FUNCTIONAL EDUCATION MULTI-GLOBAL BUSINESS SERVICES (FEMBS)

TEACHING BEYOND CERTIFICATE ACQUISITION: A MEANS OF

MAKING EDUCATION RELIABLE AND RELEVANT
Bamidele, Thomas O

Many derogatory remarks are being made on Nigeria education in recent times. Some
of the remarks are:

i. Education is a scam

ii. Education is an indirect enslavement to unemployment and poverty.

These remarks should be a concern to teachers and others involved in education

delivery.

What is/are the reason(s) for people making these statements? Before giving answer
to this question, it is better we try to define Education and state its goals. There are
many definitions of Education but for this discussion, Education is defined as the
training of the young ones with the view of their growing up and developing into
adults who can fend for themselves, live in the society and be of service to the
society.

The goals of education as stated in Nigeria Policy on Education section 1(7) includes:

a) the inculcation of national consciousness and national unity;

b) the inculcation of the type of values and attitudes for the survival of individuals
and the Nigerian society;

c) the training of the mind in the understanding of the world around; and

d) the acquisition of appropriate skills and development of mental, physical and

social abilities and competencies as instrument for the individual to live in and
contribute to the development of the society.

As an addendum, Martin Luther King Junior stated that "the function of education is
to teach one to think intensively and critically -- Intelligence plus character - that is
the true goal of education.

The question may now be asked "Are our trained youths able to fend for themselves?
Are they of service to the society? Are there positive values imbibed in our educated
youths to show that the goals of our education are achieved?"
As individuals, we can now deduce the reason(s) for the aforementioned derogatory
remarks. What then must the teachers do to achieve the goals stated and make our
educational system purposeful, reliable and relevant? This is a call for us as teachers
to review our roles and see what we can do as regards our lessons delivery to achieve
the desired goals as set up in the National Policy on Education so that we can be
successful as teachers and feel fulfilled.

Thus, today's teacher is expected to be a facilitator bearing in mind that it is the

teacher that makes the difference not the classroom. To make the difference, three
things about the teachers are highly essential for consideration, these includes
teacher's personality, teacher's preparation and the teacher's presentation in the
classroom.

1.0 PERSONALITY AND CHARACTERISTICS OF THE 21ST CENTURY TEACHERS

I want to start this part of discussion by stating that I am in agreement with the fact
that teachers job is a complex and demanding task. Unfortunately, the renumeration is
not a motivator and the societal recognition is not encouraging. Despite all these,
every teacher should note that a major reason of becoming a teacher is to make a
difference in the lives of as many students as you can. For this reason, you must not
allow discouragement else, you will waste your time. To be a change agent, a teacher
must have the following personality and characters

1.1 ADAPTABILITY/FLEXIBILITY
This means adapting to changing environments, content and student's needs. He is
constantly open to new ideas and approaches and looks for a way to make them fit into
his environment.

1.2 CREATIVITY/INNOVATION
This goes hand-in-hand with Adaptability. Think outside the box and find solutions to
new challenges.

1.3 COMMUNICATION
This is the ability to communicate ideas and concepts clearly and effectively both
verbally and in writing.

1.4 COLLABORATION
This is the ability to promote group work and team building activities to enable
inclusively in the classroom. The teacher makes use of project work for the learner to
interact with colleagues, experts, family members and other community members
locally, nationally and globally.

1.5 EMPATHY
This is being able to understand and connect with the student's emotions and
perspectives, thereby promoting trust and a sense of safety in the classroom.

1.6 SENSITIVITY
Here, we refer to the teacher's ability to listen attentively, observe body language and
non verbal cues to understand students needs and make changes bases in students'
feedback to improve the learning experience.

1.7 SCHOLASTIC ABILITY

A teacher is a scholar who knows much about his subject but does not pretend to know
it all. He is given to lifelong learning. He has a growth mindset by aspiring to know
more and make progress.

1.8 RESPECTFUL ATTITUDE

This is the behaviour of a teacher which makes him to give respect to the constituted
authority. A teacher with this attitude will give respect to his superiors and equals in
his place of work. He will abide by the rules and regulations of the school. He will be
punctual in the school as well as classroom and act promptly to instructions from his
superiors.

1.9 DIGITAL LITERACY

The illiterate of today is not a person who cannot read and write but someone who is a
novice in the digital world. A teacher of today must be digitally literate to guide the
students on how they can source for information to increase their knowledge.

It is not possible to exhaust all the needed personality traits/characters but I believe if
we can develop along the characters mentioned above, we will make differences in the
live of our students.

2.0 PREPARATION FOR CLASSROOM TEACHING

Abraham Lincoln, one of the greatest American Presidents in the history once said
"Give me six hours to chop down a tree and I will spend the first four sharpening my
axe". This underscores the importance of preparation in any endeavor in life, teaching
not an exception.

Educationists have evaluated the traditional teaching method and find out the
following shortcomings

i. Lack of customization in learning

ii. Limited students participation, and

iii. Emphasis on rote learning.

To overcome these shortcomings, teachers must engage in diversified teaching
methods that will take care of individual student's need and learning styles, make the
lessons activity based and engage students in the process that will evolve critical
thinking. This kind of teaching process is not possible without serious preparation
before the lesson.

The preparation begins with the teacher getting the curriculum and syllabus for the
level of education they are to teach. From the curriculum and syllabus, the scheme for
each term of the session for that level is prepared. The scheme will supply what the
teacher will prepare for and plan for each week. Thus, the frequent preparation is in the
development of lesson plan. In the process of developing the lesson plan, the teacher
visualizes the lesson before it occurs.

2.1 CONTENT OF LESSON PLAN

The lesson plan is very flexible and adaptable to students' need and learning styles. It
must contain the following

 Theme/Sub-theme

 Topic

 Resources to be used

 Specific objectives

 Content

 Teacher and learner activities

 Evaluation guide

Different schools use different formats to document their lesson plans. From
experience, teacher's see the documentation of lesson plan as unnecessary burden
placed upon them by their Principals and Supervisors but this is not so. Many teachers
use to copy their previous lesson notes to meet the need of the current set of students
they are teaching, this is wrong. I hope you will see the importance of preparing afresh
for each lesson by going through the benefits of lesson planning.

2.2 FACTORS TO TAKE INTO CONSIDERATION DURING LESSON PREPARATION

i. The content of the lesson.

ii. The learners - level of maturity, learners learning styles, and population of the
learners.

iii. Instructional materials available and the place of instruction.

iv. Work load of the teacher.

v. Available time for instruction.

2.3 BENEFITS OF LESSON PLANNING

i. It helps the teacher develop self confidence.

ii. Proper care is taken to consider the level and prior knowledge of students.

iii. It motivates the teacher to ask pertinent and relevant questions.

iv. The teaching material is organized in a time frame despite the fact that
preparing and writing a lesson plan takes a long time.

v. It directs the teacher as to what and where he should teach.

vi. It assists the teacher to properly understand the objectives.

vii. It helps the teacher to think in a systematic manner.

viii. It helps the teacher in evaluating his or her instruction.

ix. It motivates the teachers to improve future lessons.

If you want to make the most of your teaching career and help students develop skills
and competencies for success, preparation must be an important part of your teaching
journey.

3.0 PROFICIENT TEACHER LESSON DELIVERY IN THE CLASSROOM

After due preparation, a teacher goes to the classroom with the mind that he is not the
sole source of knowledge and information but he has to design activities that will make
his students learn and achieve his set objectives for the lesson.

To make the students learn, the nine (9) events recommended for effective learning
according to Robert Gagne (1985) must feature in the classroom.

3.1 GAIN ATTENTION

People generally want to engage on activities that are profitable to them, the students
are not exception to this. The students will be ready to learn what they know will
benefit them. The teacher therefore need to gain students attention at the beginning
of the lesson by telling stories, presenting a problem to be solved, demonstration and
showing videos or other things that will elicit their interest. After gaining attention at
the beginning of the lesson, the attention has to be sustained throughout the lesson
by introducing things that will keep them alert.

3.2 INFORM LEARNERS OF THE OBJECTIVES

This allow the learners to organise their thoughts around what they are about to see,
hear and/or do.

3.3 STIMULATE RECALL OF PRIOR KNOWLEDGE

Remind the learners of previous knowledge they have which is relevant to the current
lesson. This will help the learners to build on their previous knowledge and skill.

3.4 PRESENT THE MATERIAL

This is the step by step presentation of the content.

3.5 PROVIDE GUIDANCE FOR LEARNING

This is the instruction to students on how to learn.

3.6 ELICIT PERFORMANCE

This is the learners practice that makes them do something with the newly acquired
behaviour, skills or knowledge.

3.7 PROVIDE FEEDBACK

Show correctness of the learner's response and analyze learner's behaviour. Let them
know your reason of acceptance or rejection of their responses.

3.8 ASSESS PERFORMANCE

Test if the lesson has be learned.

3.9 ENHANCE RETENTION AND TRANSFER

The teacher should inform the students about similar problem situations and provide
additional practice, put the learners in a transfer situation. This can be done by giving
home work and project to the students.

All these events are student centered and activity based. This has placed an enormous
task before a teacher who at the same time is being faced with many challenges.

CONCLUSION
I hope everyone will agree with me that teachers have a vital role to play as a social
reformer who is the backbone of the society. The creativity and adaptability of
teachers' personality must be put into action so that the goals of education as stated in
the National Policy on Education (NPE) will be achieved and teachers will not waste
their precious time and life.
SEMINAR QUESTIONS
I. What are the goals of education as stated in the National Policy on Education?

II. What are the shortcomings of traditional teaching methods?

III. List out some of the factors to be considered while preparing your lesson.

IV. Teacher is the major agent of social change. [Yes/No]

V. It is mandatory to prepare and document lesson plan. [Yes/No]

VI. Give three (3) benefits of lesson planning.