Research Paper
Education
E-ISSN No : 2454-9916 | Volume : 6 | Issue : 2 | Feb 2020
COMPETENCIES REQUIRED BY A TEACHER IN MODERN TIMES Roopa Vats Assistant Professor, Guru Nanak College of Education, Punjabi Bagh, Delhi, India. ABSTRACT Aims and objectives of education depend upon the need and aspiration of society. Thus, as demands of society changes, it directly influences the educational system. In every educational system, teachers are responsible for creating healthy and positive learning environment. So, teachers' need to have some professional competencies such as competencies related to subject matter, curriculum development and its implementation, communication skills, reflection, research and use of ICT. In this 21st century, teachers need to facilitate 21st century learners. Thus, teachers require competencies that enable them to engage with these learners. In this article, there is a discussion on the framework of teaching competencies that will improve the teaching learning process in school. KEYWORDS: Teaching competencies, Teacher, Teaching. INTRODUCTION: Education is the process of preparing the individual for the future life. In the process of educating someone, the knowledge, skills and values of a group of people, are generally transferred from one generation to another. This is usually happens through the process of training, teaching and research. Thus, education is that process, through which we usually intend to bring desirable changes in the behavior, attitude, knowledge, skill & value of child. The aim of education is depends upon the needs and aspiration of the concerned society. These demands of society changes with times. In this modern time, we need to prepare our learners for the requirements of 21st century. Thus, teachers need to be equipped with the necessary teaching competencies. Most of the times, teachers competencies are referred to planning, implementation and assessment of curriculum but this is a narrow conception as these are the basic duties of a teacher in a school. There are many other dimensions that are related to the teachers’ competencies such as professional development, researches in the related area, balanced emotional development and concern for environmental issues, all these also need to be discussed. In its report, education commission (1964-66) laid emphasis on the quality of teacher, as according to it, India’s destiny is depends upon the quality of class room it has. Thus, teachers are the important factor that creates/improves quality in education system. Teacher not only impart knowledge h/she has but also shapes the character, attitude of the learners towards the learning. Out of various variables of teaching learning process teachers are the important one that led students to their overall development. Thus, the concept of idea teacher differs from society to society. Teachers on the basis of their experiences and education are expected to guide and assist student to be creative, critical thinker, innovative and a good problem solver. Teaching is a system of actions that a teacher attempts to bring predetermined changes among the learners. Teaching enable the learner to adopt their thinking, feeling and attitude to adjust the various complex environment of life. Teaching is an interactive and a two way process. In the process of teaching, teachers present the content or curriculum to the student and motivate the learners to transform various facts into laws and principles. For doing so, the teachers are requires to use various teaching learning material and method. The process of teaching can be divided into 3 stages namely pre active stage, interactive stage and post active stage. In pre active stage, the teacher plans classroom teaching learning experience before the actual classroom teaching. In this stage, teacher plan the lesson, teaching learning material and method. Before teaching, teacher needs to have proper understanding of level of his/her students. During this stage, the teacher also hypothesizes the learning outcomes and plans the teaching learning process in order to achieve them. The next stage is interactive stage, which is the actual classroom teaching phase. At this stage, teacher interacts with the students. H/she uses a number of strategies to achieve predetermined aims of education. Actions in this stage are more spontaneous as teacher tries to implement planning through the interaction with the student. Classroom management is another important factor of this stage. During the interaction with the whole class the teacher uses various skills such as skill of classroom management, reinforcement, stimulus variation, increasing pupil participation, questing, probing question, illustration with examples, demonstration and using audiovisual aids. The third and another important stage of teaching is the post active stage, which
happens after the teaching interaction with the class. At this stage, teacher retrospect and reflects on the activities and results that happen in class during the interactive stage. In this stage, teacher assess the achievement level of learning objective. Teacher also reflects upon the changes and improvement strategies in teaching learning process. TEACHING PROFESSION AND ITS REQUIREMENTS: Teaching is always believed to be one of the noble profession. Teaching as profession require a long period of preparation through teacher education programs. Through teacher education programs, pupil teachers develop the various competencies require by them in arranging effective teaching learning process. In order to gain competencies required in teaching profession, teacher always have to strive for excellences. In teaching, teacher have to be committed to moral, ethical and religious values and dedicated themselves to the service. These are many requirement of teaching profession that a teacher needs to fulfil to achieve desirable changes in students behavior. Some of them are as follows: . Good knowledge of subject matter: For teaching students, teachers need to have good knowledge of subject matter that to be taught to the students. For teaching of students of elementary level, teachers required to have basic knowledge of many areas such as language, mathematics, science, social science, health and physical education, art and craft, peace education and yoga education. For teaching students of secondary senior secondary and higher education teachers need to have indepth knowledge of a specific subject Good communication skills: For the effective teaching, teacher should have good communication skills. The teacher should be able to communicate sensitively by using appropriate language. Language used by teacher to communicate with students, parents, staff members and colleagues needs to be appropriate to the age of student, gender, religion, race and psychological development. Selection of appropriate instructional strategies: An effective teacher selects appropriate instructional strategies that suits to needs of all students. Teachers may use more than one strategy that fulfill the individualized needs of learner. Organization and management of classroom discourse to develop the students’ academic and social skills. Develop effective evaluation plan: The teacher plans various evaluation procedures to access students in terms of achievement of predetermined learning objective. In the teaching learning process teachers also need to evaluate his/her teaching behavior Developing problem solving attitude among learners: The effective teachers prepare teaching learning process in such a way that its activities or modes critical, creative & analytical thinking skills among the learners. Following professionalism: Teachers need to understand the ethical, legal and moral responsibilities of teaching profession. The effective teachers’ learners through his/her experience by reflecting upon them. For the fulfillment of requirements of teaching profession, teacher need to develop competencies. Competency is the way of to transmit the knowledge, skills and applications to the students in
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International Education & Research Journal [IERJ]
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Research Paper
E-ISSN No : 2454-9916 | Volume : 6 | Issue : 2 | Feb 2020
today’s world, our teachers need to have necessities competency require to deal with the 21st century learners. Learners in 21st century are full of energy and has vast source of knowledge due to the access of internet and ICT tools in this situations, a teacher require to have such competencies that fulfill the need of 21st century learners. Modern teachers should be competent to the use of ICT tools in teaching and learning process, reflective practitioner, able to create inclusive learning environment, democratic in dealing with students and highly motivated to develop him/ her professionally. In a broader way, teaching competencies are classified in the following categories: Subject knowledge competency: Teachers should have mastery over the content they need to teach in class. Teachers prepare and implement the lesson for the students of their class. For preparing and implementing these lessons, they integrate essential knowledge throughout the curriculum. Teacher presents the content in front of students and motivates them to engage with the content area to enhance their knowledge and satisfying their curiosity to learn. Teachers through the demonstration of content facilitate learners to draw connection among different topic of content area or discipline. This is the most important competency as teachers require to deliver content in the classroom. Competency of facilitating lifelong learning: Through the process of teaching, teachers aimed at developing a healthy human with a balanced personality. For this teachers plan the activities, in such a way, that leads to the overall development of child including physical, intellectual, social, moral and emotional development. Through teaching learning process teachers develop the ability of learning to learn among the learners. So that learners are being prepared for lifelong learning. Teachers plan the instructional strategy by identifying various development stages, weaknesses and strengths of learners. In this way, by promoting the quest to learn teachers lead the students to the path of lifelong learning. Along with motivating students for lifelong learning, teachers need to be competent enough to keep him/her on the path of lifelong professional development.
students’ learning. Teachers used ICT based audio visual aids in class and motivate students to take up the assignments that have ICT components. Teachers use ICT to produce, manipulate, store and communicate information in classroom. CONCLUSION: In teaching learning process, teachers need to demonstrate the competencies related to teacher. Effective classroom management, selection of effective teaching practice, effective assessment and technological skills are the important competencies that are required by a teacher for interacting with 21st century learners. In this modern times teachers need to plan, implement and evaluate teaching learning process with respect to already planned objective. Teachers uses various strategies to arrange positive relationship, corporation and desired learning. In modern time teacher need to engage diversified leaners in meaningful teaching learning process. REFERENCES: 1.
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Competency to maintain social- cultural balance in the class: Every class has variety of students. Teachers establish an environment that cater the needs of diverse students. Teacher should be competent enough to provide positive learning environment. Students’ social cultural background, values like democracy and human rights, collaboration and team work all need to be kept in mind while preparing learning environment in school curriculum. For doing all this, teachers need to have competencies in such area. Teacher should have proper knowledge about the various communities in the society so that h/she can create environment to positive include diversity in class. For doing so, teachers can use variety of lessons and materials that help the learners to understand stereotypes and praise the contribution of different members of society. Competency of curriculum development: Curriculum is the sum of overall experience that a child gain in this school. It includes all the activities that’s happen in school and helps in overall development of child. Teachers are the agents of curriculum transaction. But transaction will be done at its best when teachers are aware about the basic tenets of curriculum. Teachers should be competent enough to design, plan implement and adapt the curriculum as per the needs of their students. Teachers is the one who knows the reality of teaching learning process at ground zero. Teachers should be aware of philosophy related to curriculum, theories and moods of curriculum development. Competency of effective communication skills: Communication is the process of transmitting the knowledge and information from sender to receiver and received by speaker in the same sense as send by the speaker. Communication in class by the teacher could be verbal and non-verbal. Teachers should be competent enough to produce effective meaningful communication cycle with the students. Competency for Research: Research is the integral part of teachers’ professional development. During their period of teaching teachers face many challenges and problems. In order to find out solutions of these problems, teachers may conduct action research. Teachers also conduct research related to their specific subjects for their professional development. Thus, teachers need to be competent to conduct researches in order to keep him/ her updated. Competency to be reflective practitioner: For effective teaching, teachers need to be competent to reflect upon the experiences and results h/she have through teaching learning process. Teacher analyzed the student performance by reflecting on it. Competency of using ICT tools: Teachers in modern times have to be techno friendly. Teachers’ need to be competent to used technology effectively in teaching learning process. Integration of technology with the instruction is necessary for maximizing the
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International Education & Research Journal [IERJ]