Teachers' and students' perceptions of self-regulated learning and math competence: Differentiation and agreement

•Teachers and students assess students' math competence/self-concept and self-regulated learning.•Large sample of 73 teachers and their fifth-grade students (N = 1289).•Exploratory SEM revealed three-factor solutions for teacher and student assessments.•Latent correlations between teachers' and students' assessments were small.•Assessment of students' math competence/self-concept showed the highest agreement.

Teachers' diagnostic competence is a crucial determinant of their teaching quality. However, prior research has indicated only a moderate association between teachers' and students' assessments of students' competence/self-concept and motivation. Furthermore, it is unclear how well teachers are able to differentiate between students' overall competence and other competence-relevant characteristics. The present article therefore investigated teachers' and students' perceptions of math competence/self-concept and two aspects of self-regulated learning (preactional and actional strategies), using a sample of 73 teachers and their fifth-grade students (N = 1289). Exploratory structural equation modeling revealed three-factor solutions, indicating that both teachers and students differentiated between the assumed self-regulated learning factors and math competence/self-concept. Latent correlations between teachers' and students' perceptions were small to moderate; their assessments of students' math competence/self-concept showed the highest agreement. The findings are discussed with respect to their implications for assessing and improving teachers' diagnostic competence of students' learning.