DEFINITION
Micro-teaching is a training device
carefully planned for the beginning teacher or student-teacher for the sole
purpose of improving teaching and learning. It does not simply mean small or
mini teaching. It is a system that has lasted for many years in civilized
countries like American and Britain and its importance is indubitable. In fact,
micro-teaching provides prospective teachers with teaching practice training
practice training to master teaching skills one by one or step by step. It is
after the necessary teaching skills have been mastered that a prospective
teacher can jollily go to full scale macro-teaching.
Micro-teaching reminds us of our
training to become tailors or seamstresses or carpenters. In the case of our
learning to become tailors or seamstresses we do not start to cut and sew costly clothes like
‘Hollandis’. We start learning the art of tailoring by learning the skill of
handling the scissors, the skill of cutting cement bags or newspapers to
requires shapes and sizes, the skill of cutting cheap clothes and the skill of
using the machine in sewing them, the skill of using the needle, etc. when all
the necessary skills have been mastered, the prospective tailor or seamstress
can now cut, sew button various stuff ranging from the cheapest to the most
costly clothes. Now think of the skills you have to master to become a good
carpenter.
ELEMENTS OF MICRO –TEACHING
Micro-
teaching is a scaled down teaching encounter since it offers the reduced
versions of the following elements:
(i) Class size - between
3 to 7 pupils
(ii) Skill - one unit of skill or information at a
time
(iii) Content - one unit of activity or information
(iv) Time - between 5 to 10 minutes
(v) lesson objective - simple,
specific, clear measurable.
Micro-teaching therefore is scaled
down in terms of time, number of students, concepts taught and the teaching
skills taught.
AN IDEAL LACE FOR MICRO-TEACHING
Micro-teaching is expected to be
done in a micro-teaching laboratory where the following should be provided
(i)
Videotape
(ii)
Camera
(iii)
Electrical
equipment
(iv)
Technicians to
tape the line-teaching, etc.
All these are provided to make teaching-learning very
effective. They help to fulfill one of the most important values of
micro-teaching which states that the student-teacher after presenting a lesson
has the golden opportunity to take a look at what he had done. With the help of
the supervisors comments he can easily correct his mistakes and make necessary
improvements in the future.
COMPONENTS OF MICRO- TEACHING
Micro-teaching is a trainings device with the
following components.
(a)
Careful planning
of the lesson
(b)
Clinical control
and supervision
(c)
Immediate feed
back aimed at improving future performance.
Let us take them one after the other:
(a) Careful
Planning
Careful planning of micro-teaching
lesson must include:
(i)
Content
development which emphasizes the inculcation of a predetermined skill.
(ii)
Teachers
activities in the class geared towards the inculcation of the skill.
(iii)
Pupils activities
to master the skill
(iv)
Teachers/pupils
activities to teach and learn the skill
(v)
Teachers/pupils
activities to teach and learn the skill
The skill to emphasize must be pre-determined and each
skill should be taken at a time. In fact micro-teaching galvanizes a beginning
teacher into learning the whole are of assumption that the complex art of
teaching can be split into specific skills that can be more easily handled and that
by tackling and mastering one skill at a time, the practicing teacher will end
up acquiring a collection of such skills which he will use in a macro-teaching
in the classroom.
(b) Clinical
Control and Supervision
Since the number of pupils or students in a micro
teaching class is between 3 to 7, it is very easy for a beginning or student
teacher to observe the behaviour of the taught, give a thorough check or
control if they misbehave and thoroughly supervise their activities or
performance. A teacher who manifests his/her inability to control and supervise
a class of from 3 to 7 students will find it impossible to control and
supervise a full class of from 30 to 50 pupils.
(c) Immediate
Feedback Aimed at Improving Future Performance
When micro-teaching is under taken in an equipped
laboratory, he beginning teacher or student-teacher receives an immediate feed
back from the video tape, his/her pupils or students and from his/her
supervisor. These forms of feed back will stand him/her in good stand to have
better performance in subsequent teaching.
In
fact at the end of micro-teaching lesson the video taped lesson containing the
activities of both the teacher and the taught are replayed. During the replay
both the teacher and the pupils or students have golden opportunity to watch
their performances during the course of the lesson and observe their good
points or weaknesses. The supervisor who watched the lesson from the beginning
to the end with an eye of the expert analyses the performance of the teacher
and makes useful suggestions for improvement. With this immediate feed back on
his performance, the student-teacher might be required to re-teach the lesson
with a different group of students if his/her performance left much to be
desired and make honest effort to improve his/her performance by correcting all
the mistakes made in the first teaching. The second teaching with still better
performance encourages the student-teacher to take up the remaining skill with
confidence and success.