Are you ready to teach?

In her talk entitled “Relationship between readiness and effectiveness of teachers,” Dr. Umme Kulsum of Bangalore University explored the relationship between teacher readiness and teacher effectiveness. With a sample of 100 in-service teachers in and around Bangalore, she examined how effective teachers were based on their age, sex, marital status and readiness, which she defined as having a teaching and college degree.

 

In her introduction, Dr. Umme explained that lower standards of education are connected to lack of adequate teacher training. In particular, those teachers that are effective are more likely to remain in teaching and even demonstrate greater effort in classroom planning and posses greater enthusiasm for teaching.

She said, “As teachers, we are all striving towards excellence and work towards improve in our teaching.” However, in order to ensure all students are in classes with effective teachers, we need to understand what makes a teacher effective and how to equip those entering the profession with the skills, attitudes and knowledge needed.

 

Although there were some questions about the relevance of the study since the ultimate measure of teacher effectiveness was self-reported by teachers, the presentation raised several important questions among the audience. They asked, what are new teachers learning in teacher preparation colleges? And, is it what they need to know for today's classrooms? What is the relationship between personality and content knowledge in being an effective teacher?