Personal and social training as a part of class teachers’ lifelong learning

Introduction: Globalization provided people in once isolated lands with an array of democracy types and international principles. The boosting traditional, conventional, societal, ethnical, and cultural differences in countries all over the world are pushing educational authorities to reexamine their contemporary habits, customs, principles, and practices of citizenship. Examining the assumptions and methods of cultural democracy in education settings is the foundation of critical pedagogy. Thus, a critical multicultural pedagogy is formed on critical views on democracy and diversity by illuminating the transformative nature of citizenship. Accordingly, this study inquires the conceptual grounds of class teachers in a phenomenological tradition in that it investigates the conceptions of these teachers on the concept of diversity and democracy. The data of the study were gathered through a questionnaire, besides semi-structured interview questions designed by the researcher. Based on a mix method research design, this study makes use of both qualitative and quantitative techniques to collect the required data. 160 class teachers officially working in diverse regions in Turkey voluntarily participated in the study (N=150 for the questionnaire and N=10 for the interview). Related implications to raise the awareness of class teachers on diversity and democracy were presented at the end of the study.Methods: This study searched for the conceptual underpinnings of the class teachers in the phenomenological tradition (Marton, 1981). Just like other methods to utilize philosophical phenomenology to the social sciences (Entwistle, 1997), the interpretative process of phenomenographic research is quite similar to that of grounded theory which refers to a set of systematic inductive methods to practice qualitative research (Richardson, 1999). Based on a mix method research design, this study makes use of both qualitative and quantitative techniques to collect data.Results: The findings demonstrate that class teachers are open to new perspectives, diverse religions and different genders. Thus, it can be said that a critical perspective was adopted by class teachers. Further, class teachers should be included into curriculum and syllabus design which are solely carried out by policy makers. Otherwise, critical skills of class teachers might be destroyed in the process of education. Thus, primary school curriculums and textbooks need to focus on the importance of democracy and diversity. Policy makers, Ministry of National Education, Turkey and Higher Council of Education need to include critical theory and critical pedagogy into curriculum. Future studies should focus on the views of both novice and professional class teachers. In addition, views regarding democracy and diversity from different cultures need to be examined in future research. Direct democracy, representative democracy, gender diversity, cultural diversity and pluralistic perspectives need to be adopted by related textbook publishers, classroom teaching departments, administrators and policy makers.Discussion: The findings of the study show that the participants developed a positive perspective towards democracy and diversity, although some issues in the context of Turkey are hardly mentioned or criticized (Dodd, 1992). The most important problem in examining democracy and diversity was religion because the participants stated that they respect religion, in their case Islam, because they somewhat would not want to hear church bell in a land of Islam (Bader, 2007). Diversity has been conceptualized as a positive element in the study. Since democracy and diversity are interrelated and interwoven, the participants generally adopted these terms (Banks et al., 2005).Conclusion: The results of the study suggest that the respondents had positive conceptions on individual and cultural diversities. Further, they developed good attitudes towards cultural democracy and they believe in the power of integration through individual differences. Critical pedagogy is an educational theory which aims to form a progressive and democratic culture by means of critical inquiry, which consequently results in valuing and respecting personal and cultural differences. Critical pedagogy perceives teaching as a naturally political event, refuses the neutrality of knowledge, and asserts that matters of social justice and democracy are not recognizable from only educational activities.

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Conceptions of Class Teachers on Democracy and Diversity

Üredi

2020

“…It is therefore extremely important for teachers to pay attention to these facts not only at secondary schools but at all levels of the educational system, which is one of the basic pillars of public administration. One of the ways how to help teachers in mentioned issues is to provide them with social-psychological training as a part of lifelong learning (Geršicová & Barnová, 2018).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Perceived Teachers’ Justice and Perceived Teachers’ Authority

Čopková

2020

Introduction: The presented study discusses the issues of teacher’s authority, its building and maintaining in the context of teacher’s justice. The main question to be answered is how high school students perceive teachers as authorities in relation with their perception of teacher’s justice.Purpose: The aim of the present article is the identification of the relationship between perceived teachers’ justice and perceived teachers’ authority among Slovak high school students.Methods: 159 Slovak high school students (120 males and 39 females) have participated in our study. Their average age was 17.2 years. The students have attended 3 kinds of high school - technical (49.7%), services (31.4%), and general (18.9%). Two questionnaires were administrated - Teacher Justice Scale (Dalbert & Maes, 2002) and Measurement for Omnisicient Authority Beliefs (Zhou, 2007). Data were examined by Pearson correlation, t-test and ANOVA.Results: The results have shown the significant positive relationship between perceived teachers’ justice and perceived teachers’ authority. No gender differences were identified. There are significant differences in general perceived teacher’s authority among secondary school students depending on their specialization - technical, services and grammar.Discussion: Results of the study support previous findings of Cseri (2013) and Gavora (2007) who point out the importance of teachers’ justice in building positive learning environment that support students’motivation to learn.Limitations: The proportion of male and female participants was not equal. Also the proportion of participants divided by school specialization was not equal.Conclusion: Accessing students fairly is not an easy task for any teacher, since perception of oneself as righteous may differ greatly from the perception of this apparent righteousness by individual students, who naturally dispose interindividual differences. It is extremely important that teachers pay attention to this fact not only at secondary schools but at all levels of the educational system, which is one of the basic pillars of public administration.

“…Interventions to reduce (student) teachers' anxiety or distress would be highly relevant to teachers' perspective-taking tendency, and for students who may then be able to positively change their social behavior (Singh, Lancioni, Winton, Karazsia, & Singh, 2013) at university and in their lifelong professional learning as teachers (Geršicová & Barnová, 2018;Tamášová, 2015;Ütkür, 2019).…”

Section: Conclusion and Implications For Educational Practicementioning

confidence: 99%

Does Test-Anxiety Experience Impair Student Teachers’ Later Tendency to Perspective-Taking?

Wolgast

Hille

Streit

et al. 2020

Introduction: We aimed to examine whether student teachers’ tendency to test anxiety relates to their later perspective-taking tendency and self-efficacy. The purpose of the presented study was to obtain first insights into the relationship between test anxiety, perspective-taking, and self-efficacy tendencies in student teachers. These tendencies may determine student orientation across different situations. We tested the hypothesis that the test anxiety components emotionality and worry relate to later low perspective-taking and self-efficacy.Methods: We conducted a longitudinal study with 275 student-teachers and analyzed the obtained data using structural equation modeling.Results: The data analysis revealed that only emotionality is related to lower perspective-taking and self-efficacy in later life.Discussion: We conclude that lowering student teachers’ test anxiety emotionality (e.g. through interventions) would result to later increased perspective-taking tendency.Limitations: Participants attended the study voluntarily, so it was a self-selected sample. We employed a correlational design over two measurement times instead of experimental methods.Conclusions: The obtained results give an explanation of why student teachers focused rather on themselves than on school students in classes. The perspective-taking tendency is important for teachers’ student orientation. The role of perspective-taking in different teaching situations might be investigated in further research.