6th Teaching & Education Conference, Vienna

ARE TEACHERS HAPPY? ILLUMINATING INSIGHT INTO INSTRUCTIONAL PRACTICES

NIHAL YURTSEVEN

Abstract:

Instructional quality is one of the most crucial components of a successful educational setting, to equip students with necessary knowledge and skills as well as increasing the effectiveness of instruction. The purpose of this study is to examine teachers’ views and contentment towards their instructional practices. The research questions are as follows: 1. What makes teachers happy regarding their instructional practices? 2. What makes teachers unhappy regarding their instructional practices? 3. What are teachers’ instructional goals? 4. What do teachers need to achieve their instructional goals? The study was carried out through qualitative research design. Qualitative research is conducted with an aim to uncover facts about individuals’ experiences, perceptions, and perspectives towards a particular phenomenon (McMillan & Schumacher, 2006). The participants of the study were 142 teachers, working in different parts of Turkey in different educational stages. Of the 142 participants, 63 % (n=89) were female and 37 % (n=53) were male. An electronic form was used as a data collection tool in the study. The form consisted of two parts. In the first part, demographic information such as gender, the educational stage the participants work at, type of institution, duration of professional experience, level of education and branch were included. In the second part, there were four open-ended questions interrogating participants’ happiness regarding their instructional practices. The data was analyzed through content analysis. With this analysis technique, the teachers’ responses were initially read carefully and coded. After the coding step, the researcher brought the related codes together to form categories and the categories were grouped to reach themes. Findings of the study indicated that teachers had an average happiness point of 7 towards their instructional practices. Secondly, professional development activities and innovative implementations, made teachers happy regarding their instructional practices. Thirdly, teachers felt unhappy when they disregarded students’ individual differences. Fourthly, teachers’ instructional goals were related to improving their content knowledge and technological competencies. They needed administrative support and time to achieve their instructional goals.

Keywords: teacher education, instructional quality, instructional practice, instruction.

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