Exploring Teachers' Views on the Impact of an Online Distance Learning Course on Their Self-Efficacy Beliefs

Abstract

This paper reports on an online distance learning course that emphasizes the improvement of the self-efficacy beliefs of in-service elementary school teachers in teaching biological concepts. The course utilizes digital educational content and Open Educational Resources (OERs) and focuses on the interaction, peer support, and peer teaching into an online learning environment. In the design framework of the course, we investigated the educational needs of teachers and took into consideration the findings of other studies. A total of 251 teachers were enrolled in the online distance learning course and 142 completed it. Quantitative and qualitative data was collected in November 2020 through the bio-STEBI-A instrument and the posts in the forums of the course. The quantitative results revealed an improvement in both subscales of bio-STEBI-A, which were also confirmed by the qualitative ones, that underline the course, thus contributing to the improvement of self-efficacy beliefs of in-service elementary school teachers in teaching biological concepts. Recommendations are made for future research.

Following up on the impact of a distance learning teachers’ professional development program in science: Α longitudinal case study

“…The study is a continuation and extension of previous research carried out by the researchers (Tzovla & Kedraka, 2021;Tzovla et al, 2021aTzovla et al, , 2021b, which measured the self-efficacy beliefs of a group in-service elementary school teachers before and after their participation in a teachers' professional development online course. Specifically, in collaboration with the Teaching and Professional Development Laboratory of Bioscientists of the Department of Molecular Biology and Genetics at the Democritus University of Thrace, an online distance learning professional development course, in the teaching of biological concepts was designed and offered to in-service elementary school teachers during the COVID-19 pandemic.…”

“…Researchers have dealt with this issue and noted the meaning of teachers' professional development in strengthening their identity (Noben et al, 2021). In this frame, they have reported opinions, and criticism concluding that the evaluation of these programs is sinequa-none and that these programs must be constantly evaluated and updated to be effective (Hsieh et al, 2023;Tzovla & Kedraka, 2021). Follow-up is common in various scientific fields such as medicine, pharmacy, or engineering (Civaner, 2020), but it is not systematically applied in education.…”

The impact of self-efficacy on the well-being of primary school teachers: a Greek-Cypriot study

“…Moreover, high self-efficacy is related to adopting innovation in teaching practice, increased support, encouragement, and autonomy of students ( Caprara et al, 2006 ), and strengthening parental involvement in the educational process ( Egyed and Short, 2006 ). Attending teacher professional development programs seems to positively affect its improvement ( Aji and Khan, 2019 ; Mertasari and Candiasa, 2020 ; Tzovla and Kedraka, 2021 ; Tzovla et al, 2021a , b ). In addition, teachers’ self-efficacy is documented to influence students’ self-efficacy ( Trygstad et al, 2014 ), their behavior, and their performance ( Shahzad and Naureen, 2017 ).…”