Self-Efficacy or Overconfidence? Comparing Preservice Teacher Self-Perceptions of Their Content Knowledge and Teaching Abilities to the Perceptions of Their Supervisors

Abstract

This study investigated how closely related the perceptions of student teachers were to those of the clinical educators and university supervisors who evaluated them in subject-specific content knowledge and teaching ability. Although our initial concern was low teacher self-efficacy, our study found student teachers consistently rated themselves higher than the professionals who evaluated them. Supervisors also had concerns about the students’ ability to process anything but top ratings in a constructive way. Our results suggest that our teacher education program may not be instilling enough healthy doubt in many future teachers, helping us better strike the difficult balance between under- and overconfidence.