Middle School Students’ Perceptions About Good Teaching

Abstract

Teaching in the contemporary period seems to be a challenge for some teachers. Easy access to varied information as well as the preoccupation for the virtual environment of communication make today's students a generation, called the digital or Y generation, with its specific peculiarities. There are opinions that teachers complain about the non-involvement of students in their own education, their lack of motivation or the lack of a real partnership between family and school. However, this study comes to prove the opposite. Students want to learn, want to be successful in learning, and also have a clear picture of the type of teacher that can help them excel. This research aims to investigate the perceptions of preadolescents concerning the skills that an accomplished teacher has to possess. This transversal study is based on a nonexperimental, qualitative design. The research was conducted between February and March 2018, using semi-structured interviews. The obtained answers revealed that students are not indifferent to learning. The vast majority of students desire to succeed, to self-indulge. Students highly value the teacher who explains the new content so that everyone understands, who is attentive to students' feedback, to their non-verbal expressions. They value positively teachers who transmits self-confidence, have a correct diction, master the pedagogical skills specific to the constructivist approach, but who pays attention to the management strategies of the student group.

Keywords: Urban middle schooleffective teachingengaged learningstudent perceptions

Introduction

Today’s teaching process in Romania is provocative and more refined compared to the past. The teaching process today in Romania is provocative and more refined compared to the past. Classes of crowded students with a consistent number of students, frequent legislative changes, the multitude of roles and tasks of the teacher, the oversized curriculum, the socio-cultural diversity of students, the educational paradigms promoted are just a few of the arguments behind the previous statement.

Even more, these challenges take place in a historical societal context, strong and rapid development and technological innovation. The generation of students that teachers are addressing today is extremely heterogeneous, from pupils with special educational needs and the category of students called "functional illiterates" to "Google generation", "digital or Y generation". They have easy access to information, have the ability to communicate virtually unrestrictedly and much more possibilities for development. But are they really taught to use technology for their benefit? Is there really a concern to help them discern between types of information or create new data?

In order to achieve a higher quality level in educational activity, lifelong learning becomes imperative and not an option. Teachers learn in order to: improve students’ achievement, extend teaching competences and accumulate new knowledge (Dârjan, 2010). They also have to form a set of social attitudes that underpin the start of a quality educational process (Gavreliuc & Gavreliuc, 2012).

The literature reveals that there are discrepancies between beliefs, attitudes of teachers and teaching practices (Popa, &Voinea, 2016). The contextual limitations mentioned above, the competing attitudes, incomplete professional training are some of the elements that maintain this incongruity (Li, 2016).

Problem Statement

Since 1970, researchers have been interested in evaluating teaching through the points of view of direct beneficiaries, students. Both qualitative and quantitative approaches have been used. The investigation of the quality and efficiency of teaching through pupils' points of view brings new perspectives in defining good teaching (Telli, Den Brok, & Cakiroglu, 2008; Bakx Koopman de Kruijf & den Brok, 2015). It also allows teaching to be adjusted according to students' learning needs, targeting the educational process to achieve relevant visible results. Given the particular characteristics of the digital generation of Romanian pupils, we ask ourselves whether their perceptions of good teaching are close to those presented in the scientific literature. Besides, there is a limited number of studies that approach both sides of teaching: the good/ effective one and the opposite.

Research Questions

The main question of this research is: Which characteristics should a teacher express in order to be considered a good teacher by middle school pupils?

Specific questions: What are the characteristics of the teaching that secondary school students consider to be the most important? What are the issues that secondary school students dislike in teaching? How much students value digital technology in the teaching process?

Purpose of the Study

This research aims to investigate the perceptions of preadolescents concerning the skills that an accomplished teacher has to possess.

The objectives of the research are: 1. To identify the characteristics that make teaching efficient. 2. Identifying the aspects of teaching activity that drive away learners from engaging in learning. 3. Evaluating the level of valorisation of digital technology in the teaching process.

Research Methods

This transversal study is based on a nonexperimental, qualitative design. The research was conducted between February and March 2018, using semi-structured interviews. All the interviews were recorded with the participants’ permission. Because the participants are minors, the informed consent was requested from both children and parents. The rights of the participants were made known with the announcement of the specific aspects of the research (purpose, methods and research tools, investigation procedures, duration of the interview, assumed risks).

Findings

The obtained answers revealed that students are aware of the effective teacher's attribute. Using their simple language, students demonstrate a profound knowledge of the essential aspects of teaching. We have collected all the characteristics mentioned by students, in an Excel document. Synonyms were counted to one characteristic. The number of students, who have chosen a certain feature, even if expressed by different synonyms, has been shown in brackets in the tables below. In the interest of categorizing the data, we conducted a content analysis. There were 67 unique characteristics of the teacher after the elimination of synonyms. Placing features in the established categories was done with the help of an independent researcher. The descriptive statistical analysis was used to respond in detail to the research questions.

Conclusion

The opinions of the students in this study on the characteristics a good professor have formed a comprehensive picture. The middle school students were able to respond to all questions included in the interviews. They have demonstrated to have a clear image about what means to be an effective teacher and also for those which represent the opposite side. We used semi-structured interview with open ended questions which were appropiate for the respondents. They had the opportunity to express themselves in their own words. Thus, researchers have discovered more specific nuances of the subjects under consideration. The discovered features can be used to build a new research instrument suitable for a quantitative design. In total, 67 unique characteristics of the teacher were reported in 10 different categories. Students appreciate the teacher who has the sense of humour, act friendly, that is perceived as kind, patient, calm and understanding, treat students equally and he/she loves his job. Students highly value the teacher who explains the new content so that everyone understands, who is attentive to students' feedback, to their non-verbal expressions. They value positively teachers who transmit self-confidence, have a correct diction, master the pedagogical skills specific to the constructivist approach, but who also pays attention to the management strategies of the student group.

The results show that the level of use of digital competences is quite low. Students also want to make more use of digital competences in the teaching process. They want to learn to do something constructive with all the opportunities that the owned devices present. Incorporating information technology in teaching can increase student interest in school. The obtained answers revealed that students are not indifferent to learning. The vast majority of students desire to succeed, to self-indulge. They know and can say openly what they want in order to make the teaching - learning process efficient.

Acknowledgments

We thank Bianca Ioana Popa for assistance with collecting the data.

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