Reasons Why Students Prefer Some Teachers Over Others
By: Donald Lukman
Tags: Academic, Dissertation, Personality, Undergraduate Project, Thesis

Teachers are arguably the most important members of our society. They give children purpose, set them up for success as citizens of our world, and inspire in them a drive to do well and succeed in life. The children of today are the leaders of tomorrow, and teachers are that critical point that makes a child ready for their future.

Teachers have the ability to shape leaders of the future in the best way for society to build positive and inspired future generations and therefore design society, both on a local and global scale. In reality, teachers have the most important job in the world. Those who have an impact on the children of society have the power to change lives. Not just for those children themselves, but for the lives of all.

See Some Samples Of Undergraduate Project Topics That Are Related To Education

Teaching is difficult. Excellent teaching is even harder. Building a strong connection with students, along with pedagogy, best practices and sometimes a magic wand, is the foundation to any lasting teaching.

Students who are in classrooms with teachers that they like and have a close relationship with may learn more. For teachers, teaching students who like you makes their job easier. Teachers, who experience close relationships with students report that their students have better attendance, cooperate more, are more engaged and are more self-directed.

TEACHERS’ PERSONALITY

Teachers‟ personality is one of the characteristics of achieving excellence among teachers. In other words, teachers themselves need to have a high personality first before attempting to develop students‟ personality. Teachers especially Religious Teachers need to provide guidance or advice to the students and build their characters. The personality of teachers plays a role in influencing the students’ character development. Other than forming students‟ personality, the teachers‟ personality can also impact the performance of schools, effectiveness of Teaching and Learning activities, creativity of students and motivation.

TEACHERS’ EXPERIENCE

The classroom management practices teachers adopt have been shown to relate to their years of teaching experience. Comparing novice (i.e., student teachers having less than 40 hr of classroom teaching experience) and expert (i.e., teachers with at least 10 years of teaching experience and whose classroom management expertise was recognized by peers and/or school administrators) teachers’ representations of classroom management issues. This suggests that with years of experience, teachers develop a better understanding of classroom management, which enables them to anticipate issues and to adapt their classroom management practices accordingly. Years of teaching experience were positively associated with compromising and integrating two positive conflict strategies within classrooms that are conceptually close to autonomy support and negatively associated with obliging, which is conceptually close to control. Regarding the relation between teaching self-efficacy and experience, research showed a positive correlation indicating that teachers tend to become more confident over their career.

TEACHER-STUDENT RELATIONSHIP ABILITY

The brain is a social organ and close relationships, such as a positive student-teacher relationship, encourage learning, in part, because they promote a positive learning environment. From birth, we learn from our interactions with other people; this includes, family, friends and yes, teachers. Positive teacher-student relationships in the school setting have positive implications not only for students, but for teachers and the school climate as a whole. When students have positive relationships with their teachers, it affects how they view school and how engaged they are. Students who have this kind of relationships have more positive feelings about school, are more engaged, and in turn, are often higher achievers. While positive student teacher relationships can result in more engagement, and higher grades among students, negative relationships can have the opposite effect.

Positive student-teacher relationships also have the power to positively improve school climate, something that can affect everyone involved in a school. School is, in a very general way, student and staff perception of their school. We can think of it this way: Students who have positive relationships with their teachers tend to be more engaged. Students who are more engaged typically are more likely to succeed. Being successful in school leads to positive educational experiences which in turn create a positive perception of school.

ABILITY TO USE INSTRUCTIONAL MATERIALS

One important dimension in teacher education that is getting a lot of attention is related to the use of instructional materials. Instructional materials are those materials used by a teacher to simplify their teaching. They include both visual and audio-visual aids and could either be concrete or non-concrete. These instructional materials bring life to learning by stimulating students to learn. The use of instructional materials in the classroom has the potential to help the teacher explain new concepts clearly, resulting in better student understanding of the concepts being taught. However, they are not ends in themselves but they are means to an end. It is held that good teaching resources can never replace the teacher but the teacher uses them to achieve their teaching and learning objectives. Some of the instructional materials necessary for effective teaching and learning of Social Studies include the chalkboard, models, graphs, charts, maps, pictures, diagrams, cartoons, slides, filmstrips, radio, and television. The importance of the use of these materials cannot be underscored. This has been emphasized by a number of scholars. Instructional materials are critical ingredients in learning and that the curriculum could not be easily implemented without them. A teacher who has adequate and relevant teaching facilities is more confident, effective and productive. Relevant instructional materials enable the learners to have a clear understanding of Conflict and Conflict Resolution. Instructional materials are essential since they help the teacher and learners avoid overemphasis on recitation and rote learning that can easily dominate a lesson. Resource materials allow learners to have practical experiences which help them to develop skills and concepts and to work in a variety of ways.