Michelle Cox

Cultural Responsiveness and Motivation in Preparing Teachers: Pre-service Teachers: Does Cultural Responsiveness Affect Anticipated Self-determination to Teach in Specific Settings? Michelle Cox

Motivation to teach is essential to educating allchildren in the public schools. This study examinedthe anticipated self-determination of pre-serviceteachers to teach in classroom settings that variedin the ethnic and racial composition of the studentsin the classes. Additionally the culturalresponsiveness of participants was measured toexamine whether high/low cultural responsivenessinteracted with the specific contexts given. Theresearch findings revealed that both culturalresponsiveness and the scenarios related toprospective teacher anticipated motivation forworking with specific groups of students. Additionally, data indicated that pre-serviceteachers were not significantly and positivelydeveloping their cultural responsivenessunderstanding during teacher preparation. This studyalso provided interesting stereotypical beliefs thatsupported the quantitative findings.