Abstract:

Education, unlike teaching is essentially a dialectic endeavor. As a result, it is characterized by two distinct yet interdependent realities; the first of which represents the institutional worldview and the other belongs to the intended beneficiaries of such educational interventions. The two realities are not necessarily antithetical but very rarely in the practice of education are the two identical. The present paper tries to unearth the dual nature of all educational interactions with specific reference to educational objectives. It argues that more often than not, the institutional definition of objectives dominates the educational interventions and classroom practices. The paper presents School Experience Program (SEP) component of Teacher Training courses as a case in point. SEP is intended to be one of the most dynamic components of teacher training courses. It is expected that the context-embeddedness of the entire experience would automatically result into learning for the student teacher. The institutional objectives underlying the SEP are conceptualized to be exhaustive and include such varied areas as administrative and pedagogical competence on one hand to attitudinal suitability and skill mastery on the other. Some of the generic objectives include ‘providing student teachers with an exposure to the working of school as an organization, augmentation of their teaching competencies, inculcation and nurturing of requisite attitudes and sensitivities, developing necessary soft skills like communication, time management etc. Traditionally, a discussion on objectives would end here, but a reflective educational practitioner would suggest a corollary to these institutional objectives, which may be referred to as the student teachers’ expectation set from SEP. These objectives would reads as-‘gaining from the insights into the working of schools as an organization, acknowledging shortfalls in ones’ teaching competencies , identifying requisite attitudes and sensitivities, defining the rationale for each of them and observing successful teachers to identify a repertoire of useful soft skills etc. It is thus a primary responsibility of all people engaged with education to acknowledge the needs and expectations of their students. A beginning can be made by giving a representation to the students learning aims in their teaching/instructional objectives. The paper uses illustrative examples to highlight how a reflective teacher educator/teacher might re-word her instructional objectives to approximate the students’ worldviews. The paper further borrows from theories of educational psychology to highlight the importance for collaborative objective constructions. The argument then proceeds to highlight the need for evaluation to be a collaborative effort if such educational programs are to be a success. Illustrative examples are used to highlight how limited or zero participation of students in the evaluation exercises may lead to dilution of educational performance as well as drying up the intrinsic motivation of students. The paper concludes by suggesting that collaborative evaluation can not be left to the discretion of few reflective teachers and should much rather be made the norm than exception.

Keywords:

Educational objectives, student experiences and expectations, collaborative objective formulation, participatory evaluation.