Pupil Teachers’ Attitude towards Teacher Eligibility Test (TET)

Education is a process of acquiring knowledge and skills in general and in the field of teacher‘s education in special. Quality teacher‘s education is the need of the hour. The effective teaching depends upon the teacher with updated knowledge, skills and technology. It is necessary to ensure teachers with the essential aptitude and ability to meet the challenges of teaching at the primary and upper primary level (Christina, 2016). Having a degree with teacher education like D.Ed. and B.Ed. is not enough to become a school teacher. So the National Council of Educational Research and Training (NCERT), New Delhi recommended introducing Teacher Eligibility Test (TET) to check the entry behaviour of the candidate who is going to be a teacher. It is conducted by both Central and State governments in India. Most states conduct their own TET. The rationale for including the TET as a minimum eligibility criterion for a person to appoint as a teacher is to bring national standards and benchmark of teacher quality in the recruitment process and to lay special emphasis on teacher quality. The NCERT has decided to improve the quality in teacher education by conducting CTET and it recommends to state governments to conduct the eligibility test at state. TETs should be made mandatory for teacher hiring throughout the country at all levels of school education. This would ensure that despite alternate pathways open to become teachers, standards of teaching are maintained. Teachers could be required to renew their certifications periodically so that they continue to invest in their own development. This study is intended to know the attitude of the pupil-teachers towards TET examination.

Murugan and Srinivasan (2014) revealed that reveals that the attitude of private school teachers have high TET attitude and the private school teachers attitude is not significant with respect to gender, locality. Furthermore there is a significant difference in TET attitude between rural and urban area school teachers. Again, the pupil teachers considered Teacher Eligibility Test as crucial element to ensure quality of teachers. A good number of pupil teachers were also in favour of periodic testing of those who are already working in schools (Rathi and Jathol, 2012).

The study is based on descriptive survey method. The sample consists of 200 students teachers studying in different B.Ed colleges affiliated to Utkal University, Bhubaneswar. A tool like ‗Attitude towards TET (ATTET)‘ is used to measure the attitude of students teacher which was constructed and standardized by the investigator. The face and content validity were found. The reliability of the tool is 0.72 which was found by test-retest method.

It is shown from the Table-1 that the mean scores of boys and girls student teacher on attitude towards TET are 65.93 and 66.05 with SD‘s 4.56 and 4.32 respectively. The t-ratio comes out to be 0.33, which is not significant at any level of significance. That means there are no significant differences in attitude between boys and girls student teacher towards TET. However the mean score of girls student teacher is higher than the boys students. It implies that the girl‘s students have some extent positive attitude towards TET.

It is shown from the Table- 2 the mean score of arts and science students teachers on attitude towards TET are 63.45 and 65.42 with SD‘s 4.25 and 5.0 respectively. The t-ratio came out to be 2.72, which is significant at .05 level of significance. That means there is a significant difference in attitude between student-teachers having arts and science background. Moreover, the mean score of science students is higher than the arts students. That means science students have positive attitude towards TET.

respectively. The t-ratio comes out to be 2.42, which is significant at .05 level of significance. That means there is a significant difference between rural and urban student teacher on attitude towards TET. Further, the mean scores of urban students is higher than the rural. It indicates that students teachers belong to urban areas have positive attitude towards TET as compare to their counter parts.

The teachers have a significant role to enhance the quality education at school level. So appointment of teachers also taken into consideration serious and fairly. The person those have passion and skill to teach, should be appointed. So the govt. take initiative to check the ability and skills of prospective teachers. The findings of the study revealed that students teacher having science background having positive attitude towards TET as compare to arts students. The findings supported by the (Behera, 2018) and whereas contradicted with result of (Sharma, 2012). So some motivation program should be given to the arts students to pursue and have create interest towards TET. Further, the urban students have positive attitude towards TET as compare to their rural students. There should be created awareness programme about need and importance of TET to become teachers. So, teachers should be prepared and should always be at their best for enhancing attitude towards TET.

Behera, A. (2018). Attitude of Post graduate Students towards teacher eligibility test. Unpublished M.A. Education, Baripada: North Orissa University Christina, A.D. (2016). Attitude of TET among B.Ed students-teachers. International Journal of Research – Granthalayah, 4(5), pp. 18-21. Murugan, S. and Srinivasan, P. (2014). Attitude of Private School Teachers towards Teacher Eligibility Test, India Journal of Education and Vocational Research, 5(1), pp. 13-16. Rathi, N. and Jathol, P.S. (2013). Attitude of prospective teachers towards teacher eligibility test. e-Reflection: An international Journal of Multidisciplinary Peer reviewed Journal, 2(6), pp. 334-340. Sharma, S. (2012). Attitude of pupil teachers towards Teacher Eligibility Test. Unpublished M.Phil.

University.

Professor and Head, School of Education, North Orissa University, Baripada