The Influence of the Primary School Teachers’ Environmental Awareness and the Concern for the Environmental Issues on their Self-Efficacy of Environmental Education Teaching in Yunlin County, Taiwan

• Main Authors: Ya-Chen Hsu, 許雅貞
• Other Authors: none
• Format: Others
• Language: zh-TW
• Published: 2011
• Online Access: http://ndltd.ncl.edu.tw/handle/34133758140172345788

碩士 === 康寧大學 === 休閒資源暨綠色產業研究所 === 99 === ABSTRACT With global warming and human destruction, the natural environment has deteriorated sharply recently. The declaration of the United Nations Conference on the Human Environment proclaims that one of the most effective solutions for saving our planet is to make efforts on environmental education (E.E.). In general, children are more flexible learners with better abilities on constructing new concepts comparing to adults. If the teacher can assist their students to cultivate knowledge and to develop awareness about the environment from the early stage, they will become responsible citizens to the environment. This study is intended to investigate the primary teachers’ self -efficacy in E.E. teaching from the perspectives on teachers’ environmental awareness and the concern for the environmental issues. Basically, the educational effectiveness can help students become excellent learners. Consequently, the first purpose of this research focuses on the influence the elementary school teachers’ environmental awareness and the concern for the environmental issues on teachers’ self -efficacy in E.E. teaching. The second purpose is to probe into the relation between the teachers’ environmental awareness and their self -efficacy in E.E. teaching, and the relationship between the teachers’ concern for the environmental issues and teachers’ self -efficacy in E.E. teaching respectively by analyzing the teachers’ background factors. The third purpose is to explore the factors that construct the teachers’ attitude concern for the environmental issues. This study applied the questionnaire method. Based on the scope of administrative divisions and schools, the stratified proportional sampling method was used in this study. There were 469 valid questionnaires from 26 public primary schools in Yunlin County. The questionnaire designed by the researcher consists of environmental awareness, the concern for the environmental issues, and teachers’ self -efficacy in E.E. teaching. The collected data in this study were analyzed descriptively using the Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (SPSS 17.0). This study used Factor Analysis Approach for statistical tests, and independent T-test and One-way ANOVA (1-Way Analysis of Variance) were also used to test the goodness-of-fit index (GFI). Based on the data analyses, the main findings of the research are stated as follows: 1. The primary school teachers in Yunlin County showed positive scores on the environmental awareness, the concern for the environmental issues, and teachers’ self -efficacy in E.E. teaching scales. 2. The teachers who participated in environmental groups, took environmental courses and attended environmental education workshops showed significantly higher scores than those teachers without above mentioned experiences on the environmental awareness and teachers’ self -efficacy in E.E. teaching scales. Meanwhile, the result of Cross Tabulated Statistics also showed that over 80% of the primary teachers with the mentioned experiences had the same consensus significantly. 3. The concern for the environmental issues including living environment issues, pollutions, limited resources, the nature conservancy, and strong economic activities was analyzed by the Factor Analysis Approach. The findings showed that the female primary teachers had significantly higher concern for the environmental issues than the male primary teachers did. 4. The findings showed that primary teachers’ environmental awareness and the concern for the environmental issues had significantly positive influence on teachers’ self -efficacy in E.E. teaching. 5. The model of the Linear Regression Analysis also showed that the environmental awareness and the concern for the environmental issues can predict teachers’ self -efficacy in E.E. teaching. Moreover, the environmental awareness had higher influence than the concern for the environmental issues did on teachers’ self -efficacy in E.E. teaching. The environmental awareness and the concern for the environmental issues were good predictors for teachers’ self -efficacy in E.E. teaching, and they could explain 25.4% of the variance. 6. By using the Analysis of Moment Structures (AMOS 7.0) to test the goodness-of-fit index (GFI) between the theoretical model and the observing data, the results showed that the goodness-of-fit index (GFI) between the theoretical model of teachers’ self -efficacy in E.E. teaching and the observing data is quite good. 7. According to the results of the study, this research may provide related educational authorities or institutions with some good suggestions for teacher training programs and workshops. Hopefully, this study may also offer some propositions for the future studies.