A COMPARATIVE ANALYSIS ON THE CHALLENGES OF TEACHING PRACTICE EXPERIENCES OF HOME ECONOMICS STUDENT-TEACHERS AND POSSIBLE PANACEA

Background of the study

A student teacher observed that the practical component of teacher training - practice teaching - was a challenging and stressful element of the course. She didn't seem to appreciate the experience. The experience of this student teacher describes her own thoughts about practice teaching. This anecdotal reference positions the research issue as both relevant and productive in the context of existing research on teacher preparation in South Africa. Teachers who enter the workforce for the first time after finishing their studies face a slew of challenges. Student teachers who complete our existing teacher education programs are not always prepared to join the classroom. These issues are connected to their practice teaching experiences, as evidenced by the researcher's own professional interactions with student teachers. During their practice teaching, some student instructors appear to be unprepared for the real world. Tang (2003) discovered that the quality of student teachers' outdoor learning experiences was a prominent concern in his research. Converting theoretical knowledge into practice will always be difficult - learning to teach is a difficult task (Solomon, Worthy & Carter as cited in Farrell, 2002). Many scholars have written on the'shock of reality,' which refers to the difficulties of transitioning from theoretical training and academic knowledge to practical teaching work (Johnston, Rastoy, Holdaway & Friesen as cited in Bertone, Meard, Euzet, Ria & Durand, 2003). According to research conducted in 1999 by the United States Department of Education's National Center for Education Statistics, just one in every five instructors feels adequately equipped to work in a modern classroom (Thomas & Loadman, 2001:195). In support of this conclusion, French academics debated the limitations of practical experience (Charlie & Durand as cited in Bertone et aI., 2003). Borlo and Mayfield (as cited in Bertone et al., 2003) discovered that practical experience can be extremely beneficial in learning how to teach. curriculum, including various outputs and inputs related to teacher quality such as professional development experiences, adequate planning periods, and adequate content preparation of teachers with regard to content knowledge associated with the curriculum taught (Huntley, 1998; Knudson, 1937; Leung, 2006; Palmer, 1991; Southern Region Education Board, 1998). Other researchers have investigated the link between teacher quality and teacher retention (Ingersoll, 2000; National Center for Education Statistics, 1996), and national organizations have established minimum content preparation standards to improve teaching and learning (Interstate New Teacher Assessment and Support Consortium [ITASC], 2008; National Council for Accreditation of Teacher Educators [NCATE], 2007; National Middle School Association [NMSA], 2008). This study investigates parameters associated with teacher quality inputs (i.e., coursework, grade point average, and teacher test scores). According to Okorie (1986), education is a portion of life that is consciously managed and experiences are produced according to a conscious design. According to Emereole (2000), it is generally organized in accordance with individual and social requirements, and it is the most effective tool for change in any community. As a result, the level of education supplied in any community, as well as the type of the change effected by that education, are both dependent on the quality of instructors and the efficiency of their teachings in schools (Awotua-Efebo, 1999). According to Kizlik (2007), education is a cooperative dynamic and life-long process through which a community intentionally develops knowledge, skills, values, and other forms of behavior for its survival and sustenance, and passes them from one generation to the next. According to Asuru (2000), it is important to emphasize that individual nations throughout the world provide education for their populations for a variety of reasons. According to Adagba (2005), the reasons include the many ways in which these countries feel they can serve their inhabitants as individuals and their country as a whole. Akpomi (2010) also stated that, in order to achieve their philosophy of education, the Government of Nigeria established an implementation committee for the National Policy of Education in 1983, fully aware that the importance of teaching practice and internship in teaching education cannot be overstated, the committee therefore recommends: Those methods of training teachers need to be rationalized, so that they reflect the Nation's, Education philosophy. The approach of on-the-job training should be used to train a large number of untrained primary school teachers. The selection and training of a lead instructor who will give personal teaching to teachers and trainees while also effectively supervising them.