Self Efficacy

As I view it, self efficacy is someone's beliefs of what they are capable of achieving.  It is a very important concept for teachers to understand, because how a student feels about their likelihood of success at school has a significant impact on their effort and attitude.  I saw how at the high school level students who had struggled throughout the grades and failed several classes had no belief in themselves or their abilities.  As a result, they showed up on the first day prepared to fail and were not willing to even try anymore.  It is critical for teachers to give clear, descriptive, positive feedback to students in order to build their sense of self-efficacy.  Students should talk about what they do well, and learn how to set clear goals with achievable benchmarks as they develop their understanding of their own abilities.  If students are not taught strategies for persisting in learning until they achieve their goals, they will end up as many of my students in high school with a very poor sense of self and little willingness to try.

Personally, I feel that I do have a good sense of self efficacy in many areas of my life.  Academically, I have been successful over the years, but not always because things have been easy to me. I had positive influences in my family and teachers who pushed me to work harder.  Today, as a result of this positive support, I do believe that as long as I give a quality effort in my studies I will be able to be successful.  Professionally, I think my self efficacy is not as positive, I suppose because of the number of factors that impact my ability to achieve success as a teacher.  Individually, I do have confidence in my ability to work hard for my students and develop creative and engaging lessons.  I have worked with kids in a number of settings, and feel that I am able to connect well with them.  But, because I have struggled to motivate my older students, and I know there are students who have left my classroom without understanding the content, I do not always feel that I am as capable as I would like to be.  However, because of my belief in the strengths that I do have, I am motivated enough to persevere and continue to improve in my teaching.