INFLUENCE OF A COOPERATIVE EARLY FIELD EXPERIENCE ON PRESERVICE ELEMENTARY TEACHERS SCIENCE SELF-EFFICACY

The influence of a cooperative early field experience on preservice el ementary teachers' science self-efficacy was investigated in this stud y. The sample was comprised of 120 preservice elementary education stu dents enrolled in an elementary science methods course at a large midw estern university. Cooperative learning groups were formed within each of five laboratory sections of the methods course. Each cooperative g roup witnessed several modeled science lessons employing cooperative t echniques prior to planning and teaching a cooperative elementary scie nce lesson in a local public school. Two randomly selected elementary science methods laboratory sections were tested directly before and th ree other sections immediately after the performance of a cooperative teaching field experience. Testing involved obtaining scores from subj ects' response to the Science Teaching Efficacy Beliefs Inventory, for m B (STEBI-B). The STEBI-B measures science teaching self-efficacy bel iefs. A random sample of personal interviews were also given by the re searcher to a selected subsample of study participants at the end of t he semester. The significant ANOVA findings reported for the data coll ection subgroup (time of teaching) main effect (F = 8.63, p < 0.01), l ack of significant correlations between the alternative predictor vari ables, and the STEBI-B scores provides evidence to support an inferenc e that early cooperative field experience had a positive influence on the subjects' science teaching self-efficacy. (C) 1996 John Wiley & So ns, Inc.