Which Variables Predict Teachers’ Diagnostic Competence When Diagnosing Students’ Learning Behavior at Different Stages of a Teacher’s Career?

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Published: 
September, 2016

Source: Teachers and Teaching: theory and practice, VOL. 22, NO. 4, 461–484, 2016
(Reviewed by the Portal Team)

The purpose of this study was to examine whether teachers’ motivation to diagnosing, attitude toward diagnosing, the self-efficacy, their knowledge, and reflection on experience in diagnosing would predict their diagnostic competence.
The authors also examined whether teachers with professional experience were more competent diagnosticians than students in the second phase of German teacher education who in turn were expected to be more competent than students in the first phase.

Methods
The sample of this study included 293 participants (93 German grammar school teachers, 107 German teacher students in their second phase of teacher education, and 93 German preservice students in their first phase of teacher education).

The participants completed three tests. All tests were based on the model of Klug et al. (2013) : a scenario test, a knowledge test, and a questionnaire.

Discussion
The findings demonstrate that teachers’ motivation to diagnose and teachers’ knowledge of diagnosing are substantial predictors of teachers’ diagnostic competence.
The authors also found that motivation to diagnose is the best predictor followed by knowledge about diagnostics in the group of teachers, but not in the other two groups.

The authors also found that motivation to diagnose cannot predict diagnostic competence in the other two groups of teacher students in the first and second phases of teacher education.

Furthermore, the authors found unexpectedly that reflection on experience appears to be a negative predictor of postactional diagnostic competence in the group of teachers, whereas it is not a significant predictor in the other two groups.
They also found that self-efficacy in diagnosing did not happen to be a positive predictor of diagnostic competence.

The authors also found that teachers with professional experience are more competent diagnosticians than students in the second phase of teacher education who in turn were more competent than students in the first phase.

 

Reference
Klug, J., Bruder, S., Kelava, A., Spiel, C., & Schmitz, B. (2013). Diagnostic competence of teachers: A process model that accounts for diagnosing learning behavior tested by means of a case scenario.
Teaching and Teacher Education, 30, 38–46. doi:10.1016/j.tate.2012.10.004 

Updated: Oct. 10, 2018
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