The power of feedback and reflection: Testing an online scenario-based learning intervention for student teachers

TL;DR: Overall, this research demonstrates the potential of an easy-to-implement online intervention in enhancing self-efficacy and classroom readiness and points towards the importance of combining feedback and reflection within online scenario-based learning activities.

Abstract: Advances in research on educational technologies and increasing access to computers offer teacher education providers numerous tools and opportunities for supporting student teachers. However, systematic investigations of online interventions using complex classroom scenarios (scenario-based learning activities) are currently lacking. This study tested whether an online scenario-based learning activity has a positive impact on student teachers’ self-efficacy and emotional, motivational, and cognitive classroom readiness before they start their first teaching practicum. In order to draw differentiated conclusions, we explored whether the effectiveness of the intervention depends on the inclusion of automatized expert teacher feedback and the opportunity to reflect on the scenarios. A total of 238 Australian student teachers (64.3% females, mean age = 23.84 years, SD = 6.64) participated in the study. The student teachers were randomly assigned to one of three experimental conditions:control group (online scenario-based learning activity), intervention group 1 (online scenario-based learning activity and feedback), and intervention group 2 (online scenario-based learning, feedback, and reflection). The findings indicated that, compared to the control group, both intervention conditions had a significant positive effect on cognitive classroom readiness. A significant positive effect on self-efficacy was found for intervention group 2. Overall, our research demonstrates the potential of an easy-to-implement online intervention in enhancing self-efficacy and classroom readiness and points towards the importance of combining feedback and reflection within online scenario-based learning activities.

Summary

Introduction

• This is a repository copy of The Power of Feedback and Reflection : Testing an online scenario-based learning intervention for student teachers.
• Self-efficacy and multi-dimensional classroom readiness Student teachers need numerous skills and profound knowledge in multiple areas, such as content knowledge and pedagogical content knowledge (Kunter, Kleickmann, Klusmann, & Richter, 2013) to succeed in the practicum and later as teachers.

The power of feedback and reflection

• Feedback can be highly informative as it points towards gaps between one’s current understanding and what is aimed to be understood (Hattie & Timperley, 2007).
• In sum, SBL augurs well as a tool for increasing self-efficacy and classroom readiness, even though it should include feedback and the possibility to reflect on taken actions in order to unfold its full potential.
• Considering the two interventions separately, the authors expect that both intervention 1 and intervention 2 ( and reflection) should increase self-efficacy (Hypothesis 2a for intervention 1 and Hypothesis 2b for intervention 2), motivational classroom readiness (Hypothesis 2c and 2d, respectively), emotional classroom readiness (Hypothesis 2e and 2f), and cognitive classroom readiness (Hypothesis 2g and 2h).
• Six situational judgment test scenarios were used for the current study.
• A feedback report for the control group, including their chosen options in the scenarios and the feedback from expert teachers was provided after they had done the post-test measures (see Figure 1 for a schematic diagram of the elements of the intervention).

Sample

• Of the 264 student teachers who gave consent to the use of their data for research purposes, the authors excluded 10 participants as they skipped the SBL activity and/or had missing values on TSP working paper May 2020 8 all outcome measures.
• The authors did not use the data of 16 further participants of one of the two intervention groups who had indicated that they did not carefully read the feedback and/or worked on the reflection exercise (‘manipulation check questions’) for the main analyses.
• The resulting final sample consisted of 238 student teachers (86 in the control group and 76 in each of the intervention groups).
• The majority of the participants were recruited from two university-based teacher education providers in New South Wales (NSW), one city and one regional (150 and 54 student teachers, i.e., 63.0% and 22.7%, respectively).
• Table 1 provides descriptive information separately for the three conditions.

Measures

• The authors measured self-efficacy with items adapted from Tschannen-Moran and Woolfolk Hoy (2001), as used by Klassen and Durksen (2014) in a study with student teachers.
• Klassen and Durksen (2014) slightly modified the wording of the three original items after consultation with a group of teacher educators (sample item: ‘I am confident that I can manage student behaviour’, αControl Group = .78; α Intervention 1 (feedback) = .81; and α Intervention 2 (feedback + reflection) = .71).
• The following variables were used as covariates: student teachers’ age, year of study, gender (0 = female, 1 = male)2, prior experience working in schools (0 = yes, 1 = no).
• These variables were included to control for key sociodemographic characteristics of their sample and because prior research has documented effects on their outcomes of interest (e.g., effects of gender and teaching experience on self-efficacy, see e.g., Huang, 2013; Klassen & Chiu, 2010).

Analyses

• The analyses were performed with Mplus Version 8.2 (Muthén & Muthén, 2017) using the robust maximum likelihood estimator (MLR) to account for non-normality of their data.
• The authors reported the effects both without (Model 1a) and with control variables (Model 1b) to increase transparency and to provide information on whether and how effects and potentially patterns of significant vs. non-significant findings changed depending on the inclusion of control variables.
• In these analyses, the results for the overall intervention effects remained unchanged and a statistically significant effects for cognitive classroom readiness, but not for the other outcomes was found.
• Considering the two types of interventions separately (i.e., feedback with and without reflection), aids in clearing up the findings and tells a more differentiated story by disentangling the functioning of different intervention components.
• Furthermore, by engaging in reflection, student teachers became more active agents of their own learning, which could have also fed into their self-efficacy (e.g., Mizumoto, 2013; Walton, 2014).

Conclusions

• Given that ‘practitioners, in any field, encounter many problem situations within their professional lives which are difficult to replicate realistically and bring to life in a lecture format’ (Gossman et al., 2007, p. 141), teacher education-tailored online SBL activities consisting of challenging and realistic school-based situations hold immense promise for educational practice and the widespread use in teacher education.
• International Journal of Educational Research, 77, 15-25.
• The effects of scenario-based simulation course training on nurses’ communication competence and self-efficacy: A randomized controlled trial.
• Effects on teachers’ self-efficacy and job satisfaction:.

Figures

Figure 1. Overview of the experimental design.

Table 2

Table 1

Full text

This is a repository copy of The Power of Feedback and Reflection : Testing an online
scenario-based learning intervention for student teachers.
White Rose Research Online URL for this paper:
https://eprints.whiterose.ac.uk/160983/
Article:
Bardach, Lisa, Klassen, Rob orcid.org/0000-0002-1127-5777, Durksen, Tracy et al. (2
more authors) (2021) The Power of Feedback and Reflection : Testing an online scenario-
based learning intervention for student teachers. Computers & education. 104194. ISSN
0360-1315
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.compedu.2021.104194
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TSP working paper May 2020 1
Teacher Selection Project Working Paper
13.05.20
The Power of Feedback and Reflection: A Brief Online
Scenario-based Learning Activity Designed to Increase
Student Teachers’ Self-efficacy and Classroom
Readiness
Lisa Bardach1, Robert M. Klassen1, Tracy L. Durksen2, Jade V.
Rushby1, Keiko C. P. Bostwick2, & Lynn Sheridan3
1 University of York, UK
2 University of New South Wales, Australia
3 University of Wollongong, Australia
This Working Paper reports in-progress work that is not yet peer reviewed. The purpose of
the Working Paper is to stimulate discussion and to contribute to the advancement of
knowledge. Please check our project website for news of recent publications. This work is
supported by the European Research Council (grant #647234 SELECTION)

TSP working paper May 2020 2
The Power of Feedback and Reflection: A Brief Online Scenario-based Learning
Activity Designed to Increase Student Teachers’ Self-efficacy and Classroom
Readiness
Lisa Bardach, Robert M. Klassen, Tracy L. Durksen, Jade V. Rushby, Keiko C. P. Bostwick,
& Lynn Sheridan
Abstract
This study aimed to test whether an online scenario-based learning activity increases student
teachers’ self-efficacy and emotional, motivational, and cognitive classroom readiness before
they start their first teaching practicum. Specifically, we explored whether the effectiveness of
the intervention depends on the inclusion of expert teacher feedback and the opportunity to
reflect on the scenarios. A total of 238 Australian student teachers (64.3% females, mean
age = 23.84 years, SD= 6.64) participated in the study. The student teachers were randomly
assigned to one of three experimental conditions: waiting-control group (scenario-based
learning activity), intervention group 1 (scenario-based learning activity, feedback) and
intervention group 2 (scenario-based learning, feedback, reflection). The findings from a path
model indicated that both intervention types significantly enhanced cognitive classroom
readiness. A significant effect on self-efficacy was found for intervention group 2. Overall, our
research demonstrates the potential of an easy-to-implement online intervention in
enhancing self-efficacy and classroom readiness.
Introduction
Teaching is a highly complex and demanding profession. Teachers have to effectively deal
with a diverse student population, face students’, parents’ and other stakeholders’ different
and sometimes contrasting needs and expectations, while teaching students in ways aligned
with the demands of twenty-first century education characterized by increased accountability
and public scrutiny (Flores, 2017). Teacher education programs hold the prime responsibility
for adequately supporting aspiring teachers in developing these competencies. Among the
numerous learning opportunities provided in these programs, the teaching practicum clearly
constitutes the most influential experience in teacher education (e.g., Bullough et al., 2002)
and has been labelled as the cornerstone of teaching preparation (Ronfeldt, 2015, p. 204).
During the practicum, student teachers can apply acquired pedagogical knowledge in real
classrooms within complex school settings, and thus, in a context that most closely
resembles the workplace environment they will encounter as a practicing teacher.
Overall, student teachers tend to value the practical teaching experiences offered by the
practicum (e.g., Smith & Lev-Ari, 2005), but at the same time, the practicum can be
perceived as stressful and overwhelming (e.g., Kokkinos & Stavropoulos, 2016). Moreover,
performance in the practicum has been identified as a precursor of later teacher
effectiveness and low practicum performance makes student teachers more likely to drop-out
from the program and the profession (Goldhaber, Krieg, & Theobald, 2017; NCATE, 2010).
In light of this, there is a strong need for teacher education providers to find ways to
adequately prepare their students for the challenges of the practicum, and to increase their
confidence as teachers and their ‘readiness’ to teach.
The present study therefore tests an online scenario-based learning activity designed to
boost student teachers’ self-efficacy and classroom readiness before the practicum.

TSP working paper May 2020 3
Comparing a waiting-control group in which student teachers worked on scenario-based
learning tasks comprising complex classroom situations with two intervention groups
including additional feedback (intervention group 1) and additional feedback and a reflection
exercise (intervention group 2), allows us to gain insights into the effectiveness of different
components and combinations. All in all, by shedding light on the potential of a brief and
easy-to-implement online scenario-based intervention and specifically, the role of feedback
and reflection in enhancing self-efficacy and classroom readiness, the present study
contributes to the literature and yields information that is useful for teacher education
practice.
Self-efficacy and multi-dimensional classroom readiness
Student teachers need numerous skills and profound knowledge in multiple areas, such as
content knowledge and pedagogical content knowledge (Kunter, Kleickmann, Klusmann, &
Richter, 2013) to succeed in the practicum and later as teachers. However, from a socio-
cognitive perspective (Bandura, 1997), it also seems necessary that they, themselves, are
convinced that they can be successful as teachers, i.e., endorse sufficiently high levels of
teaching self-efficacy (e.g., Dellinger, Bobbett, Olivier, & Ellett, 2008). Self-efficacy has, for
example, been found to augment positive emotions and counteract negative emotions during
the teaching practicum (Hascher & Hagenauer, 2016). Furthermore, meta-analyses have
linked self-efficacy to (beginning) teachers’ decision to remain in the profession (Chesnut &
Burley, 2015) as well as to lower burn-out (e.g., Aloe, Amo, & Shanahan, 2014) and higher
teaching performance (e.g., Klassen & Tze, 2014), making self-efficacy a particularly
promising target for interventions (see also e.g., Weber, Prilop, & Kleinknecht, 2019).
In addition to self-efficacy, a further relevant factor worth targeting in interventions preceding
the practicum is pre-service teachers’ perceived current ‘classroom readiness’. Different
definitions of and approaches to measure classroom readiness exist in the literature on
teachers and teacher education (see e.g., Craven et al., 2014; Darling-Hammond, Haigh, Ell,
& Mackisack, 2013; Newton, & Wei, 2013; Larsen, 2017). For the purpose of this study, we
relied on a multi-dimensional conceptualization with three tangible dimensions reflecting the
core psychological concepts of emotions, motivation, and cognition in the teaching domain:
Emotional readiness (positive feelings about teaching), motivational readiness (wanting to
teach), and cognitive readiness (having the knowledge and skills required to teach).
First, emotions are ubiquitous aspects of teachers’ lives (e.g., Frenzel, 2014) and positive
emotions have been found to impact on teachers’ performance in the practicum (e.g., Chen,
2019). In a similar vein, the recent research synthesis of Keller and colleagues (Keller, Hoy,
Goetz, & Frenzel, 2016) underlines the value of teachers’ experienced enthusiasm in
promoting adaptive student outcomes, such as achievement and motivation, as well as
teacher outcomes, such as well-being. Accordingly, emotional readiness in terms of general
positive emotions towards teaching and feeling enthusiastic about teaching covered the
affective space of classroom readiness. Second, a student teacher arguably cannot be called
‘classroom ready’ if he or she does not (yet) want to teach, and fails to see any personal
value in being a teacher (see also e.g., Watt & Richardson, 2007, for the overlapping
component of ‘intrinsic career value’). Therefore, motivational readiness was introduced as a
broader drive to start teaching, including the personal importance attached to becoming a
teacher. Third, complementing self-efficacy and its more narrowly defined future-oriented
focus on specific teaching tasks, student teachers’ general impression of their capabilities in
the teaching domain represent pivotal prerequisites of their effective teaching and well-being
(e.g., Yeung, Craven, & Kaur, 2014). For this reason, cognitive classroom readiness was
included as third facet to capture student teachers’ perceptions of the extent to which they

TSP working paper May 2020 4
possess the knowledge and skills required to be a good teacher—a construct proximal to
self-concept (e.g., Shavelson, Hubner, & Stanton, 1976; see also e.g., Paulick, Großschedl,
Harms, & Möller, 2016).
How can we effectively foster pre-service teachers’ self-efficacy and classroom
readiness?
An intervention aiming to prepare student teachers for the practicum and, crucially, boost
their self-efficacy and classroom readiness ideally combines a range of elements to achieve
the best outcomes (see also Authors, anonymized). As such, interventions should provide
authentic and complex learning experiences that prompt student teachers to consider
different ways of acting and problem solving in everyday teaching situations (e.g., Sheridan &
Kelly, 2012). Such approaches, known as scenario-based learning (SBL), case-based
learning, or problem-based learning (e.g., Errington, 2011; Smith & Ragan, 2005) rely on
principles of situated learning theory (e.g., Lave & Wenger, 1991) and situated cognition
(e.g., Brown, Collins, & Duguid, 1989), stating that learning is maximized if it can be
embedded in situations that mirror the context in which learners later have to apply their
acquired knowledge.
SBL has been found to be effective in promoting students’ learning in different fields, such as
medical education and training programs for police officers (e.g., McLean, 2016; Werth,
2011). In addition, scarce research in teacher education suggests that scenario-based
learning approaches can enhance student teachers’ self-efficacy (Goodin, Bartos, Caukin, &
Dillard, 2014). SBL could also be effective in increasing student teachers’ self-perceived
classroom readiness: For instance, such activities allow student teachers to take on the role
of the ‘actor’ and navigate through challenging and meaningful classroom situations, thereby
potentially raising their motivation to teach and identification with the profession (motivational
classroom readiness). Given that participating in SBL activities has shown to produce
learning gains and evoke positive feelings (e.g., McLean, 2016; Sheridan & Kelly, 2012), they
should also lead to higher ratings of self-evaluated knowledge and skills in student teachers
(cognitive classroom readiness) and more positive teaching-related emotions (emotional
classroom readiness).
The power of feedback and reflection
Core aspects of SBL and related authentic learning approaches that could underlie their
effectiveness and drive changes in self-efficacy and classroom readiness in populations of
student teachers evolve around two components that can be seamlessly integrated within the
scenario tasks (e.g., Battista, 2017; Herrington, Oliver, & Reeves, 2003): First, SBL activities
inhere principles of good feedback practices, arguing that feedback needs to be timely,
specific, accessible, and able to ‘feed-forward’ in that learners should be able to apply what
they have learnt (e.g., Gibbs & Simpson, 2004; Hounsell, 2007; Smith, Starratt, McCrink, &
Whitford, 2019). Feedback can be highly informative as it points towards gaps between one’s
current understanding and what is aimed to be understood (Hattie & Timperley, 2007).
Considering that ‘social persuasion’, i.e., evaluative performance-related comments one
receives, constitutes one of the sources of self-efficacy highlighted by Bandura (1997; see
also e.g., Morris, Usher, & Chen, 2017; Oh, 2011; van Rooij, Fokkens-Bruinsma, &
Goedhart, 2019), appropriate feedback should--and has been found to--impact on self-
efficacy (e.g., Smith et al., 2019).
Feedback could also conceivably be critical in shaping classroom readiness. Without guiding
feedback, student teachers working on an SBL activity might easily feel lost, whereas
additional feedback should increase motivation for teaching by helping student teachers to

Frequently asked questions

Q1. What are the contributions mentioned in the paper "The power of feedback and reflection: a brief online scenario-based learning activity designed to increase student teachers’ self-efficacy and classroom readiness" ?

This study aimed to test whether an online scenario-based learning activity increases student teachers ’ self-efficacy and emotional, motivational, and cognitive classroom readiness before they start their first teaching practicum. A total of 238 Australian student teachers ( 64. 3 % females, mean age = 23. 84 years, SD= 6. 64 ) participated in the study. Overall, their research demonstrates the potential of an easy-to-implement online intervention in enhancing self-efficacy and classroom readiness. 

Q2. What was the effect of intervention 2 on self-efficacy?

the effect of intervention 2 on self-efficacy reached statistical significance only in the model including control variables, with a p-value slightly above .05 (i.e., .054) in the model without control variables. 

Q3. What is the way to promote the professional vision of teachers?

Promoting pre-service teachers' professional vision of classroom management during practical school training: Effects of a structured online- and video-based self-reflection and feedback intervention. 

Q4. What is the effect of reflection on teacher self-efficacy?

by engaging in reflection, student teachers became more active agents of their own learning, which could have also fed into their self-efficacy (e.g., Mizumoto, 2013; Walton, 2014). 

Q5. How many points were allocated to students who answered the situational judgment tests?

For instance, student teachers were allocated three points if their response was in direct alignment with the scoring key, two points if their answer was one position away, one point if their answer was two positions away, and no points if three positions away. 

Q6. What was the effect of prior experiences on self-efficacy?

Prior experiences teaching in schools (prior experience = 0, no prior experiences = 1) significantly and negatively predicted self-efficacy (β = -0.15, p =TSP working paper May 2020 10.021). 

Q7. What was the effect of the intervention on self-efficacy?

the intervention combining feedback and reflection, but not the feedback-only intervention significantly raised student teachers’ self-efficacy (standardized effect of almost medium size for the first intervention). 

Q8. What did the study show about the effects of the intervention on student teachers?

taking part in one of the interventions made student teachers more likely to believe that they possessed the knowledge and the skillset needed to succeed as a teacher. 

Q9. What did the study show about the effects of the intervention on the students?

In addition, it should be mentioned that the intervention effects in both analyses, i.e., the analyses for overall intervention effects as well as those for the effect for the two separate intervention types and the tests of differences between intervention types, remained largely unaffected by the inclusion of a set of control variables. 

Q10. What is the role of feedback in shaping classroom readiness?

such interventions seem well-suited to support classroom readiness, given that the reflection-feedback cycle should foster high quality learning experiences, and linked to that, more positive judgments of one’s teaching competencies that are continually developed and refined throughout the activity as well as higher levels of motivation to start ‘real’ teaching. 

Q11. What did the intervention incorporating feedback and reflection have?

the two interventions succeeded in raising student teachers’ more general impressions of their competencies as teachers, whereas the intervention incorporating feedback and reflection had an impact on the more specific construct of teaching self-efficacy. 

Q12. How many students were included in the study?

The resulting final sample consisted of 238 student teachers (86 in the control group and 76 in each of the intervention groups).