Belize's Third and Fourth Form mathematics teachers' self-efficacy, attitudes, and confidence: Mathematics teaching and disciplinary literacy in mathematics

This study examined Belizean Third and Fourth Form public high school mathematics teachers' self-efficacy beliefs about teaching mathematics, their attitudes toward Disciplinary Literacy in Mathematics (DLM), and their confidence in imbuing mathematics teaching-learning-curriculum with DLM. A quantitative methodology was used, and data was collected from 50 mathematics teachers across Belizean public high schools using a combined survey instrument derived from the Mathematics Teaching Efficacy Beliefs Instrument (MTEBI) and the Literacy in the Disciplines 6-12 (LID 6-12) survey. The findings revealed several patterns: (1) contrary to expectations, participants who attended more than five professional development sessions reported significantly lower self-efficacy than those with fewer or no sessions; (2) the PD variable was recoded from three categories (0, 1-5, More than 5) into two categories “No PD” and “Any PD” due to methodological concerns; (3) PD participation showed no significant relationship to self-efficacy; (4) years of teaching experience is a significant predictor of self-efficacy; (5) no statistically significant differences were found in confidence levels based on years of teaching experience, though teachers with 16-20 years showed the highest confidence; (6) female teachers reported significantly higher confidence in implementing DLM compared to male teachers; and (7) there was weak positive correlation between confidence and attitude scores, but the correlation was not statistically significant. The findings of this research provide timely insights for designing effective support systems that address the multidimensional nature of teacher development.