A Study of the Attitudes of University of North Carolina Education Faculty Toward the Use of Computer-Based Simulation in Pre-service Teacher Education Methods Courses

ABSTRACTMARY F. ENGLEBERT: A study of the attitudes of University of North Carolina education faculty toward the use of computer-based simulation in pre-service teacher education methods courses. (Under the direction of DR. JOHN GRETES) The use of computer-based classroom teaching simulations has proved to be a very effective methodology for training pre-service teachers. Despite wide adoption of this instructional methodology in Australia, South Korea, and other countries; however, education faculty in the United States have been slow to adopt it. To date no research has been discovered that establishes a cause for this reluctance. Since attitudes impact behavior, this study sought to discover whether the age, tenure status, or Carnegie Classification of university was associated with the attitude toward computer-based classroom teaching simulations of education faculty who teach instructional methods courses in the University of North Carolina constituent universities. The study used descriptive and inferential statistics to determine that no association appears to exist between these characteristics, common to all of the faculty in the study, and the attitudes held by the faculty toward adopting computer-based classroom teaching simulation as an instructional methodology.