A Comparative Examination of Student Teacher and Intern Perceptions of Teaching Ability at the Preservice and Inservice Stages

Abstract

This study investigates how the culminating teacher preparation program (TPP) experience (either student teaching assignment or internship) influences the perceptions teachers report about their ability to perform instructional tasks required of teachers. A multivariate ANOVA test (N = 502) was conducted to compare perceptions of student teachers (those who taught 15 weeks) and interns (those who taught a full academic year) at two points in time—once at the conclusion of their TPP and again after their first year of teaching. Results indicate that overall, student teachers report higher perceptions of their ability to perform instructional tasks than interns do at both the preservice and inservice teacher stages. Interns reported higher scores at the inservice stage on only the mathematics subscale, suggesting that there is some change in self-efficacy as teachers gain teaching experience. Findings suggest that the student teaching context provides more modeling and verbal support and produces teachers with higher perceptions of teaching ability than those who complete an internship.

Keywords

elementary teacher education student teaching teacher beliefs teacher perceptions

Introduction

The overwhelming majority of elementary school teachers in the United States receive their training from traditional teacher preparation programs (TPPs) that are affiliated with a college or university. The remaining 20% to 30% of teachers are trained through alternative certification programs (Kee, 2012; National Research Council, 2010). In recent years, the focus of teacher education research has centered on making comparisons between teacher candidates attending traditional TPPs and teacher candidates seeking alternative routes to licensure (see Darling-Hammond, Chung, & Frelow, 2002; Kee, 2012; Zientek, 2007) to determine the differences between teacher candidate perceptions of ability. These decisions are often based on the assumption that traditional TPPs resemble each other so much that there is little to no variability among programs and that differences in teacher training are more likely to be found between alternative routes and traditional routes to licensure.

However, there is a great degree of variability within and between TPPs and the impact they have on teacher perceptions and teacher effectiveness (Gansle, Noell, & Burns, 2012). Gansle and colleagues noted that these variations include how teacher candidates are recruited and accepted into the program, how content and pedagogical knowledge is shared, how field experiences are structured, and how teacher candidates are exposed to professional knowledge and skills. TPPs play a pivotal role in improving the quality of teaching and learning in our schools (Plecki, Elfers, & Nakamura, 2012), and yet our understanding of how TPPs affect teacher effectiveness and perceptions of preparedness is limited at best (Gansle et al., 2012). Thus, to understand more fully the connection between teacher preparation and student achievement (see Armor et al., 1976), we must begin with an examination of the different features of TPPs and ask whether these program features influence the perceptions teacher candidates have about their ability to teach. In this article, we describe a study that adds to the current literature base by collecting cross-institutional data from teacher candidates across one state that were assigned to either a student teaching assignment (a student teacher is defined as a preservice teacher who attended a TPP and was assigned to teach approximately 15 weeks of one academic semester) or an internship (an intern is defined as a preservice teacher who attended a TPP and was assigned to teach full-time in an elementary classroom for a full academic school year). Then, we track these teacher candidates into full-time teaching positions to determine what happens to the perceptions of these teachers once they have taught for one school year. Do they still feel as prepared and capable to teach?

Literature Review

We framed this research study within the context of the sociocultural theory (Vygotsky, 1978). This theory suggests that what students learn is significantly influenced by the experiences that he or she has (Gee, 2000; Grossman et al., 2000; Martin, 2004). The context, school setting, environment, teacher educators, and cooperating teachers within and associated with TPPs all play a role in the types of learning experiences teacher candidates have. A preservice teacher enters the TPP with a variety of classroom and educational experiences of his or her own that can further influence and/or inhibit what he or she learns within the TPP. The context and setting of the TPP provides a situated learning environment with specific content, instructional, pedagogical, and methodological coursework, along with varying degrees and types of field-based clinical experiences. One way to measure the influence of TPPs, and the teacher training context, is to measure the perceptions teacher candidates have about their ability to teach based on their TPP experiences.

For this, we turned to Bandura’s (1977, 1997) theory of social cognition to provide a framework for the interpretation of teacher perceptions. Ever since the RAND Corporation study (Armor et al., 1976), researchers have noted that the perceptions a teacher has about his or her teaching ability is one of only a few teacher characteristics directly related to student achievement (Cakiroglu, Capa-Aydin, & Hoy, 2012; Caprara, Barbaranelli, Steca, & Malone, 2006). The perceptions a teacher has about his or her ability to teach does not necessarily refer to one’s actual ability to do something, but rather the teacher’s perceived ability influences the confidence and persistence he or she will exhibit to complete the teaching task (Tschannen-Moran, Hoy, & Hoy, 1998). These perceptions directly influence the daily teaching decisions teachers make (Bandura, 1986; Dewey, 1933; Nisbett & Ross, 1980). Kagan (1990) described teacher beliefs as the “highly personal ways in which a teacher understands classrooms, students, the nature of learning, the teacher’s role in the classroom, and the goals of education” (p. 423). When it comes to teacher training, Shulman (1987) maintained,

The goal of teacher education is not to indoctrinate or train teachers to behave in prescribed ways, but to educate teachers to reason soundly about their teaching as well as to perform skillfully. Teaching is both effective and normative; it is concerned with both means and ends. Processes of reasoning underlie both. The knowledge base must therefore deal with the purposes of education as well as the methods and strategies of teaching. (p. 13)

Therefore, student teaching is designed to provide teacher candidates with both the knowledge base needed to teach and experience with the methods and strategies of teaching. These experiences influence the way a teacher perceives his or her ability to teach. Bandura (1997) explained that there are four main sources that influence one’s efficacy judgments. These include mastery experiences, verbal and social persuasion, vicarious experiences or social modeling, and psychological responses. Whenever a person performs a skill or task successfully, his or her self-efficacy increases. The more experiences we have where we “master” the task, the greater our sense of efficacy. Verbal and social persuasion can also strengthen one’s efficacy beliefs. This is especially true when the verbal and social persuasion comes from someone we respect and admire. In addition, vicarious experiences or social modeling increases self-efficacy. When one witnesses others successfully completing a task, one’s confidence to complete the task is strengthened. Finally, psychological responses (such as mood, emotions, and feelings) also influence one’s self-efficacy to perform tasks. The more positive emotions associated with completing a task successfully, the stronger one’s self-efficacy becomes. Thus, using Bandura’s theoretical framework as a guide, we provide a model or conceptual framework (see Figure 1) to describe the types of experiences preservice teachers need to have to build teacher self-efficacy and to feel well-prepared for classroom teaching.

Figure 1.

Model (based on Bandura’s theoretical framework) depicting sources of teacher self-efficacy that are present during the culminating field-based experience of the teacher preparation program.

The Student Teaching Model

One of the most prominent experiences that teacher candidates have is the culminating field-based experience known as student teaching. Clift and Brady (2005) noted, “The field experiences provide prospective teachers opportunities to practice ideas or gain experience with concepts” (p. 325). Feiman-Nemser and Buchmann (1987) further described the student teaching experience as the chance for teacher candidates to teach under the direction of a more experienced teacher, an opportunity to watch an experienced teacher firsthand, an opportunity to find out what the cooperating teacher thinks about teaching, an opportunity to interact with children and learn how they think, and an opportunity to discover what it feels like to be in charge in a classroom. Although there is no official student teaching model that has been adopted by TPPs in the United States, Guyton and McIntyre (1990) determined that the student teaching model today looks very similar to the student teaching model used during the mid-1800s. Since that time, the only distinct changes that have occurred in the student teaching model are that the length of student teaching, the amount of supervision provided, and the field-based experiences prior to student teaching have all increased.

The Council for the Accreditation of Educator Preparation (CAEP), the largest accrediting organization in the United States, provides very few standards regarding what student teaching should look like. For example, CAEP has no standard on the length of student teaching, the number of supervisor observations required, and how supervisors or cooperating teachers are selected. General CAEP recommendations suggest that the student teacher should be actively included in classroom processes, be involved as a member of the instructional team at the school to make teaching decisions, and should actively participate in collaborative projects that improve teaching and meeting the needs of the student population (including successful work in the classroom with diverse ethnic groups, students with exceptionalities, and students from all socioeconomic status [SES] groups). Without an established student teaching model, TPPs are left to rely on research to determine which characteristics of student teaching produce more capable and more effective teachers. Allen (2003), however, asserted that the research base is inconclusive regarding the effectiveness of the varying forms of student teaching or internship experiences.

Wilson, Floden, and Ferrini-Mundy (2001) reported that there is still a great deal of variation in how TPPs structure the student teaching or internship experience. For example, some TPPs require yearlong (paid or unpaid) internships whereas others require only semester-long student teaching placements. These variations are found both between and within TPPs. Silvernail and Costello (1983) explained that TPPs began implementing yearlong internships to address criticism for not providing extensive enough clinical experience. The idea is that the more clinical experience a teacher candidate has and the longer the duration of this clinical experience, the more prepared the teacher candidate will be to teach. In reality, yearlong internships have also been used by principals who simply need a last minute hire.

The Influence of Student Teaching

There is evidence to support the idea that student teaching experiences positively influence the confidence preservice teachers report about their ability to influence student achievement compared with those who did not have a student teaching experience (Darling-Hammond et al., 2002; Kee, 2012; Oh, Ankers, Llamas, & Tomyoy, 2005; Zientek, 2007). For example, Helfrich (2007) found that teacher candidate perceptions increased after student teaching and that there were significant differences between these perceptions based on whether teacher candidates were receiving a master’s degree (had more coursework), or if they were completing only a bachelor’s degree. Fives, Hamman, and Olivarez (2007) reported that self-efficacy increased in student teachers over time and that the type and degree of support student teachers received further influenced these perceptions of ability. Knoblauch and Woolfolk Hoy (2008) also found that student teachers in rural, urban, and suburban settings all experienced significant increases in their self-efficacy and perceived ability to teach after student teaching. Yet simply having a student teaching experience is not sufficient. High-quality student teaching placements are critically important if they are to influence preservice teacher perceptions in meaningful ways (Beck & Kosnik, 2002; LaBoskey & Richert, 2002).

When it comes to the duration of the student teaching placement, there has been conflicting evidence. Chambers and Hardy (2005) demonstrated that there are not significant differences between preservice teachers who completed a traditional one-semester student teaching experience versus those who completed a yearlong internship (one academic year) in terms of their perceived ability to teach. D. J. Boyd, Grossman, Lankford, Loeb, and Wyckoff (2009) and Ronfeldt and Reininger (2012) reported similar findings, stating that simply increasing the duration of the student teaching experience does not seem to have a substantial enough impact. In addition, Spooner, Flowers, Lambert, and Algozzine (2008) found in a comparison between student teachers who graduated from the same TPP but experienced two different types of culminating field-based experiences (either a semester-long student teaching assignment or a yearlong internship) did not report significant differences in their perceptions of teaching ability. And finally, when comparing interns who completed an internship in a traditional setting with interns who completed their internship in a professional development school setting, McKinney, Haberman, Stafford-Johnson, and Robinson (2008) reported no significant differences in such areas as persistence, approach to children, planning/organization, and putting theory into practice. Silvernail and Costello (1983), however, demonstrated that student teachers in a yearlong experience reported less anxiety about their teaching responsibilities when compared with those who were assigned the traditional semester-long student teaching experience.

In the only longitudinal study we found that followed preservice teachers through the different stages of the TPP, Woolfolk Hoy and Burke Spero (2005) reported that preservice teacher self-efficacy and perceptions of teaching ability continued to increase throughout the TPP and at the conclusion of student teaching. As these student teachers in Woolfolk Hoy and Burke Spero’s study became novice teachers, their self-efficacy declined when it was measured after 1 year of teaching. Moreover, there is empirical evidence to support the claim that novice teacher perceptions increase regarding their ability to teach if they have experienced student teaching (Oh et al., 2005; Reynolds, Ross, & Rakow, 2002).

We know from the current research base that having a student teaching experience enhances teacher perceptions, but are there differences in these perceptions based on whether a student teaching assignment or internship was completed? And what happens to these perceptions once teachers begin teaching? We did not locate a single study that examined teacher perceptions at both the preservice and inservice stages based on the type of student teaching experience teachers were assigned. Clearly, more research is needed that examines not only how perceptions vary by student teaching assignment but what happens to these perceptions once preservice teachers secure full-time employment. This type of empirical evidence can assist TPPs in making decisions about how best to structure culminating field-based experiences. We used the following research questions in our study:

Research Question 1: How do teacher candidates who differ in their culminating field-based experience (student teacher or intern) report their perceptions of teaching ability at the end of their teacher training?

Research Question 2: In what ways do perceptions of preservice teachers (based on student teaching or internship experiences) change after they have taught for 1 year?

Method

In this section, we describe the context, the participants, instrumentation, and the data analyses procedures used in the current study. There were two phases (preservice and inservice) of data collection in this study. The first set of data was collected at the conclusion of the TPP, and the second set of data was collected at the conclusion of the first year of teaching.

Context

Five TPPs from a Western state in the United States were included in the current study. These TPPs were selected because together they produce the highest number (70%) of teacher candidates each year across this state. Other programs in this state include smaller colleges and universities and alternate routes to licensure, which together make up the remaining 30% of teacher candidates. The TPPs in the current study vary in admittance criteria, the number of teacher education courses required in reading, math, multicultural, and assessment, the number of practicum hours assigned prior to student teaching, and the student teaching and/or internship experiences provided. See Table 1 for a description of TPPs included in this sample. On the completion of their coursework and practicum experiences, most of the preservice teachers enrolled in these programs were assigned a student teaching placement, whereas others applied for and were assigned an internship. The student teaching assignment or the internship constituted the culminating field-based experience at each TPP.

Table 1.

Teacher Preparation Program Descriptions.

Elementary education program	Admittance criteria	Reading, math, assessment, and multicultural education courses	Practicum/fieldwork experience	Internship or student teaching
Program A	GPA 2.85, passing scores on multiple Praxis tests, Technology Skills Assessment	Foundations of literacy development, Literacy in Grades K-2, Grades 3-6, Children’s Literature, Multicultural education, Instructional design and assessment, Elementary mathematics	Approximately 140 hr	Student teaching and internships
Program B	GPA 2.50, passing scores on multiple Praxis tests, 3 letters of recommendation, professional purpose statement	Learning literacy and development, Reading Methods I, Reading Methods II, Advanced reading methods, Multicultural education, Ethnic studies course, Assessment and data-based decision making	Approximately 400 hr	Student teaching
Program C	GPA 2.75, passing scores on multiple Praxis tests, Teacher Education Writing Exam, ACT 20 or higher, group interview, speech/hearing test	Classroom literacy instruction, Assessment and instruction for struggling readers, Assessment and differentiation of the curriculum	Approximately 546 hr	Student teaching and internships
Program D	GPA 3.0, passing scores on multiple Praxis tests, group interview	Literacy Methods I, Literacy Methods II, Children’s literature, Multicultural education, Curriculum design, and Assessment	Approximately 210 hr	Student teaching and internships
Program E	GPA 2.75, passing scores on multiple Praxis tests, Collegiate Assessment of Academic Proficiency, interview, biographical statement	Reading instruction in primary grades, Reading instruction in intermediate grades, Foundations of diversity, Instructional planning and assessment	Approximately 150 hr	Student teaching

Note. GPA = grade point average. ACT = American College Testing

In the current study, a student teacher is defined as a preservice teacher who was assigned to teach approximately 15 weeks of one semester (either fall or spring semester) alongside a cooperating teacher in an elementary classroom. A university supervisor was also assigned to mentor and provide training to the student teacher on a weekly basis. An intern is defined as a preservice teacher who was assigned to teach full-time in an elementary classroom for a full academic school year (including both fall and spring semesters) without a cooperating teacher in the classroom. A teacher who teaches at the same school was assigned to serve as the mentor teacher to support the intern in curriculum planning and classroom management. A university supervisor was also assigned to the intern for mentoring and additional training. Additional comparisons between student teaching and internships examined in the current study are listed in Table 2.

Table 2.

Comparisons Between Elementary School Student Teachers and Interns.

Characteristics	Student teacher	Intern
Duration	Approximately 15 weeks	Full academic year (40 weeks)
Mentoring	Share classroom full-time with the cooperating teacher	Teach alone in classroom. Mentor teacher in school assigned to provide 10 hr of training per week. Minimum of 4 hr/week once the intern has become proficient
Supervision	University supervisor visits weekly	University supervisor visits minimum of 6 times
Supervisor mentoring	Weekly group sessions with other student teachers	Meets with the supervisor but not always with other interns
Payment	No payment or health benefits	Paid ½ of beginning teacher’s salary with full health benefits
Classroom assignment	One or two classroom placements (half time spent in the primary grade classroom and the other half in the intermediate grade classroom)	One classroom placement
Grade	Pass/fail (no letter grade)	Pass/fail (no letter grade)
Selection	All teacher candidates provided with student teaching placement	Interns must apply for internship and are selected based on grades and faculty recommendations

Simply graduating from the same TPP does not guarantee that all participants have had similar experiences—especially after experiencing a culminating field-based experience of either student teaching or an internship. We noted after examining the TPPs in our study that there might be more variation within programs than between programs. For example, most programs provide both traditional student teaching assignments and internship assignments. Thus, participants from one program who were assigned a traditional student teaching assignment have more similar experiences as participants from another program who also completed a traditional student teaching placement, than those completing an internship from their same program. For this purpose, we examined the perceptions of the teacher candidates based on their student teaching assignment, and not based on the program from where they graduated.

Participants

Phase I

All teacher candidates from the five TPPs were invited to complete a survey asking them to rate their perceived ability to teach at the conclusion of their teacher training. The participants (N = 502) in the first phase of this study were 2005-2006 graduates and this sample represented 67% of the total population (population N = 750) of teacher candidates graduating from one of the five TPPs included in the current study. At the end of the survey, participants were asked to provide their birth month and the last four digits of their social security numbers so that they could be tracked into full-time teaching positions a year later. With this information, the state office of education was able to locate which teacher candidates had secured full-time teaching positions and where they were teaching within this Western state.

The participants in the sample for Phase I were overwhelmingly female (93% female, 7% male), White (97% White, 2% Hispanic, 0.7% American Indian or Alaskan Native, 0.2% Asian, 0.1% Native Hawaiian or Pacific Islander), and predominantly between the ages of 18 and 30 years (15% were 18-21 years old, 54% were 22-25 years old, 13% were 26-30 years old, 10% were 31-40 years old, and 6.7% were 41-55 years old).

Phase II

For the second phase of the study, another copy of the survey was mailed to all of the participants who completed the survey in the first phase of the study and who had secured a full-time teaching job (population N = 340). Of this group of inservice teachers (N = 180), we received follow-up surveys representing 53% of the sample of inservice teachers in the state who graduated from the TPPs included in this study.

Instrumentation

Professional Teaching Knowledge and Skills Survey (PTKSS)

The data for this study were collected using the PTKSS. This scale was adapted from the Total Quality Partnerships Teacher Survey, a survey used in a longitudinal study analyzing preservice experiences in the state of Ohio (see Lasley, Siedentop, and Yinger, 2006). We made a few changes to the original survey administered in Ohio. The original survey prompt asked, “How prepared are you to do the following?” The prompt was changed to read, “How well can you do the following?” This change was made to make the survey applicable to both preservice and inservice teachers. These adaptations were reviewed and approved by teacher education experts.

The PTKSS has a total of 57 items that are broken down into five subscales: general knowledge and skills (15 items), diversity and multicultural perspectives (9 items), reading (13 items), mathematics (10 items), and assessment (10 items). We selected to use the PTKSS because of its emphasis on the instructional tasks related to these five specific areas. We found these areas especially relevant when examining preservice and inservice teacher perceptions regarding teachers’ ability to teach. The general knowledge and skills subscale contained items that address teaching tasks that all teachers must attend to in an elementary classroom. A teacher’s “with-it-ness,” ability to motivate students, and ability to tailor the curriculum to meet student needs and interests are all tasks expected of today’s teachers, and we wanted to capture the overall responsibilities associated with teaching. The diversity subscale was of interest because of the ever-increasing diverse student population in America’s schools. Today’s teachers are teaching a more diverse group of students than ever before and are likely at some point in their careers to spend time teaching in high-poverty and low-achieving schools (D. Boyd, Lankford, Loeb, Rockoff, & Wyckoff, 2008; Valencia, Place, Martin, & Grossman, 2006). Are teachers handling issues of diversity in their classrooms with ease and confidence?

The next two subscales included items related to reading and math instructional tasks. These scales were important to include in our study because the majority of the time in a teacher’s day in an elementary school classroom (a minimum of at least 3 hr) is spent teaching reading and math. Although these are not the only subjects taught or of importance, these subjects are the most frequently tested, making our understanding of how teachers perceive their abilities to perform these instructional tasks especially relevant. Finally, we included the assessment subscale because of the dominant role assessment plays in today’s elementary school classroom. Since No Child Left Behind (No Child Left Behind Act of 2001 [NCLB]; 2002), teachers have found themselves under greater scrutiny than ever before at both state and federal levels to produce high student achievement. How well do teachers perform assessment tasks and responsibilities? Do they manage the demands and tasks related to assessment with understanding and ease?

Sample items from each subscale of the PTKSS include the following: “How well can you motivate students to participate in academic tasks?” (general knowledge and skills), “How well can you teach in ways that support students learning English as a second language?” (diversity and multicultural perspectives), “How well can you use a variety of reading assessments to determine students’ strengths, needs, and progress?” (reading), “How well can you integrate mathematics with other subject areas?” (mathematics) and, “How well can you analyze student work in order to assess and modify your own teaching strategies?” (assessment). Responses to these items were made on a 5-point Likert-type scale ranging from not at all to very well. Additional sample items from the PTKSS can be found in the appendix.

Reliability and validity of the PTKSS

First, we analyzed the reliability of the PTKSS. Nunnaly (1978) indicated that a measure of 0.7 or greater is an acceptable reliability coefficient. All scales in this analysis met these criteria with a minimum of .93 on the preservice teacher data and a .82 on the inservice teacher data. Thus, it was determined that the different items on the PTKSS measured the same general construct and produced similar scores demonstrating that there was internal consistency among the items on the individual scales as well as among the items on the overall scale.

Next, we examined the validity of the PTKSS. For this purpose, the appropriate type of factor model analysis was needed to empirically examine the validity of the PTKSS. From the outset, an exploratory factor analysis was not considered as an option for this analysis because as explained by Henson and Roberts (2006), the exploratory factor analysis is simply a theory-generating procedure, whereas the confirmatory factor analysis is a procedure used to test theory. We already had a theory for how the items would align and so we opted for the confirmatory factor analysis.

The sample we used for the confirmatory factor analysis of this instrument consisted of the 502 preservice teachers who completed the first phase of the study. The data for this analysis were entered into AMOS 16.0 (Arbuckle, 1999). The results indicated a global factor with all five subscales loading onto one factor. This model acknowledged that the five different scales have much in common and allows for this commonality. A first-order factor was also identified with each of the items also loading onto one of the five subscales. Therefore, this model also acknowledged that each of the five separate and distinct subscales measure a particular type of teacher perceptions allowing analyses to be run for each individual scale. Fit indices and weights from the confirmatory factor analysis model can be seen in Table 3. Results from the fit indices allowed the researcher to accept the global factor with five first-order factors as having a good data fit (Dickey, 1996; Roberts, 1999; Stevens, 1996).

Table 3.

Fit Indices for the CFA (N = 502).

	Fit index
Model	NFI	TLI	CFI	AIC	RMSEA
CFA	0.87539	0.89162	0.89943	7441.76282	0.05284

Note. CFA = confirmatory factor analysis; NFI = normed fit index; TLI = Tucker–Lewis index; CFI = comparative fit index; AIC = Akaike information criterion; RMSEA = root mean square error of approximation.

Data Analysis

First, we used descriptive statistics to identify the scale means as well as the standard deviations and the ranges of both the preservice and inservice teacher data. Next, we used inferential statistics to compare teacher perceptions based on whether participants completed a student teaching assignment or an internship. We conducted a multivariate ANOVA test to compare differences between preservice and inservice teacher responses on the PTKSS. The partial eta-square statistic generated by the SPSS software was used as an effect size measure in this study. Cohen (1988) explained that partial eta-square values should be interpreted as the following: .01 is indicative of a small effect, .06 is indicative of a medium effect, and .15 is indicative of a large effect.

Findings

In this section, we share the results of the two research questions used in the current study.

Preservice Teacher Perceptions Based on Student Teaching or Internship Experience

The first research question was, “How do teacher candidates who differ in their culminating field-based experience (student teacher or intern) report their perceptions of teaching ability at the end of their teacher training?” To determine the differences in preservice teacher perceptions based on whether teachers were a student teacher or an intern, we began by examining the descriptive statistics for each of the subscales of the PTKSS. The descriptive statistics for preservice teachers are listed in Table 4.

Table 4.

Descriptive Data for Preservice Teachers on the PTKSS (N = 469).

PTKSS Scale	n	M	SD	Range
General knowledge and skills (15 items)				0-75
Student teaching	346	62.37	8.68	38-75
Internship	123	61.27	8.46	35-75
Diversity and multicultural perspectives (9 items)				0-45
Student teaching	346	33.32	7.66	9-45
Internship	123	32.00	7.08	9-45
Reading (13 items)				0-65
Student teaching	346	53.31	9.63	27-65
Internship	123	51.84	8.82	32-65
Mathematics (10 items)				0-50
Student teaching	346	41.31	7.57	10-50
Internship	123	38.95	7.50	10-50
Assessment (10 items)				0-50
Student teaching	346	42.05	6.90	22-50
Internship	123	41.08	6.60	22-50

Note. PTKSS = Professional Teaching Knowledge and Skills Survey.

Using a multivariate ANOVA test, we compared the preservice teacher perceptions (dependent variable) based on either student teacher or intern experience (independent variable) for each subscale on the PTKSS. These results are listed in Table 5. Student teachers reported higher means than interns on all five subscales, but the differences on the mathematics scale were the only statistically significant differences noted. The effect size of this statistically significant difference was small, suggesting that the practical significance of this finding is minimal.

Table 5.

ANOVAs of Preservice Teacher Perceptions Based on Student Teaching or Internship (N = 469).

Source	F	p	Partial η²
General knowledge and skills
Student teacher^a or intern	1.488	.223	—
Diversity and multicultural perspectives
Student teacher^a or intern	2.819	.094	—
Reading
Student teacher^a or intern	2.239	1.35	—
Mathematics
Student teacher^a or intern	8.830	.003	.019^b
Assessment
Student teacher^a or intern	1.936	.165	—

Reporting higher means.

.01 = small effect, .06 = medium effect, and .15 = large effect.

Inservice Teacher Perceptions Based on Student Teaching or Internship Experience

The second research question asked, “In what ways do perceptions of preservice teachers (based on student teaching or internship experiences) change after they have taught for 1 year?” To determine the differences in inservice teacher perceptions based on whether they were a student teacher or an intern, we began by examining the descriptive statistics for each of the subsections of the PTKSS. The descriptive statistics for inservice teachers are listed in Table 6.

Table 6.

Descriptive Data for Inservice Teachers on the PTKSS (N = 163).

PTKSS Scale	n	M	SD	Range
General knowledge and skills (15 items)				0-75
Student teaching	140	60.39	7.45	41-74
Internship	23	60.35	5.83	50-74
Diversity and multicultural perspectives (9 items)				0-45
Student teaching	140	30.87	6.77	14-45
Internship	23	28.74	6.06	17-42
Reading (13 items)				0-65
Student teaching	140	50.26	8.58	3-68
Internship	23	49.35	9.24	22-64
Mathematics (10 items)				0-50
Student teaching	140	38.89	6.47	19-58
Internship	23	40.61	5.20	31-50
Assessment (10 items)				0-50
Student teaching	140	38.47	6.42	25-50
Internship	23	36.96	5.60	28-48

Note. PTKSS = Professional Teaching Knowledge and Skills Survey.

Using a multivariate ANOVA test, we compared the inservice teacher perceptions for each subscale on the PTKSS based on whether inservice teachers reported having a student teaching or internship experience. These results are listed in Table 7. Inservice teachers who were student teachers at the preservice stage reported higher means than interns at the inservice stage of the study on three of the subscales (general knowledge and skills, diversity and multicultural perspectives, and reading), but none of these were statistically significant. At the inservice stage, interns reported higher mean than the student teachers on the mathematics and assessment subscales, but none of these were statistically significant.

Table 7.

ANOVAs of Inservice Teacher Perceptions Based on Student Teaching or Internship (N = 163).

Source	F	p	Partial η²
General knowledge and skills
Student teacher^a or intern	0.001	.978	—
Diversity and multicultural perspectives
Student teacher^a or intern	2.016	.158	—
Reading
Student teacher^a or intern	0.221	.639	—
Mathematics
Student teacher or intern^a	1.458	.229	—
Assessment
Student teacher^a or intern	1.936	.165	—

Reporting higher means.

Discussion

Tschannen-Moran et al. (1998) explained that when efficacy judgments about one’s ability to accomplish a task are being made, there are two key elements in play. First, the analysis of the task within a specific context is analyzed, and second, an assessment of one’s strengths and weaknesses relevant to the task must be ascertained. Thus, the context of where the culminating field-based experience (student teaching or internship) takes place is a critical contextual factor.

Preservice Teacher Perceptions

We expected that the interns in our sample would demonstrate stronger perceptions of ability on all of the subscales on the PTKSS at the preservice stage because they had a longer time to be in a classroom and more experience performing the instructional tasks. This hypothesis was not supported. Preservice teachers who participated in student teaching reported higher mean scores on all scales of the PTKSS at the preservice stage than the interns. These scores were not statistically significant, except for the mathematics scale scores and this result reported only a small effect size.

These findings mirrored those of D. J. Boyd et al. (2009), Chambers and Hardy (2005), Ronfeldt and Reininger (2012), and Spooner et al. (2008) who found that when comparing student teachers who taught for one semester with those who interned for a full academic year, there was not a substantial impact noted when the length of the culminating field-based experience increased to a year. Nonetheless, these findings were different from Silvernail and Costello’s (1983) findings who reported that interns who taught for a full academic year reported feeling less anxious about their teaching responsibilities when compared with student teachers who taught for only a semester.

Verbal and social persuasion and vicarious experiences

Why did student teachers report higher self-perception scores than interns at the preservice stage? Verbal and social persuasion and vicarious experiences, as defined by Bandura (1977), seem to define the types of experiences specific to the student teaching experiences at the preservice teacher stage. We know that the student teachers in our sample were assigned to two different classrooms during their student teaching assignment (often a primary and intermediate elementary school classroom). As a result, student teachers were provided with lots of verbal and social persuasion regarding their teaching ability from their cooperating teacher and from more than one cooperating teacher. We wondered if the fact that interns spent all of their time in one classroom (without a cooperating teacher) left these preservice teachers with more limited opportunities for verbal and social persuasion. As a result, they reported lower perceptions of ability because they had not been provided with as many opportunities to collaborate and learn from a more knowledgeable peer, as described by Vygotsky (1978).

Student teachers also received more opportunities for vicarious experiences and social modeling. This changing context allowed for student teachers to observe and learn from two different classroom settings and two different cooperating teachers. Student teachers have vicarious experiences or social modeling when they watch the cooperating teacher model an instructional skill or a teaching technique. If the preservice teachers can identify with this model, they are more likely to have stronger feelings of efficacy. Zeichner and Hoeft (1996) emphasized the need for strong support and monitoring during field-based experiences. Interns may not have been receiving sufficient monitoring and support. Our findings suggest that a variety of classroom and teaching experiences may be helpful to preservice teachers so they get a better sense of the wide range of challenges inherent in teaching and can see these demands handled in a variety of ways and from more than one cooperating teacher. Interns, though they spend more time in the classroom, are not able to observe a cooperating teacher “in action” minute by minute to see how he or she teaches or how he or she handles classroom management situations. They are left to their own devices and novice experiences when making classroom and instructional decisions.

To provide initial support for this recommendation, Oh et al. (2005) found that the amount of direct supervision student teachers received during their student teaching experience was significantly associated with the teacher’s long-term desire to remain in the teaching profession. Programs that provide more oversight of student teaching produce more effective teachers in the long run (D. J. Boyd et al., 2009). The oversight, mentoring, and support within the student teaching/internship context are important to consider when measuring one’s ability to accomplish an instructional task successfully.

Inservice Teacher Perceptions

When we examined the perceptions of the beginning teachers after they had taught for a full year in an elementary classroom, we again expected to find significant differences between those who had completed a student teaching assignment and those who completed an internship, with the interns reporting higher scores. This was true only on the mathematics scale. Interns reported higher perception scores than the student teachers in Phase II, but these findings were not statistically significant. The student teachers had higher scores on the diversity, reading, and assessment subscales, but these were not statistically significant either. It should be noted that student teachers and interns reported at the beginning teacher stage essentially the same score on the general knowledge and skills subscale.

Mastery experiences and psychological responses

Why did interns report higher scores on the math subscale and essentially the same score as student teachers on the general knowledge and skills subscale? Mastery experiences and psychological responses seem to explain the slight increase in scores and the experiences of the interns at the inservice teacher stage. Bandura (1977) explains mastery experiences as multiple opportunities to practice a task successfully, which leads to feelings of mastery. Mastering difficult tasks such as these can play a critical role in building self-efficacy (Bandura, 1997; Mulholland & Wallace, 2001). Because interns spent more time in the classroom, they had many more opportunities to master some of the instructional tasks and classroom procedures than the student teachers did. The areas where intern perception scores more closely resembled or surpassed those of the student teachers at the end of the first year teaching may have been due to these mastery experiences.

At the inservice teacher stage, interns also had another source of efficacy in play. Interns were experiencing a more realistic psychological state regarding teaching. Bandura explains that psychological responses greatly influence one’s self-efficacy. The intern experience was very similar to that of a novice teacher with little support and little reinforcement. They were alone in the classroom without a classroom teacher. We know from research that the first year of teaching can be a discouraging and overwhelming experience (Veenman, 1984). Research has also described the “reality shock” that most beginning teachers experience (Corcoran, 1981; Veenman, 1984). By the time the interns were beginning their first year of teaching, they had already completed a year of internship and had moved past some of these overwhelming feelings associated with the first year of teaching. Intern scores at the inservice stage were higher on the math subscales when compared with the student teachers. It makes sense that student teachers would report higher scores at the preservice stage, because of their limited teaching experience, when compared with the interns. Once the psychological state of the interns improved after completing their internship year or their unofficial first year of teaching, their efficacy was higher than that of the student teachers.

Conclusion

Based on the results of the current study, there seem to be pros and cons to each of the culminating field-based experiences known as student teaching and the internship. Student teachers have more opportunities for vicarious experiences or social models and more opportunities for verbal persuasion in their self-efficacy to perform instructional tasks. The interns have more opportunities for mastery experiences and therefore have higher levels of perceived teaching ability as they finish up their first year of teaching because of the many more months of experience they bring to the classroom.

The differences in perceptions of teaching ability between student teachers and interns at both the preservice and inservice stages in the current study suggest that overall, student teachers may be having a culminating field experience that builds stronger self-efficacy to perform instructional tasks. These findings also suggest that simply extending the culminating field-based experience without sufficient mentoring, support, and modeling may be less helpful and less meaningful in building teacher self-efficacy. We encourage TPPs to analyze the culminating field-based experiences they provide to ensure that there is adequate time and support to build in plenty of verbal persuasion and social persuasion, sufficient vicarious experiences or social modeling, and mastery experiences.

Using Bandura’s (1986) social cognition theory as a guide, verbal persuasion or social persuasion in a student teaching or an internship setting includes positive feedback from the cooperating teacher, the university supervisor, other teaching colleagues, the principal, parents, and even the students regarding a preservice teacher’s ability to teach. Vicarious experiences or social modeling will involve ample opportunities for the preservice teacher to observe the collaborating teacher teaching successfully, as well as collaboration with the cooperating teacher and other teachers to plan instruction and to prepare for teaching success. And finally, sufficient mastery experiences are needed so that the preservice teacher has lots of opportunities to perform teaching skills or tasks successfully. This includes teaching in a variety of contexts (whole group/small group) and on a variety of topics (reading, math, content areas, etc.) and with a variety of students, if possible, as preservice teachers do not know where they will secure a teaching position and therefore need a wide variety of experience to feel capable and up to the task.

In our analysis of comparing perceptions of ability at both the preservice and inservice stages, we provide TPPs and elementary schools with additional points to consider. Woolfolk Hoy and Burke Spero (2005) explained that self-efficacy increases throughout teacher training and that once these beliefs are established, they are fairly resistant to change. In the current study, however, our findings demonstrate that the perception of ability may not be completely static at the end of the TPP and that there might be still more we can do at the beginning teacher stage to continue to strengthen these perceptions of ability. This becomes important in a profession known for its extremely high attrition rates (Ingersoll, 2002). These findings support the need for professional development and induction experiences right from the beginning of the profession. Are there things school administration and teacher education programs can do to provide mentoring and support at such a vulnerable stage of the profession?

TPPs have a responsibility to provide high-quality training experiences if they are to produce candidates who are not only effective but also influential in student achievement. Darling-Hammond (2010) proclaimed that “schools of education must hold themselves to a higher standard” (p. 45). There is much TPPs can do to better support teacher candidates in their future roles as teachers. Darling-Hammond continues, “Teacher educators must be prepared to create partnerships with schools in their communities (and) confront and dismantle those regularities of the university that prevent investments in strong academic and clinical training” (p. 45).

At the same time, however, Wheatley (2002) cautions against the impulse to drive perception scores higher and higher because self-efficacy that is too high is not always a good thing either. Doubts in one’s teaching ability can foster reflection, spur collaboration, and increase motivation for improvement. Teacher perceptions should be high enough to encourage persistence and confidence, but low enough to provide a good understanding of the complexities involved with teaching students.

Implications and Limitations

In regard to practical implications, the current study suggests that the student teaching experience might be a more cost and time efficient culminating field-based experience when compared with the internship when it comes to teacher perceptions. Student teachers reported higher perceptions on all scales at the preservice stage and on most of the scales at the inservice stage. Although the internship provides more classroom experience, the results do not produce teachers with significantly higher teacher self-efficacy. Longitudinal research is still needed that examines other components of TPPs that are related to student teaching such as the types of mentoring and support provided to student teachers, as well as the cooperating teacher, to more fully understand how these differences in student teaching experiences enhance or diminish teacher perceptions. Further research is needed that addresses how student teaching experiences influence not only teacher perceptions but also one’s actual ability to teach (collected through teaching observations), one’s content knowledge (on a variety of subjects), and the influence student teachers have on student achievement.

The current study was limited because of its use of self-report data. It would be helpful to couple these data with teaching observations, interviews, and journal entries. Selection bias is another limitation. Participants who returned the survey may have felt more or less efficacious about their teaching ability when compared with the preservice and inservice teachers who did not return the survey. We caution against any causal interpretation of the findings from the current study because this study was descriptive and our results are suggestive and not intended to establish causation.

Footnotes

Appendix

Sample Items From the PTKSS.

Question prompt before each section: How well can you do the following?

Sample items from the General Knowledge and Skills Subscale

• Improve academic performance of unmotivated or challenging students.

• Tailor teaching and curriculum that builds on students’ needs

• Develop curriculum that builds on students’ experiences, interests, and abilities

• Relate classroom learning to the real world

• Use educational technology in instruction

Sample items from the Diversity and Multicultural Subscale

• Help parents and families to better understand their children and support their learning

• Implement strategies to help students from different cultures interact positively with each other

• Use community resources to create a multicultural curriculum

• Work with parents and families to help me understand students and support their learning

• Develop a curriculum that includes perspectives, experiences, and contributions of different

Sample items from the Reading Subscale

• Teach reading vocabulary (emphasizing word meaning.)

• Teach oral reading

• Help foster students’ oral or written responses to literature

• Teach silent reading (including time for independent reading)

• Use instructional strategies to help children with reading comprehension

Sample items from the Mathematics Subscale

• Use mathematical problem-solving processes in teaching

• Teach mathematical representations

• Use mathematics communication processes in teaching

• Integrate mathematics with other subject areas

• Teach mathematical concepts to student groups that are mixed in ability

Sample items from the Assessment Subscale

• Assess how well students are learning

• Use standardized assessments to guide your decisions about what skills, concepts, and processes to teach

• Align assessments with expectations of what students should know and be able to do.

• Assess higher level objectives (problem solving, critical thinking, etc.)

• Analyze student work to assess and modify your own teaching strategies

Note. PTKSS = Professional Teaching Knowledge and Skills Survey.

Declaration of Conflicting Interests

The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Funding

The author(s) received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Author Biographies

Sarah K. Clark, PhD, is an assistant professor of elementary education in the School of Teacher Education and Leadership at Utah State University. Her research focuses on enriching the teacher education experience, teacher training and development, and the enhancement of literacy instruction.

Deborah Byrnes, PhD, is a professor of elementary education in the School of Teacher Education and Leadership at Utah State University. Her research interests include social studies and diversity education, emotional intelligence, and teacher education.

Richard R. Sudweeks, PhD, is a professor in the Instructional Psychology and Technology Department and director of the PhD Program in Educational Inquiry, Measurement, and Evaluation at Brigham Young University. His research interests include projects related to evaluation, measurement, and assessment.

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