The Relationship between Pre-Service Teachers’ Self-Efficacy Beliefs in Science Teaching and their Teaching Practice Performances

The purpose of this study was to investigate pre-service primary school teachers’ self-efficacy beliefs in science teaching and also to show the relationship between pre-service primary teachers’ self-efficacy beliefs and their performance in teaching practice courses. Data collection was done using a survey consisting of the demographic characteristics of teachers, “Observation Form towards Practice Courses (OFTPC)”, and also"Self-Efficacy Beliefs in Science Teaching Scale" originally developed by Riggs and Enochs (1990) and adapted to Turkish by ？zkan, Tekkaya and ？ak？ro？lu (2002) . The population of the study consisted of 600 pre-service primary school teachers studying at Afyon Kocatepe University, Faculty of Education. The sample of the study consisted of 371 pre-service teachers chosen through convenient sampling method (Karasar, 2010). After the scale was filled by all teachers, 43 scales were dissolved and 328 scales were evaluated. Research results revealed that pre-service teachers’ self efficacy beliefs differed significantly in terms of gender, grades, and science lesson environment. Moreover, a high level positive correlation was found between pre-service teachers’ self-efficacy beliefs and performance in teaching practice courses based on science activities