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Article published In: Language Teaching for Young Learners
Vol. 4:1 (2022) ► pp.118–142

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Research article

Self-efficacy beliefs among non-specialist teachers in primary English education

 | Ryukoku University, Japan
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Available under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial (CC BY-NC) 4.0 license.

For any use beyond this license, please contact the publisher at rights@benjamins.nl.

Published online: 3 December 2021
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https://doi.org/10.1075/ltyl.21010.mat
Abstract
Although the teaching of English to primary school children has been rapidly growing in many English-as-a-foreign-language (EFL) countries around the world, a shortage of specialist teachers remains a persistent challenge. Consequently, non-specialists, such as homeroom teachers initially trained as generalists, are more often required to teach English. The present study, focusing on 304 non-specialist teachers serving in Japan’s public primary schools, was designed to explore their perceived self-efficacy for teaching English, and to examine the impact of teacher characteristics (i.e., their perceived English proficiency, English-teaching experience, and appraisals of collaboration with native English-speaking teachers) on their level of self-efficacy. A multiple regression analysis revealed that the collaboration variable was more influential than the proficiency variable and that there was no significant relationship between teachers’ self-efficacy and teaching experience. Moreover, integration of these results and teachers’ comments in the open-ended question suggested that they functioned most effectively in student engagement by playing roles unique to non-specialist teachers and that they perceived team teaching to be more beneficial in classroom management than solo teaching. Implications for in-service training are discussed to support non-specialist teachers in primary English education.
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.Background
    • 2.1EFL teachers’ self-efficacy and proficiency
    • 2.2Teaching experience and self-efficacy
    • 2.3Appraisals of collaborative teaching and self-efficacy
    • 2.4Context of the study
  • 3.Method
    • 3.1Setting and participants
    • 3.2Instruments
      • 3.2.1Teachers’ perceived self-efficacy scale for teaching English
      • 3.2.2Teachers’ perceived English proficiency scale
      • 3.2.3Teachers’ collaborative teaching appraisal scale
    • 3.3Data analysis
  • 4.Results
    • 4.1Descriptive statistics, PCA, and reliability analysis
    • 4.2Multiple regression analysis
    • 4.3Analysis of responses to the open-ended question
  • 5.Discussion
    • 5.1Level of non-specialist teachers’ self-efficacy for teaching English
    • 5.2The impact of teacher characteristics on overall self-efficacy
    • 5.3Implications for non-specialist EFL teacher education
    • 5.4Limitations
  • 6.Conclusion
  • Notes
  • References
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