Students' Misconception of Teaching
Games for Understanding in Relation to
Self-Efficacy
Julismah Jani
Sultan
Idris Education University, Malaysia
Phil
Pearson, Greg Forrest and Paul Webb
University
of Wollongong, Australia
Abstract
At the
Australian university where this study took place, it was assumed by the
physical education lecturers that final year students should
be familiar with Teaching Games for Understanding (TGfU) because they had
already satisfied course program requirements and that they would therefore be
able to benefit from the teaching of games content during teaching practice.
The lecturers also assumed that as students progressed through their studies at
university, what they learnt in TGfU modules studied at Year 2 would prepare them for Year 3 and, finally, Year
4. However, when collectively reflecting on lecturers’ teaching
experience, what they have frequently observed is that merely satisfying course
and module does not ensure an understanding of TGfU concepts among students. This
study represents a preliminary investigation to track the
prevalent misconceptions about teaching
games for understanding of fourth year students in Physical and Health
Education program at an Australian university and its relation to their
self-efficacy. The misconception instrument with reliability of KR-20=.52,
consists of 20 dichotomous questions with
true/false answers (Bond
& Fox,
2007: Applying the Rasch model: Fundamental measurement in the human sciences
(2nd ed.), 15-27, Lawrence Erlbaum
Associates, Publishers: Mahwah, New Jersey London). The self-efficacy
questionnaires (a=.86)
consists of 20 items of 5-point Likert-type
scale (Bandura, 2006: Guide for
constructing self-efficacy scales,
Self-Efficacy Beliefs of Adolescents, 307–337, Information Age
Publishing: Charlotte, North Carolina). The
questions were constructed from researched literature and mostly worded as
statements from the texts. Fifty-seven fourth
year students enrolled during class session were asked
for their consent prior to completing the misconception and self-efficacy
questionnaires in the fourth week of their spring semester. Descriptive
statistics for misconception variables were examined, and correlation analysis
was conducted to evaluate the relationship between misconceptions and
self-efficacy. Of the 20 questions related to
conceptualisation of TGfU, four misconceptions appeared to be prevalent among
the fourth year physical education
majors. It was found that
71.93% (N=57) students conceptualised
TGfU, ‘as having four categories with similar concepts and
tactical problems across all four games categories’. Other misconceptions
variables that did not score more than 70% with correct answers are as follows;
45.61% students conceptualised
TGfU, ‘as teaching tactics
and not teaching skills’, 57.89% ‘in which students play games in order to
further understand the importance of skill progression and skill practice’, and 40.35%
‘approach is that a teacher needs to know all of the intricacies (technical and
tactical) of each game to teach it to students’. The self-efficacy test related
to TGfU was analysed and it was found that five out of ten questions that students scored more than 80% on
agreement of their belief and perception about TGfU. Eight out of ten
questions, students scored more than 80% of their capability in teaching
related to TGfU. Correlation between misconceptions and self-efficacy were also
examined and the results demonstrated were not significant with a very weak
relationship between misconceptions and self-efficacy [r (57) = .09, p
= .517]. Gaining
insight into the way in which students view TGfU may help better inform
lecturers about their students’ cognitive barriers. Results acquired by this
study may assist in preparing lecturers to be located within the curriculum and
associated with relevant teaching strategies if TGfU is to be made useful for
students.
