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European Journal of Education Studies ISSN: 2501 - 1111 ISSN-L: 2501 - 1111 Available on-line at: www.oapub.org/edu Volume 3 │ Issue 8 │ 2017 doi: 10.5281/zenodo.887411 ISSUES OF QUALITY IN TEACHING PRACTICE SUPERVISION AMONG OPEN DISTANCE STUDENTS: STUDENT AND LECTURER INPUT Ngara Rosemary1, Magwa Simuforosa2i Zimbabwe Open University, Faculty of Education, 1 Midlands Region, Gweru, Zimbabwe Great Zimbabwe University, Faculty of Education and Culture, 2 Educational Foundations Department, Masvingo, Zimbabwe Abstract: While Teaching Practice (TP) students are expected to carry out teaching duties as guided by their training institutions and instructions from the school managers, there is need that all stakeholders get involved to improve the quality of the practicum. As such, the purpose of TP supervision is meant to achieve the set of objectives of training and building up a teacher to the level of acceptable standard. This study was conducted with the open distance students who were following up a Post-Graduate Diploma in Education at Zimbabwe Open University (ZOU). The study employed focus group method with participants and a few open ended questionnaires were administered. In the study, it was established that TP supervision was regarded as effective in some ways such as being timeous but not productive in giving students room to air their opinions as discussions were dictatorial and hurriedly done. The study suggests, among other things, a relook by the University on the minimum numbers of students each TP supervisor should supervise on a given day, especially in remote areas where schools are far apart. Keywords: student, student teacher, teaching practice, supervision, distance learning Copyright © The Author(s). All Rights Reserved. © 2015 – 2017 Open Access Publishing Group 824 Ngara Rosemary, Magwa Simuforosa ISSUES OF QUALITY IN TEACHING PRACTICE SUPERVISION AMONG OPEN DISTANCE STUDENTS: STUDENT AND LECTURER INPUT 1. Introduction At Zimbabwe Open University (ZOU), the Teacher Development Department operates under the Faculty of Arts and Education. Several teacher education courses are offered in the department of teacher education, among them being: the Post Graduate Diploma in Education (PGDE), Bachelor for Early Childhood Development (BECD) and Diploma in Primary Education (DIPED). All teacher education courses, cannot not be completed without the practicum component. Student teachers’ practicum is a critical component in teacher development courses since it is an opportunity to student teachers to gain professional experience and ethics so that they become socialized into the teaching profession. It is an induction into the teaching profession to improve teachers’ skills and extend the body of knowledge on effective teaching practices. The ZOU TP model offers a separate block of classroom based teaching. When doing TP students in all teacher development programmes are attached to a school and are expected to carry out all duties of teaching under the guidance of a mentor who is appointed by the school. To facilitate quality in TP, meticulous supervision of students should be done by all the stakeholders. The purpose of TP supervision is to make sure that objectives of TP are achieved. However, it would appear that students at ZOU have had issues in the manner the teaching practice supervision is handled and as such a study was undertaken to understand how the practicum is conducted with the distance students. For downloading the full article, please access the following link: https://oapub.org/edu/index.php/ejes/article/view/1022 European Journal of Education Studies - Volume 3 │ Issue 8 │ 2017 825