self-efficacy teaching

Teachers’ self-efficacy teaching with technology

By Peter R. Albion____________________________________________

Information technology in education has shifted towards curriculum integration. Consequently, teacher education programs need to prepare graduates for teaching with IT. Graduates should possess both skills in the use of IT and belief in their capacity to integrate IT into teaching. Teachers’ self –efficacy in actual interaction with IT, can provide an enormous feed back in the process of evaluating the long term impact of performed courses after taking the new technology used design.

Providing equipment to schools was a necessity, provoking a futuristic vision to prepare students with real needed skills to be functional in the society. The first approach with this new technology was when Queensland government provided equipment and shifted to the new concept of information and communication technology (ICT) in education focused for its use as integration into the curriculum. In the words of current Queensland policy, information technology should be applied "to effective learning and teaching in all key learning areas, P12"(Education Queensland, 1998b). In Queensland, the most recent policy initiative included competencies that are to be achieved by all teachers in the state education system within the three year span of the program (Education Queensland, 1998a).

Although, there are no stated requirements for graduating teachers to meet these standards prior to employment, it seems that employers of teachers will soon expect that applicants and current employees become capable with respect to ICT. Then, a necessary training would be required to address these actual issues using strategies such as new technology standards for teacher education programs.

The way that teachers address the use of technology in the class setting could be the result of multiple factors including the accessibility, nature of the curriculum, time and personal capabilities to be adaptable into the new era of technology. However, relevant evidence suggests that teachers' beliefs in their capacity to work effectively with technology are a significant factor in determining the use of the computer in the classroom. Studies of computer use during teaching practicum have found that, despite possessing positive dispositions towards computer use, pre-service teachers lacked confidence in their capacity to teach successfully with computers. (Albion, 1996; Downes, 1993)

A continuous growth in the movement for the integration of technology into the daily practice of teaching may become a community expectation. Consequently, as teachers, we must be careful to be aware of these new expectations, because these ones may become as a requirements to approach quality of content in the classroom. Being in the vanguard and providing and integrating information technology into our daily practices of teaching could be now our new philosophy. We can be separated by the new innovations. We must embrace the self-efficacy theory that offers insights into the development of materials with more powerful instructional designs, and take advantage of it, to help our students and offer them a true interaction with technology.