Current literature in education has posited that teaching methods courses fail in the endeavor of providing a meaningful experience for pre-service teachers.  One method of bringing about relevance is through the conscious awareness, or reflection, on the importance of the information to the individual.  Much has been written on the benefits of reflective thinking regarding teaching experiences.  However, there is paucity in the reflective thinking research on how it may benefit pre-service students’ perceptions on the efficacy of a teaching methods course.  Perceived course efficacy is defined as how the students relate the relevancy of content knowledge with its future use in the profession of teaching. The purpose of this study was to examine the students’ perceived efficacy of a teaching methods class for secondary physical education that incorporated self-regulating reflection strategies as part of the course.  Twelve pre-service teachers enrolled in a teaching methods course for secondary physical education volunteered for this study.  The teaching methods course was designed and taught as a course that infused critical thinking and self-regulating reflective practices.  The students were asked to reflect and write upon what they had learned at the conclusion of each lesson.  At the termination of the fifteen-week semester, the students were asked to write a reflective essay on the relevance of this course in their teacher preparation program.  Student participants signed a consent form to relinquish a copy of their course logbooks and final reflective essay papers. The reflective essays were unitized for analysis.  The unitized data was then coded, categorized and sorted using the constant comparative method.  Trustworthiness was established through triangulation and recording all events in a logbook kept by the principal investigator.  The analysis of the data revealed three themes: (1) conceptual change, (2) content knowledge, and (3) self-regulation awareness.  Conceptual change statements referred to comments about how course information brought about a philosophical change regarding their perception of physical education.  Content knowledge statements revealed basic foundational knowledge gained during the course.  Self-regulation statements reflected the importance of writing and keeping a course log.  The results indicate that positive course efficacy was achieved for these students through the self-regulated learning techniques utilized in this course.  Reflective thinking is a conscious self-regulating process that is useful in making relevant connections between theory and practice.  Consistent application of self-regulated learning practices across all teacher preparation courses may enhance teacher education programs.