The concept of teaching and its meaning

Teaching is defined as a complete process whereby the learner is made to “pay attention, make observations, associate ideas, and remember previous experiences and reason”. Teaching can equally be defined or described as a process of educating someone.

Also, teaching is a process of developing the cognitive, affective and psychomotor powers of the learner through giving the learner knowledge of facts about one subject matter, reinforcing or developing positive attitudes on the learner and also developing certain physical or manipulative skills in the learner.

The scope of teaching

Teaching is a set of activities which can be carried out inside or outside the classroom. Teaching activities fall under two categories.

• The teaching aid activities (i.e the preactive activities)
• The learning aid activities (ie the interactive activities)

The pre active Teaching and activities

These are the activities the teacher embarks upon before classroom encounter. The activities are designed to facilitate teaching during a teacher’s classroom encounter.

The Interactive learning and activities

Learning aid activities are teachers’ behaviours that are designed to facilitate learning on the part of the learner. Learning aid activities are also called interactive teaching activities. They include the deeds or speech of the teacher in th class and his attitude or skills based upon the objectives of his lesson. Interactive learning aid activities however fall into three groups:

• Creating good learning environment
• Generating good learning experiences
• Conducting affective evaluation of learning

The purpose of teaching

The purpose of teaching is to educate someone. That is, to develop his cognitive affective and psycho – motor powers. To develop cognitive powers, the teacher informs the learner about his subject matter, makes him or her evaluate a situation, synthesize ideas, draw conclusions and make generalizations.

To develop affective powers, the teacher socializes the learner by making the learner accept, utilize behaviourally and internalize the mores and norms of the social system to which the learner belongs. The teacher appeals to the learner’s conscience and trains him to have control over his emotions. Also, the teacher inculcates into the learner moral virtues like sympathy, patriotism, self-discipline, sense of responsibility, humility, democratic attitude. Tolerance, honesty and love.

To develop psycho-motor powers, the teacher gives the learner the technical know how. He engages the learner in doing. He teaches the learner new techniques and new ways of doing things. He makes the learner active through participation in productive technology and develops the learner’s body.

The purpose of teaching is to educate the “taught” through overall development of his intellect, spirit and physique or mind, soul and body.

The factors that directly or indirectly influence teaching

The factors are

• The child
• The subject matter
• The environment
• The teacher

The child is a determinant of all that goes into education. He is a growing, complex organism with diverse interests, needs and personal characteristics which influence directly or indirectly what he can learn, where he can learn, from whom he can learn and the quality of his learning. Because he has diverse interests and needs, he is only interested in what you are doing if what you are doing can help satisfy his needs or meet his interests.

Children differ in abilities and n biological, physical, temperamental, intellectual and social characteristics. A good teacher therefore has to consider very carefully the relevance and the appropriateness of his selected learning experiences as well as the contents of his lesson in the light of the varying interests and capabilities of his pupils. He also has to vary his teaching methods to take cognizance of pupils individual differences. His lesson objectives should be attainable to the pupils and the objectives should be diverse and flexible so that different categories of pupils in the class can well be taken care of.

As pupils cannot learn at the same rate, the teacher has to structure his pedagogical strategies of pupils in class. For example, the above average, the average and the below average pupils.

The subject matter as a factor influencing teaching

A teacher’s teaching strategies are considerably influenced by the type of subject he teaches. Subject matter variables affect greatly the rate at which ideas about the subject can be assimilated by the pupils and how the subject can be taught. Such subject matter variables include the way ideas are arranged and integrated in a subject, the peculiar concepts and notions that characterize a subject.

The main instruments that the teacher uses is modifying, changing or developing a child’s behaviours in order to make him an educated person are the knowledge, attitudes, skills, concepts and values contained in the learning experiences that constitute the subject matter of a lesson. Since the teacher modifies, changes or develops behaviour through an educational process called “teaching”, it follows that effective teaching and in fact, effective education is influenced  by the nature of the subject matter.

Again, the nature and scope of the subject matter affect considerably what can be taught at a given time, how it can be taught, when it can be taught, where it can be taught and to whom

The Environment as a factor influencing teaching

The environment is defined as the totality of all the natural and artificial phenomenon having direct or indirect influence on man in a given place. The components of the environment are human beings, human behaviours, societal laws, values and customs, natural, physical and artificial features and the prevailing economic and socio economic situations. All these components of the environment exert influence on what, why, when, how and where we teach.

Educational activities are based on the problems and opportunities that exist in a given environment. Materials for teaching in terms of learning experiences and audio visual aids are derived from the environment. Social environment is both context and content in education because what is considered important In the environment affects what is considered important in the school.

The Teacher as a factor influencing teaching

The teacher is the principal factory operator in the school’s manufacturing industry. The quality of the school’s products depends greatly on the qualities of the teacher. The teacher influences if not determines what to teach, when to teach and how to teach. The quality of the teaching is influenced by the teacher’s qualities or disqualities.

To ensure good teaching, the teacher must be cheerful, firm, tolerant, democratic, impartial, loyal, honest, self-disciplined, sociable, creative, resourceful, humorous, neat, simple, adaptable, reasonable, humble and knowledgeable in child psychology. He should have a command of theoretical knowledge about learning and human behaviours. He should possess the technical skills of teaching that facilitate pupil learning. He should display the attitudes that can promote learning and good human relationships and he should have a good mastery of the fact of his subject matters. A teacher who lacks these qualities may constitute problem to himself in his professional assignment.

The meaning, types and factors influencing learning

Ordinarily, learning could be defined as the art of growing or the art of making progress through study, practice or by being taught. But educational psychologists have defined it as any change in behaviour that is consequential on experience because they consider learning as an instrument of change in behaviour. Learning has also been defined as a change of performance brought about through conditions of activity, practice and experience. Learning may be described as the permanent acquisition and habitual utilization of new knowledge, attitudes and skills to modify or alter action or realize objectives.

The concept of teaching and its meaning

Teaching is defined as a complete process whereby the learner is made to “pay attention, make observations, associate ideas, and remember previous experiences and reason”. Teaching can equally be defined or described as a process of educating someone.

Also, teaching is a process of developing the cognitive, affective and psychomotor powers of the learner through giving the learner knowledge of facts about one subject matter, reinforcing or developing positive attitudes on the learner and also developing certain physical or manipulative skills in the learner.

Recommended Reading

Paul R. Burden., Methods for effective teaching: Meeting the needs of all students.