The Effects of Teachers’ Training on Professional Development and Teaching Practice: A Case Study of Two Selected Colleges in Bangladesh

Main Article Content

Mohammad Jahangir Hossain Mojumder

Abstract

Nowadays, demands are growing for outcome-based and transferable learning, particularly in higher education. Being the terminal formal schooling, it needs facilitation of pupils’ achievement of problem-solving skills for real-life by teachers. To this end, this qualitative research employs a case study approach, which is suitable to test an event with small samples, and a phenomenological method to analyze respondents’ perceptions and activities thematically and descriptively to assess changes. In-depth interviews, focus group discussions, and class observations are used to collect data from two selected colleges to examine the extent of professional development and methodological shift in teaching as effects of training to include active learning strategies for better learning outcomes. The data though reveals that the selected flagship training program offers a bunch of pedagogical methods (not need-based) to imbibe, yet reject the idea that the nationally arranged training remains a successful effort to increase trainees’ knowledge, skills, and polish attitudes except disseminating a few concepts superficially. Moreover, trainees lack the motivation to shift their teaching habits and are unconvinced that the application of these newly learned strategies will transform anything. Likewise, they are discontented about training contents and unenthusiastic in consort with unfavorable opinions about training procedures and trainers to some extent. Therefore, the results suggest limited or no significant professional development and modification in teaching practice, rather teachers continue conventional teacher-centered method, and the effort stays insufficient, extraneous, ‘fragmented’, and ‘intellectually superficial’. Additionally, at the colleges, large class size, inappropriate sitting arrangement, pervasive traditionality, absenteeism, and other analogous challenges limited them to change their practice. Considering all these, this study suggests that alternations should be initiated at a micro (teachers & college) and macro-level (training providers & policymakers) to offer tailor-made, autonomous, and need-based training. Last but not the least, this endeavor is limited by being entirely qualitative with a small sample size and not eliciting the views of any of the trainers and policymakers and which can be an indication of points of departure for future study.

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How to Cite
Mohammad Jahangir Hossain Mojumder. (2021). The Effects of Teachers’ Training on Professional Development and Teaching Practice: A Case Study of Two Selected Colleges in Bangladesh . PanAfrican Journal of Governance and Development (PJGD), 2(1), 148-179. https://doi.org/10.46404/panjogov.v2i1.2917
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Articles
Author Biography

Mohammad Jahangir Hossain Mojumder , Chowmuhani Government SA College, Bangladesh

Dr. Mohammad Jahangir Hossain Mojumder is an Assistant Professor at the Department of Political Science at Chowmuhani Government S.A. College, Noakhali, Bangladesh. He has been in teaching for the last 15 years covering both higher secondary and tertiary levels. In 2019, the author obtained his Ph.D. from the Institute of Bangladesh Studies, University of Rajshahi. In addition to that, recently, he has been pursuing an MA in Education at the University of Nottingham Malaysia (UNM). Previously, he performed as a trainer for the higher secondary level teachers. His publications include a book from Routledge, UK, a couple of journal articles from international publishing houses, and a good number of newspaper articles in substantial national dailies in Bangladesh. Furthermore, he has presented several papers in international seminars and participated in various other workshops. Notably, his areas of academic interest include (local) governance, NGOs, service delivery, women’s empowerment, remittances, and education.

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