Teaching Vocation Research Articles

Michael Nicholson on Martin Wight: a mind passing in the night

In his article on ‘The enigma of Martin Wight’ (Review of International Studies, i, 1981, pp. 15–22), Michael Nicholson makes some questionable assertions. One concerns the object of international studies. He says, ‘Surely the point of studying international relations or any other aspect of human behaviour is to improve the human condition not to stand as passive spectators deploring the appalling standard of play’ (p. 19). He goes on to doubt whether Wight's position was really that of the passive spectator, but on the revealing ground that a man who had such a big impact on others could hardly have been in the business for its ‘entertainment value’ (p. 20). I find this a remarkable pair of alternatives: improvement or entertainment! There seems no place here for the scholar, the man dedicated to finding out how the world works because he is fascinated by it. Nor is account taken of the vocation of teaching, the desire just to pass on to others the understanding one has gained. Of course, I am sure Nicholson would say that his remarks were not an exhaustive account of the possibilities. But what he does seem to be, saying is that the scholar must also be concerned about making the world a better place. I see no ground for this position. It implies a moral deficiency in those who are simply devoted to learning or who do not believe in the possibility of progress. This is a large claim.

木工の基本動作の評価に関する研究

As the first step of educational psychological study of “teaching vocation” as a subject matter of secondary school, three fundamental skills of woodworks such as sawing, planeing and hole-making by chisel were selected.Subjects: Subjects were 61 boys of 8th grade randomly selected from different three secondary. schools. Each represented districts of, industry, commerce and residence, and agriculture. To avoid measuring errors, the same instructions manual was used.The details of wood-works: (1) Sawing: to make one-inch cubes as many as possible out of a long bar which section is one inch square for 15 minutes.(2) Planeing: to make a plane board of 2.8×8×0.4inches for 60 minutes.(3) Hole-making by chisel: to make a 0.5 inch square holes as many as possible on a plane board for 40 minutes.Scales for evaluation: to. quantity qualities of each product of children, different 2-point-scales for evaluation (passed or failed) were made. The full score on each scales were 7 points for sawing, 22 for planeing and 21 for hole-making by chisel.The correlations: The following 5 kinds of scores were correlated.(1) quality of sawing (mean of scores)(2) quantity of sawing (number of products)(3) planeing (scores)(4) quality of hole-making (mean of scores)(5) quantity of hole-making (number of products)Scores of two aptitude tests, mechanical aptitude test, and vocational aptitude test made by a ministry of labour were also correlated. It resulted that there was no correlation among the scores except one between quantity of hole-making, both of which contain the same factor of speed.

The Vocation of the Catholic Woman Teacher

The teaching profession has for a long time been recognized as a normal sphere of influence for women. But even among Catholics, teaching is too often considered as no more than a profession; in other words, simply a means of livelihood requiring a high degree of training or specialized knowledge. It is, in fact, very much more. At this time, when observations and educational theories are current subjects of interest and discussion, it is perhaps worth trying to make some assessment of the teaching vocation to which both lay women and teaching religious are called by God. It is at last being recognized by both clergy and laity that in these days the term ‘vocation', for so long restricted to the meaning of a call to life in the cloister, has in fact a very much wider sense. Now it is understood, rather, as the call of God to the individual to follow a particular path that he reveals to them.

Evaluative Studies of Teacher Education

An important aspect of the supply of teachers-the special theme of this issue of the JOURNAL —is the quality of their preparation. In the highly responsible vocation of teaching, quality is in every sense as important as quantity. To specify all of the qualities of professional leadership desired in each new teacher, however, is more difficult than to specify the number of new teachers needed. Hence it becomes essential to examine unceas ingly those educational conditions and processes which it is hoped during college years will bring out and develop the requisite qualities. Mr. Barr, Professor of Education at the University of Wisconsin, and long a leader in research in this area, and Mr. Singer, a teaching assistant at the same University, have Prepared especially for this issue of the JOURNAL a summary of recent research which seeks to evaluate various practices in teacher education. This summary represents an extensive canvass of the research literature and brings to a focus the findings of various studies on this particular issue. —Douglas E. Scates, Editor.