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PUBLICATION INFORMATION

TITLE OF PUBLICATION
ACTIVE LEARNING – ATTITUDES OF TEACHERS (RESULTS FROM A STUDY)
NAME OF AUTHOR(S)
Daniela Mitkova
Nikolina Georgieva
Nadejda Raycheva
NAME OF PUBLISHER
Sofia University, Sofia,
YEAR OF PUBLICATION
2011
LANGUAGE OF PUBLICATION
Bulgarian
PUBLICATION TYPOLOGY
Research
TARGET GROUP OF PUBLICATION
Researchers, Teachers, Policy Makers
SIZE OF THE PUBLICATION
Over 10 pages
DESCRIPTION OF CONTENTS
At the current stage of development of Bulgarian schools teachers are set in a new social and school environment. They face the challenges of today, which set out certain requirements towards their personality, professional knowledge and skills, and qualification. These requirements are also imposed by the European tendencies for improving the quality of education by changing the educational paradigm - a unity of learning and teaching.
The paper presents an empirical study whose aim is to identify the attitude and disposition of teachers in relation to matters such as active learning, application of respective methods and tools in the real-life school practice, needs for different forms of teaching/learning, and promotion of good teaching/learning (pedagogical) practices.
The study has been implemented by a survey including 12 questions, aiming to investigate the opinion of teachers in three areas:
• general disposition and attitudes of teachers in relation to active learning;
• teaching/learning methods and techniques motivating and stimulating students' cognitive activities;
• necessity, type and form of improving teachers' qualification in relation to the use and development of good teaching/learning (pedagogical) practices.
The subject of the study is teachers in Maths and Informatics, Chemistry, Biology and Physics. Most of the teachers have an experience of 10-20 years. The majority of them work in small towns which, due to different reasons, are not involved in programmes and projects linked to the application of modern educational technologies. The positive aspect of the study is that it identifies the opinions, practices and needs of teachers working in small towns and villages. Most of them are within the age and experience ranges that involve high level of motivation to apply modern teaching/learning methods in their teaching and researching activities, as well as high activity in mastering innovative practices.
The study covers two groups of questions. The first group is of general character and aims to identify the attitude of respondents to the possibilities for and approaches to active learning which, to a great extent, are not utilized. The following reasons could be given:
• Unawareness of the possibilities of innovative practices for achieving the educational goals, and orientation to traditional methods, tools and forms of teaching/learning;
• Insufficient methodological competence in integrating active and interactive technologies in the teaching/learning process;
• Insufficient provision of teaching aids and equipment to cover such type of teaching/learning, and lack of encouraging educational environment in schools.
The second group includes questions involving answers based on their own teaching practice.
The results show that most teachers consider the need for studying and applying good teaching/learning (pedagogical) practices. They prefer organized and group forms in order to improve their qualification - educational programmes and seminars. This raises the question about the improvement of the ways and paths of receiving information about the achievements and experience of teachers in different school subjects, of analyzing good practices, and adapting them to specific school subjects.
The authors of this study draw the following conclusions:
• the active and interactive teaching/learning strategies, methods, techniques and forms are considered an "episodic" element rather than a necessary part of the teaching/learning process.;
• teachers should be trained in a way in which they are expected to teach their students;
• there is a need for wide promotion of good teaching/learning practices by using interactive forms to improve qualification.
Those conclusions provide ground for reconsideration of the overall strategy for improving teachers' qualification, including regulation of the choice of the teaching subjects, the objectives, the organizational forms and the pedagogical technologies.
REVIEWER’S COMMENTS ON THE PUBLICATION
At the current stage of development of Bulgarian schools teachers are set in a new social and school environment. They face the challenges of today, which set out certain requirements towards their personality, professional knowledge and skills, and qualification. These requirements are also imposed by the European tendencies for improving the quality of education by changing the educational paradigm - a unity of learning and teaching. Active learning, as a modern psychological and pedagogical concept for teaching and learning, is of particular interest both in theoretical and practical aspect.
Considering the significance of that problem, the present study provides information about the attitude and disposition of teachers in relation to active learning, the application of respective methods and tools into real-life school practices, the necessity of different teaching/learning forms and the promotion of good teaching/learning practices.
PDF OF THE PUBLICATION
NAME OF THE REVIEWING ORGANISATION
Technical University Gabrovo

Comments about this Publication

Your comments are welcome


Date: 2013.05.29

Posted by Samantha Trad Pštross (Czech Republic)

Message: As a teacher I really appreciate this paper. The researchers did an empirical study focused on teachers in rural areas - an important group of people who are often overlooked. Their findings will be very useful to help improve education in Bulgaria.

National Reports on successful experiences to promote lifelong learning for chemistry The national reports on chemistry successful experiences to promote lifelong learning for chemistry are now available on the related section of the project portal. The reports presents examples of successful experiences in the partner countries and the results of testing of ICT resources with science teachers.

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