Introduction
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The Universal Declaration on Human Right (1948) has recognized education as Fundamental Human Right. Education provides basic as well as specialized skills that ensure the socio-economic development of the individuals. Education empowers people to know about their rights as the citizens of the country and in women, it reduces the gender bias/inequality.
Education is the passport to accelerated economic growth…. (it) is the key to building human capital and human capital is the vital ingredient in building a nation.
-Mahboob-ul-Haq and Khadija Haq. Human Development in South Asia 1998.
Education is the basis of all growth. The quality of human capital in the state, that is the physical and mental capabilities of the population, will determine it’s progress. Education not only improves the faculties and skills of people; it also dramatically contributes to their physical well being.
Human Development in Karnataka 1999.
Government of Karnataka has identified Education as a sector critical to promoting growth and development of the state’s human resources and thereby accelerating socio-economic development. The government has formulated various committees and taken up innovative policy initiations towards improving quality of education.
The teachers play a vital role to reflect the challenge of teaching in the contexts of both univerraling elementary education and strengthening the academic standards at ALL LEVELS OF SCHOOLING. The teachers join the service with a lot of roles to play. The teachers face many challenges in due course – namely urban – rural colleges, Mastery of subject, Mastery over the language of instruction, use of appropriate pedagogy, socio-economic and cultural context of the students, infrastructure, education of girl students and involving the parents and the community. These challenges have to be confronted head on. The meticulously designed programmes by the department of PU Education in Association with Regional Institute of Education Mysore find very useful in building up the confidence of teachers to face the challenges, both Academic and Professional. The teacher can successfully face the challenges if they broader their knowledge base in their domain – subject of teaching in communication skills and using the necessary / relevant tools like ICT.
Objectives
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This awareness module helps the teachers in identifying the challenges they face in teaching in PU Colleges. The module helps the teacher to formulate the strategies to confront on the challenges. The soft skills and communication skills developed through the practices can help them to manage the stress and involve the Parents and Community in the improvement of quality of education. The module inspires the teachers to develop on interest in professional development through in-service trainings or by taking up some research activities. The Academic Plans prepared in the beginning of Academic year helps the teacher to proceed at a constant pace.
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Academic Challenges
The minimum Academic Qualification for the post of Lecturer in PU College is “Post-Graduation with second class.” The subject knowledge of the teacher at the entry level may not suffice for an effective teaching-learning in the class room. The teacher who do not update his/her knowledge in his/her subject of teaching may bound to face some challenges in the class room. Although he/she has good command over his/her subject, he/she may fail in transmitting the same to the students in the classroom. If the teacher has the knowledge of using modern – technologies as teaching aides, the teaching – learning process can be more interesting.
- Improving subject mastery of teachers:The students have various accessibilities or sources to update and upgrade their knowledge. Now a day’s teacher is no-more being considered as the ONLY SOURCE of the knowledge. Here lies the importance of teacher’s establishment of supremacy of knowledge. If the teacher does not have expected level of competency, it creates a discordance of learning.The teacher should involve continuously subject – enrichment, either by attending in service teacher-training programme or seeking the help of senior – experienced or even retired teachers. A subject based teachers group or a network can be created. The challenges faced in delivering the subject matter to the students can be sorted out by discussion amongst the group members and consulting the subject experts.
- Knowledge of Pedagogy and Communication Skills:The teachers, having very good knowledge in their subject may some time fail to transmit/convey to their students. Most of the teachers teach their students in the same way as they were taught by their teachers in their college days. Such age old methods cannot be relevant / effective for the present generation students. If the teacher develops some soft skills/communication skills and pedagogical methods, his class room teaching can be more effective.
- Use of ICT for effective teaching:A Virtual library and laboratory can be created by using ICT in the colleges Loads and loads of material is available ion Internet. The teacher must have the knowledge of using Internet facility as and when required. The difficult concepts, science experiments can be explained easily by using the CDs and other Audio – Visual materials. The language teachers too can improve the speaking and listening skills of the students. The teachers should have their e-mail address and can subscribe, free of cost, to various online journals.Edusat – satellite based teleconference is being conducted by the department of PU Education in subject enrichment of the teachers. The teachers can discuss the problems they face in the class rooms, with the experts.The Edusat – Programmes are found useful in making the teaching and learning very interesting and motivating as the students can access to the best teachers in every subject. This helps the students to understand the difficult topics of any subject very easily.
- Research Activities to improve teaching skills/techniques:The teachers after identifying the challenges they are facing in their college formulate the possible causes. The teachers can take up ACTION RESEARCH and practice the same in their day to day activities. The teachers can explore new information/development in the subject, in teaching methodologies and challenges in teaching, by involving in some kind of Research Activities. The findings so observed can be tested in the class room and if found effective and result oriented, then it can be published in the Education Columns of the News Papers and Journals and can be posted on the sites. For recent information the teachers can refer to NCERT – Published journals.
- Preparing Academic Plans:Normally the students complain that the teachers such up in completing the syllabus at the end of the Academic year. If the teachers plan their activities in the beginning of Academic year, incorporating the assessments at the different stages of learning, the students too prepare their study plan accordingly and do not pose any problems / challenges to the teachers. The subject material can be taught at a constant pace with due attention to the necessary topics.
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Professional Challenges
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The media invasion, the high usage of electronic gadgets by the students and fast changing society has posed a lot of challenges to the teachers both in Urban and Rural area colleges.
- Teaching challenges in Rural Area Colleges In Rural areas the colleges might have been situated in remote areas, which might (may) not be provided with the suitable conveyance facility. The students might be first or second generation learners and might (may) not be so comfortable with the new learning environment, medium of instruction, infrastructure, staying away from their homes for a long period etc.The problems can be addressed suitably with the Departments concerned and Parental – Community involvement in Constructive Activities of the College.In Uttara Kannada, a building constructed by the community of a village has been donated to the government to run a school. The people of the village supply vegetables and fruits to the school children. They have also provided the school with the necessary furniture. The community cleans the play ground occasionally through shramadana.In Mysore a cowshed like school, has been transformed into a Model school with the support of local committee. The Sub-committees are formed to look into various developmental activities of the school. The committee has also provided various facilities like drinking water, class rooms, toilets, power, garden plants, teaching – learning materials, sports equipments, books, computers etc. It’s a shining example of local community involvement in the department of school.In a village in Bellary District, a government school has achieved very high performance with the support of dedicated teachers and supportive parents. The School Development and Monitoring Committees (SDMC) formed for the schools have actively taken part in addressing the problems faced by the schools in rural areas. The same kind of support can be sought from the local community in the developmental activities of the colleges too.
- Encouraging girl students enrolment and retention:Educating the girl students empower them both socially and economically and hence reduce the gender bias / inequality. It general, the women can be aware of their rights as a citizen of the democratic country and can be spared from social exploitation in particular.Female literacy rate in Urban Karnataka is just above 50% of the population, where as it is below 50% in Rural Karnataka. The Urban female literacy rate is growing faster than Rural female literacy rate and hence generating a huge gap.The enrolment rate of girls is lower than that of boys, and their dropout rate is higher. But if the girls are encouraged to continue their education, then they will perform exceedingly well.The presence of female teachers in the college supports the girls to stay in the college. The separate toilets provided with water supply facility will certainly help the girl students to stay for a long time in the college. The girl students are given personal attention to know their social, economical background.
- Dealing with the students with various socio-economic background:In government colleges, the students come from various socio-economic backgrounds. Such students may pose some challenges to the teachers in the class room. The personal counseling will be of an immense help to understand the students better. The students affiliated to various organizations may pose challenges to the teachers. Such students should be ensured that their social activities should not affect the academic performance. The reason for student’s disinterest in studies may be because of poor or no support from the parents at home; poverty being one of the reasons. A library or donated book bank can be established in the college to support poor students. The poor students can be introduced to philanthropists and other agencies to support them.
- Challenges in Teaching the students from different media of instruction. A bridge course has to be conducted to motivate the students to learn minimum vocabulary of the language in which the teacher teaches in the college.
- Stress Management:The poor time management develops the stress and slowly affects the teaching process.
- Teaching the Physically Challenged Students:Special attentions must be paid to physically challenged students and provided with needful support for their learning.
- Difficult Behaviour in the Class Room:
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Reading
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The following web pages may interest you.
- 10-steps to developing a quality lesson plan.[1]
- MOTIVATING , DEALING, STRESS, & FEELING GOOD ABOUT TEACHING[2]
- MOTIVATING STUDENTS: 8 SIMPLE RULES FOR TEACHERS[3]
- DIFFICULT BEHAVIORS IN THE CLASSROOM[4]
- 101 WAYS TO COPE WITH STRESS[5]
- THE TRUE TEACHER ACCEPTS ALL STUDENTS[6]
- COMBATING STRESS[7]
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Assignment
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Prepare a brief write-up on the biggest challenge you have faced as a lecturer in a pre-universtiy college. Describe how you dealt with it.
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| Send the completed assignments to:
- mzk786@gmail.com
- znjagirdarphoton@gmail.com'
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