Highlight the impact of recent changes in the teacher education system of Pakistan on teacher’s competencies.

If you want to view other related topics. Click Here.

Ans: The rapid changes and increased complexity of today’s world present new challenges and put new demands on our education system. There has been generally a growing awareness of the necessity to change and improve the preparation of students for productive functioning in the continually changing and highly demanding environment. In confronting this challenge it is necessary to consider the complexity of the education system itself and the multitude of problems that must be addressed. Clearly, no simple, single uniform approach can be applied with the expectation that significant improvements of the system will occur.

Indeed, any strategy for change must contend with the diverse factors affecting the education system, the interactions of its parts, and the intricate interdependencies within it and with its environment.

As we consider these problems, we become increasingly cognizant of the various possibilities of using concepts and methods of the study of complex systems for providing direction and strategies to facilitate the introduction of viable and successful changes. A key insight from complex systems is that simple solutions are not likely to be effective in cases such as the education system, and that providing a balance or coexistence of what seem to be opposites may provide the greatest opportunities for successful courses of action. In the following we consider

• Integrating the commonly polarized goals of education; i.e. the goal that focuses on transmitting knowledge with the goal that emphasizes the development of the individual student.
• Adapting teaching to different student characteristics by using diverse methods of teaching. Adaptation to the ability levels, patterns of different abilities, learning styles, personality characteristics, and cultural backgrounds.
• Integrating the curriculum by developing inter-disciplinary curriculum units that enable students to acquire knowledge from different disciplines through a unifying theme while having the opportunity to contribute in different and special ways to the objectives of the integrated units.

Educational Goals

The approaches to teaching can be categorized according to major educational goals that affect teaching strategies. On one hand the goal of education is viewed as the transmission of knowledge by the teachers to the students. On the other hand the goal of education is viewed as facilitating students’ autonomous learning and self expression. The former approach which converges toward the teaching of specified subject matter, may be termed ‘convergent’ teaching and the latter approach which stresses open ended self-directed learning may be termed ‘divergent’ teaching. The convergent approach is highly structured and teacher-centered; the students are passive recipients of knowledge transmitted to them and learning achievements are measured by standardized tests. The divergent approach is flexible, student-centered, where the students are active participants in the learning process and learning achievements are assessed by a variety of evaluation tools such as selfevaluation in parallel to teacher evaluation; documentation portfolios; and special projects (see also Niche Selection (link to be added soon)).

In the highly complex education system there may be various combinations of the different approaches to teaching and probably no ‘pure’ convergent or divergent teaching. Still, the tendency in the education system of today is toward the convergent approach. In fact, among the current suggestions for implementing educational reforms to deal with the considerable problems of the education system, there has been a strong emphasis on setting convergent goals, an aspect of which is the use of across-the-board standardized testing. Testing has been commonly viewed as a prudent way to determine the success or failure of the teaching and learning process. There has been a relatively limited use of other means of evaluation which are more complicated and more demanding in terms of application and interpretation.

As educators seek ways to meet the demands put upon the education system in today’s world of rapid changes and ever increasing complexity, it may be helpful to recognize that there is a need for both convergent and divergent approaches to teaching and learning. Educators who stress the importance of the acquisition of specific knowledge as a useful way to prepare the students for productive future functioning, must come to realize that even for the purpose of this goal alone, a divergent approach is needed today. With the great proliferation of knowledge and rapid changes in most fields as well as the appearance of many new fields, it is critical to develop students’ capacity for self-directed learning and self growth. On the other hand, those who emphasize the importance of autonomous growth and creative self-expression, must realize that the students need academic skills (such as reading, writing, calculating, etc.) as prerequisites for productive self expression. Since the creative process involves new ways of using existing knowledge, it is important to provide opportunities for students to acquire such knowledge (which can be acquired by convergent teaching). Hence, convergent and divergent teaching strategies are both needed and the challenging question is how to find the balance between them within the complexity of the process of teaching and learning. It is likely that the two approaches may increasingly become not mutually exclusive but interrelated and interdependent.

An important development is the growing awareness that academic achievement could improve by adapting teaching to students individual differences. This awareness is finding its most distinct expression in the education system’s attempts to deal with the issues of students with special needs. However, other aspects of adaptation to students’ individual differences get far less attention.

In general, adaptation to individual differences under convergent teaching tends to be limited. The students are all expected to strive toward one goal of learning specified required knowledge; some may attain it and others may fall by the wayside or be given some remediation with limited results. Nevertheless, there are various possibilities of effective adaptation to individual differences under convergent teaching. In addition to adaptation in the rate of learning, where each student can be allowed to work at his/her own pace, there are many possibilities of adaptation through the use of diverse methods of teaching. Even when all the students are taught the same material, teachers can use different methods, different techniques or different media, to cater to individual differences in abilities and personality characteristics. Such a ‘multi-convergent’ approach can be more effective in giving the students opportunities to use their aptitudes and inclinations for learning and attaining higher achievements. As the students experience success and consequently a sense of competence, their motivation is enhanced to pursue further learning. Such an approach has a better potential for success than the common reality of students with learning difficulties, who often struggle through remediation with a sense of inadequacy and discouraging experiences of failure.