Importance of supervision

We all know that the role of a teacher is very important in the life of the students. Getting a good teacher is a boon to anyone and that will largely decide the future of the children. It has been found that the children tend to study that subject more which is taught by a good teacher. When I say good teachers that does not mean good in the subject only but in all respect, including their behavior and the values. The teachers are the motivator and counselor for the students and their direction to the students decide the result for their students. When we go back to our school and college days it is realized that some of the teachers are remembered by us more than others. The teachers whom we remember are the ones who showed us the right path in most difficult times. They were not concerned about their problems but did everything possible for their students. So if the future of the children is to be secured we must expose them to good teachers only. But is it easy to find good teachers in today`s time when not many people want to be teacher for different reasons known to all of us. I do not say that all the new teachers are the ones who were unwilling for the profession because there are many who came to this field by choice and are happy with their choice. But they also need to be trained and taught the way they are expected to teach the students. The schools have either in house training programme or they outsource the same. Most of the organizations do not call it as the training programme but development programme. The reason for the same is that training programme may seem to be for limited staff whereas the development progrrame is for the entire staff. Let us try to understand the logic behind the same.

In a school there will be two categories of the teachers. One those who are new and inexperienced and the second those who have been in the profession for more than two to three years and are considered as experienced. Experienced as well as inexperienced teachers need to be supervised and the development programme to be planned accordingly. Some people argue that why an experienced teacher should be supervised? They say that the teacher has been doing the job for many years and that is why does not need any help. CPD department should utilize their resources and energy to develop the skills of the new teachers. Some supervisors also echo the same feelings because they find it easy to supervise and guide the new teachers then the so called experienced teachers. This made me to realize to think whether old and experienced teachers are good enough in motivating their students and make their children things easily. The experienced teachers can also be divided in two groups. First the ones who subject centered and care very little for the learner. They consider the subject to be the most important and if they are at that then learner should be able to do well. The second category is of those teachers who consider the learner to be the most important and the rest of the things are secondary. The same may be true for some inexperienced teachers also but then it is easier to change their approach in comparison to the experienced teachers. As I mentioned before also that subject knowledge is important but that cannot be the focal point. The learner is the centre and rests of the things revolve around him/her. Te supervisors always find it easy to deal with the new teachers than the old ones because the new ones have just come out o the teachers` training institutes.

The teachers can be classified in one more way. There are some teachers who are ineffective but they do not know it. In this case the supervisor can play a significant role to make the teacher aware of the problems and counsel and guide how to take care of the problems. Such teachers are very likely to improve with the help of the supervisors. There is another group of the experienced teachers who know that they re not effective but they do not admit it to anybody. They are really very difficult for the supervisors. At time the supervisors give them up by saying that why to waste their time and energy for such cases. But will leaving such cases be helping the cause of the future of the children being taught t by such teachers. This is difficult question but needs the attention of all the responsible people particularly the supervisors. Another problem with such teachers is that they do not show any enthusiasm to participate in the teachers` training or the professional development programme. They always blame the children for everything whether it is the discipline in the class or the children not performing well in the test or examination. The other category of the teachers who must be handled on priority is the bunt out ones. These are the teachers who have been in this profession for long time and are tired and have no enthusiasm and will to enjoy what they are doing. Such teachers will also be doing a lot of harm to the children. Some educationists and psychologists feel that if you try to make all good then there is a possibility that the ones who can be made better will also be not being reaching to that level.

This is true that all schools and the colleges have the above mentioned category and all of them are to be helped so that the learners do not suffer because of the fault of somebody else. It may be difficult to improve the ineffective teachers who know this very well or the burned out teachers but we cannot afford to let them ruin the future of the children. The head of the institution and the board of governors should ensure that such teachers are ether improved or made to leave the job so that no child suffers at the hand of such people but that should be the last resort. First they should be counseled and made to realize that they needed to improve not only for their sake but for the sake of the children exposed to them. At the same time the new and other category of teachers should not be ignored because most of the time of the management and the supervisors is spent on the other category. The experienced teachers should also realize that they can learn every moment and everyday from everyone around them including their students.  The management and the head of the school are responsible for every child of the school and not only for few ones so they must try that has no teacher in their organization remained ineffective. The professional development programme should be compulsory in all the schools and all the teachers should be the part of the same. Nobody is perfect but at the same time nobody can stop us from moving towards the perfection. This is all the more true for the teaching community because that deals with human beings and not with machines.