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Joint International IGIP-SEFI Annual Conference 2010, 19 - 22 September 2010, Trnava, Slovakia
IMPLEMENTATION OF MICROEDUCATION INTO PREPARATION OF
STUDENTS OF ENGINEERING, PEDAGOGY, AND PSYCHOLOGY
BEFORE ENTERING A TEACHING PRACTICE
Michal Balažovjech1, Ján Bajtoš 2
Michal Balažovjech 1, Faculty of material science and technology SUT in Trnava,
Slovakia;
[Link]@[Link] ,
Ján Bajtoš 2, Pavol Jozef Šafárik university in Košice, Department of education,
Slovakia
[Link]@[Link] ,
Abstract: The preparation of student teachers in technical subjects is a very
systematic and thorough process. It is necessary to incorporate theoretical
knowlegde into this process. Students need to acquire enough knowledge necessary
to carry out their future profession. On the other hand, it is necessary to prepare a
quality pedagogical practice for them as a space for the practical test of their
acquired knowledge. As such, the pedagogical practice plays a key role throughout
the learning process, and therefore, it should receive sufficient attention. One
method, which is concerned with the student teachers to the profession, is the
method of Microeducation. This is a relatively unknown method in our country but
has had many positive responses in the world, and it is recognized among
professionals who deal with this topic.
Keywords: microeducation, student teachers, video analysis, simulations,
introspection.
Introduction
Based on past experience, we can conclude that the students‘ teaching experience is
one of the largest and most powerful experiences during their study. During this
practice, they have a chance to test their acquired knowledge in real terms before
entering into practice. It provides a first contact with real teaching situations.
From the perspective of the students, the pedagogical practice is a new experience
and the first contact with their future profession. The fact that it is the first teaching
experience "from the other side of the desk" it may cause uncertainty and fear of
failure from teaching in class. Therefore, it is essential that each student has been
thoroughly prepared in all respects, and its output before students at a specific
school was not his first. In preparation for pedagogical practice, students will receive
training that is focused on the practice of learned skills. The most common training
takes the form of outputs that simulate real learning in school.
One of the methods of preparing students for teaching is microteaching, which in
foreign circles is considered a very effective method (Orosová, 2009). This method
will place the student into the role of the teacher before a group of fellow students
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Joint International IGIP-SEFI Annual Conference 2010, 19 - 22 September 2010, Trnava, Slovakia
that creates a background in the classroom. Based on the video output, they have a
chance to see their behavior with the company of a teacher and adapt their
subsequent performance. The main emphasis is repeatability immediately after the
feedback, which makes it possible to immediately obtain recommendations from the
analysis and have the opportunity to correct the identified weaknesses.
According to the people who are interested in this issue, effective training through
microteaching reflects positively on the level of pedagogical practice of the student.
Prior to her students, they will be prepared with the "know how" and the overall level
of education will be positively improved.
Another great example is that unlike other teaching experiences the student will have
the opportunity to teach in a friendly, familiar atmosphere, without fear of failure or
negative adoption of pupils. In this atmosphere students may not be worried and feel
the jitters and therefore, they can effectively practice their skills.
1. Microteaching
According to available sources, we can deduce that microteaching is a relatively
young method that has been used in the preparation of future teachers. It has its
roots in America, where it was founded and developed in 1963 at Stanford University
in California. It was developed as a means of trying to find a new, more efficient way
(method) to prepare future teachers.
James M. Cooper and Dwight W. Allen (Cooper - Allen, 1970) were at the birth of
microteaching and greatly contributed to the development of the training methods.
Together, they wrote a publication entitled Micoteaching: History and Current Status,
which is from the perspective of microteaching and is reflective of one of the most
important and original work on this method. Their original application is defined as:
• pre-service training
• in-service training
• peace corps training
• supervisor training
• training college teachers
As the Mazacova wrote, microteaching is the procedure that takes several years and
applies not only in teacher training. With this staging, and to some extent using
simulation methods, training can be significantly upgraded and enhanced for various
professions. Using this method, a number of teaching skills can be developed that
are necessary for teaching activities (Mazacova, 2000).
In pedagogical vocabulary (from Walter, Prucha and Mares), microteaching is
defined as the procedure used in teacher education for practicing teaching skills. The
principle is to facilitate the conditions for a teacher activities and reducing the number
of students, teaching unit, and the range of practicing skills (Walterova, 2007).
1.1 The whole process can be described in the following three points:
1. Preparing to teach specific skills: theoretical training of the teaching skills. It is
often given by writing, orally or by video but most of the time they are
combined. Students in this stage often can see the video as a teacher
demonstrates the skill. Then, the video is usually discussed with the students
until it is all clear.
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Joint International IGIP-SEFI Annual Conference 2010, 19 - 22 September 2010, Trnava, Slovakia
2. Teaching the microlesson: A student teaches a short lesson (usually around
15 minutes) to a small group of students trying to learn the teaching skills. The
output is recorded on camera. Then the student could watch himself with the
company of the teacher and together they discuss the positive pieces and his
weaknesses. Often the colleagues and classmates watching the lesson will
add comments. Recording outcomes increases the strength and effectiveness
of feedback.
3. Planning on the base the criticism: After the criticism, the student usually has a
break in which he re-plans a lesson and implement changes from critics. The
time period is usually around 15-20 minutes.
Learning specific Teaching Re-planing Re-teaching
skills microlesson microlesson
1. Step 2. Step 3. Step 4. Step
Given by After the lesson Teaching a new
writing, orally or a discussion is Drawing ideas lesson before a
by video held with the from criticism new group of
teacher and students
student
1. Heading: General Introduction or Background
Papers accepted are published in the symposium proceedings. We ask all authors to
follow these guidelines in order to maintain a high standard of consistency.
Figure 1: Description of microteaching process.
2. Implementation of microteaching in conditions of SUT
Based on the information on this method, we decided to compile and implement this
model into conditions of teaching with the students of engineering, pedagogy, and
humanities with Faculty of material science and technology in Trnava. Whole training
was complete until the students entered the pedagogical practice.
On the basis of meeting criteria and guiding principles of this procedure, we defined
the following steps:
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Joint International IGIP-SEFI Annual Conference 2010, 19 - 22 September 2010, Trnava, Slovakia
1 Initial meeting with students - explaining the whole process of preparation and
training of psychodidactics skills, performance schedule and identifying key criteria
for making outputs and preparing for a lesson.
2 Microlessons - outputs of individual students, divided into four groups of seven
students (each group has reserved a day), are recorded on video. We decided that
this was mainly to increase the effectiveness for the two outcomes for students
whose analysis took place with students and teacher.
3 Analysis – the main objective was to identify the strengths and possibilities for
improvement (in order to maintain positive motivation, we used the term
weaknesses) and to implement the recommendations of students to the next output.
4 Video analysis - seeing the video from the student‘s output with company of the
teacher and processing methodology and analysis to identify opportunities for
improvement and identify the negative factors that should be avoided during practice
at a secondary vocational school (total recovery).
Initial
meeting with Teacing Analysis Re-teaching Video analyssys
students microlessons microlessons
10 minút 10 minút 10 minút
Figure 2: Microteaching process.
During this training, observations have been compiled to assess psychodidactics
competences, whose use is key. We implemented these competences into
microteaching as follows:
Ability to design a learning process:
This is accomplished by monitoring the process of preparation for microteaching,
which is identical in principle to the preparation for the lesson (with the exception of
focusing only on the exposure phase of the lesson), and on the basis of the defined
criteria to assess the outcomes of the video analysis and consult with their students.
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Joint International IGIP-SEFI Annual Conference 2010, 19 - 22 September 2010, Trnava, Slovakia
Ability to implement and support the learning process:
This is accomplished by monitoring the outputs and recording the behavior of the
student. Observation sheets were filled in by the students and teacher. They were
designed to help map out the best use of psychodidactics skills and after the
subsequent analysis waqs performed it can suggest specific improvements.
The observation sheet concerned with the monitoring of the following skills:
• Time control output;
• Get the attention of students;
• Acquaint the students with objectives of the output;
• Activation of students;
• Rated output structure;
• Continuity and follow-parts output;
• The impact of teacher on climate;
Ability to evaluate the learning process:
After the teacher processes the outcomes, the students conducted the video analysis
from their own output. Thus was achieved in the presence of the teacher, which
defined their strengths in the SWOT analysis on the basis of established patterns of
usage of psychodidactics skills in their outputs.
3. Results
After the preparation, we processed and interpreted all the data . In following chapter
we publish some of the main partial results.
Before we start the preparation we used the questionaire to find the main fear. The
questionnaire consisted of four groups of questions as follows:
• Fear of failure of their knowledges;
• Concerns about the establishment of authority;
• Concerns about performing in the role of teacher;
• Concerns about the use of psychodidactic skills;
Consequently, we evaluated the entire questionnaire and the result shows the
following chart:
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Joint International IGIP-SEFI Annual Conference 2010, 19 - 22 September 2010, Trnava, Slovakia
100
90
80
70
60
50
40
95%CI
30
N = 28 28 28 28
F1T F2T F3T F4T
Figure 3: Concerns about pedagogical practice.
From the interpretation of Figire 3, we can determine that in addition to the third
group of questions (Concerns about performing in the role of teacher), students have
concerns of all groups (median occurs above 50%). The biggest concern of the
students is from psychodidactic competences (80-90%).
During the outputs of individual students, we focused on monitoring the improvement
of individual skills as follows.
• Time control output;
• Activation of the pupils;
• Creating a positive climate in the classroom;
The results are shown in the following charts
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Joint International IGIP-SEFI Annual Conference 2010, 19 - 22 September 2010, Trnava, Slovakia
Table 1: Time control output.
Table 1 shows that the rate of improvement after the first output is over 60%, which
means that analyzing the first output and the feedback from teachers students can
replan and improve their output in a relatively short period of time so that is a
noticeable improvement.
Table 2: Activation of the pupils.
Activation of students in class also noted the positive results that show that
microteaching students can effectively improve the skills of the maintenance activities
in class.
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Joint International IGIP-SEFI Annual Conference 2010, 19 - 22 September 2010, Trnava, Slovakia
Table 3: Creating a positive climate in the classroom.
In assessing the creation of the classroom climate it should be noted that students
were engaged from the beginning of stiff and act with visible stage fright, which
passed on the overall climate in the classroom. Gradually, the effects of teachers and
relaxing atmosphere throughout the students' stage fright and lost output is more
than improving.
Conclusion
In conclusion, we have noted that most students in the questionnaire said that
psychodidactics skills had benefits for their preparedness and would recommend it to
other students.
With the above results we can conclude that the preparation of future teachers by
improving their microteaching skills can be a positive development of psychodidactics
competences and thus the overall readiness to implement the student teaching
experience. Even under these facts it suggests that microteaching is a means for
improving teaching skills.
Reference:
[1] Walterová, E., Mareš, J., PrŮcha,J. :Pedagogický slovník, Praha, Portál 2008, ISBN 978 80 7367 416 8
[2] Mazáčová, N.: Činnostní pojetí přípravy studentů učitelství, [online].[cit. 29.1. 2009] dostupné na internete
[Link]
[3] Allen, D. Cooper, J.: Microteaching: History and Present Status, [online].[cit. 15.4. 2009] dostupné na internete
<[Link]
[4] Orosová, R.: Pregradual preparation of students in realation to psycho-didactic competencies. In: Modern achievements of
science and education. Khmelnitsky: XHY, 2009. s. 139 - 141. ISBN 978-966-330-070-2
