Author: Siyu Duan
Duan, Siyu, 2025 Classroom Management Self-efficacy of Chinese and Australian Preservice Teachers: A Cross-cultural Mixed Methods Study, Flinders University, College of Education, Psychology and Social Work
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Teachers, especially novice teachers, often struggle with classroom management (CM), which may lead to disruptive student behaviours, low student engagement, teacher burnout and teacher turnover. Concerns about the inadequacy of preservice teacher (PST) preparatory training in CM have been raised. To effectively manage classrooms, teacher must possess professional knowledge, skills, and self-efficacy beliefs in their CM capability. To ensure beginning teachers engage in effective CM practice, it is important to understand the development of PSTs’ classroom management self-efficacy (CMSE).
This explanatory sequential mixed methods research aimed to explore and interpret factors of influence on the development of CMSE and any cross-cultural differences among Chinese and Australian PSTs’ CMSE. Australian and Chinese PSTs in the final year of their degrees (general education) were invited to participate in the research. Specifically, 527 Chinese PSTs and 97 Australian PSTs participated in an online survey. Nine Chinese PSTs and nine Australian PSTs participated in the follow-up semi-structured interviews.
Single-group analyses of the Chinese and Australian samples provided valuable insights into the predictors (personality traits, perceived support, formal course experience, and informal experience) of PSTs’ CMSE within each group. A multi-group structural equation modelling was tested to find similarities and differences in how these variables predict PSTs’ CMSE. Contrary to expectations, no significant differences were identified between the two country groups, either in the level of CMSE or in the relationships between CMSE and its predictors. A subsampling approach was also used to address the unbalanced sample size between the two groups.
Following the quantitative analyses, 18 interview participants were purposefully selected based on their survey results (high, medium, and low scores of CMSE scale) to maximize potential variety among the interview participants. Through thematic analysis, qualitative description of PSTs’ CMSE and influential factors that formed PSTs’ CMSE were constructed from the interview data. The identified themes of CMSE were identical to the three dimensions of self-efficacy (strength, generality and magnitude), which could provide a more holistic understanding of PSTs’ CMSE than scale scores. The findings of the contributors of CMSE shed light on the significance of enactive, vicarious, social and affective sources of self-efficacy in the development of PSTs’ CMSE. They also helped to identify interacting factors, such as interpersonal support and adaptive strategies, that may influence the strength or direction of the relationships between the sources and CMSE. Furthermore, cultural similarities and differences were highlighted in these findings.
The two sets of data were ultimately integrated to address the two overarching research questions: 1) how self-efficacious do Australian and Chinese final year PSTs feel about CM; 2) What contributes to Chinese and Australian final year PSTs’ CMSE. Specifically, two strategies including joint displays and narrative were used to merge the quantitative and qualitative results to draw integrated results.
Keywords: classroom management self-efficacy; sources of teacher self-efficacy; cross-culture
Subject: Education thesis
Thesis type: Doctor of Philosophy
Completed: 2025
School: College of Education, Psychology and Social Work
Supervisor: Kerry Bissaker