The Importance of Time Management and Cooperative Learning on Me as a Teacher and the Learners of EF - Term Paper Example

The influence, the importance of time management and Cooperative learning upon me as a teacher to be and the learners of EF Time Management Teaching is a time consuming process and time is an insufficient factor in school as in any other aspects of life. Managing the time of teachers and students is an equally challenging factor in a class room. Time management relates to all aspects of teaching like organizing the classroom, organizing the day, deciding the time to be taken to teach subjects, maintaining time consuming behavior problems of students, and recording the progress of students. Effective utilization of time in school starts with efficient organization and management of the classroom. A teacher can manage time efficiently in a classroom by planning, reducing paperwork, preparation of routines, schedules and time table that eliminate waste of time and confusion, allocate independent assignment, use learning centers, prepare seatwork that allows the teacher to work in small groups and maintain an environment in classroom that enables student to have a smooth transition from one activity to another. Beginners and veteran teachers can increase their teaching time with efficient use of time by assessing factors that consume time and thereby teachers can increase their teaching time. A teacher can be a good classroom manager by delegating work to volunteers, aides and students and save the extra time for other valuable student related work (Time Management 2009). Importance of time management Time management enables a teacher to recognize the amount of time required to complete important tasks on a regular basis. Prioritization of activities is made simple and allocation of time for optional activities can be made through effective time management. This gives an opportunity to avoid unimportant tasks of lesser significance that consume more time and engage the teacher fruitlessly. Effective time management simplifies the schedules of the teacher and gives more freedom to accomplish the objectives of teaching with reduced stress. Well planned teaching schedule rescues the students from a poorly organized day at school. A teacher can keep the daily teaching routine under control by discussing time management issues with colleagues (Making time for success). Further, teachers are responsible for the success of students. The effective utilization of class time reduces the anxiety of teachers and enhances the performance of students. Teachers will have some extra time at the end of the class to reflect and review the topic learned during the class on a well organized day (Time Management 2008). The significance of a teacher’s lesson time management should not be underestimated. Lesson time planning is of great significance because a class sometimes comprises little buggers who may take away a considerable amount of time if the class is not well timed and planned and may start playing and ultimately the teacher will lose control of the situation in the class (Lesson Plan Time Management for Teachers). Teacher time management gives an opportunity to increase the student’s time on task that will result in better student achievement. Engaging students on a task in the classroom is a difficult duty of the teacher because teachers should be careful to allocate more time for academic tasks and engage the students in a fruitful manner. Teachers should have knowledge about managing time for a number of activities and divide the given time with achievement groups and help the students to focus on a given task (Stallings, J. 1980 p.11-16). Influence of Time management on teachers Teachers who participate in professional development program will have sufficient time to obtain, practice and learn new skills and concepts in teaching and can find time to cooperate and interact with colleagues (Abdal-Haqq 1996). Proper utilization of time gives opportunity for students to put full effort into learning with specified time spent on instruction, engagement in task, and increase in the working time and finally resulting in better achievements (Wong, H.K & Wong, R.T Slide No.10). While evaluating the time of a teacher, it is found that a day is fully booked and therefore the teacher should make time to be available for parents and students after the classroom hours to address issues. An effective method that can be used by teachers to make time is to save time by implementing group activities whenever possible. Since a teacher has to respond to all the requests of students, certain activities like making telephone calls, answering emails, discussions, reading publications and articles and filing papers may be set aside as group activities at the end or beginning of the day (Landers, D 2007). Cooperative Learning One of the successful teaching methods in small groups is Cooperative learning where students with varying ability levels utilize a number of learning activities to better their knowledge about a subject. While implementing cooperative learning in a classroom every member of the group is accountable to learn and help others in the team to learn and thereby create an environment of achievement. Students who form a part of cooperative learning group continue to engage in an assignment till all members of the group understand and complete the assignment. Cooperative learning is a mutually beneficial method of group study that enables students to benefit from each others efforts, recognize the requirements of others, understand that the performance of a group is caused by the performance of oneself and the team jointly celebrates the success and takes pride in the success of the group. Cooperative learning can be used to promote the learning of students and improve academic achievement, improve student satisfaction, increase retention of students, assist students to better their skills in communication (oral), promote self esteem among students, and develop social relations skills and to promote positive attitude in race relations. Cooperative learning is effective in class room only in specific circumstance and gives more productive results than individual efforts. Circumstances that yield better results in cooperative learning are (a) Positive interdependence – the effort of all the group members is essential for the success of the group (b) Face to face communication (c) group and individual accountability (d) small group and interpersonal skills - conflict management, leadership, trust building and decision making and (e) group processing. A teacher can take advantage of Cooperative learning methods to delegate learning activity among students and gain better achievement levels through group study. This also gives more time for the teacher to deal with students who are weak in studies (Cooperative Learning). Cooperative learning is helpful for teachers while evaluating a class and communicating the results of the evaluation. Teachers can take the help of students while using labor intensive quality and performance assessment. Simplified assessment methods can be used in cooperative learning which cannot be used when students conduct individual study. Teachers can critically assess the skills, learning ability, ability to communicate and interpersonal skills and the efficiency to give out good quality work while assessing student in cooperative learning. Teachers can assess the students and students can assess their peers through cooperative learning and students can mutually support needy peers in a better way. While using cooperative learning assessment becomes an integral part of the regular classroom life that promotes better achievement. In whole, the quality of education will improve with lesser burden for the teacher and the learning process becomes simple. The assessment of classmate’s work helps students to strive towards better quality work, assess peers work and understand the feedback in a better way. Cooperative learning offers the opportunity for the teacher to understand individual as well as group outcomes. Individual evaluation is more relevant than group evaluation though both have its own significance (Cooperative Learning and Assessment). Educationists strongly opine that a strong psycho-social base is essential to give insignificance to competition at school. This can be substantiated using the cooperative learning method. Teachers can overcome problems like poor academic assistance by initiating small group study where students can help themselves. Cooperative learning can also overcome the problem of unequal participation in classrooms. With the implementation of cooperative learning the class teacher can enhance the interacting skills of students and model pro social behavior. A teacher has a key role to play in cooperative learning. The teacher should act as a facilitator, guide, model, supervisor, contingency manager and supporter to the students in the group. The teacher should ponder points for students to improve their capacity and effectively interact to bring out fruitful outcomes. The teacher should also initiate conversation, teach methods of courtesy, sharing, help seeking and help giving and guide students to show empathy towards other members in the group. Research indicates that cooperative learning brings positive effect on peer empathy and emotions, improves tolerance levels, better respect for diversity, improved self confidence, better social acceptance and improved school attendance. This method of teaching has also has positive outcomes and increase in the achievement levels of pupil and makes them more humanized by gaining pro social capabilities (A framework of cooperative learning). Certain disadvantages of cooperative learning are: aggressive students may dominate and take over, gifted students may show superiority, loners will find it difficult to share answers and some students do not give positive result with this method of learning. Further, the teacher should pre plan the activities of the group and decide the knowledge and skill to be taught to the students. The teacher should also guide the students to learn in groups (Kizlik, B 2009). Conclusion The amount of time efficiently spent by the teacher depends on the amount of time taken by the students to meet their learning needs. The changing and challenging educational environment has an effect on the learning capabilities of children which in turn has an effect on the teachers to enrich the academic excellence of students with more effort in terms of attendance, attention, courtesy and responsibility. The inclusion of special need students in regular schools demands more time from teachers and therefore time management becomes an integral part of teaching. Time management also rates the efficiency of a teacher’s performance within the restricted classroom time at school. Teachers can be more creative when they have more time for collaborating and planning and this can be earned only with a well planned day. While evaluating the advantage of time management it is equally important to realise the disadvantages of poor time management by teachers since it may lead to poor creativity and the teacher may teach only the fundamentals of the curriculum. Poor management of time may require teachers to carry home work to be done during weekends and evening resulting in the lack of time to be spent with family. Too much of hard time will lead the teacher to frustration and exhaustion and the change and creativity to be effected in school will be compromised. A teacher need not rush with subjects if time is well managed and can find additional time to deal with pressure from parents and student characteristics. The implementation of recognized teacher aid kits like the readymade Teachers Time Management Survival Kit designed by Steven R.Mamchak and Susan P.Mamchak would help the teacher in tracking the home work and make up work (on absence from class) by placing the responsibility on the students (Parson, S. 2004). A teacher can rely on cooperative learning because it gives opportunities for students to learn and teach each other in real world circumstances. Teamwork has gained much importance because it is valued for its managerial competence in the corporate world. Students tend to be well organized when they learn to solve problems by themselves. The main objective of cooperative learning is to make the students actively indulge in the learning process that reduces the burden of the teacher to grab the attention of students each time an assignment has to be done. When there is more involvement of students along with peers, students feel less pressurized to complete an assignment. However, cooperative learning should be strategically implemented. Cooperative learning method has proved to outperform individualistic and competitive structures socially and academically irrespective of the grade or content level. Teachers can teach in a more positive environment when there is well defined cooperation from students. It requires a teacher to invest patience and time to implement cooperative learning in a classroom. A teacher can be successful in using cooperative learning if the students can be held collectively and individually accountable by maintaining the expected level of performance (Learn About Cooperative Learning). Therefore, cooperative learning and time management can influence the creativity and success of a teacher if managed strategically. Reference A framework of cooperative learning Available: http://www.merinews.com/catFull.jsp?articleID=147597. Accessed on March 12, 2009 Abdal-Haqq, I. 1996 Making Time for Teacher Professional Development Available: http://eric.ed.gov/ERICWebPortal/custom/portlets/recordDetails/detailmini.jsp?_nfpb=true&_&ERICExtSearch_SearchValue_0=ED400259&ERICExtSearch_SearchType_0=no&accno=ED400259. Accessed on March 12, 2009 Cooperative Learning Available: http://edtech.kennesaw.edu/intech/cooperativelearning.htm. Accessed on March 12, 2009 Cooperative Learning and Assessment Available: http://www.co-operation.org/pages/assess.html. Accessed on March 12, 2009 Kizlik, B. February 2, 2009 COOPERATIVE LEARNING Available: http://www.adprima.com/teachmeth.htm. Accessed on March 12, 2009 Landers, D. (2007) Time Management for Teachers Available: http://www.sideroad.com/Time_Management/time-management-for-teachers.html. Accessed on March 12, 2009 Learn About Cooperative Learning Available: http://educate.intel.com/in/ProjectDesign/InstructionalStrategies/CooperativeLearning/. Accessed on March 12, 2009 Lesson Plan Time Management for Teachers Available: http://www.teach-esl-to-kids.com/lesson-time-management-for-teachers.html. Accessed on March 12, 2009 Making Time for Success Available: http://k6educators.about.com/library/weekly/aa091299a.htm. Accessed on March 12, 2009 Parson, S. (2004) Research on improving teacher time management Available: http://www.thefreelibrary.com/Research+on+improving+teacher+time+management.-a0126683335. Accessed on March 12, 2009 Stallings, J. (1980) Allocated Academic Learning Time Revisited, or Beyond Time on Task. Educational Researcher, Vol. 9, No. 11, 11-16 Available: http://edr.sagepub.com/cgi/pdf_extract/9/11/11. Accessed on March 12, 2009 Time Management August 28, 2008 Available: http://www.kde.state.ky.us/KDE/Instructional+Resources/Career+and+Technical+Education/Career+and+Technical+Ed+Resources/Tips+and+Topics+for+CTE+Teachers/Time+Management.htm. Accessed on March 12, 2009 Time Management 2009 Available: http://www2.scholastic.com/browse/article.jsp?id=4153. Accessed on March 12, 2009 Wong, H.K & Wong, R.T. The First Days of School. How to be an effective teacher Unit-D – Lesson Mastery. (Slide No.10) Available: http://meredithmhiggins.com/local/Classroom%20Management/E491%20Classroom%20Management%20Presentation.pdf. Accessed on March 12, 2009 Read More