Wen-Chung Wang
National Chung Cheng University
Hsueh-Chu Chen
Wu Feng College of Technology and Commerce
In this study, we develop an inventory of teaching perspectives, which can be used to investigate effects of preservice education and practical training on teaching perspectives. There are five domains in the inventory: classroom management, teacher roles, student diversity, knowledge and curriculum, and instructional affairs. After pretest, we administered the inventory to 773 college students and secondary school teachers. We apply item response theory to analyze dimensionality, differential item functioning, distribution of ability and item difficulty, and group differences. The results show that the inventory is unidimensional and is measuring “progressiveness of teaching perspectives.” Of the 22 items, five exhibit moderate effects of differential item functioning. If these 22 items are to be treated as criteria, most subjects’ perspectives are quite progressive. However, these items are too easy to well differentiate individual differences. The subjects are more progressive in “conceptual” issues than in “practical” issues. There are no group differences in progressiveness between the awarded teachers and general teachers. Likewise, there are no differences between the students of education program and general students. However, the students are more progressive than the teachers. It may be because the students are more optimistic, or the teachers are more practical. Since the issues examined are common to psychological tests, this study can offer some suggestions to test development and analysis.
Keywords: Rasch model, item response analysis, teaching perspectives, test development.