Developing the self-efficacy of Northbridge learners
Self-efficacy is the belief that you can manage a task or a situation and influences our opinions, feelings, behaviours, and motivation. Students at Northbridge International School Cambodia with a higher self-efficacy believe that they possess the skills to navigate through life and attain their goals.
Self-efficacy is the belief that you can manage a task or a situation and influences our opinions, feelings, behaviours, and motivation. Students at Northbridge International School Cambodia with a higher self-efficacy believe that they possess the skills to navigate through life and attain their goals.
As teachers and parents, we often want to protect and prevent children from making mistakes, but research shows that learners must be able to make mistakes to develop their self-efficacy. Our role and responsibility as teachers and parents are supportive in the journey to learner self-efficacy.
At school, teachers provide support to develop self-efficacy by:
- Differentiating to accommodate all learners and ensure tasks are adequately challenging.
- Using peer role models encourages learners to see how people of the same age relate to problems and find solutions.
- Providing freedom of choice for tasks to allow students to develop their independence.
- Providing honest feedback to students to enhance self-awareness.
- Offering daily problem-solving opportunities that allow students to cope with challenges without fear.
- Providing pastoral care
At home, parents and guardians can provide support by:
- Helping your child set SMART ( Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant and Time-based) learning goals. These goals are more manageable, require frequent feedback and help nurture strong self-efficacy.
- Praising effort and praising honestly will help strengthen self-efficacy beliefs through positive encouragement.
- Helping your child see their strengths during a setback so they can persist.
- Modelling self-efficacy to your child by sharing your own obstacles and efforts to work towards goals.
- Celebrating both small and big successes.
'It takes a village to raise a child' - African proverb
The old adage still rings true, and I hope you will implement these suggestions to help us build your child’s self-efficacy.