Before recommending to teachers what they should train / retrain to be efficient teachers, respected by their students (which leads to increasing difficulty) and stay fit, it is advisable to review the concept of continuous training and its birth a little.
Continuous training: why?
It is remarkable to see how in all times, until the s. XIX inclusive, the stage of life in which a person had to study and train (childhood, adolescence and early youth) was considered radically separated from that in which he was already a professional who practiced his trade, not requiring more education (second youth, adulthood and old age). There was no overlap between the two periods: one was a student or an apprentice, and then a professional. Seeing a thirty-year-old student, for example, would have been as unusual as seeing a worker (considered as such) of ten or fifteen.
This was quite logical since the rate of advancement of knowledge and techniques was slow and did not require further training throughout a career. For example, and for a complex science such as medicine, when a young man had already been educated as a doctor, he could practice the profession for the rest of his life knowing that, in his old age, the state of the art would be very similar to what existed when he finished. his higher studies.
With the arrival of the Industrial Revolution this begins to change drastically. The evolutionary rhythm of technique and technology accelerates remarkably, productivity grows exponentially and this drags behind it a spiral of dizzying changes in many other disciplines. The environment of any worker becomes much more complex, increasingly specialized, and the continuous discoveries, inventions and advances in various fields cause that a professional is increasingly driven to recycle periodically so as not to expire his knowledge, to combine his activity. work with a certain study of new trends.
At the beginning of this new era, very few adults will be aware that they must work and re-train, even a little bit and very occasionally, so as not to lose effectiveness. But, already mediated the s. XX, the continuous updating in the profession itself is becoming more important, since the changes occur with increasing speed, becoming obsolete knowledge that, very recently, seemed absolute truths.
This circumstance begins to be detected first, by some liberal professionals (engineers, lawyers, doctors, architects) and, later, by the group of individuals and companies.
They begin to appear what is called recycling programs, update programs, continuing education programs, masters, improvement courses, etc., segmented by specialties and with a regulated approach that tries to be very practical.
In the 1970s, permanent training was already frequently spoken of as a need that, in the long run, all of us will have to cover, and professionals who are anxious to sharpen the saw begin to value very positively.
In the 1980s and 1990s the rate of change continued to accelerate and a period of strong economic growth was underway (with a major crisis in 1993). The work environment is becoming more complex, interdependent and fluctuating. Professionals are increasingly required to be productive, but at the same time, they need to be up-to-date on the latest developments.
Continuing education for teaching: what for?
Is all this applicable to the world of teaching, to that of teachers? Of course and without any doubt. Not only is it applicable, it is essential that teachers recycle themselves so as not to lose track of their own students who, increasingly, are very up to date in terms of collaborative work and technology.
Nowadays, any student can put a teacher on the spot just by consulting Google, just by taking a look at a good blog, just by accessing Wikipedia or YouTube… The so-called Web 2.0 has profoundly revolutionized the world of teaching and that's there, whether we want to see it or not. Our students already know it and use it.
In the eLearning process, for example, students can computer record and archive their work and reflections. These are digitally documented (in images and / or sound and / or text), stored in the virtual platform of common access and the whole class can consult them, while recording their own.
Then, the student becomes a kind of teacher of other students (everyone sees everyone's contributions). Sometimes disciples can even be teachers of their own teachers. Everything is blurred and equalized. This is another advantage as the individual talent of each member is used in the best possible way for the benefit of the community. Once again, talent to power.
This same form of global enrichment based on individual contributions is another enormous advantage of Web 2.0. Imagine the reader who could have learned from number one in his math class (and not just from the teacher). Wouldn't you have liked to share your reflections and moments of study with the best student at your university, the one who had the most perfect schemes and solved problems as or faster than the professor himself? How about knowing what, for example, the brightest companion of the Master thought?
Are we truly aware of the enormous loss of knowledge and time that comes from having classmates who cannot communicate their ideas and who are taking notes all the time, in silence? Have we stopped to think about what it means to listen to a single teacher, when the whole class can contribute and co-educate? Do we realize how much we learn (= discover and surprise ourselves) when we hear other disciples arguing that they start from the same basic information as us?
Students do know this and increasingly demand that the teacher be more a moderator, a facilitator, than an old-fashioned professor.
I ask the reader to recall a time when, being sure of an idea, he has assisted in an intelligent argument of a completely contrary thesis.
We have all lived this experience, sometime. Didn't it shed a different light on the question? Didn't it enlighten you and at least allow you to reflect again? Somehow, didn't it make you wiser or more humble? Didn't it make you discover something, about the problem, about the group that was talking about it or even about yourself?
Why should current teachers be trained? In order not to be obsolete in front of their students. Sorry to say it like that, but it's the truth.
Continuing education for teachers: in what?
If students ask for more dialogue, more criteria and fewer firm rules, if they want more openness and collaboration, and less dogmas, teachers must continually retrain and train in the new technological tools that allow all this, and that we could group under these themes:
- eLearning or virtual teaching.
- Web 2.0 and collaborative work.
- Knowledge management.
- Social networks.
- New supports: iPad, eBook, etc.
- Generically, effective use for teaching Internet and New Technologies.
