Assessing the Impact of a Semester-long Course inAgricultural Mechanics on Pre-service Agricultural Education Teachers’ Importance, Confidence, and Knowledge of Welding

摘要

This study sought to assess the perceptions of Oklahoma pre-service agricultural education teachers re-garding the importance of identified welding skills standards and their confidence to teach them, based on a semester-long course on metals and welding. This study also sought to determine pre-service teach-ers’ knowledge of welding prior to and at the end of instruction. It was found that pre-service teachers rated the seven constructs above average in importance; yet, they had below average confidence in their abilities to teach them at the beginning of the semester and between average and above average confi-dence at the end of the semester, which resulted in large practical effect sizes. Further, they increased their knowledge score from an Fat the beginning of the semester to a C at the end of the semester, which was both statistically and practically significant. These pre-service teachers should be followed, longitu-dinally, to determine if and when they are able to fully master the skills and teach them effectively in the classroom and laboratory settings. Because agricultural mechanics is a vast field, future research should assess pre-service teachers’ perceived levels of importance and confidence in areas outside of welding, such aselectricity, plumbing, and small gas engines.