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Explain the Need and Significance of Teacher Education?
The following factors contribute to the perception of a need for teacher education:
(1) It is well known that one of the crucial elements of the necessary learning environments for accomplishing a country’s educational objectives is the academic and professional standards of instructors.
If teacher preparation was to have a beneficial impact on the standard of curriculum implementation in classrooms, student learning, and broader societal transformation, the focus of teacher preparation needed to change from training to education. The following elements require more emphasis:
- How long academic preparation takes,
- The depth and quality of subject-matter expertise, the range of teaching abilities, and
- Satisfy the requirements of various learning scenarios,
- The level of dedication to the field, awareness of current concerns and difficulties, and
- The degree of drive.
(2) Good education for all children depends not only on teachers having the knowledge and abilities to do their jobs, but also on their taking ownership of ensuring that all students learn at high levels and behaving accordingly.
(3) People bring views, values, commitments, personalities, and moral codes from their upbringing and education to teacher education, which have an impact on what they can learn in teacher education and in the classroom as well as who they are as teachers. One of the main goals of teacher education is to assist prospective teachers in critically examining their beliefs and values in relation to teaching, learning, and subject matter and developing a vision of effective teaching to direct and motivate their study and practise.
(4) According to the National Academy of Education Committee’s Report (Darling-Hammond and Bransford, 2005), teachers regularly face complicated decisions that call for a variety of types of knowledge and judgement and may have a significant impact on students’ futures. Teachers must be aware of the various ways that student learning might take place in the context of development, learning differences, linguistic and cultural factors, as well as individual temperaments, interests, and learning techniques in order to make wise judgments.
Teachers need to be able to take the steps necessary to gather additional information in order to be able to make more informed decisions about what is going on and what approaches might be helpful. This is in addition to having a solid understanding of the foundational concepts related to the learning and performance areas mentioned in the aforementioned quotation. More significantly, instructors must place the interests of the students at the forefront of all decisions they make.
(5) Teacher education, like any other educational intervention, can only function on professional commitments or dispositions that can be changed. While we cannot change someone’s nature, we may change attitudes toward others and foster a professional rather than a personal role orientation toward teaching as a discipline.
6 According to the Ministry of Education publication -Challenge of Education: A Policy Perspective (1985), -Teacher performance is the most important input in the field of education.
