A study on teaching effectiveness of extension teaching-learning in agricultural universities of northern India
Loading...
Date
2019-06
Authors
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
G.B. Pant University of Agriculture and Technology, Pantnagar - 263145 (Uttarakhand)
Abstract
Extension Education has established itself as profession and discipline with three important components of teaching, research and service. In India, Extension researches and teaching are being practiced by teachers and students in more than 61 State Agricultural Universities (SAU’s), four Deemed to be Universities (DU’s), three Central Agricultural Universities (CAU’s) and four Central Universities (CU’s) with Agriculture Faculty. India’s signing of General Agreement on Trade and Tariff (GATT) in 1994 and joining of W.T.O. has put agriculture into a framework of global market and therefore Extension has moved beyond production, towards Market led Extension and Knowledge Management. With these global changes, to cater the present farmer needs and to harness job opportunities in teaching, research, development NGOs, agro-input and marketing companies, P.G. students needs specific skills mainly in areas of ‘Extension management’, ‘Development communication’ and ‘Human resource management/ training’. Inculcating these skills among students demands effective teaching with a strong link of curriculum with market needs. Keeping above facts in mind a study entitled “A Study on Teaching Effectiveness of Extension Teaching-Learning in Agricultural Universities of Northern India” was undertaken to study the socio-personal, psychological and professional characteristics of teachers and students, perception of teachers and students with respect to the adequacy of Extension course curriculum, teaching effectiveness at P.G. level, relationship between the selected characteristics of teachers and students with teaching effectiveness and to develop framework for effective teaching in Extension Education at P.G. level. The present study was conducted in universities of North zone having agriculture as a subject, which comprises of 23 universities located in Jammu and Kashmir, Himachal Pradesh, Punjab, Uttarakhand, Uttar Pradesh, Haryana and New Delhi. Ten universities having agriculture as a subject from North zone were selected randomly with all teachers and Post graduate students (M.Sc. and Ph.D.) of Extension Education discipline as the respondents for the present study. Thus a total of 66 teachers engaged in teaching of Extension Education discipline and 210 Post graduate students were the respondents of the present study. The descriptive research design was used and the quantitative information was collected through pretested structured questionnaire. The findings revealed that maximum number of the teachers belong to middle age category (40.90%), had doctorate as their highest degree of qualification (81.82%), belonged to medium category of job experience (39.38 %), had medium level of job satisfaction (56.06 %), had high level of job commitment (46.96 %), had high level of self confidence (62.12 %), had high level of achievement motivation (65.16%), had neutral attitude towards their profession (51.51%), had medium value expectancy (46.96%), had medium professional productivity (48.48%), had medium category of verbal immediacy (63.80%), had medium category of non-verbal immediacy (71.90%) had medium category of instructional skills (79.52%) and had medium category of classroom interaction (75.72%). It was also found that maximum number of the teachers (46.96%) categorized appropriateness of institutional variables in medium category. In case of students majority of students (93.34%) had English as their medium of school education, had medium academic performance (77.62%), had medium level of self confidence (71.90 %) and had medium level of achievement motivation (63.34%). Regarding perception of teachers and students with respect to the adequacy of Extension course curriculum at P.G. level, the findings revealed that maximum number of the teachers (40.90%) perceived that course curriculum has low adequacy and maximum number of the students (49.04%) perceived that course curriculum has medium adequacy. Further it was found that majority of the students (64.29%) perceived that overall acquisition of Extension competencies was low. Regarding teaching effectiveness, it was found that among all eight teachers attributes majority of the students and categorized “teachers fairness” (57.61%), “teachers attitude towards teaching” (43.33%) and “teachers attitude towards students” (37.14%) under high category. The findings revealed that majority of students rated “overall teaching effectiveness” under medium category (48.09%) followed by high category (34.76%), on the basis of ratings of teachers attributes. The teaching effectiveness indices of 10 universities were: G.B.P.U.A.T. (0.69), I.A.R.I. (0.74), P.A.U. (0.64), I.V.R.I. (0.65), N.D.R.I. (0.67), H.A.U. (0.59), S.K.U.A.S.T. (0.56), C.S.A.U.A.T. (0.46), S.H.U.A.T.S. (0.51) and B.H.U. (0.58). The overall teaching effectiveness index of all 10 universities was 0.607 indicating a teaching effectiveness of above average. Overall, it was found that majority of teachers and students (51.01%) categorized teaching effectiveness as medium It was found that all eight attributes; teachers’ preparedness, teaching pedagogy of course, teachers’ availability to students, course characteristics, teachers’ attitude towards students, teachers’ attitude towards teaching, teachers’ creativity and teachers’ fairness were significantly associated with overall teaching effectiveness. Among teachers related variables the findings revealed that educational qualification, job commitment, attitude towards profession, self confidence, value expectancy, personal attributes, professional productivity, instructional skills, class room interaction, job experience, achievement motivation, verbal immediacy and non verbal immediacy were significantly and positively correlated with teaching effectiveness. Among students related variables; achievement motivation, academic performance and self confidence were significantly and positively correlated with teaching effectiveness. Among institutional variables; HRD activities, teaching infrastructure and feedback mechanism were significantly and positively correlated with teaching effectiveness On the basis of the findings, two framework were formulated (a) Framework for effective teaching on the basis of teachers attributes (b) Framework for effective teaching on the basis socio-personal, psychological and professional characteristics of teachers and students and institutional variables.
Description
Keywords
null