Philippine E-Journals

Readiness of Benguet State University Pre-service Teachers in the 21st Century Teaching Environment

Imelda G. Parcasio

 

Abstract:

This study looked into the Benguet State University pre-service teachers’ readiness in the 21st century teaching environment as evaluated by their respective Cooperating Teachers during their off-campus student teaching. It is a descriptive quantitative study conducted in Baguio and Benguet with 130 teacher-respondents from 14 Cooperating Schools of BSU College of Teacher Education. Based on the concept of eight 21st century skills, the cooperating teachers observed and evaluated the pre-service teachers as very good adaptors because of their ability to be flexible in teaching and learning at the same time; visionaries because they are open to suggestions and criticisms; collaborators because they have the skills in facilitating curricular instructions with the aid of technology, and risk takers as they accept criticisms to enhance instruction. On the other hand, the pre-service teachers need enhancements in the other skills like learning, communicating, role modeling and leading. The challenges faced by the cooperating teachers in guiding the pre-service teachers are: mentoring on ICT utilization, improvement of communication skills, lack of time for one-on-one coaching, the inability of pre-service teachers to meet the deadline of requirements, and the missing of reminders to instructions given to them by the cooperating teachers.