TEAM TEACHING

Team teaching -Meaning
Team teaching a style of instruction in which resources as well as interests and expertise of a team of teachers are pooled in order to enhance the effectiveness of instruction/curriculum transaction to the maximum possible by utilizing all facilities available in school.
Characteristic of Team teaching
1. It utilizes the service of two or more teacher in the process of teaching the same class.
2. It is an instructional strategy rather than training strategy.
3. In team teaching a group of teachers are responsible for realization of the educational objectives, rather than an individual teacher.
4. A team of teachers of the same subjects work together to deal relevant content area to the same group of students.
5. It can be termed as co-operative teaching , in which teachers together plan to pool resources, interests and expertise for teaching the same content for the same group of students.
6. Every individual teacher of the team gets an appropriate role in the instructional process in accordance with one’s special competencies or area of specialization.
7. The group of teachers involves have shared responsibilities in planning, organizing, leading, controlling and evaluating.
8. In team teaching, the group of teachers have to jointly consider the needs of their pupils.
Objectives of Team teaching
1. To make the best use of expertise of a number of teachers.
2. To improve the quality of teaching by utilizing the sills of more then one person.
3. To develop positive attitude towards co-operation or group in teaching – learning situations.
4. To help the student to satisfy the needs and solve the difficulties relating special content areas.
5. To develop the sense of shared responsibility in teaching and evaluation.
6. To minimize the scope of teaching wrong things to the students by any individual teacher.
Types of Team teaching
1. Team teaching in the same class period.
Here the members of the team discuss the various aspects of the same topic to be covered in the same class period and share these aspects in tune with the special knowledge area in which each has expertise.
2. Tam teaching based on ability.
In this type, units are shared by different teachers not on the basis of subject matter, but on the basis of special competencies such as lecturing, demonstrating, guiding discussion etc.
3. Team teaching based on specialization
Teachers with different subject specialization are jointly made responsibilities for instruction, starting from course formation to evaluation. They share the content according to their specialization areas.
4. Team teaching on relay system.
Hear one teacher starts the instructional process, when he completes, another follows and so on. Hear the division of work not based on subject competency or skill. Each teacher supplements, enriches and supports what others have done.
Principles of team teaching
1. Principle of size and composition of the class.
The size of the class should be vary according to the objectives of the team teaching.Eg. To remove the difficulties of students in certain subject, the size of the class should be small.
2. Principle of level of instruction
The entering behavior of the group of students should be determined so that the presentation of each member of the team in tune with the level of the class.
3. Principle of assigning duties to teachers of the work.
Duties to the teachers should be appropriate according to their competencies of teaching.
4. Principle of learning environment.
Learning environment must be generated by employing appropriate teaching aids and other inputs.
5. Principle of time factor
Time schedule should be prepared by allotting appropriate time to subtopics, lead lecture, group work etc.
6. Principle of Supervision
o The aim of team teaching is to develop mastery over subject matter by utilizing the expertise of teachers
o Supervised study is essential for assimilating various items of knowledge of a topic
o The nature and duration of supervising students activities depends upon the purpose for which team teaching is employed.
Procedure of Organizing the Team teaching
Team teaching involves three steps
1. Planning
This step involves the following activities
• Formulating the objectives of the team teaching session.
• Writing these in behavioral terms.
• Identifying the entering behavior of the learners.
• Deciding the details of the material to be taught.
• Assigning duties to teachers, such as lead lecture, follow up work and supervision considering their interest and competencies.
• Fixing up the level of instruction.
• selecting appropriate teaching aids and other inputs, if any, for generating learning environment.
• Deciding ways and means to be adopted for evaluating the student performance.
2. Organizing
The organization of team teaching is decided by considering the needs of the learners. The following are the general activities which are usually performed by a team of teachers.
• Determining the level of instruction. Some questions are asked to explore the background of the leaner’s.
• Selecting the appropriate communication strategy by considering the level of language achievement of the learners.
• Presentation of lead lecture by a competent of the team; other teachers listen the lecture and note down the element of the topic that appear to be not easily understandable to the learners or nor appropriately presented.
• Follow up work. The other teachers have to supplement the lead lecture by explaining the elements of the topic in a simpler way so that the learners can understand easily.
• Providing motivation or reinforcement during both the stages. i.e, during the lead lecture and follow up work.
• Supervision of student activities which are assigned in lead lecture or group work or follow up work. This stage is considered to be important for assimilation.
Every member of the team should be conscious about time schedule and about the duty assigned to him. He must be well prepared and ready for implementing the plan.
3. Evaluating
Evaluation is an important aspect of ant type of teaching. It will helpful to measure the performance of learners. It also provides reinforcement to the team of teachers as well as to the learners, this stage involves the following activities.
• Asking oral questions. Each question should measure a particular objective envisaged by the team.
• Taking decision about the level of performance and realization of the objectives.
• Diagnosing difficulties of the learners and providing the remediation.
• Revising the planning and organizing phase of team teaching itself on the basis of evaluation of the student.

Advantages of team teaching
1. Better planning
• Team teaching has to overcome repetition and hence every teacher has to devote more time towards planning and preparation of his unit.
2. Better utilization of resources.
• It results in the optimum use of available resources, human, material, finance. A number of teachers can work together and make the best use of their specialized knowledge.
3. Effective use of teaching techniques.
• Teachers observe each other and thus improve their teaching techniques.
4. Better motivation.
• It provides better motivation for good teachers to become team leaders. Student too are better motivated while they are being taught by a number of teachers. Teachers with greater technical skills influence the performance of their colleagues.
5. Better follow-up work.
• It ensure better follow-up work as a number of specialists teach the same subject to the same class.
Limitation of team teaching
1. It is very difficult to ensure co-operation among teachers of a team.
2. It is not east to assign powers and responsibilities to a group of teachers. It might happen no one takes care of the responsibilities expected.
3. Many teachers do not maintain regard and respect. Every teacher considers himself an expert of the subject and has his own style of teaching.
4. Teachers generally do not like to deviate from the routine methods of teaching and they do not prefer any change in the system of education.

INTRODUCTION TO MICRO-TEACHING

Introduction
            You know that the economic prosperity and good quality of any nation depends upon the development of human resources of that nation. The significant fact in the development of manpower resource refers to the competencies and the level on which these competencies are imparted. You also know that it largely depends on those who develop these competencies. Therefore, for this purpose we need highly competent teachers for imparting these competencies. It is essential that teachers imparting these competencies should have the capability to perform their task efficiently. For this, they need to acquire requisite competencies themselves.Here we will attempt to understand as to what competencies are essential for becoming better teacher and how these competencies can be imparted.
Teaching - Meaning

• Teaching is the stimulation, guidance, direction and encouragement of learning.
• Teaching is the communication between two or more persons, who influence each other by their ideas and learn something in the process of interaction.
• Teaching is to fill the minds of the learner by information and knowledge of facts for future use.
• Teaching is the process in which learner, teacher and other variables are organized in a systematic way to attain some pre-determined goals.
• Teaching is to cause the child to learn and acquire the desired knowledge, skills and also desired ways of living in the society.
• Teaching is the stimulation, guidance, direction and encouragement of learning.
• Teaching is to cause the child to learn and acquire the desired knowledge, skills and also desired ways of living in the society.

Teaching : Definition

“Teaching is an intimate contact between a more mature personality and less mature one which is designed to further the education of the latter.” - (H.C. Morrison, 1934)

"Teaching means many different things, that teaching act varies from person to person and from situation to situation. " -            (Bar, 1961)

"The behaviour or activities of persons as they go about doing whatever is required of teachers, particularly those activities which are concerned with the guidance or direction of learning of others." - (Ryan, 1965)

"Teaching is the arrangement of contingencies of reinforcement under which students learn. They learn without teaching in their natural environment, but teachers arrange special contingencies which expedite learning and hastening the appearance of behaviour which would otherwise be acquired slowly or making scene of the appearance of behaviour which might otherwise never occur." - (B.F. Skinner. 1968)

"Teaching as an act of interpersonal influence aimed at changing the ways in which other persons can or will behave." -             (N.L. Gage, 1963)

What is a teaching skill ?

·   A teaching skill is that behaviour of the teacher which facilitates pupils’ learning directly or indirectly.

·      A teaching skill includes all arts and behaviour of the teacher which maximizes pupils’ learning.

·     A teaching skill is that art of the teacher which makes communication between the teacher and pupils sufficiently.

Attempts have been made to list teaching skills. Allen and Ryan listed the following teaching skills at Stanford University in the U.S.A.

1.         Stimulus Variation

2.         Set induction

3.         Closure

4.         Teacher silence and non-verbal cues

5.         Reinforcing pupil participation

6.         Fluency in questioning

7.         Probing questioning

8.         Use of higher questions

9.         Divergent questions

10.      Recognizing and attending behaviour

11.      Illustrating and use of examples

12.      Lecturing

13.      Planned repetition

14.      Completeness of communication

B.K. Passi has given the following list of Teaching Skills in his book “Becoming Better Teacher; Micro-teaching Approach” :

1.         Writing instructional objectives

2.         Introducing a lesson

3.         Fluency in questioning

4.         Probing questioning

5.         Explaining

6.         Illustrating with examples

7.         Stimulus variation

8.         Silence and non-verbal cues

9.         Reinforcement

10.      Increasing pupil participation

11.      Using black board

12.      Achieving Closure

13.      Recognizing attending behavior

NCERT (National Council of Educational Research and Training) in its publication Core Teaching Skills (1982) has laid stress on the following teaching skills…

1. writing instructional objectives
2. Organizing the content
3. Creating set for introducing the lesson
4. introducing a lesson
5. Structuring classroom questions
6. Question delivery and its distribution
7. Response management
8. explaining
9. illustrating with examples
10. Using teaching aids
11. Stimulus variation
12. Pacing of the lesson
13. Promoting pupil participation
14. Use of  blackboard
15. Achieving closure of the lesson
16. Giving assignments
17. Evaluating the pupil’s progress
18. Diagnosing pupil learning difficulties and taking remedial measures
19. Management of the class 

Component of Teaching Skill

Component of teaching Skill is the sub-skill to be practiced or maintained to achieve the mail skill

Core Teaching Skills

It is not possible to train all the pupil teachers in all these skills in any training programme because of the constraints of time and funds. Therefore a set of teaching skills which cuts across the subject areas has been identified. They have been found very useful for every teacher. The set of these skills are known as CORE TEACHING SKILLS

Core Teaching Skills are:

1.     Skill of Probing Questions

2.     Skill of Explaining

3.     Skill of Illustrating With Examples

4.     Skill of Stimulus Variation

5.     Skill of Reinforcement

6.     Skill of Classroom Management

7.     Skill of Using Blackboard

8.     Skill of Introducing a lesson

Core Teaching Skills and their Components

S.No.	Skill	Components
1.	Probing Questions	Prompting, seeking further information, redirection, focusing, increasing critical awareness.
2.	Explaining	Clarity, continuity, relevance to content using beginning and concluding statements, covering essential points.
3.	Illustrating with examples	Simple, relevant and interesting examples appropriate media, use of inducts, deductive approach.
4.	Stimulus variation	Body movements, gestures, change in speech pattern, change in interaction style, pausing, focusing, oral-visual switching.
5.	Reinforcement	Use of praise words and statements, accepting and using pupils’ idea, repeating and rephrasing, extra vertical cues, use of pleasant and approving gestures and expressions, writing pupils’ answer on the black board.
6.	Classroom Management	Call pupils bynames, Makenorms of classroom behaviour, attending behaviour reinforced, clarity of direction, check non-attending behaviour, keep pupils in Eye Span, check inappropriate behaviour immediately.
7.	Use of blackboard	Legible, neat and adequate with reference to content covered.

Meaning and Definition of Microteaching

• Meaning

      Microteaching is a procedure in which a student teacher practices teaching with a reduce number of pupils in a reduced period of time with emphasis on a narrow and specific teaching skill.

Definition

•       “Microteaching is a scaled down teaching encounter in class size and time”            - D.W.Allen(1966)

•       Microteaching is defined as a system of controlled practice that makes it possible to concentrate on specified teaching behaviour and to practice teaching under controlled conditions.- D.W. Allen & A.W.Eve (1968)

•       Microteaching is a scaled down teaching encounter in which a teacher teaches a small unit to a group of five pupils for a small period of 5 to 20 minutes.                                                  - L.C. Singh (1977)

Objectives of Microteaching

•       To enable teacher trainees to learn and assimilate new teaching skills under controlled conditions.

•       To enable teacher trainees to master a number of teaching skills.

•       To enable teacher trainees to gain confidence in teaching.

Characteristic of Microteaching

•       Microteaching is a highly individualized training device

•       Microteaching is an experiment in the field of teacher education which has been incorporated in the practice teaching schedule

•       It is a student teaching skill training technique and not a teaching technique or method

•       Microteaching is micro in the sense that it scale down the complexities of real teaching

•       Practicing one skill at a time

•       Reducing the class size to 5 – 10 pupil

•       Reducing the duration of lesson to 5 – 10 minutes

•       Limiting the content to a single concept

•       immediate feedback helps in improving, fixing and motivating learning

•       The student  are providing immediate feedback in terms of peer group feedback, tape recorded/CCT

Phases of Microteaching Procedure

1.     Knowledge Acquisition Phase (Pre-Active Phase)

            It includes the activities such as;

Ø  Provide knowledge about teaching skills.

Ø  Observe the demonstration of teaching skill.

Ø  Analyze and discuss the demonstration of the teaching skill.

2.     Skill Acquisition Phase (Inter-active Phase)

        It includes the activities such as;

Ø  Planning and preparation of micro lesson for a skill.

Ø  Practicing the skill.

Ø  Evaluation of the practiced skill (Feedback).

Ø  Re-plan , Re-teach and re-feedback till the desired level of skill is achieved.

3.     Transfer Phase (Post –Active Phase)

Ø  Giving opportunity to use the mastered skill in normal class room teaching.

Ø  Integrate the different skill practiced

Steps of Microteaching

1. Orientation of the student teachers

–   Providing necessary information and theoretical background about microteaching such as :

•   Concept of Microteaching

•   Significance of using of microteaching

•   Procedure of Microteaching

•   Requirements of microteaching

2. Discussion of Teaching Skills

•   Discuss various skills.

•   Discuss component behaviour of teaching skills

3. Selection of a Particular Teaching Skill

•   Persuade and help the trainees to select a particular skill.

•   The student teacher may be given necessary background for the observation of a model of demonstration lesson on the selected particular skill

4. Presentation of a Model Demonstration Lesson

•   Presentation of model lesson can be done by;

o      A Teacher Educator or an expert can demonstrate the use of the skill.

o      By exhibiting a film or a video tape.

o      By making the trainees listen an audiotape.

5. Observation of the Model Lesson and Criticism.

•   Observation should be with an observation schedule.

•   Careful analysis of the observation of model lesson helps the trainees to know the desirable and undesirable component behavior of the skill thoroughly

6          6. Preparation of Micro Lesson Plan.

•   Prepare a micro lesson plan by selecting the proper content to practice the demonstrated skill.

                 7. Creation of Microteaching Setting.

•   Should provide proper facilities.

•   Pupils: Real pupils/Peer Trainees (Number of pupils- 5-10(Normal:6)

•   Available Time         :6 Minutes.

•   Supervisor  : Teacher Educator and Peer Trainees.

           8. Practice of the Skill (Teaching)

•   Trainee teaches micro lesson for 6 minutes.

•   Teaching is observed by the teacher educator and peer both with an observation schedule.

•   Lesson can be taped on a video or audio tape for providing feedback

            9. Providing Feedback

•   Feedback is provided in terms of the component behaviours.

•   Mechanical gadgets can also be used.

•   Duration :6 Minutes.

            10.  Re-planning.

•   Re-plans micro lesson in view of feedback.

•   Available Time:12 Minutes.

             11.  Re-teaching.

•   Teacher trainee re-teaches micro lesson on the basis of re-plan and re-arranged settings.

•   Duration :6 Minutes.

             12.  Providing Re-Feedback

•   Trainee gets re-feedback on the basis of performance in the re-taught micro lesson.

•   Duration :6 Minutes.

             13.  Repetition of the Microteaching Cycle.

                        Time duration for the microteaching is;

•  
Teach             : 6 Minutes.

•   Feedback       : 6 Minutes.

•   Re-Plan          :12 Minutes.      Total 36 mts.   

•   Re-Teach        : 6 Minutes.

•  





Re-Feedback  : 6 Minutes.

 

Plan :                           This involves the selection of the topic and related content of such a nature in which the use of components of the skill under practice may be made easily and conveniently. The topic is analyzed into different activities of the teacher and the pupils. The activities are planned in such a logical sequence where maximum application of the components of a skill is possible.

Teach :                         This  involves the attempts of the teacher trainee to use the components of the skill in suitable situations coming up in the process of teaching-learning as per his/her planning of activitieó. If the situation is different and not as visualized(in the planning of the activities, the  teacher should modify his/her behaviour ás per the demand of the situation in the Class. He should have the courage and confidence to handle the situation arising in the class effectively.

Feedback :                   This term refers to giving information to the teacher trainee about his performance. The information includes the points of strength as well as weakness relating to his/her performance. This helps the teacher trainee to improve upon his/her performance in the desired direction.

Re-plan :                      The teacher trainee replans his lesson incorporating the points of strength and removing the points not skillfully handled during teaching in the previous attempt either on the same topic or on another topic suiting to the teacher trainee for improvement.

Re-teach :                     This involves teaching to the same group of pupils if the topic is changed or to a different group of pupils if the topic is the same. This is done to remove boredom or monotony of the pupil. The teacher trainee teaches the class with renewed courage and confidence to perform better than the previous attempt.

Re-feedback :               This is the most important component of Micro-teaching for behaviour modification of teacher trainee in the desired direction in each and every skill practice.

14.  Integration of Teaching Skills (Link Practice)

            When mastery has been attained in various skills ,the teacher trainee is allowed to teach the skills together. This separate training programme to integrate various isolated skills is known as ‘Link Practice’

ü  It helps the trainee to transfer effectively all the skills learnt in the micro teaching sessions.

ü  It helps to bridge the gap between training in isolated teaching skills and the real teaching situation faced by a student teacher.

ü  Desirable Number of Pupils       :15-20

ü  Preferable Duration                   :20minutes.

ü  Desirable Number of Skills        :3-4 Skills

•       Link practice or integration of skills can be done in two ways;

1.     Integration in parts

                                    3 or 4 teaching skills are integrated and transferred them into a lesson of 15-20 minutes duration. And again 3 or 4 skills are integrated and are transferred all the skills to one lesson.

2.     Integration as a whole

Student teacher integrates all the individual teaching skills by taking them as a whole and prepares a macro lesson then transferred them into a real teaching situation

Merits of Microteaching

•   It helps to develop and master important teaching skills.

•   It helps to accomplish specific teacher competencies.

•   It caters the need of individual differences in the teacher training.

•   It is more effective in modifying teacher behaviour.

•   It is an individualized training technique.

•   It employs real teaching situation for developing skills.

•   It reduces the complexity of teaching process as it is a scaled down teaching.

•   It helps to get deeper knowledge regarding the art of teaching

Limitations of Microteaching

•   It is skill oriented; Content not emphasized.

•   A large number of trainees cannot be given the opportunity for re-teaching and re-planning.

•   It is very time consuming technique.

•   It requires special classroom setting.

•   It covers only a few specific skills.

•   It deviates from normal classroom teaching.

•   It may raise administrative problem while arranging micro lessons

Microteaching Vs Traditional Classroom teaching

Microteaching

•   Teaching is Relatively Simple 

•   Carried out in controlled situation

•   The Class Consist of a small group of students          

•   takes up one skill at a time

•   Teaching time is 5 to 10 mts.

•    Immediate Feed back provided

•   Provision for re-teaching

•   Students gains confidence in teaching

Traditional Class room Teaching

•   Teaching is Complex Activity

•   Carried out in uncontrolled Situation

•   Classroom consist of less than 35 to 40 students

•   Teacher practices several skill at a time

•   Teaching time is 40 to 45 mts

•   No immediate feedback

•   No provision for re- teaching

•   Students usually tensed and scared