SelfEfficacy: Fostering Student Determination

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Self-Efficacy Fostering Student Determination
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•     The Little Blue Engine                  by
  Shel Silverstein
• The little blue engine looked up at the hill.His
  light was weak, his whistle was shrill.He was
  tired and small, and the hill was tall,And his
  face blushed red as he softly said,I think I
  can, I think I can, I think I can.
• So he started up with a chug and a strain,And he
  puffed and pulled with might and main.And slowly
  he climbed, a foot at a time,And his engine
  coughed as he whispered soft,I think I can, I
  think I can, I think I can.
• With a squeak and a creak and a toot and a
  sigh,With an extra hope and an extra try,He
  would not stop now he neared the top And
  strong and proud he cried out loud,I think I
  can, I think I can, I think I can!
• He was almost there, when CRASH! SMASH!
  BASH!He slid down and mashed into engine hashOn
  the rocks below... which goes to showIf the
  track is tough and the hill is rough,THINKING
  you can just aint enough!

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(No Transcript)
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Self-Efficacy

• defined as peoples beliefs about their
  capabilities to produce designated levels of
  performance that exercise influence over events
  that affect their lives. determines how people
  feel, think, motivate themselves and behave.
  (Bandura, Self-Efficacy, 1994)
• refers to beliefs in ones capabilities to
  organize and execute the courses of action
  required to produce given attainments. (Bandura,
  Self-Efficacy The Exercise of Control, p. 3)

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Through the personal belief system you can

• Doubt your capabilities by
• - shying away from difficult tasks
• - giving up
• - low aspirations
• - dwell on deficiencies
• - focus on adverse consequences of failure
• - and therefore undermine efforts by diverting
  attention from effective thinking, slowly
  recovering from setbacks, and falling easy to
  stress and depression.
• Believe in your capabilities by
• - approaching difficult tasks as challenges to
  be mastered and not threats
• - fostering interest in something new or unknown
• - have high effort
• - and therefore think strategically, attribute
  failure to insufficient effort, quickly
  recover after failure, and reduce
  stress.

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Self Efficacy What defines these beliefs?

• How people deal with situations. Look at the
  process, not just the result.
• Vicarious/mastery experiences.
• Verbal persuasion.
• Social vs. Psychological (Self-Hindering or
  Self-Aiding concepts of thought)
• Understand thyself? Optimistic vs. Pessimistic.
  Dealing with stress/depression management.
• The good of failing, and the bad of always
  winning (externally). Chances for adversity.

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Self-Esteem vs. Self-Efficacy

• Self-efficacy is concerned with judgments of
  personal capability, whereas self-esteem is
  concerned with judgments of self-worth.
• There is no fixed relationship between beliefs
  about ones capabilities and whether one likes or
  dislikes oneself. (p.11)

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Individual Factors Together That Create
SELF-EFFICACY.

• Self-Concept Composite view of ones self formed
  through experience and feedback from others.
• Self-Esteem Judgment of self-worth.
• Motivation Intrinsic need to deal effectively
  with the environment.
• Proxy Control Moving influence and power into
  your behalf through exercising the control that
  you do have.
• Locus of Control Internal or external?
• Behavior (social skills/cues/different registers)
• Personal expectations
• Through these people create BELIEFS in
  capabilities, which determine the decisions we
  make and how we go about solving problems. They
  determine the level of control people will take
  over what they can influence and the goals that
  they make.

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• Perceived self-efficacy is concerned not with
  the number of skills that you have, but with what
  you believe you can do with what you have under a
  variety of circumstances. (p. 37)
• So, it is based on what you believe you can do
  (the limits you set on yourself), not your actual
  ability.
• To claim that people visualize outcomes, and
  then infer their capabilities is to invoke
  backward causationpeople do not judge that they
  will drown if they jump in deep water, and then
  infer that they must be poor swimmers. Rather,
  people who judge themselves poor swimmers will
  visualize themselves drowning if they jump in
  deep water (p. 21).

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• Individuals with low self-efficacy tend to
  believe that things are tougher that they really
  are. This creates stress and narrow vision of how
  best to go about the problem. By contrast,
  persons who have a strong sense of efficacy
  deploy their attention and effort to the demands
  of the situation and are spurred by obstacles to
  greater effort. (p. 394)
• High efficacy people attribute failure to
  insufficient effort low efficacy people
  attribute failure to deficient ability.
  (Collins, 1982)

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How to create opportunities for self-efficacy

• Locus of Control Allowing the students internal
  locus to proceed and teaching how to self
  regulate.
• Helping students understand that people make
  causal contributions to their lives, but they are
  not the sole causes of their destinies(33).
  Which leads to coping and resiliency.
• Risk taking, chances for decisions and
  experiencing something new along with the
  positive or negative outcome that may come
  allowing for self reflection and evaluation.
• Role modeling, creating those vicarious
  experiences.
• Being a persuader to help cultivate peoples
  beliefs in their capabilities while also helping
  to create attainable successes.

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Foster the Cognitive

• Organizational, monitoring, evaluating, and
  regulating ones self.
• Using that inner speech for following thought
  processes/problem solving.
• Attributing accomplishments to effort rather than
  products.
• Understanding main ideas and what is really
  important.
• Do, dont just hear. There must be actual
  experiences in which to transfer cognitive skills
  in order to exercise them. e.g. problem solving-
  creating a plan, follow through, and then
  reflection even in the little daily obstacles.

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Academically

• Students who doubt their intellectual efficacy
  gravitate toward students who devalue academic
  pursuits.
• The very technologies that people create to alter
  and control their environment can become a
  constraining force that in turn controls how they
  think and behave. (Products tests, grades)
• Academic efficacy plays an influential role in
  career choice and development. It predicts
  academic grades, the range of career options
  considered, and persistence and success in chosen
  fields. (Betz Hackett, 1986Lent Hackett,
  1987)

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Standards and Goals

• People construct personal standards that they
  then use to guide, motivate and regulate their
  own behavior. People do things that give them
  self-satisfaction and a sense of self-worth. They
  refrain from behaving in ways that violate their
  personal standards because it will bring
  self-censure (p.8)
• Without standards against which to measure their
  performances, people have little basis for
  judging how they are doing or for gauging their
  capabilities. Goal attainments provide rising
  indicants of mastery that help to instill and
  verify a growing sense of personal efficacy. (p.
  217) (Choices, Decisions, Goals (prob.
  solving))

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As a teacher

• Teachers beliefs in their efficacy affect their
  general orientation toward educational processes
  as well as instructional activities (p. 241)

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As a teacher

• Low efficacy teachers
• - pessimistic view of students motivation
• - strict classroom control and regulations
• - use negative sanctions to get students to
  study
• - distrust their ability to manage a classroom
• - are stressed and angered by student
  misbehavior
• - Take a custodial view of their job
• - If they had to do it all over again, wouldnt
  be where they are now.

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As a teacher

• High efficacy teachers
• - regard their students as reachable and
  teachable
• - create efficacy to create student achievement
• - direct efforts at resolving problems
• - invite and even initiate family involvement

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As a teacher

• Good instruction should promote interest as well
  as technical skills in subject matter. Teaching
  that instills a liking for what is taught fosters
  self-initiated learning long after instruction as
  ceased.

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Closing

• Children can learn a lot from computer terminals,
  but they need human teachers to help build their
  sense of efficacy, to cultivate their
  aspirations, and to find meaning and direction in
  their pursuits. The content of early schooling is
  perishable and long forgotten, but the
  interpersonal and self-development effects endure.