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Training Quality Teachers
Training Quality Teachers
IntroductionThe quality of a profession improvement is fundamental to enacting, developing and sustaining teacher professional’s quality. Education of quality teachers is a key component of education in Kenya. Teachers have an impact in all education aspects and directly affect a country’s economy. Lucas, 1972 states that teacher education is quite an important aspect of education and via it teachers who are perceived as role models of any society are brought up and prepared. The education of quality teachers is the fundamental pillar of all established education systems and the guardian of the culture of society. These sentiments were also backed up by the sessional paper No. 6 of 1988 when it stated “there was vital need to develop and support quality teacher education program if the management of education within the country is to prosper and national growth is to be fast-tracked” (Republic of Kenya, 1988).Just as other education components education of quality teachers is affected by technological, political, social and economic society developments. Basing on real experiences in Kenya this report focuses on the shortcomings and practices of evolving professionals that are of quality in a developing nation. The paper also discusses the best practices and models in teacher professional development.
Contents
TOC o “1-3” h z u HYPERLINK l “_Toc377157431” Introduction PAGEREF _Toc377157431 h 1
HYPERLINK l “_Toc377157432” What is teacher education? PAGEREF _Toc377157432 h 1
HYPERLINK l “_Toc377157433” Importance of Teacher Education PAGEREF _Toc377157433 h 2
HYPERLINK l “_Toc377157434” Critical issues in teacher education PAGEREF _Toc377157434 h 4
HYPERLINK l “_Toc377157435” Assessment Methods PAGEREF _Toc377157435 h 4
HYPERLINK l “_Toc377157436” Issuance of Instructions PAGEREF _Toc377157436 h 4
HYPERLINK l “_Toc377157437” Lesson Development PAGEREF _Toc377157437 h 4
HYPERLINK l “_Toc377157438” Achievement of set Curricular Goals PAGEREF _Toc377157438 h 5
What is teacher education?Teacher education is a concept that has been so controversial, both in meaning and use. It’s a concept that is interpreted differently by different people, hence a multidimensional concept. Some people define teacher education as an education program that aims at equipping teachers with the basic skills necessary for them to handle their career. Others define this concept as a process through which teachers are exposed to the teaching profession and are taken through training on how to become good instructors. Yet another school of thought integrates the two definitions and defines teacher education as a training carried out in equipping teachers with both didactic and academic contents, in preparation for the challenges they are likely to face in their entire lives, especially as concerns their career life.
Management of teacher education has also raised brows among the concerned parties. It’s the lack of understanding on how effectively this aspect should be managed that has caused so much misunderstanding of the teaching concept itself. Failure to regard teacher education as a professional aspect makes people question if teaching in itself is a profession.
Importance of Teacher EducationResearch indicates that teacher education, and hence teacher quality accelerates national development and integrity. This makes education a driving force behind development in a society, hence why most countries focus more on developing quality teachers. This is supported by reports that have been written, indicating how much a country, and especially developing countries are investing to ensure production of quality teachers.
The history of formalized teacher education for instance in Kenya dates back to the 19th century during the times of Christian missionaries. The basis of the models that were used is associated to the European and Canadian teaching models. The main reason behind initialization of formal teacher education was the rapid expansion of schools and the need for education among the colonies. Bush schools were in much need of qualified teachers who could handle the students effectively and according to the Christian requirements.
Quality management is a theory in supply management that ensures eminence in a company’s products and services. Quality management deals with, but is not limited to the standards at which the company operates. Its paramount concerns involve customer relationship management, issues affecting leadership in the companies, and to what extent the people are involved in improving on the quality standards of the goods and services produced.
In the perspective of quality teachers, quality management is important in ensuring quality students from the instructions availed to them.
A major characteristic of quality teachers is that they manage the resources available and people as a process. For instance in instilling discipline in students, they acknowledge that this is a process and handle it with lots of understanding. Analysis on previous records indicates that untrained teachers were not effective in service delivery, and mainly their nature of discipline could often fail to yield the expected results.
Critical issues in teacher educationAssessment Methods
Some teachers assess students on the measure of their narrative and writing expository essays during examinations. This has been challenged as not a good mechanism of assessment since the environment under which the assessment is done may not be so conducive for the students to express themselves. On the other hand, other teachers assess students based on their understanding. This too has been challenged since different situations and factors may affect this aspect to a greater extent. Teacher education, therefore, aims at establishing standard measures for assessment.
Issuance of InstructionsWhen, where, why and how to issue instructions is another critical issue addressed by the people concerned with training quality teachers. Some of the instructional features advocated for include explaining concepts for the students to digest on their own, interpretation mechanisms, application of various frameworks during instruction and finally advocating for self-knowledge where the students are encouraged to do research on their own. Review of background information is also a step towards effective content delivery.
Lesson DevelopmentLessons have a unique way in which they should be developed if they have to meet the set objectives. Different teachers, however, may opt to doing their lesson plans in their own ways based on their own understanding. Such an attitude, however, fails to consider the diversity that exists within the students who make the main audience of the lesson planned. It’s this diversity that makes lesson planning a critical factor in ensuring teacher quality hence a major issue addressed in training teachers.
Achievement of set Curricular GoalsMost developing countries have a curriculum that teachers across the concerned country should follow when creating content and developing lessons. With this curriculum is also a set of specific goals and objectives that should be met once the syllabus is covered. Research indicates that when teachers are given the freedom to search for relevant content to deliver to the students the quality of education is compromised to a greater extent. This explains why the concerned body of government has to come up with a curriculum and train teachers towards
Training Programs
Training Programs
Name
Institution
Training Programs
One of the most challenging tasks for any human resource manager is the identification of qualified staff. This is surprisingly even more difficult when it comes to selecting and recruiting entry level staff, as in most cases they are either lacking in knowledge or sufficient expertise. Due to such hindrances, most entry level staff usually require some form of orientation training to best prepare them for the demands of their jobs. It is because of such problems that innovative programs aimed at preparing prospective entry level employees for their future duties are increasingly on the rise. Two such programs include: Partners in Career and Workforce Development program, and the Midwest Community College HIT Consortium. Both programs aim at equipping prospective employees with the requisite skills to help them settle into their new work places seamlessly. The programs aim at equipping the employees with skills they do not have but require in order to effectively fulfill their duties. At the same time, these programs also ease the work of human resource managers, as they ensure a steady supply of qualified personnel in need of no further training. This is a huge advantage considering that in most cases entry level jobs require some degree of on job training and apprenticeship.
The Partners in Career and Workforce Development program, helps individuals with an interest in entry level employment. The program trains potential employees at no cost, with the potential of placement at one of the partner hospitals. The training program entails a 4 week period of classroom instruction, followed by a four week period of internship. In order to prepare potential medical records clerks, office assistants, patient service coordinators and laboratory aides amongst others, the program exposes trainees to medical terminology, the healthcare environment, computer skills, and interviewing skills, as well as other important skills. Once completed, the trainees are equipped with certain skills fundamental to operating within a hospital environment. The program basically covers all areas an entry level employee is likely to encounter in their day to day activities, as well as prepares them to tackle problems commonly encountered in the hospital. The fact that eligible graduates of the program are actually enrolled into short term paid internship is no doubt an added advantage of the program (Partners Healthcare, n.d).
The Midwest Community College HIT Consortium program on the other hand, attempts to create health workers sufficiently conversant in health information technology in order to improve technology utilization in hospitals as well as the use of EHRs (Electronic Health Records). Though not a form of training specifically targeting entry level employees, the program aims at imparting a skill that may have previously been missing in health workers, essentially fast tracking the adoption of information technology. Initially, the program entailed full funding for students training either in a health related or IT related field on health information technology. This training is usually focused and is aimed at achieving a particular goal, by equipping future health information technology users, trainers and even consultants with the requisite knowledge (“Community College Consortia,” n.d).
While the first program is more focused on preparing the trainee for their tasks while in employment, the second one takes the right approach by collaborating with already existing educational institutions. This strategy no doubt makes the second program more successful, and highlights a need for institutions of higher learning to collaborate with employers in developing programs that are efficient at preparing employees for their future roles. While the first program may develop better prepared candidates, the second one is likely to record higher enrollment, due to its partnering with institutions of learning. The first one is likely to have more qualified graduates, because it has ensured the trainee gains the exact skills required to fulfill their duties by exposing them to, and essentially orientating them to the work environment, through internship.
References
Partners Healthcare (n.d). Partners in Career and Workforce Development. Retrieved from http://www.partners.org/For-Employees/PCWD/Exploration/Health-Care-Training-And-Employment/Default.aspx
“Community College Consortia.” Retrieved from http://www.healthit.gov/policy-researchers-implementers/community-college-consortia
Training plan for Customer Service Medical Support Assistant
Name
Professor
Customer service
30 March 2012
Training plan for Customer Service Medical Support Assistant
Customer service is one of the most important departments in every company because it acts as the main link between the customer and the company. In the absence of customers, businesses have no one to sell their goods or services to. For any business to be successful, it must take customer care very seriously beginning with top management to those below them. Competition for customers has risen in all sectors which mean that customers can go elsewhere if they feel that they are not receiving the best services (Scott A. Snell, et al, 2012). Medical support assistants are the first people that patients meet when they visit medical facilities. They act as a link between patients and doctors and they also answer calls, remind doctors of their daily agendas and schedule appointments.
Steps in conducting a needs assessment
What is the purpose of the needs assessment?
This step requires individuals to state the things they are well acquainted with, the things they think they are acquainted with and the things they want to be acquainted with about the problem. It also entails why an individual is carrying out needs assessment. In addition, this step identifies what one is attempting to measure and what is to be done with the data collected. This step also involves identifying ways of reporting the information obtained, bringing all interested parties onboard and assigning responsibilities to people during different steps.
Identifying the population
This step involves identifying the people who will take part in the needs assessment like patients, hospital administrators, doctors, medical support assistants, nurses, members of the community and volunteers.
Establishing the ways of carrying out the needs assessment
This step entails coming up with ways to carryout the needs assessment.
Devise a survey instrument to use during the needs assessment
The survey instrument chosen may include questionnaires, observation and interviews among others.
Collect all data regarding the need in question.
This step includes establishing baseline data, management system for organizing the data; follow up mechanisms for those who did not respond, organizing the data by key groups and summarizing the data to make it simple to understand.
Analyzing data
This step involves determining the strengths and weaknesses of the data collected.
Use the results to develop both long and short term goals of the organization. To do this, one should first develop a plan and allocate all the required resources to implement it.
Training objectives
To develop a training program that meets the needs of everyone involved in healthcare.
To provide support and guidance to medical support assistants with an aim of improving performance.
To stimulate positive attitudes towards healthcare professionals.
To increase productivity among medical support assistants by equipping with the necessary skills and equipments.
Training methods to be used by the program
The program will use four main methods namely;
Induction training-this type of training will be used on new recruits into the medical support assistant job. The training will mainly include learning the requirements of the job, the challenges in handling customers, learning the goals of the organization and learning the internal functioning and policies of the organization. Induction training will include workshops, seminars and meetings. The main reason why I choose induction training is because it’s cost effective and it prepares employees for the challenges they are likely to face in their new jobs (Anne Bogardus, 2009).
On the job training- this type of training will be aimed at the people already working in the organization. It will include demonstrations, job rotations, coaching and working on team projects. I choose on the job training because it has many advantages like cot effectiveness, makes employees become more productive and also because it gives employees the chance to learn while doing their duties.
Off-the job training- in this type of training, medical support assistants will be taken away from their workplace and get training. Some of the methods that will be used in off the job training are sponsored courses, day releases, sandwich courses, self study, distance learning and block releases. I settled on this type of training because it offers a wide range of skills compared to other methods. It also offers employees opportunity to learn from experts or specialists out then organization.
Lesson plan
Title Method Duration participants
Handling correspondence Seminar 3 hours beginners
Filing records Workshop 10 hours practitioners
Scheduling appointments Seminars 6 hours practitioners
Arranging hospital admission demonstrations 6 hours beginners
Collecting specimen coaching 2 days practitioners
Sterilizing medical equipments Seminar 1 week practitioners
Performing basic laboratory tests Sandwich courses 3 weeks practitioners
Disposing contaminated hospital wastes coaching 7 hours beginners
Some of the training materials that will be used in this training plan for medical support assistants are manuals, notes, films, fliers, internet, diagrams and PowerPoint presentations.
Program evaluation plan
Kindly tick where possible
Questions no Somehow yes Absolutely yes
Did the training meet your expectations? Do you think the knowledge gained is useful? Were the trainers effective? Were topics well covered? Was the training well organized? Were the materials used in the training effective? Was adequate time provided for questions and discussions? poor average good excellent
How do you rate the training? Which part of the training do you think needs improvement? Any other comments. The main strength of this training program is that it’s very flexible and can be used on both novice and practicing medical support assistants. It also gives participants room to interact with other people therefore improving their knowledge. Since much of the training can be done at the work place, the training program cuts down on travel expenses that employees would incur travelling to distant places (Scott A. Snell, et al, 2012). Due to its flexibility, the program also gives employees the freedom to arrange for their own participation. The program is also very effective because it uses that media that is easy to understand.
One major disadvantages of this training program is that it’s expensive. From the equipments needed to the time employees will spend on training, the program can prove to be expensive to the organization. The program also requires a lot of logistical planning and this may affect the smooth running of organization. Lastly, it may be very difficult to track the effectiveness of the plan if many trainees are involved.
References
Anne Bogardus. PHR / SPHR Professional in Human Resources Certification Study Guide. John Wiley & Sons; ISBN0470430966, 9780470430965, 2009
Justin Gooderl Longenecker, et al. Small business management: an entrepreneurial emphasis. Cengage Learning; ISBN0324226128, 9780324226126, 2005
Scott A. Snell, et al. Managing Human Resources. Cengage Learning; ISBN1111532826, 9781111532826, 2012