Pre-service Teachers’ Reflections on Personal Responsibility for Student Motivation: A Video Vignette Study

Year 2020, Volume: 9 Issue: 2, 221 - 239, 31.08.2020

Lia Danıels , Bryce Dueck , Lauren Goegan

Abstract

Teachers assume personal responsibility in four domains: student motivation, student achievement, relationships with students, and the quality of their own teaching. In all existing research, pre-service and practicing teachers score lowest in the motivation domain. This may be because some teachers view motivation as a shared responsibility or one that is contingent on external factors. Thus, the purpose of this research was to examine pre-service teachers’ reflections on two different perspectives on personal responsibility for student motivation - one that reflected high internal unmitigated responsibility and one that reflected shared and contextualized responsibility. Pre-service teachers watched two video vignettes, and then reflected on the perspectives in an open-ended written format. The descriptive statistics confirmed that responsibility for motivation was the lowest of the four domains. Moreover, the percentage pre-service teacher felt responsible for student motivation predicted which video vignette they selected. Thematic analysis of pre-service teachers’ reflection revealed four themes that give insight to how pre-service teachers make sense of responsibility for student motivation: people responsible, external factors, strategies to support motivation, and emotions. The results are discussed in light of methodological, theoretical, and practical implications.

Keywords

pre-service teachers, student motivation

Supporting Institution

Social Science and Humanities Council of Canada (SSHRC) Insight Grant awarded to the first author.

Project Number

#435-2015-0216

References

• Ames, C. (1992). Classrooms: Goals, structures, and student motivation. Journal of educational psychology, 84(3), 261-271.
• Ashton, P. (1985). Motivation and the teacher’s sense of efficacy. In C. Ames and R. Ames (Eds.), Research on motivation in education: Vol. 2. The classroom milieu (pp. 141-174). Academic Press.
• Bacon, C. S. (1993). Student responsibility for learning. Adolescence, 28(109), 199-212.
• Daniels, L.M., Goegan, L.D., Radil, A.I., & Dueck, B. S. (2020, June). Targeting Both Mindsets and Skills in a SMaRT Intervention for Pre-service Teachers. Paper to be presented at the biennial meeting of the SELF. Quebec, QB. Canada.
• Daniels, L. M., Poth, C. A. & Goegan, L. D. (2018). Enhancing our understanding of teachers’ personal responsibility for student motivation: Mixed insights informing theory, measurement, and practice. Frontiers: Educational Psychology, 3, 91. Daniels, L. M., Radil, A., & Wagner, A. (2016). Concordance between pre-service teachers’ personal responsibilities and intended instructional practices. Journal of Experimental Education, 84, 529-553. doi:10.1080/00220973.2015.1054333.
• Deci, E. L., Spiegel, N. H., Ryan, R. M., Koestner, R., & Kauffman, M. (1982). Effects of performance standards on teaching styles: behavior of controlling teachers. J. Educ. Psychol., 74(852). https://doi.org/ 10.1037/0022-0663.74.6.852
• Eren, A. (2014). Uncovering the links between prospective teachers' personal responsibility, academic optimism, hope, and emotions about teaching: a mediation analysis. Soc. Psychol. Educ., 17, 73-104. https://doi.org/ 10.1007/s11218-013-9243-5
• Eren, A. (2015). “Not only satisfied and responsible, but also hopeful”: prospective teachers' career choice satisfaction, hope, and personal responsibility. Camb. J. Educ., 45, 149-166. https://doi.org/ 10.1080/0305764X.2014.930417
• Eren, A. (2017). Investigating prospective teachers' teaching-specific hopes as predictors of their sense of personal responsibility. Asia-Pac. J. Teach. Educ., 45, 267-284. https://doi.org/ 10.1080/1359866X.2016.1169507
• Eren, A., & Çetin, G. (2019). Pre-service teachers’ beliefs about the teaching profession, curriculum orientations, and personal responsibility. Curriculum Perspectives, 39(1), 19-32.
• Flink, C., Boggiano, A. K., & Barrett, M. (1990). Controlling teaching strategies: Undermining children's self-determination and performance. J. Pers. Soc. Psychol., 59, 916-924. https://doi.org/ 10.1037/0022-3514.59.5.916
• Frenzel, A. C. (2014). Teacher emotions. In R. Pekrun & L. Linnenbrink-Garcia (Eds.), Educational psychology handbook series. International handbook of emotions in education (p. 494-518). Routledge/Taylor & Francis Group
• Fulmer, S. M., & Frijters, J. C. (2009). A review of self-report and alternative approaches in the measurement of student motivation. Educational Psychology Review, 21(3), 219-246.
• Gibson, S., & Dembo, M. H. (1984). Teacher efficacy: A construct validation. Journal of Educational Psychology, 76(4), 569-582. https://doi.org/10.1037/0022-0663.76.4.569
• Gogol, K., Brunner, M., Goetz, T., Martin, R., Ugen, S., Keller, U., Fischbach, A., & Preckel, F. (2014). “My questionnaire is too long!” The assessments of motivational-affective constructs with three-item and single-item measures. Contemporary Educational Psychology, 39(3), 188-205.
• Guskey, T. R. (1981). Measurement of the responsibility teachers assume for academic successes and failures in the classroom. J. Teach. Educ., 32, 44-51. https://doi.org/ 10.1177/002248718103200310
• Hazel, N. (1995). Elicitation Techniques with Young People, Social Research Update, Issue 12, Department of Sociology, University of Surrey, http://www.soc.surrey.ac.uk/sru/SRU12.html.
• Helker, K., & Wosnitza, M. (2014). Responsibility in the school context - Development and validation of a heuristic framework. Frontline Learning Research, 2(2), 115-139.
• Helker, K., & Wosnitza, M. (2016). The interplay of students’ and parents’ responsibility judgements in the school context and their associations with student motivation and achievement. International Journal of Educational Research, 76, 34-49. https://doi.org/ 10.1016/j.ijer.2016.01.001
• Hsieh, H.-F., & Shannon, S. E. (2005). Three Approaches to Qualitative Content Analysis. Qualitative Health Research, 15(9), 1277-1288. https://doi.org/10.1177/1049732305276687
• Klassen, R. M., Tze, V. M., Betts, S. M., & Gordon, K. A. (2011). Teacher efficacy research 1998-2009: Signs of progress or unfulfilled promise?. Educational psychology review, 23(1), 21-43.
• Larrivee, B. (2000). Transforming teacher practice: Becoming the critically reflective teacher. Reflective Practice, 1, 293-307. https://doi.org/10.1080/14623940020025561
• Lauermann, F. (2014). Teacher responsibility from the teachers' perspective. Int. J. Educ. Res., 65, 75-89. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijer.2013.09.005
• Lauermann, F., & Karabenick, S. A. (2009). “The many faces of teacher responsibility,” in Paper Presented at the 13th European Association for Research on Learning and Instruction Biennial Conference (EARLI) (Amsterdam).
• Lauermann, F., & Karabenick, S. A. (2011). Taking Teacher Responsibility Into Account(ability): Explicating its multiple components and theoretical status. Educational Psychologist, 46(2), 122-140.
• Lauermann, F., & Karabenick, S. A. (2013). The meaning and measure of teachers' sense of responsibility for educational outcomes. Teach. Teach. Educ., 30, 13-26. https://doi.org/ 10.1016/j.tate.2012.10.001
• Lewis, R. (2001). Classroom discipline and student responsibility: The students' view. Teaching and Teacher Education, 17(3), 307-319. https://doi.org/10.1016/S0742-051X(00)00059-7
• Matteucci, M. C., & Helker, K. (2018). Who is responsible for educational outcomes? Responsibility ascriptions for educational outcomes in a sample of Italian teachers, parents, and students. Learning and Individual Differences, 61, 239-249. https://doi.org/ 10.1016/j.lindif.2017.12.009
• Nederhof, A. J. (1985). Methods of coping with social desirability bias: A review. European Journal of Social Psychology, 15(3), 263-280. https://doi.org/10.1002/ejsp.2420150303
• Pelletier, L., Seguin-Levesque, C., & Legault, L. (2002). Pressure from above and pressure from below as determinants of teachers' motivation and teaching behaviors. J. Educ. Psychol., 94, 186-196. https://doi.org/ 10.1037//0022-0663.94.1.186
• Rotter, J. B. (1954). Social learning and clinical psychology. Prentice-Hall, Inc.
• Ryan, R. M., & Deci, E. L. (2017). Self-determination theory: Basic psychological needs in motivation, development, and wellness. Guilford Press.
• Ryan, R. M., & Weinstein, N. (2009). Undermining quality teaching and learning: A self-determination theory perspective on high-stakes testing. Theory Res. Educ., 7, 224-233. https://doi.org/ 10.1177/1477878509104327
• Sansone, C., & Harackiewicz, J. M. (Eds.). (2000). Intrinsic and extrinsic motivation: The search for optimal motivation and performance. Elsevier.
• Tsang, K. K. (2011). Emotional labor of teaching. Educational Research, 2(8), 1312-1316.
• Weiner, B. (1985). An attributional theory of achievement motivation and emotion. Psychological Review, 92(4), 548-573.
• Weinstein, C. S. (1990). Prospective elementary teachers' beliefs about teaching: Implications for teacher education. Teaching and teacher education, 6(3), 279-290.
• Woolfolk, A. E., & Hoy, W. K. (1990). Prospective teachers' sense of efficacy and beliefs about control. Journal of Educational Psychology, 82(1), 81-91.
• Yin, H., Huang, S., & Chen, G. (2019). The Relationships between Teachers’ Emotional Labor and Their Burnout and Satisfaction: A Meta-Analytic Review. Educational Research Review, 28. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.edurev.2019.100283