INTRODUCTION
This report will be about producing a critical analysis of skills, knowledge, personal development, and potential for my chosen career paths. The career I have decided to analyse in this report will be a teacher who works in a secondary school and teaches Geography.
Secondary school teachers support and record the progress of their students. The ages of these students range from 11-16 and can range up to 18 if the secondary school has a sixth form. In addition to that, the national curriculum involves teachers planning lessons with aims and learning objectives, this helps students to recognise and understand what they need to achieve by the end of the lesson. These factors contribute to creating a healthy culture of learning.
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The three essential skills required to be a teacher are: having knowledge of teaching, having patience, and the ability to remain calm in stressful situations, and having good verbal communication.
SKILL 1- KNOWLEDGE OF TEACHING
I believe that people who choose to become teachers generally have a passion for it, as it can be an incredibly challenging job.
Having knowledge of teaching is important. As I child growing up, I taught my younger sibling things such as: tying her shoelaces, how to write her name, and how to read. I enjoyed every second of it as it is memorising teaching someone something they did not know before which they are likely to then go and teach somebody else. For me to be able to develop these skills even better, doing things such as part-time employment in schools or youth clubs to be able to get the feeling of teaching would be a good thought. I could do this after I have finish semester two but commence looking for some type of placement in January, so I know that by the time I am ready to start everything is sorted. Hopefully, I will be able to teach a group of students myself as this would help to know whether I could be a teacher and also help me develop new skills. If I was to successfully find a placement that relates to me, keeping a diary of what went well and what did not go well every day, and then from there I can analyse and examine what needs to be improved.
In addition to that, being to prepare and deliver lessons to a range of different abilities and ages relates to being organised and versatile which all ties into knowing how to teach. I am very organised when it comes to assembling work and ensuring things are done on time. I am not used to teaching people of different ages and abilities so it would be a new experience for me. For me to improve I could do some type of work experience secondary schools, where they allow me to teach a class of different ages and abilities, so I can experience it. I will definitely face some hurdles as it is something I have never done before. Some students can be difficult, but I must remain professional at all times. Know how teach does not mean only knowing about the topic you teach. It is important to also know how to deliver things to students to enable them to understand so therefore, it is essential to know what you are teaching to pupils as they tend to assume that what their teacher is saying accurate. For instance, teaching geography to students and delivering information is very important as it is a very interactive job. Furthermore, pedagogy is the study of how knowledge and skills are imparted in an educational context ( Li, G., 2012), which means when you are a teacher you need to know how to link your knowledge with your skills.
SKILL 2- PATIENCE, ABILITY TO REMAIN CALM IN STRESSFUL SITUATIONS
Not all students are easy to deal with, some students give teachers a difficult time doing their job. This factor contributes to the teacher having to give her attention to students that are a disruption to the class. Consequently, students who are willing to learn are not able to possibly get all the information that was meant to be given during the lesson.
In terms of how I am currently with being patient and remaining calm, I need a lot of improvement. This is because I do not have much patience with children at the moment, but it is something I am willing to learn. A way for me to enhance my patience is being mindful of things that make me impatient. For instance, if I am teaching a younger family member something and they are not understanding what I am saying it can become irritating and infuriating. Taking deep breaths and counting up to 10 could also help me overcome this problem. Nevertheless, I have the ability to remain calm in situations as I understand that overthinking and stressing about the situation does make it look worse than it actually is. Another example where I struggle to have patience and remain calm is when I am driving and there is traffic or a slow driver in front. I tend to get frustrated quickly in these types of situations.
Equally important meditating can also help with patience and learning how to control breathing. If I were to take some classes for meditating, they would help to improve my patience. The main challenge I will encounter during meditating will be sitting still and trying to only focus on meditating, there is a possibility that the mind will commence drifting elsewhere. However, if I make it a regular activity, I will notice a difference. The main reason people commence meditating is that it reduces stress and as teaching is a stressful and hectic situation are very likely to occur fortunately meditating helps reduce stress. Another reason meditating is advantageous is it can generate kindness. This means that you become more pleasant to talk to and you tend to see the positive side of things more often. In relation to how this will help with being a teacher is that when situations that can be stressful for instance, a student not following rules, or students not handing in coursework/homework on time.
Taking on pastoral duties like being a form tutor allows teachers to get to know perhaps a group of 20-25 kids more and it also adds more responsibilities. For example, if a student is not meeting their target grades; the form tutor is made aware. They must monitor progress academically and urge a high standard of work as well as commitment. Situations are likely to occur where my patience is tested. For instance, if you are dealing with a student that is not reaching their target grade and there and this is because they are not following instructions or simply not putting enough in their work and you have explained to the student numerous times it can become discouraging as students may feel like you are picking on them and then start to act a certain way towards me.
SKILL 3- GOOD VERBAL COMMUNICATION SKILLS
My verbal communication skills improve every day. I constantly have younger family members around me that always want a book read to them. I make sure I pronounce the words correctly. But in terms of speed, I do talk fast and it can sometimes be difficult to comprehend what I am saying. To improve this, I will try to create reasonable pauses to help people understand what I am saying, and I will also try to go with a consistent rhythm which will help with the speed. I could do this by reading aloud more and also when I am talking with friends and family.
Events such as parents evening are necessary to have good verbal communication skills so you can get your point across and parents and the students can understand you thoroughly. Teachers have to give a review of a student over a specific period of time. They must give an honest evaluation and give good and bad points to the parents. Taking notes before each parent visits you are a good idea, so you do not forget what you have to say. Another point worth a mention is that when explaining topics to students being able to explain it accurately and properly is vital as not all students take the information the same. Some students are slower than others in the classroom. A good technique to ensure the information has been noted is randomly picking students and asking them questions that relate to the topic that was spoken about.
There will also be times when there will be newly qualified teachers (NQTs) and trainee teachers where I could be teaching, and they would need to possibly watch me teach. If they were to have any questions or queries, I need to be able to explain effectively and thoroughly so they are able to comprehend what I am explaining to them. As it could be information, they require to improve.
Subsequently, having good quality verbal communication skills is important, as it helps maintain a healthy and successful business relationship. Effective communication enhances productivity and fewer mistakes are likely to be made; as a result, things run much smoother (Cleverism, 2020).
CONCLUSION
In conclusion, the three skills I have spoken about in my report are the skills I believe are necessary to become an excellent secondary school teacher. I am good at each skill to a certain degree. Nevertheless, as mentioned before, I need to improve on each skill differently and I have a plan on how I would do this before becoming a teacher and understand I will face challenges whilst trying to improve.
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