A comparison of actual and preferred classroom environments as perceived by science teachers and students

Abstract

AbstractThis study of perceptions of classroom environment is distinctive in that, first, it made use of two instruments (the Individualized Classroom Environment Questionnaire and Classroom Environment Scale) which have had very little use in prior science education research and, second, it involved assessment not only of student perceptions of actual environment, but also of student perceptions of preferred environments and teacher perceptions of actual environment. Administration of these instruments to a sample of 2175 junior high school students in 116 classes revealed that the environment scales exhibited satisfactory internal consistency reliability and discriminant validity in each of the three forms (student actual, student preferred, and teacher actual), and that there were some fascinating systematic differences between the profiles of environment scale scores obtained for the different forms. In particular, it was generally found that students preferred a more favorable classroom environment then was perceived as being actually present and that teachers perceived the environment of their classes more favorably than did students in the same classrooms.