technology in their classroom in the future. The purposes of this journal are to investigate pre-service EFL teachers’ perceived self-efficacy levels and attitudes regarding W-PCK (Web Pedagogical Content Knowledge). Basically, there were four research questions guided this journal as follows.

1.      What is the level of pre-service EFL teachers’ perceived self-efficacy regarding W-PCK?

2.      What are pre-service EFL teachers’ attitudes towards Web-based instruction?

3.      How do pre-service EFL teachers’ attitudes towards Web-based instruction and perceived self-efficacy correlate?

4.      How does pre-service EFL teachers’ perceived self-efficacy regarding W-PCK differ with regard to several variables such as gender, year level and frequency of Web use?

This research took place at a Turkey state university and employed a web-based survey. The survey was administered to 120 EFL students. The data was collected using the Web Pedagogical Content Knowledge scale (W-PCK) originally developed by Lee and Tsai (2010) and adapted into Turkish by Horzum (2011). The students were sent a survey link via e-mail and they were requested to fill in the questionnaire. The data then was analyzed into two parts; descriptive statistics and inferential statistics by SPSS.

The result of the research revealed that Turkish pre-service EFL teachers have a high level of W-PCK self-efficacy and they also have positive attitudes towards Web-based instruction. Besides, participating pre-service EFL teachers’ level of general self-efficacy was positively correlated with their attitudes towards Web-based instruction and there are no significance differences between gender and year level, but it was associated positively with their frequency of Web use.