What skills are needed to become an internationally qualified teacher? Which international courses can teachers enroll in?
"The fact that we are preparing students for jobs that do not already exist means that our approach cannot be about a specific body of knowledge alone. We need to create students who are thinkers, innovators and problem-solvers. They must be students that will create their own ‘space’ in the world."
"Schools - and the children and teachers within them - should focus on the process of learning, of how we learn and create knowledge together, and not put such an emphasis on grades of facts learnt."
Quoted by Geoff Barton, General Secretary, ASCL
And the fact that we are living in a VUCAH world.
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Volatility
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Uncertainty
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Complex
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Ambiguous
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Hyperconnected
And if we look at each of the terms – the pandemic has proved how we have been impacted – we went through volatile, uncertain times and the world was more complex wherein each day was uncertain and there was ambiguity in every step we took during the past two hours. The pandemic also proved that we live in a Hyper-connected world wherein the classrooms across the world is a smaller place with more accessibility thanks to the world wide web.
As educators, we are at the cusp of change and we need to decode this new normal. Teachers will need to constantly upskill themselves in order to meet the requirements of the new generation who are tech savvy from the time they start crawling. Professionally qualified teachers who have formal degrees in subject content and education will need to upskill themselves in every aspect. So the question that plagues my mind is what is the skill set that a new teacher should come equipped with or must equip themselves with in order to make schools a better place. The top skills and competencies that any teacher needs to be equipped with are:
Global Pedagogy: Pedagogy is all about content, concept, delivery of content, knowledge, skills and attitudes all rolled into one. While we have been dealing with a very content delivery methodology in our classrooms and rote memorization as a priority. It is time we move towards a competency and skill enhancement focus in our classrooms. The teacher training courses need to equip new and existing teachers with skills and dispositions amongst their pupils which are transferable skills like research skills, critical thinking skills, communication, collaborative skills, and problem-solving skills. This requires teachers to move from a very textbook-oriented approach to integrate it within the curriculum and classroom framework.
Technology: This generation of teachers is going to be teaching a generation of Alpha Kids. By 2025 we will have more than 2 billion Alpha kids globally. We are teaching an entire generation that has seen technology even at birth. Digital technologies and the changing nature of the workforce have created new opportunities and challenges for the influence model. So it is imperative for a teacher to be able to adapt to changing technology within the realms of curriculum to make her pupils digital-savvy. Digital natives are intuitive learners who can multitask and adapt themselves to a VUCA world. Hence learning experiences need to embed technology as well as pedagogical requirements. Teacher training for new and existing teachers needs teachers to use technology for teaching learning and assessments. We also need to rely on virtual reality and artificial intelligence in order to make learning more accessible to our students.
We need to develop learning classrooms that can adapt fast and are flexible enough to be adapted and changed according to the young alpha’s inquisitive mind. They need to be trained for critical thinking and problem-solving skills who are quick thinkers.
Social-Emotional Competencies
With a generation used to technology we are inter-connected but are losing the human touch. So, it is imperative that schools focus on well-being and the social emotional connect with in students. Schools are social entities and it is important to develop and nurture human behaviour in schools. As relationships and emotional processes impact how we learn, as teachers it is very important that schools and teachers address Empathy and emotional intelligence as much as they focus on pedagogies and curriculum.
So any institution training new teachers must keep in mind the above factors to be able to train teachers for an adaptable world, wherein the teachers are more forward-thinking, curious and flexible. Teacher training institutions need to focus more on transferable skill sets and groom teachers who are more like bridges over which they invite their students to cross, facilitate their cross and then finally build their own bridges.
Also read,
How can I enroll in a global education course? Qualifications and Experience Requirement.
How are global education courses different from the usual teacher training programs?
