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The main purpose of this descriptive research study is to investigate the conceptual and psychometric properties of a self-efficacy perception scale developed for determining self-efficacy perception of 3rd and 4th grade Turkish pre-service teachers, who took Turkish as a Foreign Language (TFL) course theoretically in undergraduate level, towards teaching TFL. As a result of analysis of the related literature and written responses of participants, researchers initially formed an item-pool by considering that they best suit to TFL context. Then, they adapted the items into 5-point Likert scale. The current instrument was administered to 176 pre-service Turkish teachers with a random sampling design. The repetitive statistics showed that the instrument has three factors with 25 items that measure the self-efficacy of participants. The factors which have been identified in the instrument possess the construct validity and psychometric properties of internal consistency. The reliability and validity of the scale were analyzed with SPPS 17.0. According to exploratory factor analysis results for maintaining construct validity of the scale, factor values of the scale changed between 0.57 and 0.82, and total variant of the scale was found to be %70.379. As for the Kaiser-Meyer-Olkin (KMO) measuring of sampling adequacy and Bartlett's test of sphericity, KMO is found to be 0.95 being greater than 0.60 and Bartlett's test is large with Chi-square value (?[superscript 2] (300) = 4143.5; p<0,0001) and significant at 0.000. As for reliability, the results showed that the items of scale in terms of item-total correlation changed between 0.45 and 0.84, and the total internal reliability coefficient of the scale (Cronbach's Alpha) was calculated as 0.972. Additionally, the two scholars gave their positive opinions in favor of the scale for face validity. The results indicates that the scale has the validity and reliability. Furthermore, the findings of the study confirmed that this scale had validity and reliability that could be used in TFL context for exploring pre-service teachers' self-efficacy perception towards teaching TFL.

1Boy Crusoe

By Allan Eric

Also published as" A Yankee Crusoe" . A 15 year old hard working and studious farm boy finds the lure of adventure on the seas as a merchant seaman more than he can resist. This is his story. " I was born in a little town in the State of Maine, near the close of the Civil War. My boyhood life did not differ materially from that of the average farmer's son in the remote country districts of New England--except, perhaps, that I read more and thought more. Hard work on the rugged soil, two terms each year in the little yellow country schoolhouse, a day's fishing now and then filled the early years of my life full to over-flowing. " What he gets is enough excitement and adventure to overflow his wildest dreams. How he experiences disaster and uses his wits and knowledge to overcome every problem makes for a great read. - Summary by Phil Chenevert