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Role of Distance Education inIn Service Teacher Training |
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Introduction As the world moves from the Industrial Age to the Information Age, it seems education, particularly teacher training, is one of the last fields to adjust to begin to address the changing needs of the very society it teaches. Perhaps this is due, in part, to the nature of public education, particularly in the United States. ... Teacher education institutions have kept the traditional calendar even more staunchly than the K-12 schools; only in the last few decades have they begun to establish satellite campuses and district-sponsored courses for credit to meet the ever changing educational requirements for teacher recertification and upgrade. The move into the Industrial Age meant more information was needed for practical, work-related purposes, and the idea of there being an industrial center for certain fields caught on in education as colleges of various majors sprang up around the country. Rather than the teacher going to the student, the students began coming to the teachers—the institutions—for “mass processing” of educated individuals. Even the nature of curriculum development changed toward a more generalized standard of education based on a set of knowledge units that constituted a learned individual. ... It is impossible to establish a static set of “facts” and knowledge which constitutes an education. ... This need is best met by distance education. These two aspects of teacher education, mode of physical delivery and nature of curriculum, are the two areas this paper explores. ... Only in training today’s students to be self-directed, lifelong learners can society fully emerge into the Information Age. ... Not only are there not enough ELL teachers, there are not enough teacher training programs available throughout the nation to train these teachers. ... But when your numbers are lower, it isn’t financially feasible to hire a special teacher for these small numbers of students. ... And as most Title I programs are of a pull-out nature, the classroom teacher is still responsible for the ELL student the bulk of the day. The statistics on the numbers of ELL students referred for special education testing is alarming, but a testament to the true misunderstanding of the needs of English language learners. ... for university-level education and learn, first off, the jargon of their field of endeavor; these students can speak intelligently in class when answering questions, but cannot negotiate casual conversation). ... This is just one difference between BICS and CALP the ELL student encounters, and a teacher who doesn’t know BICS from CALP may hear a student with BICS proficiency and think, “this child is completely proficient in English. ... Kvaternik outlines the four purposes of teacher in-service programs: initial training of unqualified teachers, upgrading of teachers who already have a qualification, preparing teachers for new roles, and training related to content of the school curriculum (8, Table 1. ... Although these are all valid approaches to meeting the need for qualified, well trained ELL teachers, this author is mostly interested in working with certified teachers already serving in public schools who have recently encountered increasing numbers of ELL students and need follow-up training to upgrade their skills. Special Concerns One concern of all distance education courses is credibility. Although “[o]pen and distance learning has been widely applied to teacher education and there is some record of success in its use for all four regular elements of the curriculum—general education, subject-specific knowledge, pedagogy, and practical teaching” (Kvaternik, 26), it is still true that distance education has a rather bad reputation with the traditional university and educational community as a whole based on the few bad apples of those institutions offering poor-quality materials, no real curriculum standards, unqualified instructors, and, of course, the simple diploma mill. ... And since the traditional approach to education is the standard of measure, what happens when those two environments are compared? ... This is but one example of the many available which demonstrate that the right circumstances can provide the student an even higher quality learning experience through distance education than the traditional approach. Are there other potential barriers for in-service educators once the credibility issue is cleared up? The main issue will be teacher access to technology. ... This limited access can also affect teacher access to legitimate resources for various reasons. ... ” So what are the challenges to providing credible, practical in-service training to teachers unfamiliar with working with English language learners? ... Wilson writes, “[d]istance education can be delivered using various media and technological tools. It is becoming more common to use a variety of tools for design and implementation of distance learning programs. Professionals in the field of distance education cannot ignore how the rapid changes in technology can be used to their advantage. Research will be constantly needed and updated in each of the new and evolving forms of distance education delivery” (Wilson). ... As was stated above, these are new areas for most teachers who did not use the computer as a learning tool during their teacher training. This basic skills training may require introductory courses taught in person for the sake of immediate feedback and interaction to lower the anxiety of the teacher new to this use of technology. |
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Title: Role of Distance Education inIn Service Teacher Training
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