CHAPTER ONE

INTRODUCTION

1.1       Background to the study

 Education experts, in general agree that there are three factors that influence the success of the teaching and learning process. These interrelated factors are the society, school and family environments.  A study conducted by Miguel and Barsaga (1997), considered factors affecting pupils’ performance, investigating the variables of teacher, students, parents and community, and concluded that the teachers were the key factor affecting students’ achievement. Teachers are charged with the main aim of making students learn effectively and efficiently and in order to achieve this aim, the teacher has to do several activities such as planning, provide effective instruction and evaluate the learning activities using appropriate methods and techniques. Thus, the quality of the teaching-learning process depends on the efficiency and quality of the teacher and this is of great importance in the initial stage of education when the pupils are at an early age.

 Therefore, for the teaching-learning process to be effective it is necessary that the teacher be endowed with teaching competency. Teaching competence refers to “The right way of conveying duties of knowledge application and skills to students”. The right way here includes knowledge of content, processes, methods and means of conveying content. According to Donald (1982) teacher competency are “those of knowledge, abilities and beliefs a teacher possess and brings to the teaching-learning situation”. A competent teacher would create classroom condition and climate which are conducive for students learning, being competent affects his performance and makes the learning process effective. The quality of education is normally measured by pupil’s performance in their tests and pupil’s performance is related to teacher’s competence and teacher performance in classroom. Thus, three conceptual dimension of teacher quality that are commonly used in making Judgments about teacher’s work are teacher competence, teacher performance and teacher effectiveness. Teacher competence is directly linked with teacher’s performance in complex situation as is thought to serve as a causal factor for success because “competent performance presumes competence” (Westera, 2007). Teacher competency differs from teacher performance and teacher effectiveness in the sense that it is a stable characteristic of the teacher that does not change appreciably when the teacher moves from one situation into another.

 The studies conducted so far indicate that there does not exists a single set of competences which all effective teachers possess or all the ineffective ones lack. This is because the concept of teacher competence in a highly situational one and involves value judgment when one absolute set of competencies is effective in relation to all kinds of learner groups. There are different ways of classifying teacher competence and it can be in term of teacher function. Essentially, teachers have two major roles in the classroom. (i) to create the condition under which learning can take place  i.e. the social side of teaching and (ii) to impart, by a variety of means “knowledge” to their learners i.e. the task oriented side of teaching. The social side of teaching could be referred to as the “enabling” or management functions” while the task oriented side of teaching referred to as the ‘instructional functions’’. These functions complement each other and are very difficult to separate the two in actual practice. Based on this premise various organization have attempted to classify teaching competence. For example the British general has identified promoting learner’s autonomy, subject knowledge, course and session preparation and planning, teamwork, flexibility, assessment and evaluation of learning as necessary teaching competence to be possessed by a teacher in order to make the teaching- learning process efficient and effective. While the general teaching council for Scotland views teaching competence as comprising of professional knowledge and understanding, professional skills and abilities and professional value and personal commitment.

 For the purpose of this research work teaching competence for prospective teachers required by the department of education at Montana state university will be adopted. These include communication competence, intellectual competencies (conceptual, integrative and quantitative) abilities for problem solving and effective teaching, professional competencies, pedagogical competencies, behavioral competencies and social competence. Emphasis will be on pedagogical and behavioural competence and how it influences the effectiveness of the teacher in the classroom.

Get this material NGN 5,000

Message Us on WhatsApp  »