Student Teachers�� Perceptions of Teaching Practice Assessment in Egerton University, Kenya

Abstract

eaching practice is a key component of the undergraduate teacher training programme. It is during this period that the student teacher gets to translate the skills and theory learnt into reality through actual classroom teaching. Since the inception of the Bachelor of Education (Science), Bachelor of Education (Arts) and Bachelor of Science (Agriculture Education) programmes at Egerton University, the teacher trainees have always proceeded for teaching practice at the end of their third year of training. Although research on teaching practice in Egerton University has been done, there is need to replicate and investigate the current state of the perceptions of student teachers towards teaching practice assessment. It was with this in mind that the study was undertaken. The study investigated the student teachers’ perceptions of teaching practice assessment. Three teaching practice zones namely; Kericho/Bomet, Uasingishu,/Keiyo and Nyeri/Kirinyaga were randomly selected. From the zones 68 students were selected using stratified random sampling technique based on gender and subject area specialization. The study adopted descriptive survey research design and it used a questionnaire which had a reliability coefficient alpha of 0.906 to collect data. The collected data was analyzed using both descriptive and inferential statistics. The results showed that the student teachers’ perceptions towards teaching practice assessment were favorable. The findings also indicated that there were no statistically significant differences in their perceptions by area of specialization. However there was a statistically significant difference in perceptions of teaching practice between male and female student-teachers at alpha level of 0.05. The findings may be used to enhance teaching practice assessment.