Abstract
Influences of a teaching practicum on students’ aspirations as teaching professionals were investigated from the perspective of Social Cognitive Career Theory (SCCT) ; the role in this process of the National Institute for Educational Policy Research’s competencies for vocational and career development was also examined. Student teachers (N=240) completed questionnaires before and after their teaching practicum. The results suggested that the students with high competencies for vocational and career development had higher teaching self-efficacy, higher personal performance accomplishments, and less change in their teaching self-efficacy from before to after the practicum. Moreover, the results suggested that the relationships among the variables of Social Cognitive Career Theory differed between the students with high and low competencies for vocational and career development. For the students with low competencies, support from supervisors promoted teaching self-efficacy, and teaching self-efficacy had positive effects on the students’ interest in teaching and their aspirations as teaching professionals. For the students with high competencies, the positive effects of personal performance accomplishments on their aspirations as teaching professionals were modified by 3 mediating variables : teaching self-efficacy, teaching outcome expectations, and interest in teaching.
