A Preliminary Research on Basic Competency for Secondary School Chemistry Teachers

Author: Bao-Tyan Hwang, Ae-wen Liou(Department of Chemistry, National Taiwan Normal University)

Abstract：

The teacher's competency is one of the essential conditions which lead to a successful instruction; therefore, the training of competent teachers plays an important role in the re-search of education. The methodologies of teaching different subject fields vary from one to another, thus the training of teachers for different subject areas is also quite discrepant. In this study, we investigate the main objects concerning the basic abilities and qualifications of a chemistry teacher.
In this research, we conducted a questionaire which contains three-parts :(l)the investigation of the basic abilities and qualifications of a competent chemistry teacher; (2) the implementation of experiment in laboratory teaching; (3)the using of a special teaching laboratory for teaching.
The results of this research revealed that more than 50% of the teachers were convinced that these four basic abilities and qualifications were considered as important for teachers: (1) Tl:equipped with all the essential chemistry knowledge and concepts included in the teach-ing materials; (2) T2:Possessing the principles and procedures in teaching in a lab; (3) T3 '. skilful in doing chemistry experiments; (4) T12: capable of realizing and emphasizing the important portions of teaching materials. These four qualities are considered to be import-ant by almost all the experienced teachers, and they should be as the foundamental parts in the training programs. This research showed that 53.19% of the teachers could not offer enough guidance to the experimental skills of their students. However, nearly all the teachers agreed to this point of view and believed that using the lab was important.
This article also made several suggestions to using the "teaching labs" which were sponsored by the National Science Council of ROC and it may also help all the prospective teachers learn the skill and techniques of teaching in advance.

Keywords：Teacher-Education, Laboratory Teaching, Teaching Laboratory

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