Teacher Social Competence
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Abstract
The Teacher Social Competence (TSC) measure is a revision
and integration of two measures collected in the initial years of
Fast Track: the Social Competence Scale-Teacher (SCT) and the Teacher
Post Ratings (TPR). The SCT includes 25 items assessing competency
across three primary areas-academic behavior, prosocial skills,
and emotional regulation. The SCT was administered in kindergarten,
first, and second grades for all three cohorts (excluding cohort
1, grade 1). The TPR is a brief 10 item instrument designed to evaluate
changes in academic performance and behavioral functioning over
the course of an academic year. The TPR was administered in grades
2 and 3 (cohort two was also administered the TPR in grade 1). Technical
reports exist for both the SCT (hard copy only, dated 9/95) and
the TPR (soft copy on-line, dated 10/95). It should be noted that
teacher ratings of social competence are also collected on the Social
Health Profile (SHP). The SHP includes 9 items evaluating both prosocial
behavior and emotional regulation, and was administered to all cohorts,
from grades1-6. A technical report detailing this scale is available
in hard copy through data center.
This measure was developed with three principal objectives:
(1) to reduce the assessment load on teachers by integrating the
SCT and the TPR into a shorter, more efficient scale; (2) to minimize
overlap with the SHP; and (3) to reduce the likelihood of response
bias by organizing items according to content. The resultant scale
is a 17 item measure assessing several dimensions of social behavior
including prosocial behavior, emotional regulation, and academic
competence. Each item has two parts. The first part of each item
allows the teacher to rate the frequency of individual social behaviors
on a 6 point scale (ranging from "almost never" to "almost always").
The second part of each item allows the teacher to rate improvement
in the behavior over the course of the school year on a 7 point
scale (ranging from "much worse" to "much improved").
The SCT contains three conceptually derived scales-prosocial/communication
skills, emotion regulation skills, and academic behavior skills-although
factor analyses suggest that the prosocial and emotion regulation
scales are highly intercorrelated. The TPR yields two relatively
clean scales reflecting change in academic functioning and change
in prosocial behavior. While the TSC bears considerable conceptual
similarity to the measures from which it derives, the changes made
during the process of revision and integration are substantial.
Consequently, exploratory factor analyses of the TSC (using Harris-Keiser
rotation) were conducted. These analyses were conducted separately
for each of the two sections of the TSC-once for items assessing
the frequency of various socially competent behaviors and once for
items assessing change in socially competent behavior over time.
Results will be presented separately for each section.
As noted, the TSC can be divided into two sections, the first assessing
the frequency of 17 social behaviors and the second assessing change
in these behaviors over the course of an academic year. Results
from the analyses conducted here strongly suggest that these two
sections should be scored separately and treated as distinct.
Additionally, while this measure was developed to include three
conceptual subscales (prosocial behavior, emotion regulation, and
academic competence), the prosocial behavior and emotion regulation
subscales are highly intercorrelated (this is true for both frequency
and change sections). Hence, the two subscales should be scored
separately only when a strong theoretical rationale supports making
this distinction. For most research purposes, the items in these
two scales should be combined in order to score a single social
competence dimension.
Keywords: Academic Performance, Prosocial Skills, Affective Behavior,
Emotional Regulation, Empathy, Aggressive Behavior, Peer Relationships,
Goal Orientation, Reading Skills, Math Skills.
Administration History
See study
years administered.
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24 June 2004
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