Students who have low self-efficacy will be likely to give up easily, avoid challenging tasks, focus on their failings, and quickly lose confidence at the first sign of criticism (Cherry, 2013). Bandura's social cognitive theory and the concept of self-efficacy can be applied to this classroom with regard to the differences between genders. Clearly, boys had a high sense of self-efficacy vs. The girls, and the teacher did not recognize this fact. Again, refraining from offering feedback immediately after a verbal presentation might help the students with low self-efficacy address challenges in a safe way. As they build self-efficacy, learn to enjoy the art of failing gracefully, and see difficult tasks through to the end, the girls may increase their self-efficacy. The teacher can achieve this through gentle encouragement. Self-regulated learning is related to social learning, motivation, and self-efficacy. In this classroom, the teacher already incorporates activities that will encourage self-regulated learning because it is an advanced placement class. However, there are other ways the teacher can use different instructional approaches to motivate students in the classroom. For example, the teacher can ironically capitalize on the gender differences by segregating the class into boys and girls, and having a competition. If the girls lose, they will still have collaborated and the collaborative learning activity will strengthen their social networks. This will lead to increased trust among the students, possibly more collaborative learning, and more goal-driven behaviors. Accountable to peers, the...

If the girls win the original competition against the boys, it will have the added benefit of boosting the self-esteem and self-efficacy of the female students.
School administrators need to facilitate a teacher's understanding of adolescent development and learning. Most teachers have a basic understanding of adolescent development, but that understanding is weak in general. One way the school can facilitate understanding of adolescent development and learning is to have a special workshop or seminar scheduled, and the school would also offer to pay for the teachers in attendance. Another way the school can facilitate understanding of adolescent development and learning is to provide teachers will a pamphlet or a website that has information that can assist the teacher when creating lessons. A third way is to offer teachers lesson plans with specific strategies for motivation and learning that are built into the instructional design. By working with those lessons, the teacher will understand how adolescent development works in the act of teaching.

References

Cherry, K. (2013). What is self-efficacy? Retrieved online: http://psychology.about.com/od/theoriesofpersonality/a/self_efficacy.htm