The comparison of academic locus of control and the perceptions of self efficacy of teacher candidates

Abstract

Teacher is the most important factor in the efficient success of the educational studies in accordance with terminal objectives. Among many affective and personal characteristics that determine the efficiency of teachers, self-efficacy and locus of control have an important position. The aim of this study is to compare the teacher candidates who are final year students and teacher candidates that are taking pedagogical formation certificate in terms of general self-efficacy teacher self-efficacy and academic locus of controls. The research group of this study, in which screening model is used, consist of 97 final year teacher candidates that study in Aksaray Education Faculty and 107 teacher candidates that study pedagogical formation education at the same period. For this purpose, Academic Locus of Control Scale, which was developed by Akın, A. (2007), Teacher SelfEfficacy Scale, which was developed by Aydın, Y. Ç, Çakıroğlu, J. and Sarıkaya, H. (2005) and General Self-Efficacy Scale, which was developed by Sherer et al. and adapted by Yıldırım and İlhan for our culture, were preferred for the study. It is discovered that, the self-efficacy of teacher candidates is advanced and they are internally controlled. In addition, no difference was found between teacher training methods and the perception of selfefficacy together with academic focus of control.

Keywords: Teacher self-efficacy, academic locus of control, teacher competence.