Teachers are extremely important facets of any society for a multitude of reasons. They are the people who educate the youth of society who in turn become the leaders of the next generation of people. Teachers are the people who are teaching children and imparting knowledge upon them in their most impressionable years. What these kids learn from their teachers at a young age will most likely stay with them in some features for the rest of their lives. Without a doubt, teachers certainly have a significant mark on the development of young children and even older children alike; as they are teaching them and helping them develop their knowledge so that they can go on in life and be responsible and productive members of society.
In all education system, the performance of teachers is one of the handfuls of factors determining school effectiveness and learning outcomes. Teaching is said to be noble, but demanding occupation. In order for teachers to maintain a high level of professional performance under these conditions, they must assume personal responsibility for their own performance, growth and development. Mohanty (2000), explains that teacher performance as the most crucial input in the field of education. Teachers are perhaps the most critical component of any system of education. How well they teach depends on motivation, qualification, experience, training, aptitude and a mass of other factors, not the least of these being the environment and management structures within which they perform their role. Teachers must be seen as part of the solution, not part of the problem.
As generated from http://www.osba.org, in the last two decades of education reform, teachers have been viewed as central to both the problems of education and their solutions. Education researchers and school leaders have faced the challenge of motivating teachers to high levels of performance. According to sociologists, current school environments are a reward-scarce setting for professional work and often seem to work against teachers’ best efforts to grow professionally and improve student learning. Much of teachers’ work is carried out in self-contained classrooms that isolate them from the support of their colleagues. Because of this organizational structure, teachers are difficult to supervise, do not receive regular feedback from others, and often find it hard to collaborate.
Perhaps as a result of these circumstances, many good teachers leave teaching in the first three years. Clearly, education leaders need to find ways to keep teachers in the profession and keep them motivated. A motivated teacher, as described here, is one who not only feels satisfied with his or her job, but also is empowered to strive for excellence and growth in instructional practice. This issue looks at teacher motivation and considers how it has been treated historically, how it is affected by external and internal factors, and how new directions in professional development, teacher evaluation, new teacher induction and school reform are currently creating opportunities for more effective teacher motivation.
Teachers can have influence more profound than others and give the glorious position and dignified status to the nation. According to Kayuni & Tambulasi (2007) lack of motivation and commitment can have a negative impact on the student’s learning and most importantly it put the future of children on the stake. Teacher’s contribution in the human capital development and technological advancement greatly depends on their motivation and willingness for taking initiatives.
Motivation is not completely a new term. What is interesting about it is that it is commonly assumed to be a good thing that goes in influencing individual’s behavior and performance at work. Teacher motivation naturally has to do with teachers’ attitude to work. It has to do with teachers desire to participate in the pedagogical processes within the school environment. It has to do with teachers’ interest in student discipline and control particularly in the classroom. Therefore it could underlie their involvement or non-involvement in academic and non-academic activities, which operate in schools. The teacher is the one that translates educational philosophy and objective into knowledge and skill and transfers them to students in the classroom.
Motivated teachers are productive teachers. If teachers are motivated to perform their duties, they increase productivity. In contrary, teachers who are not motivated to do their daily task tend to be passive workers. From this standpoint, factors affecting teacher motivation cannot be ignored. They are there for teachers to be productive in the transfer of learning.
By: Marisa B. Regala Teacher III (Colo Elementary School)
