PRESIDENTIAL ADDRESS

Innovations in Teacher Education:

International Practices of Quality Assurance

Prof. Ram G. Takwale*

I would like to welcome all the delegates to this Round Table, organized to celebrate
completion of 10 years of National Assessment and Accreditation Council (NAAC)
activities successfully. It is my great pleasure to welcome Prof. Arun Nigavekar,
Chairman, UGC; Professor Gajaraj Dhanarajan, President and CEO of COL. and his
colleagues, Prof. Mohan Menon and Dr. Krishna Alluri. Today we will have a great
opportunity to hear Keynote Address by Professor Dhanarajan, our friend,
philosopher and guide in the field of Open and Distance Education.

Quality is emerging as a key value in all educational modes and methods in the
processes of globalization of education. India has taken up the quality assurance
and accreditation (QAA) as means for reforming and upgrading standards in Indian
System of Education. During the last ten years, India has evolved its own model of
quality assessment, and has implemented the process in case of over 100 universities
and 1000 colleges in the country. Response to the NAAC process is highly
encouraging, and the NAAC QAA (Quality Assurance and Accreditation) is not only
accepted by the academia, but has turned out to be a great motivating force for
social acceptability. It is slowly becoming a movement. Credit of this goes to the
first two Directors of NAAC, Prof. Arun Nigavekar and Prof. V.N. Rajasekharan Pillai,
who laid the foundation and promoted the activity on a grand scale throughout
the country. It is now turning out to be a quality movement in India.

India is having one of the biggest system of higher education, with more than 300
universities and 14000 colleges, 9 million students and 400 000 teachers. The
distance education system is assessed for quality by the Distance Education Council
and professional education institutions by National Board of Accreditation of AICTE.
There are about 5000 colleges and universities recognized by the UGC under 12 B
and 2 F, which enables them to receive UGC financial support; and form the first
target group to be Assessed and Accredited early.

Concerns and Issues of NAAC

1. The NAAC has evolved a fast track method of QAA, and proposes to assess the
remaining 4000 colleges and universities by the end of the Tenth Five Year
Plan, i.e. by March 2007. This still leaves more than 60 % colleges un-assessed.
What is the fast track method for their QAA?

2. Some of the colleges have come to the NAAC for re-assessment since the
validity period of first accreditation is over. NAAC is in the process of developing
the framework for the second assessment.

* Chairman, Executive Committee, National Assessment and Accreditation Council, India

1
3. e-Education is getting developed in India; and many formal as well as non-
formal institutions are employing Internet, networks and broadband for
delivering educational courses. This is creating a new situation and NAAC is
expected to offer Assessment and Accreditation (AA) of the e-education given
by the institutions. Use of ICT in educational processes will be creating many
new scenario and may lead to paradigm shifts and new paradigms. The electronic
educational modes are usually convergent mode of education that employs
face-to-face classrooms, distributed classrooms, and distance education. How
to respond to these challenges of new paradigms is the concern.

4. Indian model of QA is used so far to assess institutions only. A demand is coming

up to extend it to departments or degree programs of institutions. This involves
enormous burden of AA work, which is rather beyond the capacity of the
existing set-up of the NAAC. More of the same is also not a solution for this.

Besides all these issues and concerns, there is a larger issue. What is the ultimate
goal of the processes of QAA for the Indian System of Education?

Indian model of QA is dependent on Self Study Report by the institution. The NAAC
role is to assess the institution and help in raising quality and standards of its
education. Education or educating is also a process directed towards achievement
of higher goals relating to student, community and environmental development. A
developing country like India with all its diversity and disparities will have to ensure
that educational benefits flow to society and help in local development.

Goals and Objects of Education

Many reports and documents have given goals and objects of education. UNESCO
report gives four pillars of education as; learning to know, learning to do, learning
to live together and learning to be. The paradigm shift suggested is from knowing
to being. Extensive use of IT is creating a new information or knowledge based
society. The goal in the context of the New Age is to cultivate life-long-learning
and help create learning communities as is pointed out by another UNESCO report.
The relationship between educational institution and learner in the new scenario
is not for a few years for getting a degree, but a life-long association for learning
and developing. All these changes cast on NAAC a new responsibility to respond
not only to the existing concerns and issues essentially created due to past culture
and practices in education, but to respond to the needs and requirements of the
new scenario of Information Age.

Core Values
We should also appreciate the limitations of a Quality Assessment Agency. It can
never be prescriptive, but it can be suggestive and supportive of all the paradigms
that institutions develop by incorporating some core values which makes the
education as we understand and expect it to be. This is rather a complex task;
and evolving core values that would be acceptable to all is no doubt an important
task. However every country and society has in its culture something that almost

2
all aspire and accept. Educating is nothing else but fulfilling those aspirations and
expectations. NAAC has therefore identified five core values that should form
basis of any educational system. The educational programs should be:

1. Relating to national development.

2. Fostering global competencies among students.
3. Inculcating value system.
4. Promoting use of technology, particularly ICT.
5. Institutionalizing quest for excellence.

Developing the Indian Quality Assurance System dependent on these core values
would be one of the major goals of the NAAC. The Indian Model is based on the
Seven Criteria, which are in fact the founding seven processes of any educational
institution. The seven processes are teaching, learning, evaluating, creating and
preserving knowledge, creating institutional infrastructure, managing education
and creating educational environment. Inclusion of core values in the seven criteria
would involve identification of criteria statements, core indicators and
appropriate set of queries that would lead to the identification and / or
development of educational model of the institution in the global and local context.
The framework so developed would be used to support quality sustenance and
quality enhancement of the institution.

Objectivity and Consistency in Grading

The Indian Quality Assurance System uses nine-point grading system starting from
C through A++. The question of making the system dependent only on two-point
grading system- accredited or not accredited- was debated and discussed. Indian
Educational System has a strong hold of final examination, and students work hard
to score higher grade and marks. Educational institutions too are having the same
mind-set. The system has some advantages and some disadvantages. The nine point
institutional grading has created competitive spirit to perform well in the NAAC
AA. The amount of hard work and money that institutions have put in to improve
their institutional performance is indicative of this. This also brings in a lot of
pressure on NAAC to perform better with highly objective and consistent
assessment. Many complaints for not getting the grade expected or getting the
grade lesser than the one nearby college got, are indicative of high pressures on
NAAC. In fact there are perceptional differences in QA, resulting in differences in
assessing and grading done by the Peer Team, the institution’s self assessment and
the public or society evaluation. The current procedure adopted is not likely to
reduce the differences; and requires a different evaluation process.

One of the major problems of any process of evaluation is its subjectivity, which
can never be eliminated. It can at the most be minimized. This always introduces
measurement error inherent in the assessment. The NAAC is in the process of
assessing the standard error, which would really give the spread of the grade
point or range of marks associated with the grade, and may suggest the right
number of grade points to be used. Our major concern is how to make the whole
process objective, consistent and reliable. Objectivity depends on the collection

3
of true data or information, its analysis and assessment with reference to some
scale, either based on normative practices (normal distribution) or on criteria
references. This is an involved exercise and would need a lot of study and research
to arrive at the scientific and rational solution.

Self-Accreditation
Developing quality assessment system is a complex social and scientific task. One
thing is however certain. The QAA process should move towards the self-assessment
and accreditation and the role of the NAAC is to give peer support to it so that it
normalizes the grading on the basis of core values accepted by the institution.
The normalization process would involve promoting best practices accepted by
academia and appreciated by the society.

In the context of learning society, the Indian Quality Assurance System of NAAC
should promote development of thousands of models (Let thousand flowers
bloom !) as an expression of the developmental aspirations and requirements of
the people in the context of globalization.

Quality assurance and accreditation is a tool with great potential, and appropriate
use of it would make quality an institutional and educational value. I am sure the
Round Table would be able to help us in approaching the Indian problems with far
greater clarity and perspective.

I wish all the success to the Round Table discussions and deliberations.

4
 INAUGURAL ADDRESS

Teacher Education: Formal and Distributed

Education Mode;Contemporary Challenges of
Quality Assurance

Prof. Arun Nigavekar*

I thank Prof. Gajaraj Dhanarajan and Prof. V. S. Prasad and those assembled here. It
is a moment of joy for me because NAAC is into its ten years of existence and NAAC
has been doing a good job. I still recollect the 31st October 1994, when Latha Pillai
and myself landed in Bangalore with a draft of Rs. 50 lakhs, and the directions from
UGC on what we have to do. So the next day morning we went to the State
Government to give us the place they committed for. It took two days to a get a
place and finally we were given a rented place. We went to a mandapam and
rented two tables and two chairs @ Rs. 2 a day and a blackboard and the chalks,
that’s how NAAC started.

I think ten years is a good period to have a recollection and it is good to talk
about this in a round table like this, because since that humble beginning we did
collaborate with the IGNOU, and the DEC for Open-distance learning and we had
an MoU with NCTE for assessment and accreditation of Teacher Education
Institutions.

One important thing is that, today what we are talking is something at a core of
education, core of entire education spectrum and not just referring to higher
education, because we are talking about innovations in Teacher-education and
how we are going to address the issues related to quality assurance in Teacher
education. I thought the best way to give the inaugural address is to share with
you, how I look at this perspective in the scenario that is developing. Going straight
to my presentation, the title I have given is “Teacher Education: Formal and
Distributed Education Mode; Contemporary Challenges for Quality Assurance”.

I thought of dedicating this presentation to Prof. Gajaraj Dhanarajan, President

and CEO, COL who with his gentle and proactive approach made the Commonwealth
of Leaning a powerful tool for transforming Higher Education, not only in the
Commonwealth countries but also throughout the world. I dedicate this
presentation to Prof. Gajaraj Dhanarajan.

I would be talking on both the modes, because the Formal is a well-rooted system
and the Distributed education is the emerging scenario and there are challenges,
which we have to overcome in both the modes. Friends when we talk of training of
teachers, clearly two things emerge, one a well established Formal – face-to-face
education for training of teachers and another the new mode, I think it is dangerous

*Chairman, University Grants Commission, New Delhi, India

5
to say that it is a new mode, it is already deep rooted mode, the Distributed –
what I mean is the distance education. So when we think of these two modes how
are we going to look into the issues of quality assurance? So what I am going to do
is I am going to first talk in a generic sense the quality assurance and accreditation
process, which is world over, accepted today. Having done that, then I want to
spend some time on talking of quality assurance in these two types of systems that
are available for training of teachers.

So what is the generic system that is available today ? The first step in this system
is the Self-appraisal, which is based on well defined criteria. The Self-appraisal
report, the Spot Validation, the Criteria-wise judgment and accreditation by the
Accrediting Body are the four generic steps accepted world over today when
deciding on quality. That’s what NAAC is doing and that’s what NBA is doing, or any
other Quality Assurance body is doing. But lets go to the quality assurance
mechanism. Looking into the two types of education that are available, particularly
for training of teachers, one has to think of two different systems of Quality
Assurance, one what I call institutional Quality Assurance, that means the institution
which is imparting the teacher training program as a unit, whether the institution
as a whole has the quality or not. The next and most important is the teacher
education programme parse and the quality assurance of that teacher education
program and this is where I am going to spend little more time. But just to complete
the picture let me go back to institutional quality assurance and what are the
criteria’s, which come into that. For institutional quality assurance the six criteria
under which the institutional quality is viewed are - Curriculum Design and Planning,
Curriculum transaction and evaluation, Research, development and extension,
infrastructure and learning resources, student support and progression and
organization and management.

The entire frame work goes along with this criteria, entire Self-appraisal report
would be pivoted with these criteria and this is what also, the NCTE and NAAC
manual talks about. We may find a little variation in the British and the Australian
systems, but the core remains the same and once this is done then the generic
method takes in and you can see that the defining criteria becomes extremely
important and this is where the real problem starts.

The second type of system which I was talking earlier with reference to teacher
education program was how to judge the quality of the teacher education
programme. So in teacher education programme thinking of what should be the
benchmark, I thought a simple statement which may make the benchmark, i.e. “
teacher needs to function as an effective facilitator of pupils learning”, with
whatever involvement he or she is going to function he or she should function as
an effective facilitator of pupils learning and that should be the benchmark for
teacher education program. If the programme is found to be satisfactory in these
lines, then we can say that the teacher education program is of acceptable quality.
After this is set and satisfied then how are we going to look at the aspect related
to teachers development which is the most crucial aspect on which we should
concentrate.

6
I would now like to talk on those aspects which one should look for in any
professional course like that of the Teacher training. Any teacher education
programme needs to promote three professional things for claiming itself to be a
good training program. First professional knowledge and understanding, second
professional skills and abilities and third professional values and personal
commitment. If a teacher-training programme could address these three aspects
clearly, then the teacher training can be said to be on a sound track. But we
should see that they are inherently linked to each other and each one is
interdependent on the other two. So it is the interlinkage between these three
which you cannot avoid, and it is through this inter-linkage that one has to think
of the quality framework.

If I have to go to the quality framework so as to achieve these three aspects, I

must create benchmark statements for each of these aspects and these statements
then will form a frame work for defining criteria. The moment I define the criteria
these criteria becomes the basis for Self – appraisal. So I come back to my first
step of generic method. It is at this stage that the generic method will take over.
So when we are going to develop a mechanism exclusively for teacher training
program this is where we have to focus and it is through this mechanism which I
personally feel that we need to go about. But the world is not so simple, the
things are changed, and I talked about two modes which have come, one- face to
face mode and then the other most important mode that has emerged i.e., the
Distributed mode which has now become the focal point. We often talk about
borderless education, in fact to me borderless education cuts across these five
things: Sectoral boundaries, whether it is further or higher, washed out geographical
borders, public and private, no more borders, no question in relation to time and
space. So when we talk of new paradigm for distributed education, people always
talk it as a geographical thing that has happened. It is much beyond that, the
sectoral boundaries are wiped out, the levels of education are no more there, no
more are there definite geographical borders, no sectoral boundaries (education
and industry) public and private and time and space. It is a seamless scenario that
is emerging because of distributed education and that is where the new realities
are coming. The new educational realities are in distributed education mode. In
distributed education mode the very structures, processes and criteria that govern
the traditional Assessment and Accreditation process may be counter productive
in new educational realities and that is what we have to understand. All that we
did for ten years suddenly appears to be counter productive. This however does
not mean that it is going to go away because in this world face-to-face education
is going to remain but we have to go little ahead of that and that is where we have
to look little more differently.

Talking about what would be the future and what are the challenge that are
emerging for us. It is necessary to redo the definition of quality and quality
assessment. Why I am saying this is, because today you cannot talk independently
of face-to-face education and the distance education. They are merged they are
hand in gloves, relating systems, and so we may have to talk about an integrated
approach and in the same context redefine the quality and quality assessments.

7
This means we will have to define quality with reference to a set of universal
attributes or standards of a quality educational experience. Which means whether
it is teacher training program, regular classroom teaching or it is professional
teaching we need to define a set of universal attributes or standards. Now coming
to the third statement that I am making, - “Standards need to be applicable
independent of delivery method” is extremely important, because, that is where
the seamless things starts coming.

What ever you are doing the standards have to be independent whether it is face
to face education or whether it is distributed education. We need to evolve quality
assurance mechanisms in view of potential “universal attributes” and for evolving
those potential universal attributes we need to do a lot of R&D on quality
enhancement and quality assurances strategies. However whatever we do the
final aim should be to improve the delivery of educational experience. Whether it
is in the classroom or whether it is through the distributed mode its not just the
access but it is the quality of access which is of concern, whether it is to NAAC,
or to the National board of accreditation, or to UGC. I thought I will, put forth
how I visualize these new things which are coming up in teacher – education.
Friend’s, it is only the quality provision that has a meaning and not just access,
and this is the challenge task and all of us have to take up whether it is
Commonwealth of Learning or NAAC or UGC. I have chosen teacher education as
the theme because that is the topic of this roundtable, but I feel this is the
universal thing for what ever education system that we are going to develop. With
these few words let me say how happy I am to inaugurate this particular seminar.

8
 KEYNOTE ADDRESS

Innovations in Teacher Education –

International Practices for Quality Assurance

Prof. Gajaraj Dhanarajan*

Salutations,

I bring you greetings from the Commonwealth of Learning. My colleague(s) and

I are pleased to be here to contribute to and participate in this dialogue on
“Innovations in Teacher Education – International Practices for Quality
Assurance”.

I wish to compliment the Director of the National Assessment and Accreditation

Council of India and his colleagues for organizing this dialogue –this is a good
testimony of the all-inclusive nature of your vision regarding the role you play in
bringing a consciousness about and knowledge of quality in post secondary
educational services. No country in the world can afford to under utilize all of its
human assets for the betterment of its citizens, least of all a nation such the
republic which clearly has a large supply of academic talent and an equally huge
demand for it. India must benefit from your enormous capacities not only on matters
relating to the quality of education in universities and colleges but also in all
areas of professional training including that of teachers.

India’s aspirations to bring Education for all of its citizens as articulated in its
constitution are much admired by its global peers. The admiration arises out of a
recognition that the challenge to this nation of nearly one billion people of which
close to 192 millions1 are the young and the youth make miniscule, the calls made
on them. The struggle of this nation, despite all of its other problems in increasing
the total number of schools from under 225,000 in 1950 to about a million by the
end of the century gives a lot of comfort to many Commonwealth countries
confronted with increasing demand for and limited supply of educational services.
The presence of a high powered delegation of teacher educators from the other
great Commonwealth country of the African continent to listen, learn, share and
develop partnerships with you is a testimony to the remarkable achievements of
this nation.

Notwithstanding these remarkable achievements of India, the task for the nation
is still to be finished. Despite the million schools between 30 - 35 million children
may still continue to be non-participants in primary education and between 40
and 60% of the relevant age cohort may not see elementary and secondary education
at all, respectively, at least in the foreseeable future. 2 India’s challenge goes
beyond just numbers. They also include improving unhealthy classroom environments,

*Former President & CEO, Commonwealth of Learning, Vancouver, Canada

9
enhancing inadequate infrastructure to support good learning and perhaps most
important of all training and retraining less qualified and motivated teachers in
large numbers.

Out of a global population of about 60 million education workers slightly more

than 3 million work in India. 3 Most of them would have finished at least ten years
of general education with perhaps up to two years of preparatory teacher training.
Should India adhere to it’s undertaking at Dakar in 2000 to provide a basic education
of high quality to all of its young, than she has to among other things provide:

20-35 million additional places in primary schools

increase the present level of female participation

improve on current pupil teacher ratios

increase the number of female teachers

provide sound preparatory and continuous professional development
education for teachers

It is in this context that I see the relevance of this round table – a round table
that wishes to consider the application of technological tools to enhance the
quality of and increase the provision for preparation and continuous teacher
training. The application of distance education or technology in mediating the
delivery of education and training evokes strong passion among those who speak
in favour of it and those who are against it. The advocates, and I am one of them,
believe that the strategy allows for economies to be achieved, is learner sensitive
and centred, provides great flexibility, is particularly suited to reach those who
otherwise get marginalized for a variety of reasons; enforces a serious concern
for pedagogical issues, respects experiential learning, treats learners as individuals
and brings greater planning to the learning and teaching transactions. Those who
dislike the use of distance education will speak of the de-humanizing nature of
the relationship between teacher and learner, loss of academic freedom and
autonomy, erosion of academic creativity, fear of commoditising a noble human
endeavour of long standing tradition; loss of quality and an absence of opportunity
for debate, discussion and collective reflection on which good education especially
teacher training is founded.

In advocating and promoting the use of distance education since around the mid-
seventies, it has often amazed me how lukewarm the teaching fraternity and its
administrators have been in applying educational innovations in their own field.
No doubt the reasons for this reticence may be based on sound professional
reasons. Notwithstanding, given the magnitude of the task of training and retraining,
especially in the use of ICTs for teaching and learning, the erosion of budgets, the
expectations of learners to be active and participatory in their training, and a
newly discovered sensitivity to disruptions of the professional and social life of
potential trainees, I am pleased to note that teacher trainers all over the world

1
Anon [2000]: Quality Education in a Global Era - Country paper: India. Govt. of India submission to
the XIV Conference of Commonwealth Education Ministers. Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada
2
Ibid
3
Ibid

10
including or especially India are at least taking a second serious look at the use of
distance education and associated technologies to meet their needs. The use of
distance education for purposes of training and retraining teachers is fast becoming
mainstream in most if not all parts of the world. There are good reasons for this
but nothing is as important as the fact that once teachers are in a classroom it
would be irresponsible to take them away from the classroom for their personal
development without adequate substitutions to take care of the development of
their pupils. Many developing countries do not have the luxury of having sufficient
numbers of teachers for substitution.

This discovery that any form of training especially of those already in the workplace
must take into account learner rights and requirements could not be happening
at a better time. The rich learning technological environments that is fast becoming
available to most nations, including India, will allow us to put training programmes
faster, make them more flexible, allow for customisation and even achieve greater
economic efficiencies than ever before. It would also allow training to be more
relevant to individual circumstances than ever before. However, in pursuing this
strategy you no doubt will be confronting issues that many others who have used
distance education have confronted and overcame. Let me revisit some of those
issues in the context of teacher training and retraining applying ICTs within or
without distance education.

Technology, whether it is print or multimedia, does not teach; the techniques we

adopt simply enable the delivery of teaching from narrow to mass catchments and,
at the same time, shifts the responsibility of learning away from the teacher to
the learner. In the process, it transforms the relationship between teachers and
learners. Even while we are entering the era where both multimedia and hypermedia
are bringing together, under one umbrella, the essence of print, audio and video
signals, computer-assisted instruction, conference and group learning, at the heart
of the teaching and learning transaction will be institutions and teachers in them.
The challenge for us will be to create pedagogies of learning within which modes
of delivery will contribute to effective learning. Even before the arrival of the
newer technologies, communities of distance educators around the world have
been at the forefront of bringing change in the educational environment. The
circumstances under which practises have been developed, took into account
the requirements of learners who used distance education and also needed:

Increased and flexible access to information (isolated learners, preoccupied

with other demands of living, require a variety of channels to access information
on both academic and administrative matters);

Increased and flexible opportunities for interaction between mentors and

peers (the freedom from time tabled environments to conduct their learning);

Increased student time on tasks (pacing of learning through devices that set
tasks and deadlines for judicious absorption of information, skills or knowledge
and completion of learning);

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Opportunities to control their pace of learning;

Learning that is relevant to their daily lives (curriculum that is appropriate

and sensitively transformed into learning experience);

Greater response to their individual circumstances (mass education does not

necessarily have to dehumanise the learning process); and

Regular and sensitive encouragement to continue their learning (counselling

for success).

By deliberate design, distance education has been instrumental in making some

fundamental changes to long held beliefs about where, when and how teaching
and learning should take place. The critical issue is not where the students are
located, but whether they can interact with a teacher or training programmes.
Bringing about the desired levels of interaction between trainees, trainers and
programmes will mean subscribing to a list of good principles. Many of you know
these principles but in the context of this keynote, let me reflect a little:

Good practise recognises the need for students to be well informed about
the courses that are available to them. Courses of study vary in many aspects
even within a programme. Well-designed courses make it transparent before
students enrol, details such as aims, objectives, course synopsis, the position
of the course in a programme, expected quantum of work, tasks that students
are expected to do and criteria that will be used in recognising the completion
of the course. Students need to know what they should do in order to make
personal preparation before a course begins.

Teacher learner contact is an essential part of a good educational environment.

These occasions are not only good for motivating learners but also helpful in
the context of overcoming learning problems. Learners are also able to use
these occasions to measure their own value systems about their studies and
their future.

Active learning is healthy : Students do not learn much from memorising

facts and reproducing set answers; they derive greater benefits by being active
in their learning. Talking, listening, observing, discussing, writing and relating
their own experiences and applying them in the context of their lessons are
all part of an active learning process. Good practise in distance teaching does
this effectively.

Peer support in learning : Is highly beneficial. Sharing one’s own ideas and
responding to the ideas of others to improve thinking and increasing
understanding. Learning can improve by it being a team effort rather than a
collection of solo performances. Study centre facilities provide valuable
opportunities for peer supported learning.

12

Feedback and encouragement Knowing what you know and what you do not
know can be a focus of future learning. Regular feedback on their performance
helps students learn better and deeper.

Paced learning : Using time effectively is critical for students; what this means
to teaching is a clear understanding of appropriate pacing of learning through
tools such as assignments, tutorials, broadcast programs, computer
conferencing etc.

Learning pathways must be mapped to facilitate different styles of learning.

Besides these good practises, which must be at the heart of any quality consideration
in using of distance education for teacher training, there are three other aspects
of distance and open learning that are crucial to its good health. These are:

Access : Supporters of open and distance learning will claim that their
educational mission is to provide access and equality of opportunity for learning
especially to individuals and groups who have been denied this before. As has
been argued before success in providing access is not a sufficient condition
for claiming greater opportunity. “Equality of opportunity is a matter of
outcomes, not merely resource availability;” in other words, providing access
is merely a starting point and equity can only be achieved if the people provided
with such opportunities are helped towards achieving their own goals.

Cost considerations : The cost efficiency and effectiveness of distance

education systems is an overriding concern for all of us. These considerations
have a major impact on policy issues and any measurement of the quality of a
distance education system will have to take into account costs and benefits.

Infrastructure : Delivering education to students off campus needs

infrastructure that is supportive of the teaching and learning environment.
This infrastructure should have among other items, the following bare essentials:
- all those who deliver content must have the skills to use teaching methods
that are resource based;
- such teachers must be trained and provided with technologies for the
performance of their tasks;
- have provision for students to have access to the emerging communication
and information technologies;
- management configures institutional resources and invests in the
production of knowledge products and the pathways to deliver them; and
- management prepares itself to cope with the diversity in the make up of
its students, their goals and the context within which they learn

I am confident that in the next two days you will delve deeply into the mechanics
and mechanisms of quality assurance, management, validation and assessment. The
presence of the representatives of both the UGC and NCTE augurs well for the
development and continuation of collaborative efforts in ensuring that a sound,

13
fair, transparent and participatory quality assurance framework. The COL has a
history of working with all these actors and we will be pleased to continue playing
that catalytic role in these ventures.

I wish you well in these considerations and look forward to the conclusions that
you will arrive at not only for the benefit of this great country but also for many
other Commonwealth countries currently faced with similar challenges.

14
 Quality Assurance in Indian Higher Education:
The Characteristics of the NAAC Model

Prof. V. S. Prasad*
and
Dr. Antony Stella **

The Indian system of higher education has always responded well to the challenges
of the time. Two decades ago, when the system came under severe criticism that
it had allowed the mushrooming of Higher Education Institutions (HEIs), compromising
the quality of educational offerings, the Ministry of Human Resource Development
(MHRD) and the University Grants Commission (UGC) took initiatives to restore the
standards of higher education. Consequently, the National Policy on Education
(1986) that laid special emphasis on upholding the quality of higher education in
India noted certain policy initiatives. On the recommendations of the Programme
of Action (1992) document that provided the guidelines for the implementation of
the National Policy on Education (1986), in 1994, the UGC established the National
Assessment and Accreditation Council (NAAC) as an autonomous body to assess
and accredit institutions of higher education and its units thereof, with its
headquarters at Bangalore.

Governance
The NAAC functions through its General Council (GC) and Executive Committee
(EC) where educational administrators, policy makers and senior academicians from
a cross section of the system of higher education are represented. The Chairperson
of UGC is the President of the GC of NAAC; the Chairperson of EC is an eminent
academician in the area of relevance to NAAC. The Executive Officer of NAAC is
the Director who is its academic and administrative head, and is the member-
secretary of both GC and EC. The NAAC also has many advisory and consultative
committees to guide its practices, in addition to the statutory bodies that steer
its policies. The NAAC has a core staff and consultants to support its activities. In
addition, it receives assistance from a large number of external resource persons
from across the country who are not full time staff of NAAC.

Vision and Mission

The activities and future plans of NAAC are guided by its vision and mission that
have a focus on making quality assurance an integrated functioning of the higher
education institutions. Its vision is To make quality the defining element of higher
education in India through a combination of self and external quality evaluation,
promotion and sustenance initiatives.

The mission statements of the NAAC aim at translating the vision into action by the
following engagement:

* Director, National Assessment and Accreditation Council, Bangalore, India

** Adviser, National Assessment and Accreditation Council, Bangalore, India

15

To arrange for periodic assessment and accreditation of institutions of
higher education or units thereof, or specific academic programmes or
projects;

To stimulate the academic environment for promotion of quality of
teaching-learning and research in higher education institutions;

To encourage self-evaluation, accountability, autonomy and innovations in
higher education;

To undertake quality-related research studies, consultancy and training
programmes, and

To collaborate with other stakeholders of higher education for quality
evaluation, promotion and sustenance.

Striving to achieve its vision and mission, the NAAC primarily assesses the quality of
institutions of higher education that opt for the process, through the
internationally accepted methodology.

The Methodology
The NAAC follows the following three-stage process, which is a combination of
self-study and peer review, for assessment of a unit:

Preparation and submission of self-study report by the institution

On-site visit of the peer team for validation of the report and for
recommending the assessment outcome to NAAC

Final decision by the Executive Council of NAAC

The self-study report to be validated by the peers is the backbone of the whole
exercise. Manuals have been developed to suit different units of higher education,
with detailed guidelines on preparation of the self-study report and the other
aspects of assessment and accreditation.

Criteria for Assessment

The NAAC has identified the following seven criteria to serve as the basis of its
assessment procedures:
 Curricular Aspects
 Teaching-learning and Evaluation
 Research, Consultancy and Extension
 Infrastructure and Learning Resources
 Student Support and Progression
 Organisation and Management
 Healthy Practices

The self-study report is expected to highlight the functioning of the institution

with reference to these areas.

The Assessment Outcome

The validation of the self-study report by the peers results in criterion-wise scores
and a detailed report. The criterion scores are further used to arrive at the

16
overall institutional score. The NAAC assigns the institutional grade on a nine-
point scale based on the institutional score. If the overall score is more than 55%,
the institution gets the “Accredited status” and the accredited institutions are
graded on a nine-point scale. Institutions, which do not attain the minimum 55%
points for accreditation, would also be intimated and notified indicating that the
institution is “Assessed And Found Not Qualified For Accreditation”. The assessment
outcome is valid for a period of 5 years. With these methodological elements NAAC
has seen various stages of development.

From Apprehension to Appreciation…

From the initial phase of apprehension about the philosophy of external review,
the country has gradually moved to the current phase of appreciation for the
intrinsic benefits of accreditation. Hundreds of seminars organized by NAAC
throughout the country, have created awareness among the stakeholders on quality
related issues. The publication program of NAAC has ensured effective dissemination
of information about assessment and accreditation. The way NAAC developed the
manuals and guidelines through a large number of national consultations and
workshops, involving the cross-section of the academia, has led to the acceptance
and appreciation of the methodology of NAAC. With stakeholder behaviour making
it clear that the outcome of assessment by NAAC will form the basis for some of
their decisions, large number of institutions have approached NAAC for assessment.
The following characteristics of NAAC that have greatly contributed to this
acceptance and appreciation deserve a mention:

Quality Assurance Framework: The overall quality assurance framework followed

by NAAC incorporates elements of all the three basic approaches to quality
assurance –accreditation, assessment and academic audit. NAAC accredits
institutions and certifies for the educational quality of the institution. It also goes
beyond the certification and provides an assessment that classifies an institution
on a nine-point scale indicating where the institution stands in the quality
continuum. A small team of external peers is sent to the institution mostly as
generalists and the report is made public as in the case of academic audit. In
practice this has been found to be the best choice for the huge and diverse
system of higher education we have.

Unit of Assessment : The unit of assessment appropriate to the objectives of

assessment and the national context has been chosen based on clear rationale.
Since putting systems in place was seen as the major objective to met first, NAAC
decided to promote institutional accreditation in the first cycle. Further, the
Indian context with regard to the following also strengthened the leaning towards
institution as the unit of assessment: Feasibility of Coverage within the cycle of
assessment, Usefulness of outcomes to Stakeholders, Size of beneficiaries, Impact
on Policies, Centralised Facilities at the institutional level, Collective Impact being
more than the sum of parts, Inter-disciplinary Approach to Programs, Linkage to
Funding, Critical Mass of the unit, Sustainability and Public Consciousness of Quality.

17
Reporting Strategy : The reporting strategy of NAAC is an overall institutional
grade supplemented with a detailed assessment report, which is made public.
NAAC was aware that “confidentiality Vs public disclosure” of assessment report is
a bone of contention in many countries, and that both the points have valid
arguments. However, the evolving systems are more towards public disclosure and
NAAC consciously opted for public disclosure. After ensuring through appropriate
safeguards that the report qualifies to be a NAAC document, the full report is
made public.

Role of the Council in Steering Assessment : Some agencies keep their role in
assessment per se minimal and only co-ordinate the assessment visits and in other
agencies the agency staff-participate in assessment. NAAC started its assessment
visits with the assumption that the staff of the agency need not be directly involved
in assessment per se. Minimising inter-team variance in this model is a substantial
task and it has been achieved through training of the assessors. To further ensure
the consistency and credibility of the assessment process, NAAC plays a major
role in planning the evaluation framework, development of instruments and
methodology, fine-tuning the implementation and ensuring the objectivity of the
process before the outcome is made public. Thus NAAC does not stop as a mere
co-ordinating agency but strikes a balance between the co-ordinating functions
and steering the assessment and this stand has been found to be appropriate.

Multi-prong approach : While working towards the support of the academia, NAAC
was aware that it would not be possible to expect 100% acceptance of all its
efforts. Whatever be the strategy followed, there would always be a minority
group to criticize it. The reason need not be based on ignorance or lack of
conceptual clarity or skepticism but may be due to genuine concerns also. Keeping
this in mind, NAAC followed a multi-pronged approach for information dissemination
on the assessment philosophy and principles targeting the various stakeholders.
Care was taken to ensure that its strategies had the following elements:
 Broad involvement and consensus building to ensure widespread support
in evolving the norms and criteria
 Careful development of the methods and instruments for assessment
 Transparency in all its policies and practices
 Rigorous implementation of procedures
 Safeguards to enhance the professionalism of assessment

Incorporating these elements, NAAC applied multi-pronged strategies at various

levels—awareness programs to reach out to the academic community, publication
programs for dissemination of information, workshops on development of
instruments, training the experts for assessment, discussions with administrators
to rope in their support for the HEIs, consultations with policy makers to ensure
government support and so on. Involving people from various backgrounds and
interests also helped to enhance the insights of the group process.

Contextualising Assessment : During NAAC’s early studies it was found that

instruments and standards set should not be followed blindly. The broad guidelines

18
by NAAC may provide an external point of reference for evaluating the quality of
the institution under assessment, but they cannot be interpreted in void.
Contextualizing, synthesizing and sensitizing the data to objectives are essential,
and for this, peer assessment is inevitable. For example, NAAC had developed some
indicators to guide peer assessment. But, the peers have an important role in
synthesizing the outcome on individual indicators to arrive at an overall assessment
and also in evaluating the contextual framework of the institution.

Collaboration with other Professional Bodies : The Indian system of higher

education has many regulatory mechanisms to ensure the satisfactory functioning
of the HEIs. The National Council for Teacher Education (NCTE) is a statutory body
established in 1995 to regulate and maintain norms and standards in teacher
education. The NCTE signed a MoU with the NAAC in 2002 for all the teacher
education institutions to undergo the collaborative assessment. The methodology
is the same but the criteria have been slightly modified, to suit the context of the
teacher education institutions. Combining the subject expertise of NCTE and the
quality assurance expertise of NAAC, the methodology has been implemented for
the teacher education institutions of the country. The efforts of NCTE and NAAC
to ensure and assure the quality of teacher education in the country are
complementary to each other. While the norms of NCTE ensure the minimum
requirement that is essential for quality education, NAAC’s framework for assessment
looks for the quality and excellence of the institutions. In the years to come,
NAAC will enter into agreements with professional bodies for collaborative
assessment, in areas where it is required.

The fact that the NAAC’s model given above suits the national context and the
other considerations of the Indian higher education system is evident from the
acceptance and appreciation academia have demonstrated towards NAAC’s process.
The impact analysis conducted by NAAC brought to limelight that there are two
major areas where NAAC’s process has made a significant impact on the HEIS – the
value framework of the HEIs and the various innovations triggered by NAAC’s process;
they stand testimony to the suitability of NAAC’s model to Indian Higher Education.

Value framework of NAAC

In this era of values losing their significance, the accreditation framework of the
NAAC has made higher education institutions in India think about the values they
practice. The focus on values practiced in the functioning of higher education
institutions has been rekindled due to the salient features (critical elements) of
the NAAC’s model that are based on certain assumptions of values, i.e. desirable
practices. The appreciation of the desirable values is expected to result in a
better understanding of the practices, particularly in the context of varying realities.

The value framework of NAAC starts with its right choice of ‘unit’ of evaluation,
namely institution as a whole, which promotes a holistic value. The institutional
accreditation that focuses on the policies, facilitating aspects and evidence of
healthy practices of the whole system strengthens a healthy interdependence
among the campus community. Gradually it promotes the holistic mindset that is

19
essential for developing institutional excellence and institutional ‘dharma’,
subsuming individual excellence and individual ‘dharma’.

Added to the holistic approach to assessment, the criteria-based assessment of

NAAC that forms the backbone of the whole assessment exercise promotes judgment
based on values. The key aspects identified under each of the seven criteria serve
as Indicators of Quality and they reflect the values of the system on which
assessment is made. For example, the criterion on “Research, Consultancy and
Extension” promotes the values such as Knowledge Creation, Knowledge
Dissemination, Knowledge Application, Social Responsiveness and Community
Orientation. The criterion on “Organisation and Management” promotes the
values such as Participation, Transparency, Integrated View of Things, Team
Work, Justice, Self-reliance and Probity in Public Finance. The values to be
promoted by NAAC are also made explicit in the criterion statements.

The process of undergoing the accreditation itself has been a rewarding experience
for the institutions to rethink the values they should be practicing. When
institutions worked on the accreditation framework of NAAC and prepared the
self-study report, they realized that it promoted the values of Self-realization and
Participation. Gradually it has triggered an objective ‘self critical’ approach to
one’s own behaviour and has led to self-realisation, which is very essential for an
educational institution that stands for autonomy and self-regulation. Self-knowledge
has to precede self-regulation, which in turn is a prerequisite for self-realisation.

Innovations Triggered by the NAAC’s Process

The impact analysis revealed that the NAAC’s process made a significant change in
all aspects of institutional functioning – pedagogical, managerial and administrative.
One could see that the institutions had become more open and sensitive to the
needs of the stakeholders. The need to keep abreast of changing trends was felt
by one and all, and institutions now found it easier to introduce innovations as
every one realised the importance of coping with the needs of the present world.
The autonomous institutions that had the freedom to innovate in curriculum and
the affiliated colleges that were offering additional programmes of their own
restructured the curriculum. In the scheme of assessment of NAAC, the criterion
Teaching-learning and Evaluation carries the maximum weightage. It gave a positive
stimulus to institutional attention and oriented the institutions to improving their
quality of teaching-learning by going beyond the routine examination-oriented
outcome. Improved teaching methods using educational technology, projects and
student seminars, providing of computer skills, encouragement of co-curricular
activities, and incorporation of community orientation were observed.

While the characteristics mentioned above and the impact the process has made
among the accredited HEIs is very encouraging in the case of first timers of the
first cycle of assessment, the way NAAC moves forward with the re-accreditation
also needs a mention here. Based on a large number of national consultations and
building on the lessons of experience, the re-accreditation methodology is being
firmed up.

20
Re-accreditation Method
The discussions held so far have recommended that the same three-stage process
– submission of self-study report, peer validation and final decision by NAAC –
should be followed for re-accreditation. The value framework regarding the
obligations of the institution in nation building and serving the various stakeholders
also have to remain the same. However, the point of time when re-accreditation is
initiated may warrant a re-look at the assessment framework. First assessment has
already initiated a quality culture among the HEIs of the country and re-
accreditation has to further strengthen those initiatives. Therefore, along with
the core values to which all higher education institutions should relate themselves
in the changing context, the framework for re-accreditation should also consider
the impact of first assessment. In other words, the framework for re-accreditation
has to be built on two major considerations – core values in the changing context
and impact of first assessment.

The following five core values have been identified for the re-accreditation process:
1. Relating to National Development
2. Fostering Global Competencies among Students
3. Inculcating the Value System
4. Promoting the Use of Technology
5. Quest for Excellence

In general, the re-accreditation framework will assess the institutional functioning

with reference to the contributions the HEIs make towards the five core values
mentioned above. The HEIs are expected to demonstrate how they contribute to
the core values through data collected during the accredited period. The evidence
to the realization of these objectives may be in terms of inputs, processes and
outputs. The re-assessment by NAAC will take a holistic view of all the inputs,
processes and outputs of an institution and assess how the HEIs have progressed
during the accredited period. In particular, the re-assessment would have a shift
in focus in assessing three aspects – quality sustenance, quality enhancement and
acting on the assessment report – that relate to internalizing the quality culture.

Quality Sustenance : During the first assessment, the NAAC’s process has triggered
quality initiatives in many aspects of functioning of HEIs. The preparation of the
self-study report has served as a catalyst for institutional self-improvement. The
participation of the faculty members, administrative staff, students, parents and
alumni has lead to new initiatives. Interaction with the peers has assisted this
process and also provided a means for the wider dissemination of information
about educational development. It has triggered many innovative practices and
paved way for institutionalising those practices. Establishing internal quality
assurance cells to coordinate the quality initiatives and use of technology in the
learning process as well as for administration are a few such initiatives. These
changes have a direct bearing on the quality of education and the re-accreditation
will consider how these initiatives have been sustained during the accredited
period.

21
Quality Enhancement : It is proper and educationally sound to expect that re-
assessment has to bring to limelight how institutions have progressed over a period
of five years with accredited status. It is reasonable that the re-assessment will
give a due place to the quality initiatives promoted by the first assessment and the
consequent quality enhancement that has taken place.

Acting on the Assessment Report : Much of the quality enhancement has been a
result of institutional efforts to act on the assessment report and the re-assessment
has to take note of that too. The post-accreditation reviews, feedback from the
accredited institutions and the outcome of national consultations indicate that
the first assessment report has been a useful document to initiate quality
enhancement activities. The re-accreditation has to address how the HEIs have
taken steps to overcome the deficiencies mentioned in the first assessment report
and also build on the strengths noted in the report.

With the special emphases discussed above, the methodology for re-accreditation
has been evolved in consultation with the academia and there is a consensus that
the methodological elements have to be similar to the first assessment. The existing
seven criteria will be followed with revision and re-organisation in key aspects.
The current nine-point scale will be continued to award institutional grades. To
facilitate the HEIs to move towards demonstrating the special emphases mentioned
above, institutional preparations for re-accreditation have commenced recently.

Milestones of a Decade…
Promoting a dialogue on quality related initiatives, during the past decade, NAAC
has promoted partnership with stakeholders for pro-active measures to promote
assessment and accreditation is a significant achievement of NAAC. Many states
have established quality cells to promote assessment. Moving beyond accreditation,
NAAC has expanded its scope by strengthening its advisory role. In states where at
least 20% of higher education institutions have been accredited, state wise analysis
of accreditation reports have been initiated for policy initiatives.

In addition to promoting the cause of quality education in the country, NAAC is a

leading Quality Assurance Agency in the international arena with valuable lessons
of experience for the emerging Quality Assurance Agencies of the other countries.
It is active in the international forums and as a member of the International Network
of Quality Assurance Agencies in Higher Education (INQAAHE), which is the largest
network of quality assurance agencies in the world, NAAC organized the sixth bi-
annual meet of the membership in 2001 at Bangalore. The NAAC is the co-convener
of the Asia-Pacific Quality Network (APQN), which is a regional sub-network of the
INQAAHE. While the developments present a rosy picture, the path taken by NAAC
has challenges also.

Issues of Concern…
The points highlighted so far indicate how NAAC is making a steady progress in the
field of quality assurance in higher education at both national and international

22
levels. The developmental path is not free from concerns, but most of the concerns
NAAC is dealing with today continue to be the concerns world over. A few of them
are as below.

Large Volume Assessment : As on 16 February 2004, 1138 HEIs -104 universities and
1034 colleges have been accredited by NAAC. With the UGC’s decision to extend
financial support for assessment and accreditation of universities and colleges
through NAAC, with effect from 1 April 2004, more and more colleges are expected
to volunteer for assessment. The implication is that NAAC has to assess a large
number of HEIs without compromising the quality of the process. Consequently,
alternative models of co-ordinating assessment visits and ICT enabled strategies to
meet large volume assessment are being worked out. Following the alternative
model of employing the services of external member conveners and Chair-cum-
conveners, the capacity of NAAC to assess institutions has already been enhanced
to around 200 institutions per month. If this trend is maintained, NAAC can assess
all the UGC recognized colleges in a period of two years, provided they submit the
reports to NAAC. To support the new model of on-site visit with member-conveners,
the database of experts has been expanded through nominations, rigorous training
programs, orientation programs and roundtables.

Professionalising the Process : Quality assurance being an evolving area the

question— “is there a better way of doing things”— is always a concern for all the
Quality Assurance Agencies. Fine-tuning the instruments and reducing the inter-
team variance in peer assessment are the two areas where the Quality Assurance
Agencies look for better ways of steering the quality assurance processes. To
address these issues, NAAC continuously fine-tunes the instruments based on field
experience and feedback collected from the accredited institutions, at the same
time maintaining the consistency of its evaluation framework.

Subjectivity that creeps into any assessment involving human factors has been
well understood. However, the world over, none of the quality assurance agencies
have found a better alternative to the central place given to peer assessment in
the quality assurance procedures. Having accepted peer assessment as an integral
part of its methodology, NAAC brings in consistency among the peers by appropriate
safeguards, training strategies and discussions. A notable effort towards this direction
is the development of the ‘National Cadre of Assessors’. Experts from different
parts of the country are selected through nomination and advertisements and
through a rigorous selection process. For the assessors thus selected, NAAC
organizes a 3-day residential training program to induct them into the ‘National
Cadre of Assessors’. This training strategy has given a professional dimension to
NAAC’s process. Further, developing indicators of quality that can guide peer
assessment is an ongoing exercise. In addition, roundtable discussion for the Chairs
of the assessment teams to discuss the issues of concern is an annual event.
Continuous efforts are taken to reduce the subjectivity and to strengthen the
professionalism of peer assessment.

23
Sustenance of Quality : As mentioned earlier, the quality assurance procedures
of NAAC have triggered a lot of healthy practices in the system of higher education
and the HEIs that have undergone the process have become quality conscious. At
this juncture one of the biggest challenges for NAAC is to help HEIs in sustaining
these efforts. Institutionalising and internalizing the quality assurance processes
has the key to this challenge. To make quality assurance an integral part of
functioning of institutions, NAAC is promoting the establishment of Internal Quality
Assurance Cell (IQAC) in all higher education institutions in general, and in
accredited institutions, in particular. Establishing an IQAC is a pre-requisite for
any institution that comes forward for re-accreditation.

To conclude, during the past nine years, the NAAC has made a niche in the higher
education scenario of India. It will continue to uphold its upward growth to ensure
its leadership at the international level in general and in the Asia-Pacific region in
particular. The next few years will show how NAAC moves ahead successfully
balancing both the national context and the international expectations. With the
support of the enlightened academia, policy makers, and dedicated staff, one can
be sure that NAAC will face the challenges reasonably well and prove its mettle.

There are many miles to go……

24
 Quality Assurance Practices in
Nigerian Teacher Education

Dr. Emmanuel Itopa Makoju*

Abstract
This paper examines Quality Assurance Practices, standardization and professionalism
as they apply to teacher education in Nigeria. It outlines the role of the National
Commission for Colleges of Education in actualising quality practices in teacher
education through its setting of minimum standards, and periodic accreditation of
teacher training institutions to ensure and maintain standards/quality. Paradigms,
for quality practices in teacher education such as the data processing model and
the college evaluation model are suggested, while strategies for further
professionalisation of teacher education are proposed to enhance quality practices
in the education sub-system in Nigeria.

Preamble
I wish to thank the Federal Government of Nigeria and particularly the Executive
Secretary of the National Commission for Colleges of Education in Nigeria, for
making it possible for me to participate in the Round Table Interaction on “Innovation
in Teacher Education- International Practices of Quality Assurance” - 14th to 29 th
March 2004 in Bangalore, India, organized by the Commonwealth of Learning (COL)
and the National Accreditation and Assessment Council (NAAC), India.

The past century has witnessed the emergence of various fields of study in
education in addition to age-long established disciplines in education such as
philosophy of education, educational psychology and sociology of education. The
more recent fields of study in education such as “Management” in education, is
derived from the business world as against “educational administration and planning”
field. In the same vein, ”quality” and “quality control” or “quality assurance” have
roots from chemical/petrochemical /brewing /pharmaceutical realms, and have
infiltrated into “education” as against “standard” and “standardization” which are
more indigenous to education. The latter nomenclature, “standard” is preferred
in Nigeria. Indeed just like the concept “production” from the industries is
sometimes used as against “preparation”, for the training of teachers, the latter,
“preparation” of teachers seems to be preferred in Nigeria. In this paper, “quality
assurance practices” will be synonymous or interchangeable with “standards” and
“standardization” in teacher education.

Introduction
Educational quality has to be promoted at national and international levels. The
International Bureau of Education (lBE) is an actor within UNESCO to facilitate and
support, through international collaboration, renewed learning processes,
curriculum development and perspectives on educational change. The three

*Provost, Federal College of Education, Kontagora, Niger State, Nigeria

25
components are interdependent and interrelated to many others. For all of them,
the stakeholders of education including children, students, parents and
communities, as well as teachers and other educators and policy makers - often
need new international, open ways of thinking and interacting. This round table
interaction forum in India is an excellent example, similar to the first Global Forum
on International Quality Assurance, Accreditation and the Recognition of
Qualifications in Higher Education organised by UNESCO, Paris, 17th - 18th October
2002. In the same vein, in Nigeria, the Federal Ministry of Education has been
organizing a national biennial conference on education captioned - “Summit on
Higher Education” since year 2000, featuring “teacher education” prominently.
Experts from all over the world usually participate in it and present papers giving
it an international flavour, the next one is due by the middle of 2004, You are all
invited to Abuja, Nigeria.

Rationale for Teacher Education Accreditation and Standards

Teacher education accreditation is the process by which an agency or organization
(the NCCE in Nigeria) evaluates and reorganizes a programme of study as meeting
certain pre-determined qualifications or standards (Seldon 1976). Accreditation is
usually a high-stakes procedure, whose main purpose is to assure the public that
a programme and its graduates are worthy of respect.

Accreditation can be applied at either of two levels: the institution as a whole, or

specialized programmes within an institution. As Larson (1983) noted, “the quality
of programmes within an institution is invariably uneven, and low quality programmes
may benefit from the lofty reputation of its institution”. Thus, there is need to
accredit programmes as well as institutions, especially when the graduates of the
programmes are likely to impact on the health, safety, or welfare of the public.
Accreditation enhances standards.

Education and Quality

The emergence of standards in Nigeria started after the sensitivity enshrined in
the National Policy on Education that education could become an instrument par
excellence for national development (NPE 1997).

Standards in teacher education become critically important if it is accepted that

no education system can rise above the quality of its teachers. Mallinson (1975.116)
suggests that the quality and caliber of teachers that service the educational
system of a country can serve as an index of development and progress for that
country. In his words: “As is the school, so is society and as is the teacher, so is
the school”. Ukeje (1991) puts the same idea in a slightly different way. According
to him:

“If the child is the centre of educational system, the teacher is the pivot of the
educational process. This is because in any educative process, there always stands
the teacher, in front or at the back, at the centre or at the side, what he knows and
does can make a great difference and what he does not know, cannot do or fails to

26
do can be an irreparable loss to the child. For, it is the teachers, in the final
analysis, who translate policies into practices and programmes into action”.

Bell (1990) in his introduction to the “World Year Book of Education 1990 “Assessment
and Evaluation” refers to quality of education as “fitness for purpose”. Thus, the
quality of education to any community, at any point in time, must take reference
from what that community perceives as the purposes of education. Similarly, the
standards associated with the quality of education will depend on the extent to
which the society values education and its custodians (i.e the teachers) with
regard to resources allocation to the development and maintenance of educational
institutions and the welfare of the teachers.

Teacher Education and NCCE Quality Assurance Practices

The bedrock of adequate foundation and training of needed manpower in a country
irrespective of area of specialization is a function of sound products from the
teacher education in that country. The standard of education in a country is
largely a function of quality of teachers in the educational system. Likewise, facilities
are paramount, but the real delivery in the classrooms setting is the teacher. The
teacher is a crucial factor in the educational system in Nigeria. The purpose of
teacher education, according to the National Policy on Education (1981) are:

1. To produce highly motivated, conscientious and efficient classroom teachers

for all levels of our educational system;
2. To encourage further the spirit of enquiry and creativity in teachers;
3. To help teachers to fit into the social life of the community and Society at
large and to enhance their commitment to national objectives;
4. To produce teachers with the intellectual and professional background
adequate to any changing situation not only in the life of their country but in
the wider world, and
5. To enhance teachers’ commitment to the teaching profession

Despite the fact that the National Policy on Education (1981) outlined the aims
and objectives of Teacher Education in Nigeria the labour market expectation
cannot be met. Apart from the fact that there are not enough teachers to cope
with the rapid school expansion, many of those teachers that are available are not
qualified to teach, as they have not received adequate training for the job they
perform. That is why Gidado Tahir (1995) says that, the major problem of teacher
education in Nigeria is that the teachers that are being trained now are not
sufficiently prepared in order to meet the complex demand of the teaching process
in Nigerian schools and colleges. The unqualified teachers could at best be warming
the classroom and keeping the children busy doing nothing. Teacher education
will continue to receive major emphasis in educational planning because no
education system can rise above the quality of its teachers.

The quality of teachers is a very vital one in the education system. To Tanner and
Tanner (1975), the success of a curriculum, largely depend on teachers handling
it... “Therefore, the quality of education is largely tied to quality and supply of
teachers in the system”. The primary aim of teacher education is to help teachers

27
help youngsters under their tutelage to achieve maximum knowledge or optimum
change of behavior in a short time under a given condition.

The recommendation of the Ashby Commission of 1962 was instrumental to the

establishment of the National Commission for Colleges of Education. The Ashbian
Group foresightedly saw the indispensability of a structure or an organ that would
see to the peculiar needs of teacher education and teacher preparation in Nigeria.
The need ultimately crystallized into the promulgation of Decree No 3 of January,
1989, by the Federal Military Government. This heralded the establishment of the
National Commission for Colleges of Education (NCCE) as a parastatal of the Federal
Ministry of Education. The NCCE is charged with the primary responsibility of making
recommendations on the national policy necessary for the full development of
teacher education and the professional preparation of teachers. This parastatal
started full operation in April 1989.

Some Mandates of the NCCE

The enabling decree mandates the Commission to among other functions,
(a) Advise the Federal Military Government, through the Honourable Minister
of Education, on and co-ordinate all aspects of non- degree teacher
education in Nigeria.
(b) Make recommendation on the National Policy necessary for the
full development of teacher education and the training of teachers.
(c) Harmonize entry requirements and duration of courses in the Colleges of
Education, lay down minimum standards for all programmes of teacher
education and accredit their certificates and other academic awards after
obtaining thereof prior approval of the Minister of Education.
(d) Act as the agency for channeling all external aids to Colleges of Education
in Nigeria
(e) Make recommendations on the development of prevocational, technical,
agricultural, business and home economics education in all our primary
and secondary schools and advise as to the necessary facilities for them,
the course requirements, the relative contribution of government and
industry and how to ensure that our women take full part in these;
(f) Enquire into and advise the Federal Military Government on the financial
needs of the Colleges and receive block grants from the Government and
allocate to the Colleges based on approval formular
(g) Collate, analyze and publish information relating to teacher education in
the country
(h) Undertake periodic review of terms and conditions of service of personnel
in the Colleges of Education and make recommendations thereon to the
Regierung
(i) Make recommendation to the Minister for up-grading of any College of
Education or de-recognition of any College of Education as a Degree
awarding institution.

At the formal inauguration of the Governing Board of the Commission on the 19th of
April, 1989, the former Minister of Education, Professor Jibril Aminu, posed a
challenge to the Commission. The Honourable Minister says:

28
“In all your dealings with the institutions, whether it be over funds, or accreditation
or the establishment of new units, or whatever, you should be fair but firm. We
cannot compromise on accountability and poor quality in teacher education will
be a national disaster, which we must avoid by insisting on only the best.
Humanitarian or political kindness to any institution or programme may eventually
prove costly to the nation”.

The above challenge was no doubt inspired by the provisions of Mandate (c) above.
The NCCE is Nigeria’s main teacher education quality assurance body with all the
Colleges of Education, and Nigeria Certificate in Education awarding institutions
directly under its mandate. Others linked with teacher education in Nigeria include:

(i) The Institutes of Education and Faculties of Education of Nigerian

Universities.
(ii) The National Teachers Institute (NTI), and
(iii) The Teachers Registration Council (TRC)

Ensuring Quality in Teacher Education

Three paradigms are offered in this section of the paper for ensuring quality in
teacher education. They are:

A Data Processing Model

One may wish to approach the issue of the quality of teacher education from the
view point of the factory model or the data processing model. This model typically
begins with the in-put into the system at one end where the raw materials proceeds
into and through the system during which the raw material is subjected to a
variety of prescribed treatments until finally at the end of the system the material
is released as a graded output. Granted that the data processing model has been
designed and has been applied mainly for non-human raw material, nevertheless
this model has been usefully adopted to apply to the school system or learning
situations. Figure 1 is an example of such production models.

Figure 1
A Conventional Teaching-Learning Mode Showing Possible Factors to Evaluate
in a College to Ensure quality

Input Characteristics Instructional Learning Outcome

In-coming Trainees Strategies & New Qualified Teacher
Processes

Cognitive Curriculum & Types of Achievement

Input Learning Tasks Efficiency of Learning
Affective Effective Affective Outcome (NCE
Input Methodology Certificates)

Adapted from Bloom (1976)

29
The application of this model to the school or college would indicate three key
areas during which quality control could be crucial and these correspond to (a)
the study of students entry behaviour /characteristics (b) the design of the
curriculum programme and the learning /teaching environment (c) the assessment
of the learning outcomes.

It is my firm belief that the quality of teachers will either rise or fall depending on
what happens in the educative process in these crucial stages. The rest of what
follows from this point on will focus primarily on the procedures often adopted to
ensure quality at the point of entry. After this one examines in some detail the
nature of the programme in-put that can ensure quality between the point of
entry and the student exit, and finally consider quality control at the point of
exit.

A College Evaluation Model

In a College evaluation model, the single most important factor or factors of quality
involve the nature of the programmes colleges offer. In considering what constitute
the essential inputs for a good teacher education programme for a college of
education a wide range of factors can be considered.

Thomas (1990) in his contributions on the evaluation of educational systems included

the following among the school inputs:

Students : Including home background, achievement, pressure in the

home as well as the usual social and economic data.
Teachers : Their background, training and experience. Attitudenal
factors were also considered essential.
Administrators : (similar to teachers)
Physical inputs : School buildings, (equipment especially Books etc).
Management : (Include the seeking and utilization of information and the
use of sophisticated management procedures).

An American accreditation agency lists the following factors as the issues of major
concern to accreditation, Educational objectives, educational programmes,
admission practices, training and experience of teachers, financial stability,
laboratory and Library resources.

In Nigeria where all teacher education programmes are prescribed on a nation -

wide basis, accreditation objectives are bound to be different from the American
system. Since major accreditation requirement is according to current practice
are prescribed by the NCCE, the main problem would appear to be that of assessing
the degree to which institutions conform to the guidelines laid down by the nation
through the Commission (Isyaku, 1993). The current guidelines of the NCCE outline
“minimum content to be imparted in each subject area” were published in 1990,
1996 and 2002 in six volumes each as follows (1) Summary of minimum standard, (2)
General Education, (3) Languages, (4) Vocational and Technical subjects, (5) the
Sciences and (6) Arts and Social Studies. Criteria for quality were specified in

30
detail including: Admission requirements, Course requirements, Minimum credit
requirements, Evaluation and Assessment, Attendance requirement, Minimum
qualification for teaching staff, minimum Teaching requirement, Minimum credits
for progression and graduation, Equipment requirement and, Modes of teaching.
(See Appendices A to E in the Accreditation Manual).

Professionalzing Teacher Education In Nigeria

One way to ensure quality practices in teacher education is to enhance its
professionalization. The following proposed steps may be considered among other
enduring strategies.

(a) Responsibility for Teacher Education : Responsibility here is conceived

in two levels, institutional and societal (government and stakeholders).
The Colleges of Education should be granted fuller autonomy with the
responsibility for planning, operating, revising and updating teacher
education. The Colleges should also continue to be responsible for effective
operation of all of its programmes, as well as its human and material
resources. The Government should further empower the NCCE for better
funding of the Colleges.

(b) Admission of Candidates for Teacher Education : This should be more

rigorous than it is now. There should be an entrance examination set by
the autonomous Colleges and moderated by competent external examiners.
Those who pass the entrance examination should be subjected to oral
and written interview (Ogbele, 1995: 10). The interview enables the College
to ensure that the result of the entrance examinations is genuine. By this
step one is able to ascertain those candidates who have the attitude and
aptitude for teaching. The NCCE should work with the College through
their personnel to ensure standard. Entry qualification should be raised
to at least five credits at SSCE/GCE or its equivalent including English
Language.

(c) Retention of Teacher Education Students : Colleges should device a system

of incentives to encourage the students to regard themselves as
professionals in training and to graduate into the fields as professional
teachers. The incentives may be in the form of financial allowances and
awards provided for, in the annual budget proposal.

(d) Content of Teacher Education : The curriculum for teacher education

needs to be designed to meet the challenges of the future. It must be
made to be found relevant and engaging for the student teacher. New
ideas and concepts in Information Communication Technology (ICT),
Information Management, Computer assisted teaching/learning and other
areas of the Information Technology age relevant to teacher education.
Indeed, every student teacher must be computer literate, to enhance
quality in the system.

31
 (e) The Process of Teacher Education : Process here refers to the practices
and methods used in preparing the student teacher. In other words, one
is talking of the theoretical and practical components of the preparation
of the student teachers. To prepare the student to graduate into teaching
as a profession, the college (teacher educators) will need to intensify the
combination of lecture, teaching, tutorial, counseling, and project
methods. Such are the process which can get the student teacher
creatively and intellectually engaged during his pre-service education.
They can also develop in him the attitude and interest to continue
educating himself as a practicing professional teacher.

(f) Duration of Teacher Education - A proposal : The College of education

should design its curriculum to reflect a five- year course in the students
chosen discipline(s) including Teaching Practice. The honours (double
major) student could use his tutorial hours as follows: 60% for his chosen
discipline, 20% for education, and 20% for General English. A student
combining two teaching subjects could use his time as follows: 60% for his
two subjects, 20% for education and 20% for General English. The Teaching
Practice experience should be spread over the five-year period. This
strategy will help the college to identify and weed out those students
who do not belong to the teaching profession. There will be need to
inculcate in the teacher education student the culture of self -
development in the teaching profession. In this consideration, successful
participation at relevant conferences should be made a requirement for
the award of that certificate. The conference experiences paid for by
the government could be part of the student’s professional orientation
during the last two years. At the successful completion of the five- year
course, the graduating teacher specializing in either of Pre-Primary, Primary,
Secondary, Special or Vocational Education. The universities can then get
involved in teacher education from the second-degree level. In the USA,
the first degree is the level of Basic education as against the Junior
Secondary School Certificate (JSS) in Nigeria.

Problems Militating Against Quality Practices in Teacher Education

The success of an educational programme is strictly tied to the quality of the
teacher. Teacher education has been adversely affected by such factors as incessant
disruption in academic calendar resulting from staff strike actions and students’
unrest, lack of infrastructure, over-stretched facilities, examination malpractices
and ill-motivated personnel’s. If quality is to be ensured, it is important that
constraints affecting teacher education should be identified.

The attitudinal disposition of the society cannot be unconnected with poor

treatment of teachers such as long delay in payment of wages, resulting into
endless industrial action, which further compounds the quality problem. Besides,
there is the issue of low level of commitment to the teaching profession by non -
professionals who see it as a stepping- stone. There is the absence of in-service
development programme like workshops and seminars for teachers in the lower

32
educational level.. Good education needs constant refreshing tasks, vital in updating
knowledge for adequate equipment for global competition. Furthermore,
unwholesome office environment which lacks comfortable furniture, modern office
equipment like computer machines, good common room, up-to-date library and
others also affect commitment to the profession.

Recommendations/Conclusion
The varying constraints of the quality of teachers identified may be corrected
through heeding the following recommendations:
1. Adequate grants to teacher training colleges is imperative in upholding
standard.
2. A good working environment in terms of modern office environment is
vital, such as, comfortable furniture and office equipment. In addition,
car loan, housing loan should be given to teachers to increase their
commitment to teaching and ensure quality.
3. There is need for teachers to be encouraged to keep abreast with demands
of modernity, such as access to modern information equipment and usage
like telephone, e-mail, Internet and so on.
4. In-service development programme such as seminars for teacher at all
levels to constantly refresh them and make keep abreast with modern
times to enhance quality.
5. Strict professionalism is also paramount. Besides, constant review of wages
in line with economic reality will stem brain drain and ensure quality.
6. Professionally unqualified people should not be enlisted as teachers in
our schools and colleges. They should be trained as quickly as possible.

It can be concluded that quality of teacher is vital for the success of any
educational endeavour for human development. The place of teachers as midwives
in the attainment of national goals and objectives is vital. Thus the quality and
adequacy of teachers in terms of appropriate ration is also very important.

References
Alyideino, S. C. (1996) Teacher Education - An Imperative for National Development
Kaduna - Alyo Nig, Ltd.

Bloom, B. (1976) Human Characteristics and School Leaving NewYork P. 11 Me Graw

Hill Book Co.

Federal Republic of Nigeria (1981) National Policy on Education Lagos, Federal

Government Press.

Gidado, T. (1995) A General Conspectus of problems and prospects of Teacher

Education in Nigeria. A paper presented at conference of Teacher Education,
NCCE, Kaduna, 1995.

Isyaku, K. (1996) National Commission for Colleges of Education - JM.inimum Standards

for Nigeria Certificate in Education , Zaria, Yaliam Press Ltd.

33
Larson, C. W (1983) Trends in the regulation of professions in Young K. E. Chambers
CM, Kells H. R (eds) 1983 Understandlng Accreditatio n Jossey- Boss, San Franciso
California.

Ogbele, M. D, (19951 The Teacher factor as it affects the Quality of Education in

Nigeria. - Unpublished Pankshin, FCE.

Okoye, P.NC. (1995) The Problems of Professionalism and1 Teaching in Nigeria -

unpublished presented at the Annual National Conference of Education
Administrators and Planning Abia State University, September, 10th to 13:h.

Seldon, W. K. (1976) Accreditation and Public Interest Council on Post-Secondary

Accreditation Washington, D. C.

Tanner and Tanner (1975) Curriculum Development-Theory into Practice New York,
Macmillan Publishing Company Inc.

Ukeje, B.O. (1992) “The Education of Teachers for the New social order “in the
Nigerian Teacher. Kaduna, NCCE.

UNESCO (2002) First.Global Forum on International Quality Assurance Accreditation,

and the Recognition of qualification in Higher Education - Proceedings Pans UNESCO
Press.

UNESCO (2002) International Bureau of Education - Overview and Strategy 2QQ2-

2007 Geneva, UNESCO Press.

34
 Role and functions of NCTE in the Context of
Quality Assurance in Teacher Education in India

Prof. P. Venkatramaiah*

Introduction
India has been facing, over the years, the challenges of Educational expansion,
Universalization of Elementary Education, Vocationalization of secondary education,
higher and professional education and over all quality of education. In all these it
is undisputed that the role of Teacher is paramount. Recognising this Kothari
Education Commission has rightly pointed out that “for the qualitative improvement
of Education, a sound programme of Professional Education of Teachers is essential.”
Keeping this in view and also to bring order to some disturbing situations that
prevailed in the field of teacher education National Council for Teacher Education
was established as a statutory body.

Quality improvement in Teacher Education has been one of the main thrusts of
NCTE established on 17th August 1995 through an Act of Indian Parliament with a
view of achieving planned and co-ordinated development of teacher education
system throughout the country. It has also got the objective of the regulation and
proper maintenance of norms and standards in the teacher education system.
NCTE is also concerned with the challenge of making teacher education relevant
to the changing context of education.

This paper attempts to highlight the various activities initiated by the NCTE so far
in the context of Quality Assurance in Teacher Education in India and also project
the future programs that are planned to be implemented to enhance the quality
in teacher education at all levels.

Quality Initiatives
A series of steps are initiated by NCTE for raising the quality of pre-service teacher
education programme. India, being a country with different states having different
perspectives on Education and several teacher Education institutes working with
commercial interest, faced lot of diversity in the field of teacher education.
Therefore the major challenge was to bring all institutions to work under a
disciplined framework. In order to achieve this the Council formulated the norms
and standards for nine teacher education courses that included pre-primary,
elementary or primary, secondary, physical and distance education programmes.
It is made compulsory for the existing and new institutions to seek NCTE recognition
after fulfilling the NCTE norms. Further the recognised Institutions have to submit
the performance appraisal report annually. These PAR’s are reviewed by the Regional
Committees and take action for withdrawal of recognition in case of violation of
norms by the institution. This is always done through the issue of a notice. A

*Chairman, Southern Regional Committee, National Council for Teacher Education, Bangalore, India

35
notice to the institution sends the right signal for satisfactory performance of the
institution in keeping the quality of teacher education.

For purposes of bringing the quality of teacher education programme on par with
similar programmes in other countries and to meet the essential stage specific
requirements the Council developed “ Curriculum Framework for Quality Teacher
Education”. The salient features of this Curriculum framework are :

1) It expects the Institutions or states or universities to evolve their own

detailed curriculum based on the framework.
2) It gives a broad frame of reference for local /regional initiatives to design
curricula.
3) It provides for the development of scientific and technological features
and use of IT and emerging communication systems in teaching -learning.
4) It emphasises Education in human values.

The characteristics of the framework suggest that it :

a) Reflects Indian Heritage

b) Responds to the latest developments in the field of Education
c) Integrates theory and practice of education
d) Enables teachers to experiment with new ideas
e) Emphasises the inseparability of pre-service and in-service education of
teachers.

It is well known that the standards of learning by the learners in our schools and
colleges are strongly influenced by the teachers’ capacity, understanding and
skills. In view of this NCTE has initiated a scheme for developing a sound basis for
teacher preparation through reorganisation of theory courses of teacher education
in terms of Conceptual Foundation.
Indian society has felt the effect of information explosion that has arisen due to
Information and Communication Technology (ICT). NCTE, being aware of the trends
and utility of ICT, has made ICT literacy a compulsory part of B Ed course. This is
done with the objective,

1) to create awareness amongst teacher trainees about ICT and its use in
teaching -learning.
2) to acquaint teacher trainees with computer system and vocabulary of ICT
3) to develop competency among the teacher trainees of using on-line and
off-line electronic resources and use INTERNET for personal academic
improvement and school teaching.

NCTE organized more than 100 one day workshops inviting around 100 teacher
educators to each one of these workshops throughout the country in order to
familiarize the basis of computer usage by the faculty of BED colleges. In addition
all the BED colleges have been supplied with CD-ROM’s to teach the basics of IT
literacy.

36
Value Education
NCTE is aware of the concern expressed in NPE-86 regarding the erosion of essential
values and the pervasive cynicism. In order to make education a forceful tool for
the cultivation of social and moral values the Council felt the need for readjustment
in the curriculum. It has already initiated action to “inculcate a sense of value
judgement, value commitment, and value transmission” among the teachers through
Curriculum for Quality Teacher Education. NCTE has published a monograph entitled
“Human Rights and Indian Values” written by Justice Rama Jois and circulated the
same to all institutions of teacher education. It has put on its website several
publications related to human values. For example (1) Gandhi on Education (2) Sri
Aurobindo on Education (3) Human Rights and National Values (4) Role and
Responsibility of Teachers in Building Modern India by Swami Ranganathananda ji
(5) Education for Character Development by Kireet Joshi etc are in the website
and also in the form of CD-ROM of NCTE.

Development Of Skills
NCTE has identified the following criticisms against the teacher education programme
in the country:

1) Teacher Education Programme tends to present theoretical and conceptual

inputs with disciplinary approach of cognate subjects.
2) Perspectives in Education do not get focussed for their clearer delineation
and conceptual articulation.

The prospective teachers have to develop the skills and abilities that would help
them face actual class room teaching situations. Therefore the course has to be
largely around practice-based theoretical knowledge. The idea is to make
knowledge in teacher education a “Professional Knowledge.”

The professional character of a teacher is observed on the basis that:

1) Knowledge components of varied kinds are integrated

2) Professional practices and process of Teacher Education should involve
analysis, discrimination, reflection and decision.

Keeping the above in view NCTE has initiated action to reorganise the context of
Teacher Education Programme and in determining the modalities of their transaction
at the secondary stage. The approach and the learning materials that are being
developed will be finalised in consultation with teacher educators.

Calendar Of Activities
The quality of any academic programme also depends on the proper and effective
way the curriculum prescribed for the course is transacted. In order to maintain
the standards in each of the TEP the Council has initiated the development of
blue print for organising the curricular and co-curricular activities over the year
chronologically. This is with in the total duration fixed by NCTE for each course

37
for the successful completion of the academic programme. This blue print called
“Calendar Of Activities” is developed, to start with, for BEd course. This calendar
also leaves scope for innovations by the individual institutions.

NCTE is also reviewing annually through the Regional Committees the academic
performance of these institutions through Performance Appraisal Reports to be
submitted by each institution. This procedure has brought in seriousness of purpose
among all the institutes of Teacher Education throughout the Country.

Seminars
The expansion taking place in the field of education in the context of globalization
on the one hand and the adoption of UEE in India on the other has put the onerous
responsibility on NCTE to disseminate the current changes in the field of Teacher
Education among the teacher educators at all the stages. Keeping this in view
Regional and National seminars are organised to constantly update the curriculum
framework, include component on value education, adopt internship etc.

NCTE has tried to share and learn from the experiences of SAARC Countries in the
process of preparing the teachers for UEE, by organising a SAARC conference
during April 26-30 1999 at New Delhi.

MoU with NAAC:

The quality of Teacher Education offered by the TTI’s needs to be audited by an
agency outside NCTE. The Council, no doubt, has been attempting to bring in
qualitative changes in the curriculum transaction in the TTI’s. But the innovative
programmes adopted by these institutes in terms of the activities under extension
service, community programmes, student support services, faculty development
programmes, social service etc have to be examined closely by an agency other
than NCTE.It is with this objective that NCTE has entered into a MOU with NAAC an
autonomous organisation established by UGC. A manual for self-appraisal of Teacher
Training Institutes was finalised by a team of experts from NCTE and NAAC.These
institutions are expected to get accredited before Dec 2005.The process of
accreditation has brought in lot of attitudinal changes in these institutes towards
Quality.

Future Programmes
ICT Initiatives: In order to make the existing teacher make use of less expensive
but more powerful multimedia for enhancing learning, NCTE has visualised net
working of 3000 and odd teacher education institutions and make 25 000 teacher
educators become computer literates and also see how these 25 000 teacher
educators would reach out to 3 million school teachers.

Two schemes are proposed to be adopted viz; (1) Networking of Teacher Education
Institutions using internet and (2) Use of Edu SAT the satellite completely dedicated
for Education to be launched by ISRO during 10th plan period. These schemes are
going to break the isolation of institutions.

38
NCTE has already created one of the biggest portals on the teacher education
system. Already 20 publications of NCTE can be accessed from the internet in a
user- friendly form.

Networking : The immediate task before NCTE is to make all the existing 25 000
teacher educators ICT literates. Once that happens it will create multiplier impact
in the sense that the 200 thousand teachers produced every year from the TTI’s
will be able to handle ICT with good facility and use it to prepare teaching- learning
materials and also access information from internet.

Under the scheme, hardware will be provided only to NCTE, SCERT, IASEs, DIETs.
Hardware will not be provided to institutions not covered under the scheme.
However the training of their faculty is included. NCTE intends to develop ICT
based instructional packages for teacher educators. The in-service education of
all the teacher educators will be arranged with the help of master trainers drawn
from Universities, private sector organisations involved with ICT education, individual
experts drawn from societies such as Computer Society of India etc The whole
programme is proposed to be undertaken with the guidance of a committee of
experts. This committee would also examine the vast amount of software generated
when 25 000 teacher educators start preparing multimedia lessons on teaching –
learning etc. The ambitious plan of NCTE is to start with 5 ICT professionals who
will develop training material and train 250 master trainers. These master trainers
will in turn train, at the rate of 100 each, 25000 teacher educators. Once these 25
000 teacher educators learn how to use ICT in teaching – learning then in the next
phase NCTE plans to go to 3 million teachers in schools.

Launching of EduSAT by ISRO with KU band is in the final stages of approval by the
Government. The KU- band has a bigger bandwidth than the C-band that sends
signals of “Gyan Darshan”. This is a great advantage. The beams of KU-band can be
focussed on different states. If there is a state level hub, it can be used for
elementary teacher education, secondary teacher education, higher education
sector, professional education sector etc. With this facility it is possible to reach
even block level. With the establishment of a 1.2 meter dish, a telephone and a
computer with a printer etc distance education effort can be strengthened and
improve both in- service and pre-service training to teachers. This is like going
beyond networking of 3000 teacher education institutions.

Teacher Training At The Tertiary Level : The University Grants Commission has
felt the need to orient the college and university lecturers at the initial stages of
their recruitment and hence established Academic Staff Colleges in Several
universities. The orientation and refresher courses offered through Academic Staff
Colleges have not been able to achieve the desired results of providing the needed
orientation to the lecturers at the tertiary level. In order to bring in orientation
to the teaching profession certain professional skills are to be acquired by the
teachers even at the tertiary level. This has become all the more important since
lot of efforts are being made in the higher education sector for the Total Quality
Management.

39
The teachers at the tertiary level need to be exposed to pedagogical science.
The training in pedagogy should be made compulsory for all the persons aspiring
to be teachers at the tertiary level. The NCTE which has the responsibility for the
planned and coordinated development of Teacher Education in the country should
discuss with UGC and arrive at a policy decision regarding the need for such a
training and then the period of training. NCTE should prepare a module for the
course that can be offered through ASC’s of the Universities.

Internship : Teacher Education Programme is a professional one like that of

Medical, Engineering and Law. A teacher trainee should have enough exposure to
class room teaching situations as pointed out above. This experience requires a
teacher trainee to have extra realistic training over and above the training in a
college of education or a TTI. This can be done only by adopting an Internship
Programme in TEP in addition to reorganising the context of TEP as stipulated
above. NCTE, after due deliberations, has introduced Internship of six months
duration at the Elementary Teacher Training Programme. It has plans to extend
this to BEd programme also. These are expected to enhance the professional
character of a Teacher Trainee.

Conclusion
In a short span of 8 years of its existence NCTE has initiated many activities to
professionalise teacher training in all the areas of Teacher Education Programme.
It has been able to bring in several innovations in Teacher Education in the context
of Quality Assurance. NCTE will continue to organize seminars at the Regional and
National levels periodically to take stock of the status of Teacher Training Institutes
and to bring in appropriate changes for improving the Quality in Teacher Education.

40
 Quality Assurance for the Universal Basic
Education Programme

Prof. Gidado Tahir*

Introduction
In the Nigerian context the formal Universal Basic Education Programme has three
major components, namely: pre-school education, primary education, junior
secondary education. Given the diversity of the programme clientele and the
multitude of skills and knowledge that it transmits, it is only obvious that the
providers of the UBE will be diverse and many. The providers include governmental
and non-governmental organisations, faith-based and community-based
organisations, associations, the industry, organised private and informal sectors of
the economy, etc. Also the avenues where learning, education and training take
place are as diverse and many. For instance, they take place in private nursery
school, public primary school, a Christian missionary junior secondary school, and
non-governmental organisation run literacy class, a Quranic school, a tailoring institute,
a hair dressing saloon, etc.

Given this situation, a thoughtfully planned framework for quality assurance with
flexibility for varying locations across the country and programme types became
necessary. Indeed, a tripartite structure of quality assurance involving monitoring
officers of the UBE implementing Agency, Inspectors of the State Primary Education
Boards and Supervisors in the Local Education Authorities, has been instituted.

Summary Of Results From Monitoring And National Assessment

On the average, 41 percent of the pupils had textbooks in the four core
subjects: English Language, Mathematics, Primary Science and Social
Studies.

Performance mean scores for primary pupils at the national level in 2001
for Mathematics and English Language were 34.02 percent and 40.10
percent, respectively. In 2003 the figures for primary pupils were 24.70
percent for English Language, 30.95 percent for Mathematics, 40.33 percent
for Primary Science and 25.18 percent for Social Studies.

Teachers reported the need for professional development in some aspects

of curriculum delivery, classroom management, out-of-school activities,
and evaluation practice.

Community participation in school development was poor.

Most schools were generally found not to be child-friendly.

*National Coordinator University, Basic Education Programme, UBE Building,IBB Close,

Wuse Zone 4, Nigeria

41

The low level of reading ability of a greater proportion of the pupils was
the most potent explanatory factor for poor performance in achievement.
Whereas, possession of English Language textbook was the best predictor
of achievement.

Teachers are inadequately prepared to teach literacy skills to children

using the language of the community.

Young children in classes 1 to 3 are not acquiring literacy skills in their

own language.

Learners in classes 4 to 6 do not develop sufficient skills in English to

learn other subjects in the curriculum.

Evidence of effective use of the National Fund given to states for the
provision of furniture, constructing and rehabilitating blocks of classrooms.

Community participation in school activities leading to increase in pupils’

enrolment, retention, and provision of facilities and self-help projects.

Increase in enrolment and retention of pupils in schools.

Provision of infrastructure, furniture, school record books, and

instructional materials by Federal, State, and Local Governments, as well
as other stakeholders.

Policy Implications

School-community relation has become an important concept in school
improvement and development. This has informed the policy on Community
Development and Self-help Projects, in which school communities identify
projects in the school, provide 25 percent cost of project execution in
cash, materials or labour and manages implementation. Projects address
issues that are related to access, equity and quality.

Feedback from National Assessment and Monitoring has necessitated a

major dialogue with stakeholders to strengthen the Teacher Professional
Development Programme, which has been in a pilot phase with support
from the World Bank.

The National Policy on Education states that the medium of instruction in

classes 1 to 3 will be the mother tongue. This is hinged on the premise
that children taught initial literacy and numeracy skills in their mother
tongue learn much faster and are less likely to drop out of school. Such
children are empowered to transfer their literacy skills to English in classes
4 to 6.

The major plank of the Teacher Professional Development Programme (In-

service) provides a structured and systematic forum for:

42
 (I) Teacher educators to work with teachers to analyze teacher
competencies and strategies for use of language across the
curriculum.

(II) So far, teacher professional development programme has been

extended to 235 schools in 19 states and 19 local governments on a
pilot basis. In all, 2040 teachers have benefited from the training.

(III) Refresher courses provided in core subjects like English,

Mathematics, Social Studies and Science as well as in teaching
methodology and lesson preparation.

(IV) Developing teacher skills in using language effectively to introduce

literacy and numeracy in the classes 1 to 3.

(V) The improvement of literacy skills of children in classes 1 to 3.

(VI) Developing instructional materials and lesson plan.

(VII) Supply of about 3 million texts in supplementary readers to boost

literacy and reading by the Federal Government.

(VIII) Supply of Supplementary Readers to 1,110 focus schools to boost

literacy reading.

(IX) A National reading campaign had been planned by UBE in collaboration

with the Reading Association of Nigeria (RAN) in focus states.

(X) Working collaboratively with teachers in other schools.

(XI) Teachers in grades 4 to 6 to work with experts/teacher trainers on

effective methods of teaching English Language in order to develop
learners’ reading and writing skills and their ability to learn through
English as a medium of instruction.

(XII) Assisting teachers to reflect on and analyze the effectiveness of

different methods of teaching English Language skills.

(XIII) Developing lesson plans and preparing instructional materials.

Preservice Training

A greater proportion (about 60 percent) of our schools are located in rural
communities. Furthermore, about 30 – 40 percent of the schools have pupil
enrolment ranging from 50 to 200 and even less.

Invariably, such schools have two or three teachers, including the head teacher.

Findings from our Action Research in a few pilot schools support the use of
multigrade teaching approaches.

43

A greater proportion (about 60 percent) of our schools are located in rural
communities. Furthermore, about 30 – 40 percent of the schools have pupil
enrolment ranging from 50 to 200 and even invariably, such schools have two
or three teachers, the head teachers inclusive.

Findings from our Action research in a few pilot schools support the use of
multigrade teaching approaches

Plans are on to develop capacity in multigrade teaching using the services of

the National Commission of Colleges of Education, National Teachers Institute
and the Universal Basic Education Programme.

Multigrade schools provide access for girls and children in nomadic Communities.

TABLE – 1: STRATEGIES FOR QUALITY ASSURANCE

No Strategies Characteristics Process Feedback Agents

1 Monitoring
Tracks
Routine 1. Post Staff of the

progress of monitoring monitoring Commission
Programme
Follow-up conference in 12 Zonal
activities monitoring with: Offices
based on
Investigative
Teachers
established monitoring
Head
performance
Nationwide Teachers
indicators monitoring.
School
and All these supervisors
benchmarks. utilize a
Officials

Checks variety of
programme instruments Schools
for flaws or
Individual or Board.
breakdowns. team visits 2. Dissemi-

Provides to school. nation of
information
Two Reports
to regulate individual
To all
activities and visits in a stake-
effect week and 16 holders,
corrections business interested
to days of team bodies
meandering visits, and
programmes covering five political
and activities. percent of leaders
schools in
the
operating
zone.

Monitors
federal
inputs and
standards.

Describes
Employs
Provides Staff of the

2 National
performance systematic information Commission,
Assessment sampling on Federal
of the
education procedures. diagnosed Inspectors,
system or its
Instrument problem Schools
subsector development. areas to Board and
relevant Local
officers, Education
e.g. Authority.

44
No Strategies Characteristics Process Feedback Agents

Diagnoses
Collecting curriculum

problems in data on improve-
the education cognitive ment,
system and non- teacher

Monitors cognitive professional
performance behaviours. support
of reform
Objectives and
programmes. reporting of action

Tracks findings. research.
learning
Dissemi-
progress nates

Provides data printed
on reports
achievement to stake-
to inform holders
policy and and
improve political
efficiently. leaders

3 Inspection:
Assessment of
Involves
Report Inspectors

Full general the school three and at the state
inspection. organisational principal: reinforces education

Follow-up structure, stages of effective boards.
inspection Curriculum pre- pedagogical

Exami- delivery, inspection, methods
nation/ achievements inspction in use.
Recognition and and post-
Preffers
Inspection. community inspection. appropriate

Advisory or relations.
Pre- remedial
routine visit.
Identifies the inspection action.
strengths and focuses on Provides
weaknesses collecting compre-
of the data about hensive
school. the school, data

Improves the selecting about
quality of members of schools
teaching and the team for policy
learning. and team formu-

Less leaders, lation.
frequently mobilizing
Facilitate
undertaken. material teacher-

Usually resources inspector
planned with and interaction
definite planning to discuss
objectives. logistics. observed

Lack of
Inspection problem.
personnel visits involve
hinders observed,
coverage of counseling
more schools and
documenting
using
several
instruments.

45
No Strategies Characteristics Process Feedback Agents

4 Supervision Improves
Individual or Post Experienced

teacher Team visits supervision head
performance to schools. conference teacher
and student
4-6 of such on Officers of
behaviour. visits in a observed the Local
Observers school term deficiencies Education
instructional of 12 weeks. and Authority.
processes
Each strengths,
Analyzes supervisor leading to
teacher and oversees 6- improvements
pupil 10 schools. of the
behaviours.
Uses of teaching-
Records variety of learning
classroom instruments process,
events in order to obtain school
to improve information administration
teacher on school and
performance, administration, relationships.
learning and infrastructure,
facilitate goal and
achievement. instructional
materials,
staffing,
teaching
and
learning.

46
 Futuristic Challenges to Quality Assurance in
Teacher Education:
Need for a Comprehensive Perspective

Shyam B. Menon *

This paper attempts firstly to define the limits of the quality discourse in teacher
education by articulating its assumptions in terms of what may be considered as
some of the basic characterizations of teacher education. Further, it paints a
picture of diversity of systems and processes involved in teacher education in
India today, thereby attempting to bring out the challenges in arriving at
formulations of quality indicators which are applicable to a variety of situations
and are, at the same time, sensitive to the specific needs and functions of each of
those. The paper then makes an effort to predict the broad future trends that
may unfold with regard to teacher education systems and the challenges that
they are likely to throw up for quality assurance.

Assumptions
It is useful to set limits to the notion of quality in teacher education right at the
beginning. Any discussion on quality in relation to teacher education must, in my
opinion, accept as its basic assumptions the following characterizations of teacher
education :

First, it must be recognized that teacher education is not an autonomous entity.

Its purpose is to cater to the needs of school education. In that sense, teacher
education is a second order phenomenon; its structure and the processes it inheres
are determined substantially by the characteristics of the primary phenomenon,
school education, the role it earmarks for teacher and the competencies it takes
to play that role effectively. Therefore, quality of teacher education is
circumscribed by the expectations of school education. On the other hand, teacher
education at its best is potentially the source of new ideas related to school.
Quality of teacher education is thus not to be understood merely in terms of its
effective performance of the role expected of it by school education, it would
also be about the extent it is able to influence philosophies and practices of
school.

Induction into teaching as a profession has two prerequisites: one, mastery

over an area of knowledge that forms the substance of school curriculum; and
two, internalization of certain basic competencies that are integral to its effective
transaction. While teacher education ordinarily presumes the former, that is
mastery over the content, in an aspirant even before he/she enters the system as
a student teacher, it has as its primary focus the development of the latter, that is
competencies related to curriculum transaction. However, quality discourse in
teacher education cannot overlook the content component. It is material therefore

* Central Institute of Education, University of Delhi, New Delhi, India

47
to take as an assumption in the quality discourse a second characterization of
teacher education, viz., that it is not a stand-alone system and is appropriately
perched atop the edifice of general education at the secondary level or a system
of liberal education in a specific area of knowledge at the tertiary level. In other
words, teacher education builds on, or is integrated with, a system of secondary
or tertiary education, which aims at imparting the basic knowledge adequate to
transact the content of school curriculum and a worldview and value system
characteristic of an ‘educated adult’.

Finally, what is ordinarily referred to as teacher education is the initial teacher

preparation leading to certification, whether a degree or diploma, based on
which teachers are recruited in school systems. However, it is now being increasingly
recognized that the initial teacher preparation only serves to equip the professional
aspirant with the basic skills and competencies. These basic abilities need to be
polished and updated regularly on an ongoing basis throughout one’s professional
career, much in the manner in which more established professions like medicine
expects its practitioners to go through alternative trajectories of continuing
professional education. School systems that take quality seriously do have structures
and processes built into them for the continuing professional development of
their teachers. Thus, teacher education includes not only the initial preparation,
but also the continuum of professional development of practitioners.

In sum, before we begin discussing on quality issues related to teacher education,

we must assume that such discussion cannot be independent of quality issues
related to school, that it cannot be seen unrelated to the quality of feeder systems
of general secondary education and liberal tertiary education, and that it has to
take a comprehensive view comprising the initial teacher preparation and the
continuing professional development.

The Growing Diversities

The teacher education scene was fairly straight-jacketed in India till the Nineties.
There were only two major streams of teacher education, both of the nature of
initial teacher preparation: The first was a two year programme after twelve years
of schooling leading to a diploma, qualifying teachers for elementary education.
The other was a one-year B.Ed. degree programme after a graduation or a
postgraduation, qualifying teachers for secondary and senior secondary levels,
respectively. When the statutory authority for accreditation and maintenance of
standards in India, National Council for Teacher Education (NCTE), was established
through an Act of Parliament in 1993, it was considered that their primary focus
would be on the above two streams. The norms and guidelines that the NCTE
formulated as instruments for accreditation and assurance of a minimum acceptable
quality were largely on the basis of input parameters in terms of infrastructure,
size and qualification of faculty etc. However, today we find ourselves in a situation
where there is tremendous variety of programmes of teacher education across
states, particularly those preparing teaching personnel for primary education,
which imposes an enormous challenge on quality assurance in teacher education.

48
India has witnessed a remarkable expansion of primary schooling since the early
Nineties largely through the centrally sponsored schemes under Education for All
(EFA). The District Primary Education Programme (DPEP) has been perhaps the most
ambitious, comprehensive and extensive of such programmes. As a part of providing
for access to primary education among the unreached, both geographically as
well as socially, several alternative school systems have been established in many
states, the Educational Guarantee Schemes of Madhya Pradesh and Uttar Pradesh
and Shishu Shiksha Karmasuchi of West Bengal, to name a few. In Gujarat, there
are different alternative school systems, each with distinct characteristics designed
to address the needs of a specific target group. These differ sometimes from
district to district. There is a specially designed system of alternative schooling
for children of migrant labour in one district, a non-residential bridge school in
another and a special alternative school for children of saltpan workers in a third.
Most of such schemes are essentially about providing the minimum basic conditions
for primary schooling inter alia through a cadre of para-teachers, who have a
stipulated minimum educational qualification, which vary from state to state and
system to system even within states, and who are inducted and trained through
training programmes whose structure and duration again vary from state to state
and system to system. Most of such programmes have a built-in component of in-
service training and continuing professional support for teachers. These
programmes together deal with a sizeable proportion of teaching personnel in the
primary school systems in India today.

The alternative schools and the system of para-teachers may well become a regular
feature, particularly so long as budgetary allocation to education does not increase
substantially. With the Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan emerging as the new initiative aiming
at Universal Elementary Education (UEE), there are clear indications that alternative
structures of schooling and cadres of para-teachers are likely to be a feature at
the upper primary level of schooling as well. With UEE within reach, when pressures
of numbers begin to hit the secondary schools, one could safely predict that
similar strategies of alternative schools and para-teachers might proliferate even
to the secondary school systems in several states in the foreseeable future.

It is thus clear that the diversity we see today in teacher education systems in
India is not an ephemeral or a passing phenomenon; it is here to stay. The expansion
and diversification of private sector in school education is also indicative of
increasing diversities in teacher education. Some private universities are already
involved in designing specific teacher training programmes, some through the
distance mode, largely focusing on the growing private sector in school education,
particularly aimed at the nascent phenomenon of international schools. Such
programmes are also likely to attract those teachers aspiring to compete in job
markets in the developed countries. The quality discourse in teacher education
must therefore reckon with training systems and strategies, vastly diverse in terms
of duration, substance and relative emphasis in training, location, level of education
at which the training is perched and mode of certification. It would thus be
increasingly difficult to define quality indicators in teacher education in terms of
input parameters alone, cutting across the vast range of systems, institutions and
strategies.
49
What the Future holds
Based on our understanding of these emergent trends in school education in
India, one could venture to gaze into the crystal ball and make some fairly modest
predictions about the future or futures that await(s) teacher education.

From what we saw in the previous section, it could be extrapolated that the
State-initiated programmes for expansion of schooling will continue to look for
alternative systems of schooling and alternative cadres of teachers. The growth
and diversification trends in private sector of schooling also prompt us to predict
increasing heterogeneity in the cadre of teachers. What follows logically is the
prediction that school systems will tend to have increasingly heterogeneous cadres
of teachers with a wide variety of educational backgrounds, trainings, orientations
and so on.

School curriculum is becoming increasingly complex. Many new areas of knowledge

are getting integrated into it. The methodology of curriculum transaction is also
undergoing transformations. This is all the more the case with those school systems,
which are pace setting and are ‘market leaders’. In this context, we are likely to
experience an increasing rate of obsolescence in teacher competencies, and
therefore, a more pronounced need for continuous professional development of
teachers and for provisions for periodic assessment of teacher competencies.

The emphasis in periodic in-service training and ongoing technical resource support
for professional development of teachers, which we have begun to see in some of
the recent alternative school systems, is likely to be mainstreamed and
institutionalized. There is enough evidence to suggest a definite shift from an
exclusive focus on initial teacher preparation to an integrated and inclusive
perspective of initial preparation and continuing professional development of
teachers.

With all these above developments, and with a liberalizing economy as backdrop, it
is most likely that along with single-entry, single-exit programmes of teacher
education with relatively rigid designs, there will also be those with more flexible
designs, with provisions for multiple entries and multiple exits and for bridges with
other courses and with continuing professional practice. In conjunction with this
development, the distinction between face-to-face (formal) mode and distributed
(open and distance) mode of teacher education will become increasingly blurred.
The insularity of conventional institutions vis-à-vis open and distance education
institutions offering teacher education programmes is likely to diminish. Multi-
mode, multi-site and modular programmes of teacher education may come into
vogue.

The Challenges for Quality Assurance

These emerging and futuristic trends in teacher education will have a bearing on
considerations related to quality and quality assurance of teacher education.
These developments are likely to throw up a number of very specific challenges

50
for quality assurance in teacher education. Our existing notions related to quality
assessment and the indicators used for this will need major transformations. We
will need to go beyond the first generation indicators which are based on input
parameters and move towards those which are applicable to a variety of situations
with a wide range of diversity in each input parameter, and are, at the same time,
sensitive to the specific needs and functions of each of those. It will need to be
based on definitions of specific competencies associated with effective practice
of teaching, and of the training experiences and processes that facilitate the
development of these competencies. In other words, the focus of quality assessment
will then shift from inputs to processes and outputs.

We will need to recognize that just like there could be different notions about
‘good’ classroom teaching and ‘effective’ professional practice by teacher, there
could well be alternative philosophies, and divergent notions emerging from them,
related to ‘good’ or ‘effective’ teacher education. This will call for flexibility in
approaches to and methodology of quality assessment in teacher education. Quality
guidelines will then need to be so formulated as to enable alternative and creative
designs for programmes of initial preparation and continuing professional
development of teachers.

The systems of accreditation and maintenance of standards may need to broaden

their domain, which is at present focused on teacher education programmes and
institutions, and include within it teacher as well. A need is perhaps increasingly
felt now for a system of professional accreditation and renewal of accreditation
of practicing teachers, in other words, a system of licensing practitioners. If there
is greater clarity about competencies associated with effective teachers and a
valid methodology of assessing them in aspirant teachers and practicing teachers,
an accreditation system could then shift its focus from teacher education to
teachers, in which case they could adopt greater flexibility in accommodating a
range of alternative and creative designs for teacher education programmes and
systems. For this to happen, new instruments, methodologies and systems for
periodic assessment of teacher competencies need to be researched and
developed.

51
52
 Assessment and Accreditation of Teacher
Education Institutions: An Indian Experience

Dr. K. Rama*
and
Dr. G. Srinivas**

Introduction
The ancient gurukul system of Indian education was a community supported,
autonomous institutional framework that not only helped a natural transmission of
knowledge from generation to generation, but also groomed adequate number of
willing and talented students as prospective teachers.In other words schooling of
the youth and training of the next generation of teachers went hand in hand in
the premises of the same institution. The gurukuls maintained high standards and
taught all subjects relevant to the needs of the society. However by the introduction
of the colonial British Administration the responsibility shifted from community to
the state and also there was a total shift in the method of imparting education.The
system was meant only to prepare personnel suiting to the British Administration.
This resulted in a large vaccum in the teaching profession. Realizing this the then
Colonial government has set up various committees to revamp the system. The
identification of the need for a formal teacher training in India can be traced
back to as early as 1854 when the Woods Despatch known as the Magna Carta of
Indian Education , and the subsequent Stanley’s report (1859) laid emphasis on
training of teachers. The first secondary teachers training school was started at
Madras in 1886. In the following years various education commissions have given
emphasis on rigorous teacher training modes and methods and as a quality initiative
the concept of imparting teaching skills through practice teaching was introduced
into the training programmes. To bring in seriousness into the profession and
further development of the faculty the Saddle’s commission has recommended the
establishment of departments of Education in the universities. It was only in 1932
that the Andhra University took the lead by introducing the B. Ed, programme
followed by the introduction of M. Ed programme in Bombay University in 1936.

In the recent times the NPE (1986) and the subsequent POA laid great stress on
rescuing the quality of education at all levels. On the recommendations of the
NPE(1986) , the National Council for Teacher Education (NCTE) that was established
in 1973 was strengthened by giving a statutory status in 1995. Enactment of the
NCTE Act by the Parliament marked the most purposeful and determined action
taken at the national level to place teacher education at a high pedestal. Before
this well measured move, teacher education in India presented a kaleidoscopic
picture both in variety and standards.Regional imbalances,difference in the skills
and competencies of the teacher trainers, large variations in the training
programmes and medium of instructions etc. added to the complexity of the

* Deputy Adviser, National Assessment and Accreditation Council, Bangalore, India

** Deputy Secretary, University Grants Commission, Northern Regional Office, Gauhati, India

53
problem. Time was ripe to embark on new conscious efforts for achieving uniform
national standards and quality approach to teacher education issues. The
establishment of NCTE as a statutory body provided the badly needed corrective
to the imbroglio.

To give a concrete shape to the deeply felt national craving for an immediate need
of quality enhancement in various programmes conducted in our colleges and
universities (as per the NPE, 1986 and the subsequent POA) the UGC established
NAAC as an autonomous body under it in 1994. NAAC was entrusted with assessing
the quality of education provided in the colleges and universities across the Nation
and accredit them by giving appropriate grades. The process of A&A of NAAC was
essentially aimed at helping the institutions in attaining high standards and in
breaking new grounds for achieving authentic, autonomous growth. The impact of
NAAC on the national higher education scenario was direct and spontaneous.
Overall NAAC has created a fresh wave of quality consciousness among the higher
education institutions in the country. Realizing that deliberate and persistent
measures taken by various individual institutions to keep aloft the flag of excellence
only could further generate and sustain a culture of quality consciousness, the
NCTE decided to persuade the teacher education institutions to undergo A&A, by
an external agency. As NAAC had already spearheaded the quality movement in the
higher education system of the country and has adopted internationally accepted
procedures NCTE entered into an MOU with NAAC for undertaking A&A of teacher
education institutions.

Assessment and Accreditation of Teacher Education Institutions by NAAC

The process of A&A by NAAC is not an external regulatory mechanism or a superior
outside judgement scheme. It is essentially an institutions collective endeavor to
constantly and consistently move forward and upward in the direction of relevance,
effectiveness and credibility of the educational work they are engaged in. It is a
process by which an institution of higher learning periodically evaluates its activities
seeking an independent outside opinion on its success in achieving its own set
objectives. The moving drive behind the A&A is the self-conviction that an
outstanding institution should not remain static at certain level of performance,
but should always surge ahead in pursuit of excellence in their chosen line of
activity. Therefore the primary role in the A&A process rests with the individual
institution or the department. The role of NAAC in the whole process is that of a
friend , philosopher and guide. However the responsibilities of both the institution
and the accrediting agency are inseparable sides of the same coin. NAAC is thus a
facilitator supporting the institutions in their endeavor for quality and excellence.

The Methodology
The three stage process for assessment and accreditation of teacher education
institutions revolves round the institutional processes.The three core stages in
the process are:
 The self assessment by the college and submission of the self-appraisal
report(SAR)

54
  Validation of the SAR submitted by the institution by the peer team
appointed by NAAC
 Consideration of the assessment report of the peer team by NAAC for
accreditation

Self Appraisal Process: The self-appraisal process which is the first step when an
institution moves towards accreditation is not just another preparation for
inspection or a mere form filling exercise but is a catalyst for institutional review.
As the process emphasizes on building for the future and the renewal of the
organization through understanding existing institutional strengths and weaknesses,
the institution need to look at three fundamental concepts - First the self-appraisal
process need to be a collaborative and participative process which should
encourage broad based participation by all the employees of the institution (faculty,
staff and administration), students, parents and community members; Second the
process should be authentic and analyze institutional strengths /weaknesses as
opposed to creating a document to satisfy the peer team members visiting the
institution. Finally, the process should be able to rejuvenate the institution and
renew passion for effective learning and institutional excellence. As it is the SAR
that informs and orients the peer team during the visit the institution should
present the factual details on the aspects of it’s functioning.

The SAR is submitted in the format given to the institutions titled as “Manual for
Self-appraisal of Teacher Education Institutions”. The manual has laid down a clear
six-point framework around which the current level of quality in TEIs is to be
appraised and submitted to NAAC by the institution concerned. The manual also
gives provision for innovations and is flexible. This is aimed at providing an opportunity
to the TEIs for giving tangible shape to creative suggestions for quality improvement.
The manual attests to the various possible dimensions of the educational activities
of a recognized TEI. As it is the campus experience in TEIs, which is crucial for the
professional development of the teacher trainees, the manual gives great
importance to the quality of life at the campus. Overall the six –point outline
proposed in the manual offers the institution a genuine basis for self –introspection
and necessary corrective actions to be initiated. Afterall, quality enhancement
efforts will have to start from the existing realities and this is the message the
manual conveys and encourages.

The nature and success of the SAR depends on several factors including in the
way it is prepared. The form of presentation and the data provided in SAR is very
crucial both to the institution and the NAAC.SAR is the product of the self-appraisal
process that is scrutinized by the NAAC and it forms the basis for assessment of
the institution by the peer team. Failure to be self aware and self-critical may be
damaging for the institution; the worst scenario for the visiting team to detect a
serious difference between what is reported and the reality it observes.

Validation of the Self –Appraisal Report and Peer Review : On receiving the self-
appraisal report from the teacher education institution, the NAAC will constitute
a panel of peers in consultation with the institution to be accredited. The

55
institution can record its reservations/objections if any on any of the suggested
peers for validation. The NAAC also scrutinizes in-house, the self-appraisal report
and prepares a peer team document for use by the team during onsite validation.

The typical visit schedule normally lasts for two days, beginning with a pre-visit
meeting of the peers and ends with an exit meeting which is an open house meeting
of the institutional members,stakeholders and the peer team members. The team
during its two day schedule, visits all the constituencies of the institute, interacts
with all the stakeholders, verifies the documents and also visits the practice teaching
schools attached to the TEI.

At the end of the visit , based on the evidences gathered by the team and the
interactions with various stakeholders the team makes a collective judgement on
the status of accreditation to be recommended to NAAC. At the end of the visit
the score sheet and the descriptive report of the team are submitted to NAAC by
the peer team. While the Score sheet giving a grade is confidential until accepted
by NAAC, the report is shared with the institution . The institution is given an
opportunity to suggest for correction on factual errors but as such cannot suggest
for changes on reporting format ,recommendations etc..

The Quality Framework of NAAC

The quality framework provided by NAAC maps out different input, process and
output norms that constitute the indicators of quality of a teacher education
institution. NAAC believes that the processes are the means by which an organization
harnesses and releases the talents of its people and thereby as a whole improves
the performance. The processes and the people are considered ENABLERS that
produce the RESULTS that measure performance. The model lays great stress on
the effective management and administration on matters relating to student
satisfaction, employability, leadership, fiscal and human resourse management and
planning, which will ultimately lead to excellence. These elements, have been
embedded into the six criteria of NAAC that are used to address an organizational
quality provision and progress towards excellence. The indicators of quality
embedded in the six criteria or the key areas are :

Curricular Design and Planning

 Admission procedure
 Details of working and teaching days
 Student ability level
 Features of current syllabi and mechanisms for its monitoring and mid-
course correction
 Developing new courses; gestation time for running new courses
 Curriculum design
 Institutions’ mission and goals
 Feedback mechanism
 Inter/multi-disciplinarity components
 Innovations

56
Curriculum Transaction and Evaluation
 Pedagogy aspects
 Professional development of faculty
 Seminars, conferences, workshops etc.
 Faculty appraisal
 Focus on specific aspects: school experience programme, inclusive
education, co-curricular activities, ICT, value education, civic
responsibilities, personality development, community orientation,
environment education etc.
 Evaluation scheme
i. Theory – assignments, seminars and project work
ii. Practice teaching
iii. Practical work, curricular activities, work experience, SUPW
 Other teaching-learning innovations

Research, Development and Extension

 Research by faculty and students (M.Ed., M.Phil., Ph.D.), financial inputs
for research and research projects (completed, in progress and outlay)
 Extension: Types of extension activities, support to G.O.’s and N.G.O.’s, NSS
and NCC
 Development of instructional material and Publications
 Development of psychological tools
 Action research

Infrastructure and Learning Resources

 Infrastructure – existing and projected expansions
 Financial inputs for creation and maintenance of infrastructure and upkeep
of campus
 Utilization
 Learning resources
 Library
 Library annual budgets: books and periodicals
 Reprographic, audio visual material and internet related facilities
 Library stock
 Computers – availability and use
 Laboratories – availability, maintenance and utilization

Student Support and Progression

 System efficiency: Exam results, NET and SLET, employment
 Alumni association/Old students association
 Feedback mechanism (from students)
 Diagnosis and remedial programme
 Financial help and types
 Guidance and consultancy services
 Personal and academic counseling
 Placement services and their use

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  Admission related facilities and their publicity
 Recreational /leisure time facilities, especially indoor
 Activity clubs: cultural, literary, etc.

Organisation and Management

 Internal coordination and monitoring mechanism
 Steps for improvement of organization and management
 Academic calendar
 Faculty recruitment
 Professional development of non-teaching staff
 Fee structure
 Heads of expenditure and excess/deficit budget
 Internal audit
 Welfare programs and grievance redressal system
 Endowment and reserve funds
 Internal academic quality check and Total Quality Management
 Modern managerial concepts and practices
 Twinning programs, student exchange programs and collaboration with
SCERT, NCERT, NIEPA and NCTE.

The institution is expected to prepare the self-appraisal report in conformity with

the six criteria of the NAAC. The inputs from the institution under the six criteria
when collated, should be able to give adequate details on both the academic,
administrative and financial aspects of the institution.

Impact of Assessment and Accreditation on Teacher Education Institutions

A major review of the assessment and accreditation procedures of the NAAC for
teacher education institutions was initiated in the context of the views expressed
by the institutions, teacher educators, students, assessors and administrators.
The observations and reactions of various stakeholders and outcome of the
discussions in various forum are reflected in the following paras.

Quality Assurance mechanisms evolved jointly by the NAAC and the NCTE have
been well accepted and appreciated by teacher education institutions. Several
institutions worked for meeting the requirements of the NAAC. As of now we have
around 70 institutions assessed and accredited by the NAAC. Valuable support has
come from governments, universities and colleges of education. The process has
now gained wider acceptance. However persons familiar with the teacher education
scenario of India feel that most of the TEIs are ill prepared to undergo the process
or even to answer to the points raised in the self appraisal manual of NAAC. Others
argue that as the points raised in the Manual are not directives from any regulatory
authority, they need not view or amplify them but report only the existing realities.
The institutions are only advised to have an objective self-evaluation in the light
of the queries posed in the manual and get themselves ready to organize their
campus activities in the suggested line. A sort of attuning to a new and resurgent
educational culture seems to be inevitable before any real success can be scored

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in the march to excellence. Without such conscious insight and adequate self-
grounding, the TEIs would not reap the benefit of A&A of NAAC.

Inferences from Institutional Case Studies

Majority of the institutions, judged the A&A process to be very useful and have
claimed to have benefited in a number of ways, specifically the process has given
impetus to the credibility of their academic and administrative services and the
social reputation. Being used to the age old policing type of reviews and inspections
by the regulatory bodies and government agencies, the institutions displayed some
understandable nervousness about the whole exercise.

Preparation of the Self Appraisal report: How an institution prepares for

accreditation depends on its existing process of self-evaluation and the data
management. Once the institutions decide to go in for A& A, the first step, within
the institution is normally the constitution of a steering committee and appointment
of a steering committee coordinator .The steering committee coordinator is normally
an active, respected member of the faculty, not necessarily experienced in
accreditation and has a critical role in establishing participative management, in
the committee and across the institution. The steering committee coordinator
will be responsible for preparing the institution wide self-study and collect the
required data. In most of the institutions the preparation of SARs took more than
six months or more mainly due to the non-availability of the past records. There
has been intensive involvement of staff and students in the whole exercise and
normally the visits completed in less than an year since the preparations have started.

Most institutions found the six criteria for assessment to be exhaustive and said
that the criteria wise self analysis used for reporting to NAAC, helped the institution
in not only identifying the key areas of improvement but also in recognizing the
various innovative practices adopted by the faculty and students which went un-
noticed all these years of existence. The major benefits reaped by the institution
categorized criterion wise are given below:

1. Curricular Aspects
Helps in understanding where enrichment is possible by adding new papers
and modifying the existing papers.

2. Teaching Learning and Evaluation

The teachers and the trainees started the use of technological aids for teaching
and learning; self-evaluation by B. Ed trainees and teaching staff was put to
practice.

3. Research, Development and Extension

Aided to initiate and lay more stress on action research, publication of news
letters and journals, inclusion of community orientation, environmental
education, value education, learning to live etc.

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4. Infrastructure and Learning Resources
a) Setting up of Language lab
b) Improvement of basic infrastructure etc.
c) Addition of equipments like computers, CD’s, LCD projector etc.
d) Augmentation of library and subscription to more number of journals.
e) Conduct of more seminars and workshops

5. Students Support and Progression

a) Creation of more endowments
b) Setting up of placement cell, formalizing guidance and counseling activity
c) Organizing seminars and workshops, personality development programme
etc.
d) Forming Alumni Association
e) Obtaining feedback from parents, society and other stakeholders through
regular meetings
f) Development of a vibrant learning environment
g) Increased participation of the students

6. Organisation and Management

a) Reviwed vision and mission statement
b) Participatory management approach
c) Efficient resourse management practices
d) Internal Quality Assurance Cell for sustaining quality
e) Team work and more co-ordination and information flow within various
divisions/constituents of the institution
f) Shared responsibility and accountability
g) Functional autonomy

On Site Validation: The peer team chairperson and members are essentially
selected from other states and normally come from similar kind of institutions.
Though the team is constituted in consultation with the institution, it has limited
grounds for suggesting changes. The team typically consists of 3 members and
coordinating academic officer from NAAC. To have wider understanding of the
institution in its regional context it is suggested to have at least one member from
the same state.

The SAR is the mirror through which the peer team sees the institution. The
meeting of the team with the head of the institution, faculty, the parents, alumni
and the open sessions with students allows the team to identify certain unwritten
hidden statements or conflict of views between students and administrators or
faculty and management etc. is what our Peer team members feel.

The institutions felt that the team members made extensive use of additional
documentation, requested further information and visited all the facilities of the
institution and some of the teams behaved more like inspection teams rather than
as peers. Most of the faculty expressed to have learnt a lot from the visiting team
and could share experiences, information and felt that accreditation is a positive

60
activity that not only improves the overall institutional performance but also aids
in dissemination of ideas and information.

The management and administrators also found to have become aware of various
developments and new practices from the visiting team and appreciated the system
of voluntary assessment and accreditation. They developed a positive attitude and
found encouraged to remain committed to quality improvement and processes.

Judgments by institutions on the value and appropriateness of the whole process

varied not only between the institutions but also within institutions. It was felt by
almost all the institutions that a good accreditation outcome is important for the
sake of institutional reputation, social status, admissions and further recognition
from NCTE/UGC and thus remain worried about the outcome of the accreditation.
Overall, it was felt that the whole exercise produces a significant encounter through
which the components of institutions standards become highly visible.

Post Accreditation Impressions and Initiatives: The institutions felt that the
accreditation should focus more on the quality of their staff and less on the
physical resources and activities described in paper. During the two-day visit the
team assess the validity of the SAR and pursues any discrepancies. The conclusion
of the assessment is a peer team report that is shared with the institution. It is a
transparent document and shared with the institution at the end of the visit.
Common critical comments in the teacher education reports relate to inadequate
(unqualified) staffing, insufficient support to students both within the institution
and during practice teaching. Most institutions have taken the reports seriously
and necessary actions have been initiated resulting in the improvement of overall
performance of the institutions. They used this opportunity to expose weaknesses
in order to exert pressure on the management or those responsible for taking
action. The SAR finally becomes the most valued document of the institution as it
reflects both historical and future of the institution in terms of academic practices
and resource mobilization.

There is a widespread feeling in the institutions that NAAC has sufficiently triggered
change in educational delivery, although survival as a professional institution
required a substantial degree of curriculum developments. Overall it was felt that
the accreditation process is highly valued and it gave an opportunity for the
institutions to review its work and enable them to meet the national standards.
NAAC also disseminates good innovative practices as judged by the peers through
annual workshops, NAAC news letter and other publications.

Effectiveness of the Tool and Major Issues Related to it

The issues of inter and intra team variations become sharper when the scale and
diversity of the Indian higher education are taken into account. An underlying
issue for the NAAC is that of arriving at a reasonable understanding of institutions
and programme reality, given the wide variation of institutional mission. A related
problem is that of determining the rating of the institutions. In turn, there are
particular difficulties in making judgments about the quality and outcomes of

61
learning, even on the evidence of the programme design, institutional
documentation on site validation of the SAR submitted by the institution.

The general criticisms on accreditation are that accreditation is too often based
on minimal information and statistical standards without insistence on higher quality
and the quality of provision available to the stakeholders, that accreditation is
influenced by the physical infrastructure of the institution and do not take in to
consideration the learning outcomes and the locational disadvantages of the
institutions and that accreditation is focused at times too narrowly on a particular
programme, without regard to the total education context and the mission of the
institution.

The variation of judgments within and between the teams, application of standards
and criteria which have no focus on the field realities, the expenses of the process,
the prolixity of self study reports and the unwillingness of some of the peer teams
to make tough decisions and the overemphasis and liberal attitude of few others,
resulted in the distrust on the process and dissatisfaction of the outcome.

Suggested Alternatives for the Present Grading System

From the feedback obtained from the institutions and the communications received
at NAAC, we find that the institutions compare their outcome with that of the
adjacent institutions in the region, and there lies the dissatisfaction. In most
cases the institutions claim for one level higher which means the expectations of
the institutions and the peer team assessment vary only marginally and many a
times it is negligible.

If we need to match the expectations of the institutions, which normally arise out
of comparisons, we may adopt the percentile based ranking rather than present
letter grading. In the process while we retain the present criteria wise weightages,
the peer team members would limit the assignment of weightages only to the
criteria leaving to NAAC the overall grading, which the NAAC would assign based
on the percentile weightages at the national level. Though even by this process of
percentile ranking, we may not be able to totally eliminate inter team variations
but certainly we can minimize the variation. If a procedure of quantitative evaluation
by the institution themselves can be followed by a similar quantitative and qualitative
evaluation could be evolved we can drastically bring down the inter team variations.
With proven effectiveness of the applicability of the tool uniformly to all range of
institutions, if substituted with clear division of weightages for qualitative and
quantitative aspects, the whole process would not only cull down the present
criticism but also would be of more informative to the users.

Conclusion
While the quantitative growth of Teacher Education has been phenomenal; meeting
well the increasing needs and demands of the Qualitative changes have evolved
slowly, and invisibly, but continuously. The ever-widening scope of Assessment and
Accreditation has comprehensively encompassed all sectors of education. Almost

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all concerned bodies progressively associated with it, have shown intimated concern
and given support.

The underlining issue is that the NAAC accreditation procedures have been providing
a public assurance of the quality in the higher education. The outcome of the
process and the judgment were always based on the self study (which only would
help the institution in its endeavor for sustainable development and quality
improvement) reports of the institution together with stakeholders’ views. With
the public dimensions underlying the process becoming wider ranging and complex,
the pressure on the accreditation systems have been increased. NAAC is looking
at the way in which consistency of good practice can be achieved and monitored
across the sector and supports the principal that a suitable means of effective
use of accreditation outcome by statutory bodies like NCTE should be developed.

In the global market the institutions effectiveness is measured by its capacity to

adapt quickly to rapidly changing stakeholder needs while maintaining superior
quality at affordable price. To achieve this our institutions should be founded on
the principles of collaboration and our Programmes designed with an
entrepreneurial spirit. They need to look for models of innovative programme
development and delivery, quality learning experiences, provide leadership in
developing a new vocabulary and new skills for transforming education in a changing
world.

After all, quality enhancement efforts will have to start from the existing realities!

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64
 Learning Design as an Indicator of
Quality in Teacher Education

Dr. Som Naidu *

Abstract
This paper focuses attention on approches to learning design as one of the critical
indicators of quality in teacher education. It suggests that a rich and resourceful
learning experience, along with sound administrative processes, is and ought to
be seen as a core indicator of quality assurance processes. Focusing attention on
learning design comprises orchestrating the entire learning experience of the
students to ensure that their learning is meanigful and motivating. It means modelling
the learning experiences of students to reflect authentic and real-life situations,
and the kinds of situations that they are most likely to encounter in their workplace.
This paper argues furthermore, that educational systems cannot claim to have
taken seriously their attempts at quality assurance without careful consideration
of what their learners will do in any educational program, and how their progress
with learning is going to be monitored and assessed.

Introduction
Although learning and teaching activities are at the heart of any educational
experience, indicators and measures of quality in teacher education specifically,
and education more generally, tends to focus attention on organizational and
administrative processes. Pick any book on quality assurance in teacher education,
in both open and distance learning settings, and in conventional systems, and you
will find that QA is targeted at the usual criteria. These comprise organisational
policies and practices and infrastructure. Very few of these focus attention on
the learning and teaching experiences. At times when there is some attention
being paid to learning and teaching, the emphasis is on the quality of the teachers,
their training, and on the support that they might be receiving. The quality of the
learning experience is seen to have been assured with qualified personnel. This is
not necessarily the case. In fact, in a larger number of educational settings, and
even in the presence of qualified teachers, the students’ learning experiences
are particularly poor.

This comprises a serious limitation of quality assurance practices in general. As

such it poses a major problem. Unless quality assurance practices adopts a
comprehensive approach to the educational process, assuring high quality standards
is always going to be incomplete. So the first step in the process is to review the
indicators and measures of quality in teacher education. However, that is not the
goal of this paper. Its goal is to articulate what it means to focus attention on
learning design as an indicator of quality in teacher education, and furthermore,

* Associate Professor, University of Melbourne, Dept. of Teaching, Learning and Research Support,
Victoria, Australia 3010.

65
what steps can be taken to assure quality in teacher education with innovative
learning design, along with other indicators as well, of course.

Learning design refers to the orchestration and arrangement of students’ learning

experiences in a way in which the opportunities for learning are optimised. Clearly
there is no major dispute with the suggestion that we learn in a range of ways.
Approaches to learning are not something that can be easily canned, distributed
and reused. However, there is a great deal of agreement with the suggestion that
some approaches to learning are more productive, enjoyable and meaningful than
others (see for instance Brown, Collins, & Duguid, 1989).

Take a look at a few course syllabi around you, and you will find that the majority
of them take on a distinctly content centred approach. In this approach the
starting point of learning is the subject matter in a linear sequence of topics. I am
looking for instance, at a course outline on curriculum development in which the
topics are arranged in such a fashion, which is as follows: Concept of a curriculum;
Theoretical bases of curriculum design and development; models of curriculum
design and development; organizational principles in curriculum development;
implementation and management of a curriculum; and curriculum review and
revision. The goals of this subject are to develop in teacher educators,
competencies in the design, development, implementation, and evaluation of a
curriculum. Presumably, in order for them to be able to develop these
competencies, they would need to have actually engaged in designing, developing,
implementing and evaluating a curriculum project. Yet in this line-up of topics on
the subject, students are not being exposed to any such experience. Instead,
they are being exposed to a lot of what others have said on the subject and then
being asked to write reports on it. How can they possibly develop the targeted
competencies?

Situated learning: An alternative approach

A meaningful alternative approach would be to put these students in an authentic
scenario such as one that they might encounter in their workplace, and for which
they are being asked to design, develop, implement and evaluate a segment of a
curriculum. In order to be able to complete this task they can be required to
access much of the same material that they were being prescribed to read
previously. The difference with this approach is that they will be reading that
same material to inform their own work on a realistic task, which they are completing
as part of the assessment requirements of this subject, and not reading to
reproduce someone else’s thinking on the subject.

There is growing interest in education on such learning designs that focus attention
on supporting learners who are engaged in critical reflection and problem-solving
activities within some authentic context. This more learner-centred focus
represents a major shift away from conventional approaches to learning and
teaching. Viewing learning within a context means two somewhat related yet
different things. On the one hand it means that the social, interpersonal and
cultural surroundings within which learning occurs affect both the learning

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processes and outcomes. It also means that the skills, strategies, and learning
processes are seen as being tightly connected to their immediate contexts of
practice rather than as neutral tools available for varied general application. In
other words, they are seen as being highly situated (Lave & Wenger, 1991).

The concept of situated learning is grounded in the belief that learning is most
efficient and effective when it takes place within the context of realistic settings
in which learners are clear about the reasons for learning (Cognition and Technology
Group at Vanderbilt, 1991; Brown, Collins, & Duguid, 1989). This is not a new
concept. The roots of this view of learning are traceable to experiential learning
(Dewey, 1938), and problem based learning (Barrows & Tamblyn, 1980; Naidu &
Oliver, 1996; Evensen, & Hmelo, 2000). Using what Brown et al. (1989) call “authentic
tasks” situated learning enables students to immerse themselves in the culture of
the subject matter, much like an apprentice carpenter is immersed on the building
site with the master builder. Learning experiences can be designed to engage
learners into “cognitive apprenticeships” which immerse them in the total ecology
of their subject matter.

Situated learning requires a radical redefinition of learning, thinking, and what it

means to be intelligent. With the emphasis not on memory but on perception,
knowledge is no longer simply something stored in the head; rather, it comprises
one’s ability to interact in a specific context in which intelligent activity is
meaningful and appropriate. Context in this case includes people, machines, design
artefacts, environments, and other objects and agents, which may interact to
establish ecological problem-solving relationships. It also includes a shared culture,
understanding, and motivations. Such a redefinition of learning contends that
knowledge is the outcome of an active relationship between an agent and the
environment, and learning must take place during the time the student is actively
engaged with a complex, realistic instructional context.

Assessment of situated learning

As the nature of learning becomes more collaborative, situated and distributed in
its context, conventional methods of assessment of learning outcomes become
inadequate. These have to be replaced by cognitive tasks and assessment
procedures that can be focussed on the processes of learning, perception and
problem solving. In addition, assessment can no longer be viewed as an add-on to
an instructional design or simply as separate stages in a linear process of pre-test,
instruction, and post-test. Assessment must become an integrated, on-going, and
seamless part of the learning environment.

More than formative and summative evaluation, the entire instructional deign process
must be changed from a serial stage model in which assessment enters and leaves,
toward a model in which the processes that serve as instructional stimuli also
serve to provide data to a multivariate model. Such a model could then provide
important feedback to both teacher and student, and serve as a partner in the
process of learning. Situated learning must encourage the construction of
instruction and assessment as one.

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Assessment must not only be integrated with instruction, but must focus on the
learning products. When learning changes from direct instruction to situated
learning, the assessment of successful and less successful learners (or experts
and novices within a domain) must change from an emphasis on right/wrong responses
toward an emphasis on the information that each student perceives in the situations
(s). The affordances that each student perceives can be detected by the types of
information to which they attend (eg., video scenes replayed), the path taken
towards solution, the types of analogies and transfer that occur, and the types of
errors that are made.

Characteristics of situated learning environments

Not all situations afford learning. Three suggestions for the type of evidence one
should look for in a suitable learning situation are:
1. The ability to afford transfer to novel situations
2. The ability to provide meaning for learning, and
3. The ability to accommodate “anchored instruction”

Transfer
Near and far transfer situations as well as situations that afford the use of both
domain-specific knowledge and higher-order skills (planning, discriminating the
relevant from the irrelevant, metacognitive monitoring of progress etc.) would
constitute the range of transfer situations needed to determine successful learning.
Such a determination could be made continuously using dynamic assessment
techniques that are completely integrated into the initial generator set of solutions.

Meaning for learning

When Brown et al. (1989) discussed situated cognition and cognitive apprenticeships,
they relied heavily on real-world apprenticeships (eg, apprentice tailors) as the
model for their analysis. While real-world experiences are perhaps the best
situations, conventional classrooms cannot provide many such situations. Some
classes are fortunate enough to be able to take instructional advantage of field
trips. The hallmark of such events is the meaning they provide to students for
their academic disciplines. As designers begin to construct learning situations
with the aid of technology, an essential standard should be the meaning students
attach to their activities within those environments. Students should be able to provide
meaningful answers when asked questions about why they are doing certain things.

Anchor situations
“Anchored instructions” is a term coined by the Cognition and Technology Group
at Vanderbuilt (1990) to describe a special type of situation for learning. It is
possible to situate learning in two ways. The first is exemplified by many law school
courses, where a separate real-world case is used to explain each new dimension
of law. In this manner, it is possible to encounter several cases in a single course.
Such situations can be considered micro-contexts of each specific topic to be
learned. In contrast, it is also possible to select “macro-contexts” that are
sufficiently rich and complex to be meaningfully viewed from several perspective’s.

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Designing situated learning environments
A situated learning perspective presents an instructional designer with four basic
tasks:
 First, the proper generator set situations that will afford learning in the domain
of interest must be selected.
 Second, scaffolding that allows novices and experts to perform alongside one
another in the learning situation must be designed.
 Thirdly, the instructional design task must include training teachers to
understand and perform using the situation as well as support their role in the
classroom with technology that can facilitate guiding and assessing students
as they work within an instructional situation.
 Fourthly, assessment must be integrated with instruction so that the situation
provides both instructional and assessment opportunities and information.

This approach to instructional design must include a new approach to assessment,

moving away from static assessment to situated assessment that incorporates both
the affordances of the environment as well as the abilities brought to the situation
by the student. In fact, it is the interaction of the two that constitutes knowledge
from the learning perspective, and therefore it is this interaction that must be
assessed and rated as intelligent or underachieving. It also suggests that new
matrices for the evaluation of situations must be adopted. When instruction takes
place in a complex, realistic and authentic context, then measures of success of
the instruction must include transfer, the meaningfulness of learning, and a capacity
to anchor instruction across the curriculum.

Schank and Cleary (1995) have argued that the design of such a learning experience
takes the form of a storyline in which students play a key role such as being a
manager of an e-business or e-learning organization. These roles are carefully
selected to reflect those that students of such a program might actually do in real
life, or might need to know about because they will very likely manage or collaborate
with others who might be performing those roles. Students work in small groups in
these scenarios with the help of detailed information about the simulated context,
together with project details. Supporting materials and resources are also available,
and online mentors are available to answer questions and point students in the
right direction on a needs basis (Schank, 1990; 1997). This is the main point behind
the story-centred curriculum (SCC) popularized by Roger Schank and his team
(Schank, Fano, Jona, & Bell, 1994).

The story in this instance is the simulated context in which the student plays a
major role. The story in this curriculum serves as the essential scaffold. These
researchers argue that stories have always been a part of human existence. Humans
have always told stories, and the most powerful of all stories shape the way in
which we relate to our world. Furthermore, we tend not to forget these life-
changing stories. There is good reason then to make powerful stories the centre
of educational practices. These stories must involve students as well as their peers,
because that is how their work situation is most likely to be. A story-centered

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curriculum is goal-based, and the goals are those that the student has for entering
school and following a curriculum in the first place. A story-centered curriculum
is also activity-based. Students work through these activities to learn the critical
skills they require in order to complete their mission and successfully accomplish
their goals (Naidu, Oliver, & Koronios, 1999). This is what is at the heart of the
concept of “learning-by-doing”. Learning designs such as these focus attention
on improving the quality of the student learning experience. They ensure that the
student learning experience is situated in authentic learning activities that reflect
real life situations, that it is meaningful, and therefore inherently motivating for
the student.

Example: Master’s in Education (Carnegie Mellon-West)

Carnegie Mellon University in the United States has recently embarked on developing
a series of masters degree programs using the foregoing approach at its new campus
in San Jose, California (see http://west.cmu.edu/masters/ls/index.htm).

One of these program is in Learning Sciences. This program is designed for the e-
learning professional in either the corporate training or the school sectors. Its
goals are to develop among students an understanding of the relevant economic
and technological concerns, as well as the fundamental principles of human learning
that underlie effective education and training. This program’s curriculum is
structured in a way so that it serves to model many of the design principles it
teaches. Students work in teams as they would in a typical job setting. They
receive frequent advice and feedback from experienced staff and other
practitioners.

Curriculum design
Course development comprises the creation of authentic learning scenarios in
the form of stories in which students take on key roles. This story is one that
provides challenges of various sorts to students depending on the field being
pursued. Each challenge relates to the one before and builds upon it. Students
work on these problems and must usually build something or analyse something
and report on what they have done. They work in teams with mentors readily
available to point them in the right direction. Mentors teach Socratically, never
telling, only suggesting directions, forcing harder thought about issues and criticizing
submitted work. Work is submitted multiple times until it is right.

The story-centred approach represents a dramatic departure from traditional

master’s degree curricula, which tends to be content driven. The effect of the
approach is that as students work through the story to achieve the missions the
story puts forth, they learn the critical skills required to successfully accomplish
their tasks. This approach is about the elimination of a curriculum that is content
driven in favour of one that tells a story — a meaningful story in which the student
takes on roles that he or she is likely to play in the real world after graduation.

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The corporate track in the program, for instance is designed to provide students
with a deeply pragmatic, active learning experience. From the outset, students
are thrust into the role of learning consultants for a fictional company, and dive
into a set of realistic projects. In each project, they perform a series of tasks that
typically include needs analysis, evaluating off-the-shelf and outsourced solutions,
recommending e-learning infrastructure and delivery strategy, designing and
developing customised solutions, and developing plans for learning-assessment.
These projects vary along several dimensions, covering the teaching of soft skills
and hard skills, use of both entirely technology-based solutions, and hybrid, human-
mentored solutions, live, distance, and blended delivery options, and training for
audiences ranging from entry-level workers to senior executives. Students also
learn the “business side” of e-learning via strong emphasis on return on investment
analysis, budgeting, and project planning and tracking. The academic track in the
program is meant to emulate the real like experiences that someone working in a
school might encounter.

Scenario Building
The building of scenarios to situate learning is not an easy or simple task. Good
scenarios cannot be pulled out of thin air either. For them to be able to provide
the opportunities for learning that the students need, learning scenarios have to
reflect reality, which means that they have to be authentic. Furthermore they
have to have the richness and variety in them that mirrors reality; otherwise they
would fail to offer the opportunities for learning that students would need. More
importantly, scenarios have to be interesting and motivating so that learners would
want to be engaged with it. Here is a simple strategy that could be useful for
developing meaningful authentic scenarios.

Steps in the process

Step 1: Determine the career goals of the students.
Step 2: Determine key attributes of the person who has achieved these goals.
Step 3: Based on these attributes, develop the learning outcomes for your learners.
Step 4: Determine the key events that might occur in the life of a person who has
achieved these learning outcomes.
Step 5: Develop a story that will be able to provide the opportunities for
these events.
Step 6: Develop the tasks that your students will be required to complete within
the context of this story.

Example subject: The Teacher as a Professional

Step 1: Career goals of the students:

Able to demonstrate leadership within a professional context

Step 2:Key attributes of a graduate:

Able to adopt and display a rational approach to professional issues

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Step 3: Learning outcomes:

Able to manage people

Ability to manage people in conflict

Able to build consensus

Step 4: Key events in the life of a graduate:

Identifying the problem and defining the nature of the problem

Exploring alternative solution strategies and adopting suitable strategy

Implementing solution strategy and managing its execution

Arriving at an amicable solution and validating the solution

Building consensus around the preferred solution

Step 5: Develop a suitable story:

The Dance Academy

Example of suitable story: Dance Academy

The Dance Academy is an internationally renowned school of dance. It is widely
acclaimed for its very high academic and professional standards, quality of teaching,
student intake and small classes. Getting acceptance into the Dance Academy is a
highly rigorous and competitive process. Students of dance from all over world
aspire to gain acceptance into this school. Although the Academy continues to
thrive and attract the best teachers and the best students over the years, it is
beginning to face increasing competition from a number of fairly reputable dance
schools. The Dance Academy (DA) cannot afford to rest on its past performance
and glory. It must work hard to give its students the best and that too at an
affordable cost; otherwise it risks losing some of the best students of dance to
other equally good schools.

Problem: While the quality of dance instruction in DA remains excellent, several

observers from within and without the Academy are concerned about the wholeness
of the total learning experience that students encounter at the Academy. Many
argue that, there is too much focus on dance instruction and not enough on
other basic skills that professionals in the field will need to possess in order to
survive in the world of dance. These are skills in reading and writing, music
composition and professional ethics etc. Of course these commentators are right,
but others argue that, all a good dancer needs to know is how to dance well,
that’s all there is to it. What good will being able to read and write in some
language do to dancers, if that’s not what they are going to do most of the time to
be able to make a living in the field. The teachers at the Academy are equally
divided over this issue and unsure of which path to take. Is it better to focus
attention on dance alone and attract the best of the dancers, or to aim to offer
a more complete education to its students while retaining high standards in dance?

Precipitating event: The foregoing dilemma that confronts the Academy was
brought to a head recently when some Faculty members argued that one of the
Academy’s star dance students from the current cohort should not be allowed to
graduate because he had not passed his courses in reading and writing. This event

72
has obviously thrown the faculty and the Academy into turmoil as it raises the
issue of what is important and what kind of curriculum it should have its students
follow. It needs to resolve this controversy promptly in order to assure parents, a
new crop of students and the profession that the Dance Academy is till the place
to be, if you are aspiring for fame and fortune in dance.

Solution action: The good news is that the Dance Academy has decided to seek
professional help with this situation. It has acquired the services of a consulting
firm, which specialises in advising high profile educational providers such as DA on
issues related to the nature of their curriculum, and their teaching and learning
activities. DA’s consultants are a group known as Learning Science Consultants
(LSC) and they comprise a small group of experts covering all aspects of education
and training. They too are widely known for their competencies and how they
have been able to turn around the fortunes of many fledgling educational providers.
So it seems that DA have sought to seek advice from the right people.

Your role: You are a very senior faculty member at DA and because of your more
middle of the road approach on this issue; you seem to have the respect of the
majority of the teachers at the Academy. You have been asked to set up a small
task force of the Academy staff and work with LSC consultants. You will lead this
project and draw upon whoever and whatever you will need to build consensus
among DA staff and resolve the problem that confronts DA.

Reminder about the steps in the process

Example subject: The Teacher as a Professional

Step 1:Career goals of the students:

Able to demonstrate leadership within a professional context

Step 2: Key attributes of a graduate:

Able to adopt and display a rational approach to professional issues

Step 3: Learning outcomes:

Able to manage people

Ability to manage people in conflict

Able to build consensus

Step 4: Key events in the life of a graduate:

Identifying the problem and defining the nature of the problem

Exploring alternative solution strategies and adopting suitable strategy

Implementing solution strategy and managing its execution

Arriving at an amicable solution and validating the solution

Building consensus around the preferred solution

73
Step 5: Develop a suitable story:

The Dance Academy

Step 6: Develop the required tasks for students:

See the following

Assessment activities
In light of the learning outcomes of this course, students will be required to
complete the following tasks. These tasks will also comprise the assessable items
for the course.

Task 1: Identifying and defining the issue

 Goal: As part of this, students are required to identify and articulate the
nature of the problem or issue that confronts them in order to be able to
demonstrate that they know how to approach a problem.
 Output: Statement of the issue or problem.

Task 2: Exploring solution strategies with LS Consultants

 Goal: This task will involve exploring various options with internal or external
consultants, in order to demonstrate competency with problem solving.
 Output: Briefing document for LS consultants.

Task 3: Implementation of the solution strategy

 Goal: This task will comprise managing the consultation process in order
to demonstrate competency at project management.
 Output: A schedule of activities with a time line and deliverables.

Task 4: Achieving a solution and validating the solution

 Goal: This activity will comprise the achievement of a solution in order to
demonstrate ability to bring matters to a close within a specified timeframe.
 Output: Draft solution and a plan for its validation by the stakeholders.

Task 5: Building consensus around the proposed solution

 Goal: This task will entail the development of a plan to ensure stakeholder
support in order to demonstrate competency with consensus building.
 Output: Plan for consensus building.

Task 6: The final proposal

 Goal: This task will comprise the development of the final proposal in
order to able to demonstrate competency with accommodating the views
of the majority.
 Output: Proposed solution that has the support of the majority.

Concluding remark
If this approach to designing learning environments is that good, why aren’t we all
doing it? Simply put, because it is harder to develop, and it means more work for
the teachers. Situated learning environments require a good deal of creative

74
thinking on the part of the teachers, for instance, in the development of interesting
and resourceful learning scenarios. It also requires thinking creatively about
authentic, meaningful and enjoyable assessment activities for the students. These
are time consuming and harder to develop than many of the conventional assessment
tasks such as report and essay writing, and tests and examinations. Innovative
assessment activities also mean more time needed by the teachers for marking and
providing meaningful feedback to students.

Most teachers themselves are products of conventional learning and teaching

practices and they feel more comfortable with those practices. Therefore they
like to remain with what they are used to, and with practices and processes for
which they have developed coping mechanisms.

Students also, not all of them, find situated learning environments all that attractive,
because it means more work for them as well. These innovative learning
environments require students to be fully engaged with the learning and teaching
processes. Not all students are that enthusiastic about this level of engagement.
Many would prefer to do the minimal amount of work that is possible in order to
be able to get away with a pass mark. Many have already developed coping
mechanisms for working with conventional teaching practices such as lectures
and taking examinations. They are comfortable with these practices, which suit
their increasingly busy lives that include study and several part time jobs in order
to be able to support themselves.

On closer look however, we must ask if these are good enough reasons for neglecting
innovative learning and teaching practices? This paper suggests that they are not
good enough reasons for neglecting innovations with learning and teaching. To do
so, would be to perpetuate a poorer quality of educational provision, which will
lead to mediocre performance, incompetence, and untapped potential among both,
teachers and students.

References
Barrows, H. S., & Tamblyn, R. (1980). Problem-based learning: An approach to medical
education. New York, Springer.

Brown, J. S., Collins, A., & Duguid, P. (1989). Situated cognition and the culture of
learning. Educational Researcher, January-February, pp. 32-42.

Dewey, J. (1933). How We Think: A restatement of the relation of reflective thinking

to the educative process. Boston: Heath.

Evensen, D. H., & Hmelo, C. E. (Eds.). (2000). Problem-based learning: A research

perspective on learning interactions. Mawah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates,
Inc.

Lave, J., & Wenger, E. (1991). Situated Learning: Legitimate peripheral participation.
lNew York. Cambridge University Press.

75
Naidu, S., & Oliver, M. (1996). Computer supported collaborative problem-based
learning (CSC-PBL): An instructional design architecture for virtual learning in nursing
education. Journal of Distance Education, Pages, XI(2), 1-22.

Naidu, S., Oliver, M., & Koronios (1999). Approaching clinical decision-making in
nursing practice with interactive multimedia and case-based reasoning. The
Interactive Multimedia Electronic Journal of Computer Enhanced Learning [On-
line]. (http://imej.wfu.edu/).

Schank, R. (1997). Virtual Learning: A revolutionary approach to building a highly

skilled workforce. NY: McGraw-Hill.

Schank, R. C. (1990). Tell me a story. Evanston, Illinois: Northwestern University

Press.

Schank, R. C., & Cleary, C., (1995). Engines for Education. Hillsdale, New Jersey:
Lawrence Erlbaum Associates. <http://www.ils.nwu.edu/~e_for_e/> Engines for
Education (“hyper-book”).

Schank, R., Fano, A., Jona, M., & Bell, B. (1994). The design of goal-based scenarios.
The Journal of the Learning Sciences, 3(4), 305-345.

The Cognition and Technology Group at Vanderbilt (1990). Anchored instruction

and its relationship to situated cognition. Educational Researcher, Volume 19, August-
September, No 6, pp. 2-10.

The Cognition and Technology Group at Vanderbilt (1991). Technology and the
design of generative learning environments. Educational Technology, May, pp.
34-40.

  

76
 Quality Assurance Initiatives in
Elementary Teacher Education in India
- An Overview

Prof. C. Seshadri*

During the past two decades massive national efforts have been launched towards
quality assurance, especially, of elementary teacher education (concerned with
preparation of teachers for classes I to VIII) in India. These have been multi-pronged
aiming at structural reforms, quality renewal of programmes and practices and
capacity building. Appropriate policy directives and generous public funding by
the national government have backed up these actions. Structural reforms have
aimed at improvement of infrastructure in existing institutions, establishment of
innovative and pace-setting institutions and creation of authorities at the national
and sub-national levels for enforcement of norms and standards. With the
establishment of structures at the district and sub-district levels a national network
of teacher education institutions is now in place. Programme quality is being ensured
through structural and curricular reforms. Capacity building of functionaries at
different levels has been attempted through national and state level resource
institutions via training cascades and development of teaching-learning materials.
An overview and appraisal of these developments with the focus on the District
Institutes of Education and Training (DIET), a major pan-Indian intervention aimed
at the total quality reform of elementary teacher education.

The Teacher Education System in India

India has more than 3000 teacher education institutions of which nearly half of
them cater to the elementary and lower stages. All these support an expanding
school system which has 6,38,738 primary (I to V) and 2,06,269 upper primary (VI to
VIII) schools, a teacher force of 32.2m and a student strength of 157m. The escalating
demand for trained teachers has led to unprecedented expansion of the teacher
education system (EFA, National Plan of Action, India, MHRD, GOI, 2003).

Teacher education institutions in India are government, government – aided or

private, unaided institutions. In addition, there are institutions run by universities.
Teachers for primary/elementary schools are trained in Teachers’ Training Institutes
(TTIs) and DIETs established in each district. DIETs are the main supply institutions
for elementary teachers in most states. The administration of teacher education
falls under the jurisdiction of the respective state governments. The academic
programmes and curriculum policies of these institutions come under the authority
of the State Boards / Directorates and lead to award of a Certificate / Diploma.
The State Councils of Educational Research and Training (SCERTs) and the National
Council of Educational Research and Training (NCERT) at the centre function as
the main support institutions.

* Former Professor of Education and Principal, Regional Institute of Education (NCERT),

Mysore, India

77
The regulating authority is the National Council for Teacher Education (NCTE).
Under the statute it is now mandatory for all teacher education institutions to
seek the recognition of the NCTE. Perspectives and policy guidelines on teacher
education are contained in the national educational policy. These are generally in
the nature of recommendations on the overall objectives of teacher preparation
and its quality assurance in the context of emerging educational concerns and
national priorities. The substantive directives relating to structure, content and
processes of teacher education emanate from the NCTE, the State Boards and the
Universities.

Major quality assurance initiatives

Establishment of National Council for Teacher Education as a statutory body
The NCTE is set up as a statutory authority to achieve planned and coordinated
growth of teacher education at all levels and ensure maintenance of quality and
standards. NCTE has laid down norms and standards for according recognition to
teacher education programmes and institutions. All teacher education institutions
are brought under its authority and NCTE recognition is made mandatory. Regulatory
actions apart, NCTE has also launched major developmental initiatives towards
quality improvement. These include: publication of scholarly works on indigenous
thinking in teacher education, state studies on teacher education, reading materials
in pedagogical theory and practice. From time to time the NCTE has also issued
curriculum frameworks, which function as national guidelines for structural reform
and curriculum renewal of teacher education. Other significant quality assurance
actions taken by the NCTE are: on-going inspection of institutions to ensure
compliance of norms, submission of performance appraisal report by recognized
institutions, notification of minimum qualifications for recruitment of teachers
and restriction of distance mode teacher education degree programmes to in-
service teachers only (Perspective Plan 2003 – 2007, NCTE).

NAAC – NCTE tie-up for accreditation of teacher education programmes

The National Assessment and Accreditation Council (NAAC) was set up in 1994 as an
autonomous organization of the University Grants Commission (UGC) to assess and
accredit all public and private institutions of higher learning. The most significant
aspect of its assessment process is self-appraisal by institutions themselves through
self-study combined with unbiased, informed and transparent review by peers.

The NCTE mandate restricted it to enforcement of essential norms and standards

only for institutional recognition, permission to start a new institution and additional
intake of students. It did not cover accreditation. It was thought desirable that
teacher education should have a system of assessment and accreditation specific
to its professional nature and unique quality criteria. Such an arrangement was
found necessary to promote the culture of self-appraisal and self-evaluation of
performance, determined pursuit of standards of excellence set by themselves
and mutual sharing of institutional experiences. To meet the needs of the situation
NAAC and NCTE have entered into an MOU to put in place an assessment and
accreditation mechanism for teacher education institutions and programmes. The
memorandum provides for laying down the accreditation norms and standards for

78
courses in teacher education at all levels, evolving mechanisms and schemes for
quality promotion and sustenance, follow up of quality initiatives and developing
linkages for mutual sharing of healthy practices and innovations (Memorandum of
Understanding between NAAC and NCTE dated 16th Aug 2002). NAAC accreditation
is also made a condition for enhancement of intake and starting of new courses
(NCTE gazette notification dated 21st Aug 2003). This is a very significant development
and holds out great promise for the future development of teacher education in
the country.

Starting of innovative elementary teacher education institutions: District

Institutes of Education and Training (DIET)
One of the outstanding quality assurance innovations in elementary teacher
education has been the establishment of DIETs under the centrally sponsored
scheme of teacher education. The scheme also led to the establishment of Colleges
of Teacher Education and Institutes of Advanced Study in Education which were
concerned with secondary teacher education.

Elementary teacher education, despite its crucial importance, has been a long
time victim of neglect for various reasons. DIETs were established primarily to lift
primary teacher education from its low status and impart professionalization to
the undertaking. DIETs are upgraded Teacher Training Institutions (TTIs) set up as
pace setting institutions. They are established to promote universalisation of
elementary education (UEE) in the district through quality programmes in initial
and incumbent teacher training, educational planning and management, research
and extension, curriculum and materials development. DIETs are expected to bring
in innovation and infuse new life to initial training through content upgradation,
curriculum renewal and adoption of newer methods of teaching and training. They
serve the training and resource support needs of elementary teachers, non-formal
and adult education workers, youth and community leaders and education officers.

The DIET functions through its seven branches: Pre-service, In-service, District
Resource Unit, Curriculum and Materials Development, Educational Technology,
Planning and Management and Work Experience. To carry out their research
functions DIETs are expected to identify a ‘lab area’ comprising schools in nearby
habitations. The DIET scheme is not prescriptive. It does not issue directives on
how the broad expectations are to be realized. It only offers a set of guidelines to
enable the DIETs to grow and evolve in the local context. The states have
considerable freedom in promoting these institutions as per their own needs and
experiences (District Institutes of Education and Training, Guidelines, MHRD,1989).
DIETs have been hailed as a major intervention in teacher education reform and
are envisioned to usher in a sea change in the primary education scene in the
district through their training, extension and research activities. Since its inception
in 1986, practically all districts in the country have been covered by the DIET
scheme.

The establishment of DIETs has made in-service education widely available for
teachers and ensured their regular participation in the programmes. The earlier

79
provision for in-service education was too meager and limited to secondary school
teachers. Now, the DIETs provide in-service education for primary / elementary
teachers on a continual basis so that every teacher gets a chance to undergo
refresher training at least once in five years. There are programmes designed for
variety of purposes: content enrichment, orientation and refresher courses, skill
training and material development workshops. The programmes are matched to
the training needs of teachers.

The establishment of DIETs succeeded in bringing training down to the district

level. This was in itself a major advance. With the setting up of Block and Cluster
Resource Centres (BRC and CRC) under the District Primary Education Programme
(DPEP), a massive national programme of primary education reform implemented in
149 districts across 14 states, the training scene has changed drastically. Training
arrangements are now decentralized, in the case of primary education, down to
the school cluster level to make training school-based and on-site. Now training
and other support services are made available to teachers on a continual basis at
or near their own work places.

Policy initiatives towards quality assurance of programmes and curricula

Quality assurance indicators and practices are a much-discussed issue in the
context of teacher quality enhancement. The national consensus has been to
intervene into teacher education processes and programmes. Over the years,
policy guidelines contained in the recommendations of Education Commissions,
National Curricular Frameworks issued by the NCTE and NCERT have suggested the
following strategies:

 Enhanced duration of training: 2 years after 12 years of schooling for pre-

school and elementary teachers. One of the models that has attracted national
attention is the Four Year integrated programme leading to the degree B.El.Ed.

 Emphasis on higher level of academic education through enhancement of entry

qualifications and additional curricular provision during training. In some states
(for eg., Uttar Pradesh) eligibility for admission is a university degree.

 Pedagogical reform - teachers to be prepared for their new roles as learning

facilitators and trained in the new pedagogy of promoting ‘learning to learn’
and self-learning skills. Emphasis on context-specific teaching-learning
strategies, child-centred methods, learning achievement levels, gender
sensitization.

 Enhanced provision for learning of practical skills – Apprenticeship in schools

for a specified period after completion of course and before certification as
teacher (Karnataka has introduced this post-course internship). Elsewhere
piecemeal student teaching has been replaced by ‘total school experience’
and internship in schools.

 Accommodating information and communication technologies - The Sarva

Shiksha Abhiyan, the new national programme of education for all accords
priority to provide computer education particularly at the upper primary level

80
 to make students familiar with computers. The training programme for teachers
would include a component for familiarity with computers and their use and
encourage them to create educational material in digital form, using different
media in the classroom. The NCTE has ensured that all teacher training
programmes will have a suitable module on computer-based education.

New Thrusts In Continuing Education of Teachers

The importance of in-service training for continuing education of teachers has
long been acknowledged in policy statements and recommendations made for its
quality reform and wider availability. In-service education is considered essential
to periodically upgrade the knowledge and professional competencies of teachers,
orient them to their new roles and enhance professional motivation. Significant
developments have taken place during recent years in policies and programmes
relating to in-service education. These include:

Setting up of dedicated structures at the district and sub-district levels for
providing continuing education for teachers. In addition to DIETs at the district
level BRCs and CRCs have been set up at the block and school cluster levels to
provide resource support to teachers

In-service education is getting institutionalized. In-service education is shedding

its ad hoc-ism and is getting institutionalised with the help of training cascades,
adoption of distance education technologies and networking of institutions.
This development has been inspired by the inroads which information and
communication technologies have made into the planning, organization and
delivery of programmes during the past few years.

New curricular thrusts

Minimum Learning Levels (MLL) : The MLL strategy aims at laying down learning
outcomes expected from basic education at a realistic, relevant and functional
level and prescribes adoption of measures to ensure that all children who complete
a stage of schooling achieve them. The MLL strategy has led to the general
acceptance of competency based approach in teaching and learning at the primary
stage and has become an important policy tool to assess the performance of the
country’s school system. Curriculum renewal, textbook development and teacher
training in all states are guided by the MLL strategy. The new pedagogy that drives
initial and incumbent primary teacher education has come to be known as ‘MLL
Teaching.’

Child-Centred Approaches to Teaching and Learning : Another major influence

on primary teacher education is the child-centred approach in its various forms
like joyful learning, activity based teaching. The idea is to help the child to explore
reality on its own by developing in him/her skills of problem solving and self-learning
with the teacher taking on the role of a facilitator. The focus is on building teacher
capability in the use of child-centred approaches..

81
Gender Sensitization : Actions taken towards promotion of girls’ education and
women’s empowerment include: removal of gender bias in school curriculum and
text books and training of teachers in adoption of girl child-friendly teaching
strategies. Gender sensitization of teachers, accordingly, is a priority action strategy
and is built into the pre-service and in-service education of teachers at all levels.

Inclusive Education : It is now realized that the majority of children having special
educational needs like the disabled can be educated alongside with their age
peers and within the same curriculum frameworks. The country is now moving
towards inclusive schooling where there will not be selected schools for integrated
education but all schools will be so redesigned as to be able to address the individual
needs of children in the classroom. The strategy recommended is to enhance
competencies of teachers through pre-service and in-service training.

An appraisal of the current situation in terms of quality assurance

indicators, practices and mechanisms
The overall scenario : Since the mid-1990s teacher education has undergone
noticeable quantitative and qualitative reform. The system has responded gamely
to the demands arising from expansion in the school education sector in terms of
increase in number and variety of training and resource support institutions. Greater
access to programmes and materials has been achieved on a hitherto unknown
scale. National norms have been prescribed for quality reform of programmes and
the same are being implemented. Dedicated structures at the district and sub-
district levels for continuing education of teachers have been established. They
are being networked to institutionalize in-service training under a massive distance
education technology driven project. Also, new programme designs have been
evolved, training content and processes renewed and new generation training
materials produced. External efficiency of the system has been improved with the
focus turned on learner achievement levels, gender concerns and child-friendly
methods in the curriculum. As to capacity building, huge numbers of incumbent
teachers have been covered through pan-Indian and state level training cascades
making use of distance education technology. The potential of training through
distance mode with the help of interactive video technology has been demonstrated
(Seshadri,C., “Educating the Educators: Review of primary teacher training” in
India Education Report, Ed. R. Govinda, Oxford University Press, 2002).

Further problems and issues to be addressed

Uneven development : On the ‘flip’ side, one has to admit that the development
of teacher education with respect to availability of trained teachers, institutional
capacity, entry qualification and duration of training, institutional facilities and
quality of programmes is not even throughout the country. For example, the
percentage of untrained teachers at the primary stage in the Eastern and NE
states is as high as 60 although it is only 10 at the all-India level. There are wide
variations across states in the extent to which the stipulated norms are officially
acted upon. National norms and standards with respect to teacher recruitment,
structure and duration of teacher education are yet to be implemented in some

82
states. There is also the system of ‘para-teachers’ operating in many states to
overcome the shortage and non-availability of regular teachers in rural areas.

Quality under threat with further expansion : The system also faces further
threats. Continuing expansion of the school system has led to demand for more
teachers and more teacher education institutions thereby increasing the pressure
on the system to maintain quality and standards. It is estimated that the country
will need an additional 4,58,000 primary school teachers and 6,08,857 upper primary
teachers (Perspective Plan, 2003-2007, NCTE). The situation calls for opening of
more institutions or by increasing seats in existing institutions. The resulting strain
on quality of teacher education would be enormous and constitute a major
challenge to be addressed.

Accreditation of elementary teacher education institutions : The NCTE has made

accreditation of institutions mandatory and more and more institutions are coming
forward to get themselves accredited. It is reported that over 50 institutions have
been accredited and requests by more institutions are pending before NAAC. This
is a healthy development. The tie-up between NAAC and NCTE has begun to work
and is presently confined to secondary teacher education. The assessment and
accreditation of ETE institutions under the agreement is yet to start. The task is
very important for more than one reason. First enhancing quality of elementary
teacher education is a national priority to achieve education for all. Secondly,
the number of such institutions is huge and diversities that characterize them (in
structure, programme, orientation, management and a host of other factors) are
complex. Thirdly, the system is poised for further expansion with the states having
given permission for the starting of a large number of such institutions to the
private sector. These pressures have put quality considerations to their severest
test, yet, both the NAAC and the NCTE have their task cut out, it appears. But
there is a brighter side to the issue. That these institutions will be subjected to
assessment by a high-level professional body would itself act as a powerful stimulus
for them to perform well and pursue excellence in a competitive situation. To
them it would amount to gaining academic status and recognition at par with
other institutions, which had been denied to them so far. It would be of great
interest to see how these institutions fare compared to their counterparts.

DIETs as a quality assurance institution : The DIET scheme was implemented in

different states at different points of time and even within a state DIETs were set
up in more than one phase. Different types of personnel policy were adopted and
the promptness and efficiency in its implementation also varied from state to
state. There are also wide variations in the role assigned to them by the states vis
a vis, especially, SCERT. They have therefore developed in various ways and to
varying degrees in different states and districts. Because of a variety of reasons
many DIETs have fallen short in a number of respects in reaching close to the
vision that was outlined for them in the Guidelines as revealed in the many appraisal
studies.

83
Even with all these imperfections in their functioning, DIETs stand out as an
outstanding quality assurance innovation. First, and foremost, the comprehensive
manner in which it has been conceptualized has made explicit the range and
variety of quality parameters that can apply to an elementary teacher education
institution. An elementary teacher education institution is not just an institution
for training teachers. It is much more. It has to provide academic and resource
support to the elementary education system towards universalization of quality
elementary education in the district. It has to serve the needs of multiple
stakeholders – non-formal and adult education workers, education department
officials, community leaders, village education committee members. Its function is
not confined to pre-service teacher training but covers continuing education of
incumbent teachers, action research and extension, work experience, curriculum
and materials development, district resource unit, planning and management
(Meeting Challenges - Documentation of Positive Practices in Four DIETs, Ed.CIL,
1999). With such an all-embracing concept, the accrediting bodies are now provided
with a map of the possible range and variety of quality parameters that can apply
to an elementary teacher education institution. Secondly, DIETs have enhanced
the profile of elementary teacher education and given it its much needed status
with its infrastructure and resources, mandate covering multiple functions and a
wide range of users and its strategic position in the implementation of UEE in the
district. The starting of DIETs has also triggered the establishment of sub-district
supportive structures thereby completing the network of teacher education
institutions in the country.

Upgrading Initial Primary Teacher Education : A basic issue relates to enhancing

the low profile of primary teacher education. Upgrading it calls for, among other
things, enhancing the entry qualification and duration of training to make it
equivalent to a degree programme. Experimentation in new designs needs to be
encouraged to evolve innovative structures like integrated programmes of teacher
education leading to a degree in elementary education with a view to eventually
adopt it as the national pattern. To break the isolation, the teacher education
programmes for different stages need to be offered under a comprehensive college
of education arrangement and organised in a flexible manner that provides for
vertical and horizontal mobility. The long term solution appears to be to have a
uniform B. Ed. degree for all teacher education programmes with provision for
specialization for teaching at the pre-school, primary/elementary/ secondary levels.
Capacity building of teacher educators : A major hurdle to the delivery of quality
service is the lack of properly trained human resources. It is generally the case
that those who function as teacher educators in elementary teacher education
institutions do not possess appropriate stage-specific professional training or
experience. The difficulty is exacerbated by the absence of degree and post-
degree programmes in primary /elementary teacher education. The M.Ed. programme
is a discipline oriented post-graduate level programme of educational studies and
research and in its present form does not address the stage specific needs of the
would-be teacher educator. What is needed to prepare such teacher educators is
a programme at the post-degree level which is focused on the knowledge, skills
and competencies leading to a deeper understanding of the philosophy, programmes

84
and processes of elementary education and development of professional skills for
training teachers. An important quality assurance indicator is thus overlooked.

Conclusion
At the end of the day, the feeling one gets is that elementary teacher education
even with all the challenges it is presently facing is on the road to soon emerge as
a truly professional enterprise. What lends hope to this forecast is the overseeing
presence of quality assurance bodies of NAAC and NCTE and resource support
institutions like the NCERT.

  

85
86
 Fostering Inclusion Through Teacher Education:
Innovative Strategies and Practices

Prof.Smriti Swarup*

“Children that learn together, learn to live together.”

Inclusive education means “all for children for all children”. If the mission to be
achieved is “Education For All”(EFA), the goal should be “to Include All” in the
system. What we require to-day is teachers for inclusive education.

Belongingness is a fundamental right and not something that children with disabilities
must earn. Providing support to students with disabilities to make their inclusion
socially and academically meaningful is the challenge teachers face in inclusive
education programmes. Meaningful inclusion in school requires administrators,
teachers and parents not only to value diversity but also question the traditional
practice of segregating students who are different.

The general philosophy of inclusive education provides for good teaching practices,
healthy relationship between teacher and students, to improve the equality of
education for “all children” in a classroom and help the development of “all children”
in different ways. The concept of inclusion places emphasis on changing the system
rather than the child.

In inclusion, it is not necessary for a student with disabilities to be “at grade

level” in order to receive instruction in the general education setting. The argument
is that our educational system, structure and practices need to shift and become
more flexible, more inclusive, and more collaborative in order to better
accommodate students with learning differences.

In the present educational context three main questions need to be addressed if

‘education for all’ is to be achieved.
Equity? Diversity? Inclusion?

Equity :

Does equity mean “all for all children”?

Does it mean, same opportunities to all?

Does it mean providing equal opportunities which does not necessarily
mean providing “same things”

Diversity :

Do we mean that diversity be over ruled?

Does it provide for diverse needs of people?

* Director, Centre for Special Education, SNDT Women’s University, Juhu Road, Mumbai,
Maharashtra, India

87

Does it mean diversifying the programmes to meet the diverse needs of
diverse people?
Inclusion :

Is it essential that all people with disabilities be included in the mainstream?

Can they be included in all spheres of life?

Can all persons with disabilities be included to the same extent?

The answers to the above questions would provide answers to the following -

Who? - Who should be included?

What? - For what purpose?
When? - When (age) should they be included?
Where? - The setting
How? - How would it happen?
How long? - For what education?

The major constraints that have been identified for achieving inclusion are -

Lack of accurate data regarding the size of the target population.

Lack of awareness and acceptability within the school and community.

Lack of resources : Human, financial, technical and material

Inadequacy of institutional infrastructure and support system.

Lack of social support or absence of flexibility in the conduct of
examination.

Lack of staff development programmes.

A great amount of literature has been produced with regard to modernization,

restructuring, reorganizing and revamping of teacher education programmes. This
indicates that not only has the intellectual society realized the importance of
teacher education, the general community has also shown its concern about the
quality of teachers.

The components of education system such as policy, curriculum framework,

teaching - learning process, teachers, students, managers etc. cannot be dealt
with in isolation. The inter relationships and interdependence of the components
is very vital for bringing reform in the total education system. The same is true for
teacher education.

The teachers have a very crucial role to play in the implementation of the
educational policies. Perhaps, one of the major causes for not being able to achieve
EFA is lack of trained teachers who would be able to cater to the needs of “all
children” in the class. This also means that inclusion of children with disabilities in
the mainstream is only possible if the teachers teaching and managing the classroom
are not only sensitized but are provided skill - training to address to the learning
needs of special children in a regular class. Besides EFA, inclusive education is
another target set by the Government of India, which will take a long time to be
achieved.

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Leadership role is required in teacher preparation for inclusive education.
Leadership is required not only for revising the teacher education curricula at all
levels but also for rethinking, restructuring and reframing and thus bringing about
a total curriculum reform.

The initiative has already been taken up by the NCTE in terms of developing a
curricular framework for all teacher education. Now the onus lies with the teacher
training institutions to implement the suggested changes. For this, we need to
train the teacher educators either through open / distance learning or face to
face short term in-service training programmes.

“When your heart is in your dream, no request is too extreme ____”

— Jimny Cricket

In the existing complex scenario, teacher education in our country needs a fresh
look. It is very important to know what do we expect from a teacher. To augment
the existing system of teacher preparation all teacher education programmes should
aim at the following functions :

1. Catering to the individual needs of “All Learners” in the class - irrespective of

their individual differences emerging out of potential, cultural, social and
economic diversity.
2. Facilitating teaching - learning process
3. Providing a role model to the learners
4. Social reconstruction in Indian context

The policy of teacher education needs to be revised because the perspectives of

teacher education have undergone change. Also the meanings and connotations
of terms like “field relevance” have changed.From the legal issues the teachers
should be required to ask a number of questions-

1. How can I provide an appropriate programme to all students in my class?

2. What services are needed?
3. Whom can I contact for assistance?
4. What are the available services and resources?
5. What instructional techniques could be used to cater to individual needs?

It has been reiterated that teacher education programmes need to be reviewed.

A thorough analysis of the existing teacher education programmes is required
considering the enormity of the problems of children with special needs. Currently,
the adequate educational services are not reaching the children with disability,
especially in the rural and semi-urban areas. Because of the single teacher and
multi-grade system, the teachers in the general schools are not able to cater to
the multifarious needs of special children.

We need to review teacher education as a link between school education and

higher education. It is a paradox that on one side we say that we need to

89
mainstream the children with disability and on the other we categorize teacher
preparation for general education and special education. Since special teachers
have no place in the general education system and general education teachers
are not trained to deal with special needs of children disability, these children
even if they are integrated in the general system are not helped because of non-
availability of adequately trained teachers. Therefore, it is imperative that teacher
education system be reviewed and revised.

If teacher education programmes have to be made inclusive, additional

competencies are needed in four areas -

Creating one community of learners

Instructional planning for students with disabilities

Managing student behaviours

Consultation / collaboration

These competencies will enable future educators to -

develop attitudes and beliefs that foster inclusion.

engage in joint collaboration (general and special educators) about students
with disabilities

understand, plan and provide the instructional programme and behavioural
supports to students with disabilities in the regular classroom.

participate in meaningful school reform efforts within their schools and in
their communities

Thus adaptations are required in -

Objectives

Content

Material - devices and equipment

Teaching - learning process

Evaluation

An Inclusive Teacher Preparation Model

Programme Components Outcomes

Shared and Collaborative Understanding

Teaching Diversity
An Inclusive
Teaching learning process : Teacher
Adapting to change
Techniques and Strategies Preparation
Programme
Flexibility
Field based experiences
Creativity

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 Needed Support Administrative support

Embedded support

Prior to instruction

Modified materials In - class support GOs/NGOs

Accommodations

Peers, Para educators, Therapists,

Special Education Teachers,
Administrators, Psychologists,
Counselors, Resource Teachers,
Volunteers

To assure quality in inclusive teacher education programme we must take care of

its -

Comprehensiveness / inclusiveness

Diversity

Flexibility

To achieve inclusive teacher education we need to work together, collaborate

with each other and tolerate others because -

“None of us is as smart as all of us.”

— Johnson & Johnson

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92
 Innovations and Best Practices Applications in
Mathematics Education in Nigeria

Mr. R. O. Ezike*

Abstract
Education practices in Nigeria have witnessed tremendous positive changes in
curriculum planning and curriculum implementation especially in the teaching and
learning of Mathematics in schools. These changes are as a result of the global
trend and development in information technology. The teaching of Mathematics
in schools with the old and ancient methods is no longer yielding the expected
results in Mathematics achievements. If Nigeria is to move with the global pace in
information technology there is need to improve the quality of Mathematics
education in schools and Colleges. Two of the innovations and best practices in
the teaching and learning of Mathematics in schools are Computer-Assisted
Instruction (CAI) and the use of Mathematics Laboratory. This paper examines the
relevance of these two approaches in teaching and learning of Mathematics in
schools and Colleges.

Introduction
The benefits of Mathematics to the individual and to the society at large cannot
be over-emphasized. Apart from its usefulness in our everyday activities such as in
commerce, industry, computer, agriculture etc., Mathematics remains the bedrock
for the steady growth of science and technology anywhere in the world.

Despite the acclaimed position of Mathematics in the society, students attainments

in Mathematics in both internal and external examinations continue to dwindle.
According to Ozoro (1993) and Alio (1997) there is a constant high rate of failure in
Mathematics attainment at the senior secondary school certificate examinations
and National Examination Council (NECO) in Nigeria.

The reasons for the student’s poor performance in Mathematics examinations among
other factors are attributable to the over-flogged traditional methods of teaching
Mathematics in primary and secondary schools in the country. The traditional
methods of teaching Mathematics, which are mainly expository, do not equip
students with effective strategies and skills for problem solving.
Today the field of education has witnessed tremendous changes. The emphasis is
now on innovations and best practices that can bring about the desired positive
changes in qualitative education. These innovations are in the areas of curriculum
planning and curriculum implementation, instructional methods and strategies,
production and utilization of instructional materials and strategies for effective
evaluation of curriculum and instructional objectives. Innovations in teaching are
replacing old methods or are supplements to old practices.

* Provost Federal College of Education, Eha-Amufu, Enugu State, Nigeria

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The old expository methods of teaching Mathematics are no longer effective.
Innovative approaches such as laboratory approach, individualized instruction,
computer-assisted instruction (CAI) and other problem solving approaches are
replacing the old order in teaching and learning of Mathematics.

This paper therefore examines the innovative potentials of computer-assisted

instruction and laboratory methods on the teaching and learning of Mathematics
in schools.

The issues at stake will be discussed under the following sub-headings:

1. The computer – What it is ?

2. Applications of computer in Education.
3. Applications of Computer in Mathematics Education.
4. Mathematics Laboratory.
5. Characteristics of a standard Mathematics Laboratory.
6. The Mathematics Teacher in the Laboratory.
7. The concept of Computer-Assisted Instruction (CAI).
8. The importance of Computer and Mathematics laboratory methods as
media of instructions in Mathematics.
9. Conclusion.

The Computer – What it is?

A computer is an electronic machine used for processing data and instructions to
produce useful information and messages through a complex electronic
configuration (Idu, 2001). It picks up data and instructions from the input unit,
processes same in the systems unit, stores, retrieves and ultimately displays the
finished job on the screen as softcopy or printed on paper as hardcopy.

A computer as an electronic machine has no common sense. It solves problems

only as instructed. When wrong, it reflects the imperfections of the humans who
programme or conjure it (Awake, 1999).

In truth (Margolis, 1985) a computer is an electronic entity. It is a legitimate

extension of the human brain. It is a logic machine. It will think for you, in
certain ways thousands of times faster than would otherwise be possible. The
computer can be used as a calculator, if so desired, but the power of the computer
is in its use with programmes. Once the programmes and data are in the memory,
the computer is able to run programmes automatically and at blinding speed
(Margolis, 1985).

A computer is a machine capable of complex Mathematical and logical operations

and processing voluminous data and information with enormous speed and absolute
accuracy (Bhatnager and Ramani, 1991). Computers (Onyewuenyi, 1994) are very,
very dumb machines. They can do nothing without being told what to do, when to
do it, what information to use, and where to store it. They are also very, very fast
machines. Once they are instructed how to accomplish a specific task, they will

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do so in an incredible short space of time. It is this speed of operation that
results in their wide spread use.

A computer as an electronic machine performs the following basic functions (Idu,

2001).

1. It accepts data and instructions.

2. It processes data and instructions very fast
3. It produces finished results automatically
4. It stores information in its memory when necessary
5. It retrieves information quickly on demand
6. It performs other complex mathematical analysis using the Arithmetic Logic
Unit (ALU) and the special mathematics coprocessor

The computer is made up of the hardware and the software materials. The software
is a set of programmes or instructions run in the computer. The computer hardware
is made up of the following essential parts:-

1. The keyboard
2. The central processing unit (CPU) containing the mother board and the
memories.
3. The monitor or the Visual Display Unit (VDU).
4. The peripherals.

Examples of computers include: Clocks, Televisions, Type writers, Radios, Video

and Video cassette recorders, thermometers, calculators, ultra-sound machines,
telephones, fax machines, satellite censors etc.

Computers can be classified according to the period of manufacture as First

generation, Second generation, Third generation, Fourth generation and the
present Fifth generation. These generations correspond with the mainframe
computers, the minicomputers, the microcomputers, the super computers etc.
computers can also be classified as digital, analog and hybrid.

Applications of Computers in Education

Applications of computer in education are numerous. Some of them include:
(a) Instruction: The use of computer in teaching school subjects is an
innovation. The lessons are programmed into computer in what is known
as computer assisted instructions (CAI). The use of computer in teaching
reduces note taking since the lectures or lessons can be recorded on
diskettes and each student can own a diskette. This can be replayed or
reproduced elsewhere by the student.
(b) Admission Processes: Admission processes in Nigerian schools have
already become troublesome. The admission system can be computerized
and this will reduce the rackets.
(c) Evaluation: Students evaluation is another area where computer can be
applied. Evaluation here covers both internal and external examinations.

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 The computer can be used in marking, scoring, grading, interpretation
and placement.
(d) Test Standardization: Computer can be of very much help in standardizing
both external and school examinations. This will reduce the problem of
comparability of standards in continuous assessment in schools.
(e) Storage of Information: Computer is helpful in education for storing
information. Nigerians are not good record keepers. Information in millions
of files can be put in a few diskettes.
(f) Retrieval of Records: One outstanding feature of a computer is its ability
to retrieve information instantly.
(g) Library Services: Computerization of library services especially in tertiary
institutions is desirable.
(h) Computerization of Teachers/Workers Salaries and Allowances at all
levels: This is another area where the application of computer in
education is desirable.

Applications of Computers in Mathematics

The computer has special features for Mathematical analysis. These features
are the Arithmetic Logic Unit (ALU) and the Maths-coprocessor.

Therefore, computer can be used in Mathematics in many ways:-

(a) For carrying out basic processes in Mathematics as a calculator.
(b) Statistical Analysis: The computer is well-suited for complex statistical
analysis.
(c) Mathematical Games: Many of the modern games are developed by
computers.
(d) Flow Charts: Computer is applied in performing computations involving
flow charts.
(f) Logic Unit: The computer started as Arithmetic Logic Unit (ALU)

Mathematics Laboratory
Mathematics laboratory is a special place where learners are engaged in
practical learning activities. It is a type of resource center equipped with
very many current instructional materials such as models, computers, abacus,
globes, geoboards, graphboards, metre-rules, counters, charts, ropes, etc.
In a Mathematics laboratory, like in any other science laboratory, children are
actively involved in practicing motor skills, solving problems by making use of
necessary instruments. Pupils are not only seen to take active part in the
entire learning process but are seen to engage in learning through guided
discovery. Children use and handle concrete objects.

All the pupils are very active. When I say active I mean it in two senses. One
is acting on material things (Piaget, 1971). But the other means doing things in
social collaboration, in a group effort. This leads to critical frame of mind,
where pupils must communicate with each other. This is an essential factor in
intellectual development. A child who achieves certain knowledge through

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 free investigation and spontaneous effort will later be able to retain it; he will
have acquired a methodology that can serve him for the rest of his life.

Characteristics of a Standard Mathematics Laboratory

A standard Mathematics laboratory is expected to possess the following
features:
(a) The space/room must be adequate in size – not too small not too large.
(b) All the drawers, boxes and shelves where different materials are kept
must be properly labelled.
(c) The Mathematics laboratory must not be congested with irrelevant details
that can obscure major elements of current interests.
(d) The Mathematics laboratory must have attendants apart from the teachers.
(e) The inventories should be up-dated from time to time.
(f) Provision of First Aid Boxes is essential to handle minor cuts and bruises.
(g) Installation of fire extinguishers inside the Mathematics laboratory is
important.
(h) Test, class-work, project, and assignment can be executed in the
Mathematics laboratory.
(i) A well-equipped Mathematics laboratory must have sets of computers.

The Mathematics Teacher in the Laboratory

The Mathematics teacher is a participant observer, therefore, he/she must do
the following:

a) Specify the objectives of the lesson clearly.

b) Identify the trait or behaviour to be observed.
c) Observe a few traits at a time.
d) Device a way of recording the observed traits.
e) Use the most appropriate tools.
f) Give adequate activities or learning experiences that can lead to the
desired behaviour.
g) Make proper use of timing.
h) Avoid undue favour to students during laboratory lessons.
i) Ensure that the relevant prerequisite skills and experiences necessary
for the execution of a particular task have been acquired.

The Concept of Computer-Assisted Instruction (CAI)

Computer-Assisted Instruction (CAI) refers to situations in which computer system
is used in the process of teaching students. Computer-Assisted Instruction (CAI)
or Computer-Aided Instruction (CAI) is an aspect of Information Technology (IT)
that refers to the classroom instructional activities, practices, tutorials, drills,
simulation carried out by the teachers as supplements to the traditional teacher-
centred instructions. CAI is a program package intended to assist students to
interact directly with the computer, which stores instructional materials and
controls the sequence of presentation.

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CAI as a supplement to the traditional, teacher-centred instruction produces
achievement effects that are superior to those obtained with traditional method
of instruction alone (Dagali, 2003). Examples of CAI applications include guided
drill and practice exercises, computer visualization of complex objects, computer
games and computer-aided communication between students and teachers. The
guided drill is a computer program that flashes questions to students, returns
feedback and selects additional questions based on the students responses. Some
of the CAI tools such as word processing, spreadsheet, and database etc. collect,
organize, analyze and transmit information.

CAI can positively increase a student’s access to information. The program can
adapt to the abilities and preferences of the individual student. It enhances the
quality of individualized instruction a student receives. Curzon (1982) enumerated
the advantages of Computer-Assisted Instruction as follows:

(i) The computer-presented programs can reduce the time needed for
understanding difficult concepts.
(ii) It can adequately present individualized instructions.
(iii) It can proceed at the precise pace demanded by the student.
(iv) It can offer swift and accurate feedback.

The Importance of Computer and Laboratory Methods as Media of

Instructions in Mathematics
The applications of computer and laboratory methods in teaching Mathematics
have far-reaching advantages. These are as follows (Idu, 2003).
(i) Learning is Integrative: The use of instructional materials in the
Mathematics laboratory and CAI effectively and adequately measure
classroom instructional objectives in the three domains of behaviour –
cognitive, psychomotor and affective domains. Students receive immediate
feedback and are excited.

(ii) Student’s Participation in Learning is Maximized: All students are

encouraged to participate actively in all Mathematical activities in the
learning process. The teacher is expected to give sufficient guide to the
students who are expected to arrive at results through successive trials.
According to Piaget (1973) a child who achieves certain knowledge through
free investigation and spontaneous efforts will later be able to retain it,
he will have acquired a methodology that can serve him for the rest of his
life.

(iii) They Enhance individual differences among students: In a mixed-abilities

class, laboratory method and CAI in Mathematics make it possible for
students to work at different rates. Many students benefit from the
immediate responsiveness of computer interactions and appreciate the
self-spaced and independent learning.

(iv) Improve attitudes of learners towards Mathematics: Perceived attitudes

of learners towards success in Mathematics can be improved tremendously

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 by proper applications of laboratory method and CAI in Mathematics.
Dagali (2002) have reported the success of CAI in improving examination
scores, enhancing student’s attitudes and lowering the amount of time
required for mastering certain concepts.

(v) They enrich the Curriculum: Use of instructional materials in the

Mathematics laboratory and CAI in Mathematics encourage enquiry spirits
among students. Through spontaneous efforts by learners on interesting
activities, familiar topics or problems can be approached in new ways.
Students are therefore likely to be led to new ideas or dimensions.

(vi) Learning ceases to be Abstract: Adequate use of Mathematics laboratory

method and CAI in Mathematics stimulate the interests of learners since
learning is practical. These approaches reduce the abstraction that is
generally associated with the expository methods of presenting
Mathematics. They encourage learning by doing.

10. Conclusion
The use of Mathematics laboratory and computer-assisted instruction (CAI) in
teaching Mathematics in schools has been reported to improve students’
performance, enhance students’ interests and minimize individual differences
among learners.

However, the use of these innovative approaches is yet to fully start in many
schools in Nigeria. This set back is apparently due to some teething problems
such as lack of qualified teachers, poor funding, lack of facilities, lack of
electricity in many villages, and so on.

At any rate, if Nigeria is to keep pace with the global trends and development
in information technology, then spirited efforts must be put in place by the
government, the private sector and non-governmental organizations (NGOs)
to promote the use of computer, laboratory method and other innovations
and best practices in teaching Mathematics at all levels of education in Nigeria.

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100
 The Anveshna Experience:
Teacher Education with a difference

T. K. S. Lakshmi*

Abstract
The teacher education programmes (TEPs) involve tremendous efforts on the part
of both the teacher educators and the student teachers. Their impact potential,
yet, seems week. The experiences of both groups have cumulated over years into
substantial arguments as to the non feasibility and field remoteness of the actual
inputs in TEPs.Pertinent questions have been asked about the curriculum
implementation in TEPs, their underlying assumptions, and conceptualization of
the curriculum frameworks as well as their substance. But in practice things
continue unchanged.

Against such a backdrop of field reality, small team of teacher educators in the
Department of Education, Banasthali Vidyapith, have attempted to break new
grounds in secondary teacher education. The presentation is on this alternative
TE programme, the ‘Anweshana’ which is essentially a learner evolved, participative
programme. It attempts to understand ‘learning’ in the teacher preparation
programme, to explore the possible optimization of use of available time-resource
frame. The presentation focuses on

- the way ‘Anweshana’ was visualized

- the preparatory efforts
- the unique program features
- the insights gained
- the efforts at institutionalization of a parallel TE programme
- the ‘spill out’ effects

Introduction
Our Teacher Education programmes generally focus on leading students teacher
to three kinds of learning:

 Learn conceptual knowledge which is arranged into several courses of

study each pertaining separately to a specific dimension of teaching-
learning process as well as the broader context in which its operates.

 Develop required verbal and non-verbal competencies through simulated

practice and school-based practice.

 Learn to integrate the knowledge from different courses of study which

seemingly look overlapping and exclusive, into one comprehensive gestalt

* Professor and Dean, Faculty of Education, Banasthali Vidyapeeth, Rajasthan, India

101
 of teacher, teaching and the broader context. Besides, learn also in
integrate the conceptual learning and practical experience received in
such way that the supplementary role of each other is perceived.

Through this, it is expected, they begin to internalize an ‘integrated experience’

of TE which would enable one to operate as a ‘professional’. Most often the STs
learn the first two kinds and integration rarely takes place. This is the reason for
student teacher perceiving conceptual substance as independent courses of study
even without most of which they can learn to practice. This points to the fact
that presentation of these two aspects in TE programmes have to be changed so
as to enable the S-Ts to perceive them in a unified form.

Some predominant issues in Secondary Teacher Education Programme commonly

pointed out are:

 Inadequate time and resource and their use.

 Teacher educator’s orientation or inclination to be pedantic.
 Overall organization of the TEP is very similar to any academic Programme
rendering it less sensitive to the demands of a professional education.
 Conceptual understanding and ‘practical’ inputs remain unintigrated.
 Inability of the Programme in developing an appreciation for the inputs on
pedagogy and a confidence about their feasibility in real situations.

The more recent explications about learning especially of the constructivistic and
humanistic views place the onus of learning on the learner. It is logical that learner
autonomy should be effective in a professional education Programme. For, the
beneficiaries are adults and graduates entering the Programme with the conscious
goal of becoming a teacher. It has to be remembered though that these incumbents
or ‘student teachers’ as they are commonly known, have been schooled into teacher
dominant ways for fifteen years or more. Yet, it seems to be possible to change
their orientation due to their maturity as well as their clear goal.

Towards a Participative TE Programme – The Anweshana Experience

One encouraging feature in the field of teacher education, perhaps the only field
is that those who carry it out-the teacher educators-are the strong critics of the
whole system. Most criticism have been forwarded by them and are naturally valid.
Every one of them wants to change the system – its structure, substance,
procedures, assessment mechanism, filed exposure – so goes a long list. But (this is
a big BUT!) little seems to have changed with some consequence. It is common
knowledge in the filed that several suggestive curriculum frameworks for STEP
have been proposed from time to time with very little impact on the system. The
reason quoted directly and indirectly is that teacher educators ‘do not want to
change’. They, on their part, seem to be continuously faced by the question,
what and how do we change?

In the backdrop of such ground realities it was a coincidence of kinds that resulted
in one attempt at visualizing STE Programme in a ‘different mould’ about eight

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years ago. This happened in the Department of Education, Banasthali Vidyapith
when a totally learner evolved learner participative Programme of STE was launched
in 1997-98. It happened because a couple of young teacher educators made bold
to see if a changed system works with feasibility and academic rigor.

This programme is successfully running the eight year now as an approved

programme. IT has been given the official name of B. Ed. (enriched) and an evolved
name by the students of “Anweshanna”. In what fallows is a brief sketch of this
programme.

As stated above the ANWESHANA intervention was initiated in with the explicit
purpose of :

 Evolving a flexible, participative TE programme which is functionally feasible

and
 Finding out the extent to which the programme inputs can be actually
participative and filed sensitive.

The main contention of the teacher educator was that if substative inputs were
provided in an integrated manner these would result in better understanding and
appreciation of filed reality, so that clear perceptions of theoretical inputs which
are directly or indirectly useful in the field would be developed. This would be
possible if there is a change in overall curricular structure which is free from
redundancy in substantive inputting, and which will enhance assimilation without
over-stretching the resource time frame.

The Intervention
The Anweshana intervention mainly comprises three processes viz.,
Initiation and Sensitization
Substantive Inputting Appraisal and Feedback

Initiation and Sensitization pertains to enabling student teachers to recognize,

accept one’s own learning needs and for leading them to generation of learning
sequences on their own. Initiation involves making decisions as to how to go about
independently; gaming and ice breaking are freely used. Sensitization comprises
several inputs, which lead student teachers to perceive their own strengths and
weaknesses, acceptance of others, significance of teacher roles, demands on
teachers and field conditions. Greater emphasis on these as is given during the
initial days; gradually, such sessions get far spread apart.

The activities under these (initiation and sensitization) are essentially informal
and spread over the year. ‘Initiation’ session, however short or long in duration,
usually proceeds every new activity selected. Sensitization sessions mainly are in
the form of drawing attention to self related aspects through open discussion,
certain aspects as and when occasions arises while the group proceeds with
conceptual probes and/ or field related observation and practice during the
discussions and/or the feedback sessions teacher educators help to being into

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focus relevant ideas such as value components involved the needed teacher
commitments, professional repercussions of specific teacher actions, appreciations
of the complex nature of forces and factors operating on teacher, learner, school
and the whole education system. Some exemplar themes of sensitization are given
in Box 1.

Box : 1

Sensitization Sessions
What do I expect form B. Ed.?
What are my strength and Weaknesses?
I introduce a friend
I wish I could………
Irish whispers
My most positive experience with a teacher
My most negative experience with a teacher
Ringtoss game.
Feedback sessions – how have I changed?
Why does it happens so?
Talk out
K-update
What else can happen?
How to maintain one’s stance amidst opposition?
Can we do something to change?
I am today…..
Feedback session

Substantive Inputting is the form of discerning ideas and concepts needed for
understanding and carrying out teacher roles; as well as, acquiring adequate
understanding of other conceptual knowledge needed as technical, theoretical
know-how; and learning experiences other than sensitization and appraisal. I
represented the ‘process’ dimension of the TEP, which is approached as ‘problems’
perceived relevant by the group for becoming effective teachers. Diagram I presents
an overview of how the process is carried on by student teachers.

Diagram 1 : Substantive Inputting - Process

Identification of Problem Seeking Solution Consolidation

identification of new Problem/s

Identification of Problem pertains to all activities that help the Group arrive at a
question or set of questions. These activities usually are widely varies, all basically
higed on group interaction. Initially, the questions generated are based on the
personal experience and perceived needs. These are quite peripheral and
conceptually vague and loose. However, as the Group proceeds seeking solutions,
they are able to redefine their questions, raise more questions and with better
clarity and focus. Whenever they arrive at a series of questions, the Group sets

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about prioritizing them and seeking to proceed in a sequence. Sometimes the
Group decides to tackle a couple of questions simultaneously through small group
work while at other time, the entire group works on the same questions either
individually or in groups.

Seeking Solutions pertained to all efforts made by the group to identify possible
ways of findings answers to the problem on hand. This includes identifying the
possible sources and how to tap them for the purpose. In other words, through
group interaction the group identifies possible sources or activities through which
their questions would be resolved. These range widely to include sharing personal
experiences, library work observation of real situations, guidance of Anweshana
Teacher Educators (ATEs) use of audio and/or visual triggers, self-instructional
material and the like. The Group identifies increasingly more variety of sources as
they become familiar with the substance as well as sources. Those activities broadly
can be categorized as individualized, group interactive and teacher dependent.
Besides, intermittently, several ‘hands-on’ experiences are undertaken whenever
felt needed; field observations, exercises in simulated contentions as well as
practices in real school conditions are carried out. In fact, field practice goes
beyond mere classroom teaching, to participation in the school teaching kind
other proportion.

Consolidation pertains to the efforts made by the group to tie up the outcomes
of their probing with the initial question they had, and list out any possible new
questions that arose. These efforts generally are in the form of discussions, listing
out of main points learnt in relation to technical knowledge as well as personal
development, preparing write-ups, feed back, altering the concept map and
identifying further problems.

On the whole the substantive inputting pertains to the identification of problems

evolvement of concepts clusters and concepts links. An exemplar concept link is
given as Diagram 2. Significantly, in the whole process two important features have
been observed year after year.

a. the initial goal setting by students teachers pertains to self rather than
pedagogy-developing self confidence, courage to face a group effective
communication and self improvement almost invariably preceded the
technical and conceptual targets.
b. A diversified range of activities are undertaken by the group. An exemplar
of this for one year is given as Diagram.

Appraisal and Feedback are continually carried out in varied ways in order to
enable student teachers find out WHAT and HOW MUCH they had learnt as well as
to perceive changes in SELF. Regular feedback sessions are held at the end of
every main activity in which the entire Group and the ATEs participate and give
their observations. Every student teacher maintains personal file in which she
records her self appraisal for each day. Periodically, assessment sessions are also
held through ‘ self check’ and test for conceptual understanding, supervised

105
presentation both in simulation and real situation and other dimensions such as
group dynamics, perception of self and the ‘experience’.

The kinds of appraisal tasks usually carried out during the year are indicated in
Box 3. Apart these, end of the university examination are also held.

In summary, the substantive dimension in the Anweshana intervention is

multidimensional. It involves all respects of learner behavior – cognitive, effective
and psychomotor. It is essentially a process of coordination between and among
individuals, conceptual interlinking as well as organizational arrangements. Every
learner has to be active participants irrespective of the variations in learner
characteristics. Due to such demand on personal involvement and participation of
each learner, all dimensions of behavior are fully ‘active’ for appropriate and
adequate assimilation to take place.

Such a processing is a total personalized mechanism activated by such individual.

Learning would be more effective if each student teacher identifies one’s own
questions of problems that one can recognize or any aspect or idea that interests
her/him. This would make the ‘process of seeking’ to understand personally
meaningful and necessary. What is learned in terms of concepts or competencies
by a group of learners may be similar but they are learned by each would be
different. This can be illustrated thus. Each learner (student teacher) perceives
concepts relations in one’s won manner, depending on which logical link one
perceives as significant. For instance the concept may be perceived by one in
relation to teacher, teacher role, methodology of teaching, whereas for another
it may seems most logical to link iit with learner, learning teacher effectiveness
and classroom climate. Though such’ conceptual links get developed by individuals
who are continually in group situation with other learners these get shared and
articulated in the group. This results in group-generated concept-links which are
shares by the group. However, when such varied relationships are sought by students
through raising questions, their initial perception and questions may quite loose,
vague and not very focused. This is but natural as they are unfamiliar with teacher’s
roles in a technical manner. Seeking answers to the questions they themselves
have raised would familiarizes them with technical terms and details. Gradually the
nature of questions tends to become more specific more technical more,
conceptually relevant ones. This trend would continue through out the programme.
The Upper limits of such thinking and inquiry reached by each S-T would depend
on the characteristics of each learner and of the group such as ability interest
motivation, aspiration, perceptions and mutual acceptance. Thus, having raised
questions on teacher roles they can priorities these questions in the order they
wish to find the answers. When the whole process is carried on in a group there
would be a group generated propritised list of concept links. The whole group
would find it relevant to seek to understand them in the same order. Further,
understanding such concept links raises several questions as a sequel trying to
understand which (i) newer concept links get generated (ii) earlier concept links
get modified (iii) some earlier concept links may be discarded even. The same is
true in respect of the affect attributes as well as competencies to be developed.

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It is through such a process one develops an image of oneself as a ‘teacher’ with
clarity as to role perception, self concept as well as conceptual technical know
how.

As a result, learning, as expected in a professional education programme, will lead

to atleast three kinds of understanding viz.,

 Conceptual understanding through theoretical as well as practical

experience.
 ‘Process’ understanding with regard to the various processes of generating
and transacting educational and more specifically instructional
experiences.
 Professional understanding of its relevance to one’s own self as a member
of the professional community, to teacher role exceptions and
administrative requirements.

Periodically, the Group, attempts to ‘concept-map’ what they have learnt. Towards
the later part of the academic session, usually in January, they carry out the
exercise of concept mapping all that they have learnt and prepare thematic clusters,
which are taken as different course. These include even those themes or concepts
the Group identifies as necessary but not yet covered. The teacher educators
edit the curriculum framework thus prepared and generate a ‘syllabus’ ascertaining
the technical requirement and expressions. This is again discussed in the group so
that it has the concurrence of all the students. This syllabus is used as basis for
the end of term university examination which is in consonance with the overall
curricular structure in the University.

This systemic demand has also provided an opportunity for the students to
consolidate their learning, and organize it into a framework. This gives them a
hands on experience in ‘curriculum development. Doing this without diluting the
learner autonomy has been a challenge.

Box : 2
The whole exercise of concept mapping was a very fruitful and satisfying
experience for the entire group in more than one ways:

1. it revealed the vast conceptual group covered

2. it revised their learning gained through variety of Les
3. it enable them to develop a gstaltic view of their conceptual
understandings.
4. it provided a basis for further study a d discussion on curriculum
development - the process forces and factors affecting curriculum
development evolving a curriculum framework and need for curriculum
revision and restructuring.
5. it led to identifying needs for further conceptual understanding without
which some concept clusters remain incomplete. A few of them were,

107
 remedial teaching exceptional children especially the gifted use of
psychological tests for understanding learner behavior significance of
guidance centers in Indian schools.
6. it enable them to suggest a curriculum framework as a basis for external
examination. However, the framework prepared by the Group had to be
rendered by ATEs to suit certain administrative procedural requirement.

Source: The Anweshana Experience, Teacher Education with a difference,

Banasthali Vidyapith, 2001

Preparatory Tasks
Visualising and carrying out any innovation is to easy. It is a greater challenge to
carryout a flexible, evolving programme such as Anweshana. Its conceptual grounding
is valid and yet, it requires a ‘new-look’ academically and administratively. The
fact that such a programme has been in operation in the Vidyapith is an indicator
for the feasibility of trying out ‘break-away’ T E programmes in other institutions.
It is pertinent to record the process through which the Anweshana programme
had to pass before its launching.

Besides the enthusiasm that drove the teacher educators to try a programme with
a difference they were very aware of the need to reorient themselves and equip
for adequacy and comprehensiveness. They got ready over two years by undertaking
a few things on their own. Some of such preparatory tasks undertaken are :
 Continuous discussions with the Head of the Department about field
conditions, field requirements conceptual inputs in TEP and the
understanding cohesions in them.
 Observing the demonstration given by the Head in group centered methods
and learner centered methods and thoroughly discussing them.
 Trying out the various instructional methods particularly the group
centered and learner centered ones.
 Participating in gaming and motivational inputs.
 Continual discussions on constructivistic and humanistic theories; the
possible details of features of and ways of implementing a new programme
the imminent pitfalls and the ways to seek remedies if needed and so on.

Trying out a structurally different programme within a well established Department

in a challenge in itself. It is naïve to expect every staff member to be equally
involved in an innovation practice. Yet success of any innovative is to a great
extent determined by the acceptance of all staff members. The initiative of a
couple of them was responsible in the case of Anweshana. The whole project with
its conceptual basis, rationale and the way it was being visualized were presented
to the staff body by the two Anweshana teacher educators (ATEs). Through
discussion a few decisions were made.

(i) all students of B.Ed. selecting the school teaching subject which are the
areas of the ATEs will be included for the new programme.

108
 (ii) Though the entire process evolves through students and assessment would
be continuous process, end of the year annual examinations should be
external as it is to the other group.
(iii) The workload for the two ATEs would also include classroom teaching in
the other group though for school based practice they would take the
entire responsibility of the Anweshana group.

With such concurrence of the staff body, the proposed innovative programme was
presented to the Board of studies and the Faculty of Education for approval and
was recommended. The next higher academic decision making body, in fact the
highest in the university set up to consider the proposal was the Academic Council
in which Heads of all Departments and the Deans of all faculties are members.
After a prolonged discussion on the relevance of trying out such an ‘unstructured’
curriculum it was approved. Later on the approval of NCTE was sought and obtained
for the programme.

The professional preparation of teachers requires them to become perceptive

and sensitive to not only their own strength and weakness but also those of students
and colleague. In order to do this, the TE programme inputs need to have the
potential for flexible, learner sensitive variations.

The End Word

The Anweshana Experience brings to force a few possibilities in teacher education.
There is a need to consider these more seriously, identify ways of breaking away
from the persisting stereotypes in Teacher education. A critical examination of
concept maps arrived at by the students needs to be made in order to ascertain
any possible omissions in conceptual understanding. It is pertinent to review the
existing evaluation procedures and examine the appropriateness of adopting the
multiple assessment modes similar to the Anweshana Programme. The resource-
time utilization over eight academic years by different batches of student teachers
will provide a more rational basis for any argument in this regard. Last, but not the
least, the Anweshana experience has shown that the essential requirement of a
wholistic view and positive attitude in teacher educators enriches the
meaningfulness of the TEP as well as makes the effort on the part of both teacher
educators and student – teachers, worthwhile and satisfying.

109
 Diagram 2 Exemplar Concept - Links

110
Roles of a Teaching Understanding learner behavior
Teacher
Learning
Views on learning

Teacher tasks and Teacher Instructional Instructional

responsibilities Instructional
Competencies Process Designing
approaches
strategies models
Co-ordination and
monitoring of Teacher’s Components Self-instructional
working
characteristcs interactive Tr.Monitored -
process instruction

Administrative formal
Mechanisms Settings
informal

Do different kinds of Kinds of Structure Academic and

Schools functions similarly? Schools of school Administrative
Education in India Controls

Source: The Anweshana Experience, Teacher Education with a different, Banasthali Vidyapeeth, 2004
 Diagram 3 Kinds of Instructional Inputs

Visual Triggers Audio triggers

Problem presentation Knowledge update
Demonstrations General monitoring
Conduct of exams observations Lectures Discussion
discussion with
Practice school Staff
of teaching KINDS OF analysing triggers
INSTRUCTIONAL INPUTS
library study
School based activities
simulation practice
Self learning Individually In Group
small group discussions
Library work
content group discussions
Role-play
Skill based teaching content mapping workshop
assignment
content organisation workshop

Preparation of material in workshops Thematic display formulation of IO’s workshop

Selecting themes Organising exhibition relating content with IO’s

PLM
workshop
glossary Collecting collating data preparing material
ISM
Display/exhibition
Bibliography
Self report best from waste

111
Source: The Anweshana Experience, Teacher Education with a different, Banasthali Vidyapith, 2001
112
 Teacher Education through Distance Education:
Innovations and Best Practices
In
Yashwantrao Chavan Maharashtra Open University

Dr. Anant Joshi **

Dr. Shashi Gaikwad*
Dr. Kavita Salunke *

Section-One
Background and Present Position:
Yashwantrao Chavan Maharashtra Open University is the first Indian Open University,
which received the Award of Excellence for Institutional Achievement in Distance
Education of COL in the year 2002. The School of Education, which came into
existence along with the other six Schools, is also attempting to achieve comparable
excellence to deserve the award.

The school launched the Teacher Education Program in 1991. The then B.Ed. program
was totally a replica of the conventional program although it was program organized
for the in service teachers through Distance Mode. The cliental is the teachers in
the Primary, Secondary and Higher Secondary schools in the state. The program
was comprised of five theory courses, three compulsory papers and two optional,
and practicum of five hundred marks. The duration of the course was two years,
where in there were 40 days for contact sessions divided in three main contact
sessions spread over the period of two years. These contact sessions were
conducted during the winter and summer vacations.

The intake was 2500 students per batch enrolled at 62 centers distributed all over
Maharashtra. The program came under the scrutiny of the National Council of
Teacher Education (NCTE) the apex body controlling teacher education in 1997.
The newly established statutory body laid down norms for the recognition of the
program and the School suspended the program for two years to fulfill the
formalities. The University got the recognition for the program in the year 1999.
The enrollment was reduced to 1500 students to be admitted at 33 centers.

The gap of two years proved to be a boon to us. During this period we critically
examined our program. We also considered the Teacher Education Curriculum
Frameworks published by the NCTE and the University Grants Commission. (UGC)
and initiated the process of restructuring of the program. The early program was
primarily first generation distance education program that later on passed into
the second generation. With the restructuring of the program we are now slowly
entering into the third and fourth generation. As a result, all the four generations

** Director, * Lecturers, School of Education, Yashwantrao Chavan Maharashtra Open University,

Nashik, Maharashtra, India

113
coexist simultaneously and will continue to coexist even in the future. We accept
the situation without any hesitation, as we believe more in the philosophy of
Teacher Education through Distance Education than the expediency gained through
ICT.

A series of discussions were held among the Faculty members. They deliberated
and explored the Philosophical Foundation of Teacher Education through Distance
Mode. We identified six theoretical pillars with a sound base of Modular Curriculum.
The origin of these pillars is shown in Figure no. I.

1. Modular Approach to Curriculum 4. Professional Development

2. Self Directed Learning 5. Reflective Teaching
3. ICT 6. School Based Teacher Education

7. Flexibility

Pillars from Distance Education Pillars from in service Teacher Education

Modular Approach to Curriculum: The entire teacher education Curriculum is

divided into a large number of modules. The students can choose the modules and
develop curriculum as per their needs and requirements. The School reviewed
the literature related to modular approach and developed a descriptor for writing
modules. It includes format and the guidelines for developing a module .The process
of development of different modules is in progress.

Self Directed Learning: The Distance learners learn by themselves. Self Directed
Learning is the step further than Self Study in which they decide their own goal,
plan the activities and strive to achieve the goal on their own. The Teacher Education
program needs to be designed in such a way that it facilitates SDL.

Information and Communication Technology: One of the basic features of distance

education is the use of ‘State of Art* Communication Technology. Initially teacher
needs to acquire at least ITC literacy skills and eventually he has to use ICT for his
own learning as well as teaching.

Professional Development: Professional development is a never-ending journey.

It requires continuous efforts on the part of the teachers and the basic need for
the same is to have the willingness to change, and the broadmindedness to accept
the new ideas and beliefs.

Reflective Teaching: The teacher trainees of the program are in service. This
becomes a strong asset for them. Every theoretical aspect they learn during the
program can be applied and tested in the real situation only if they follow reflective
practitioner model.

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School Based Teacher Education: As teachers are in service and are going to be
continued in the same place they have their own requirements. So also the schools
have their own expectations. Hence the Teacher Education program, at least in
part, should be organized and structure to fulfill the requirements.

Flexibility: The Distance mode of Education demands autonomy to the learners.

In order to exercise the autonomy there should be real flexibility. The principle
of flexibility needs to be transferred from training situation to teaching situation..
As a result, the teachers should be able to bring flexibility in their own teaching.

Based on the theoretical foundations so determined, the school has formulated

the mission statement for the program. It is as follows:

Our Mission
We are aware that the Teacher Trainees joining the teacher education program of
Open University are in service teachers. They have i) high intrinsic motivation for
enriching their professional qualification and ii) certain strengths derived out of
exposure to the realities of school as work place.

We are committed to develop through our teacher education program a teacher

who is reflective practitioner having ability to solve his own problems, commitment
for continuous professional development and flexible teaching style. He will
constantly probe into his own shortcomings and strive for overcoming them.

Through the competencies, skills and beliefs so developed, he would create an

unique place of his own in his school and in turn will have a distinct impact on his
pupils.

In order to achieve this we are pledged to create learning environment for self-
learning through Information and Communication Technology. We believe that our
teacher trainees would internalize the skills of ICT and will always try to remain at
forefront in the information age.

The mission statement guided the process of restructuring of the program and
development of material. The details and the structure of the restructured program
is as follows :

Restructured Teacher Education Program of YCMOU:

I. Duration : Two years

II. Credit points : 52 (One credit point = 30 to
35 hrs of study)
III. Study hours : 1690 hours.
IV. Medium of instruction : Marathi
V. Students enrollment : 1500
VI. Study centers and counselors : 33 and 150
VII. Course structure:

115
A) Theory component: Six courses (24 Credits) 600
Course 1. Teacher and Education in Emerging Indian Society. 100
Course 2. Foundation of Educational Psychology 100
Course 3. Education at Various Levels and Teacher Functions 100
Course 4. Changing Roles and Teacher Actions 100
Course 5. Content cum Methodology of school subjects 100
(Two school subjects)
Course 6. Optional Courses (one as per the learner’s choice) 100

B) Practicum Component : Four heads of passing. (28 Credits) 600

Practicum Component 1. Assignments and internal Tests 100
Practicum Component 2. Theory Related Practical 100
Practicum Component 3. Teaching Practice 200
Practicum Component 4. Allied Practical 200

A phased program of developing modules related both to theory and practicum

component is in progress.

Section - Two

Innovations and Best Practices

The theoretical foundations presented in section one form the basis for a number
of innovations and best practices in teacher education program in YCMOU. They
have been briefly summarized here.

Organization of Teaching Practices: All the training experiences related to teaching

practices have been organized on the basis of a training continuum which begins
with laboratory experiences having low reality, specificity and activity and ends
with field experiences with high reality, specificity and activity. The entire training
continuum along with different training experiences is shown in figure -2.

Diagnostic Micro teaching Approach: The Teacher Trainees (TT) being in service
possess certain strong teaching skills and some weak skills. In order to identify the
weaker skills, we have introduced the Diagnostic Micro Teaching Approach. The
School has developed four Diagnostic tools viz.

• Self Evaluation Scale

• Pupils Evaluation Scale
• Transcript Evaluation Scale
• Mini Lesson Evaluation Scale

These scales together help in diagnosing the verbal, and verbal-non-verbal weaker
teaching skills. The school has developed a package called ‘Maharashtra Micro
Skill’ on 12 general teaching skills. It comprises audio cassettes, videos cassettes/
CD, and print material on the skills Set Induction, Explanation, Basic questioning.

116
Open questioning, questioning for Feedback, Reinforcement, Use of teaching aids.
Use of examples and illustrations. Use of Blackboard, Stimulus Variation and Closure
along with a separate student guide.

The Self Instructional Material (SIM) has two parts. Part one consists of the
theoretical information of the skill and part two consists of observation schedules,
transcript for analysis, lesson plans, two model lessons, guidelines for micro lesson
planning, self evaluation scale for micro lesson plan and tips for the transfer of
the skills in their routine teaching. The TTs submit a report of the workshop on
microteaching and transfer of teaching skills to the study center.

A package on Teaching Methods: The School has developed print material on nine
general teaching methods for teaching, school subjects viz. Dramatization,
Discussion method. Inductive-deductive method. Problem solving method.
Communicative Approach, Journey method. Source method. Minimum Level of
Learning Approach and Lecture method. Development of nine videos for the
demonstration of these methods is in progress. The entire package is known as
‘Maharashtra Teaching Methods’. It presents theory, symbolic models, model lesson
plan and systematically developed observation schedules useful for planning,
observation and feedback. Similarly development of SIM on eight models of
teaching is the school also initiated by the School. The models selected are:
Advance Organizer Model, Concept Attainment Model, Inductive Model, Synectics
Model, Inquiry Training Model, Jurisprudential Inquiry Model and Gaming Model

Content cum Methodology (CCM) Revisited: The concept of CCM was first time
introduced by the NCTE,(1978) in its first Teacher Education Framework. As per
the framework “.... the word ‘Content Cum Methodology’ clearly implies that there
will be a meaningful integration of the content and method in terms of observable
skills developed in the student-teacher. It is not any additional content or enriched
content separately provided to the trainee in his discipline. It is rather the deeper
understanding of the concepts he is required to teach in the school.” The concept
lacked elaboration and created confusion throughout the country. Hence the
NCTE abandoned it in the Framework of 1988, and 1998. However having convinced
its importance and originality, the School initiated statewide discussion on the
same The concept was revisited in eight steps on the basis of the work of Shulman,
L., (see Grossman et.el-1990) on Pedagogical Content Knowledge. The eight steps
visualized are as follows —I. Nature and Structure of the Discipline, IL Study of
Curriculum, Syllabi and Textbooks, III. Content Analysis, IV. Content Enrichment V.
Pedagogical Analysis, VI. Integration of Content and Methodology VII. Knowledge
Representation VIII. Evaluation in CCM. Print material on CCM is almost ready.

Lesson planning workshop: The purpose of this workshop is to enable the TTs to
acquire the mastery over the planning skills. The workshop is conducted with the
help of a print material, which develops lesson-planning skills among the TTs.,

Simulated Teaching: This offers an opportunity to the TTs, to translate the lesson
plans into action and they achieve mastery over translation ability. The simulated

117
teaching is organized on the lines of the workshop organized by Jyoce B.and Weil
M. (1997) on Models of Teaching.

Coaching Team: The concept of Coaching Team has been borrowed from Jyoce
B.and Weil M. (1997) .The coaching teams are the learners’ Self Help Groups. The
peers in groups observe each others lessons and ensure transfer of teaching methods
in their routine teaching.

Lesson Observation Handbook: The observation is done by different categories

of people such as Teacher educators. Mentors, Peers, and Self at various levels of
continue A Lesson Observation Handbook has been developed as a manual for the
observation and self-training. The guide is divided into three parts. Part one
introduces the system of Open University, B.Ed. program. Teaching practice scheme
etc. Part two contains theoretical background of lesson observation, observation
scales, qualitative and quantitative remarks, and evaluation scales fore nine
methods. Part three contains procedure of appointment of the observers in the
capacity of Teacher Educator, Mentor and Peer, their role and responsibilities,
addresses for communication, and the scheme of monitoring of lesson plans. The
selection of mentor and approval of the jointly prepared plan of conducting lessons
is done centrally by the school.

Training of the counselors: The School has conducted massive orientation program
of all the counselors at study centers. They have been given recognition as a
counselor after the completion of the orientation program, in addition to this;
supplementary orientation and training programs are organized whenever new
concepts/practices are introduced. The School conducts regular meets of the
Directors and coordinators of the study centers twice a year before the
commencement of the contact sessions.

Use of Information and Communication Technology (ICT): The University has

supplied a computer set to all 33 study centers along with internet connectivity,
required soft wares and a set of CDs. Every student is provided eight audio cassettes
/CDs related to theory courses and micro teaching. Two persons from each center
have been trained in the use of the computer sets and Internet connections. The
University has its own website with a separate web page of the school. Discussion
forums have been established for the students to interact with the school as well
as the subject counselors appointed by the school. The discussion forums are
developed according to the subjects, and the activities of the school. Software
are being developed for on line admission and online testing. However there are
constraints on the use of ICT because of the internet connectivity, bandwidth
etc. and ICT illiteracy. In view of this, the School has developed two programs viz.
Certificate in ICT Literacy skills for Distance Learners and Certificate Programme
in ICT for School Teachers.

Interactive radio programs on academic subject are organized from ‘Mumbai

Akashwani’ once every month and the students ask questions on telephone. Indian
Space Research Organization (ISRO) in collaboration with YCMOU has initiated a

118
pilot project as a preparation for the EDUSAT to be launched in 2004.lnitially 100
Virtual Learning Classrooms are going lo be established, 50 with two way video
communication and 50 with two way audio and one way video communication.

In order lo ensure use of audio and video cassettes/CDs supplied to the Study
centers and the students assignments based on them are asked

Use of Workplace for training purpose: The School has conceived the workplace
as the main learning place- The duration of the program being two years and every
TT has 400 active days at his disposal for self-training. He can’ “consider his routine
teaching as an opportunity for self-training. Hence the School has entrusted the
responsibility of using the inputs given lo him during the contact sessions in his
regular leaching. Accordingly assignments and activities arc designed. The
philosophical principles learnt while performing the experiments by the TT are to
be brought by him into practice. The social service activities work experience/
SUPW co curricular activities are conducted at study centers as well as at school
level. Workbooks have been developed to reflect upon one’s own teaching.

Evaluation: The Question papers in the end examination haye two parts. Part one
is Objective type, which test Knowledge and comprehension. Part two is supply
type and the questions are based on application and higher thought processes.
Here they get the opportunity to apply the acquired theoretical knowledge to
solve their own problems. We are slowly heading towards open book examination.

Quality Checks: A number of quality checks are incorporated in the operation of

the program. Directors and coordinators submit report of each session in their
regularly : arranged meets. Every TT submits report of all the activities to the
study centers along with the snaps of the activities wherever possible. He has to
also submit the plan of Teaching Practice to the School with the counter-signature
of the Headmaster of the school Very recently an idea of writing personal diary
has been incorporated. The TTs make entries in their diaries for two years; the
entries are to be in the context of the contact sessions, counselors, study material,
university, their positive and negative opinions about all these without prejudiced
mind and honesty. These diaries are to be submitted to the University. The purpose
of this diary is to collect the qualitative data about our program and its
implementation with the viewpoint of qualitative check and improvement of the
whole program so also as a device of reflective thinking on their own practice.

Sanwad is a monthly magazine sent to each and every student of the university.
This activity is coordinated by the School. This is one of the effective means of
communication, academic enrichment, source of motivation for students and means
of feedback for us.

The most important quality check is the viva-voce conducted at the end of the
program by a panel of the Director of Study center and one external referee.
They go through all the material submitted by the candidate verifying the
authenticity and ask them to redo in case of any lacunae.

119
Epilogue
The School through its activities has established its own identity in the state of
Maharashtra. We believe that the School would emerge as the nucleus of the
activities in sphere of Teacher Education in the State. We are sure we will exemplify
how the quality program in Teacher education can be offered through Distance
Mode with an ingredient of innovativeness. We will be instrumental in disseminating
and stabilizing innovative ideas in collaborating colleges of education and will bring
about qualitative change in the Field of teacher education In Maharashtra. This is
our vision for future too.

References
I. Grossman, P., Wilson,S., and Shulman L.(1989 ), Teachers of substance: subject
matter knowledge for teachers. In M.C. Reynolds (Ed), Knowledge base for the
beginning teachers. New York: Pergraman Press

2. Joyce,B.,and Weil.M., (1997), Models of teaching (V Ed.),New Delhi, Prentice

Hall of India Private Limited.

3. NCTE - Teacher Education Curriculum: Framework, New Delhi, NCERT, (1978)

Fig.-2 Training Continuum

High Reality Specificity Activity.

Continuous lessons(6)
Self Evaluation lessons (10)
Coaching Lessons observed by Peers (6)
Test lessons at Study Center (2)
Teaching Practice supervised by Mentor/ Sr.Teacher (8)
Teaching Practice supervised by Teacher Educator (8)
Simulated Teaching
Lesson Planning Workshop
Demonstration of lessons
CCM-Workshop
Microteaching
Theory
Field Experience
Lab experience
Low Reality Specificity Activity

120