Vision and Mission of a Language Teacher.

Imagine you have a rare free weekend with no professional responsibilities. What will you do? What will you plan for yourself and your family? Instead, would you go ahead without any plans for the weekend? Would the results of both be the same? You know the answers for the above. Your personal vision and mission statements for teaching also does the same for you.

WHAT IS A VISION STATEMENT?

Your vision is your dream. It refers to the most ideal situation generated if your dreams are perfectly manifested. Without a vision, you lack direction. As the ancient Roman philosopher Seneca observed, "If a man knows not what harbor he seeks, any wind is the right wind." Identifying where you want to go in relation to where you are is the key to identifying those areas where you need to improve.

Vision statements are short phrases or sentences that express your hopes or dreams for the future. A vision is a clear, comprehensive photograph of an individual at some point in the future. By developing a vision statement(s) one clarifies one’s core values of teaching. Our vision statements inspire us for action. Your vision describes the optimum, the mental picture you carry of the ideal future state for yourself (5 & 10 year picture). We all have some ideas about what that might be and by spending a little time clarifying your vision, it will help define your mission and give a clearer sense of direction.

A Vision Statement:

• Defines the optimal desired future state - the mental picture - of what an individual wants to achieve over time;
• Functions as the "north star":  Provides guidance to what an individual is focused on achieving in five, ten, or more years, amidst all the distractions of one’s everyday work,;
• It is what inspires the individual towards achieving his lofty vision,

Features of an effective vision statement include:

• Clarity and lack of ambiguity
• Paints a vivid and clear picture, not ambiguous
• Describes a bright future (hope)
• Memorable and engaging expression
• Realistic aspirations, achievable
• Alignment with educational values and culture
• Time bound if it talks of achieving any goal or objective

WHAT IS A MISSION STATEMENT?

A mission statement describes what a teacher is going to do and why he/she is going to do that. A mission statement is the wind that brings you to your desired harbor. It guides your travel and powers your momentum. A mission statement grounds one’s vision in practical terms. Mission statements are similar to vision statements, in that they, too, look at the big picture. However, they're more concrete, and they are definitely more "action-oriented" than vision statements. Mission statements are the "how-to" statements or action plans that help schools achieve their vision. They prompt change and growth. The mission should answer three key questions: • What is it that I do? • How do I do it? • For whom do I do it? Your vision statement should inspire you to dream; your mission statement should inspire you to action.

A Mission statement:

• Defines the present state or purpose of an individual;
• Answers three questions about what an individual does – what, for whom and how.

• Is written succinctly in the form of a sentence or two, but for a shorter timeframe (one to three years) than a Vision statement; and,

WHY SHOULD YOU CREATE VISION AND MISSION STATEMENTS?

First of all, because these statements can help you focus on what is really important. It's easy for a teacher to lose sight of one’s focus when dealing with the day-to-day hassles of teaching. Your vision and mission statements help you remember what is important as you go about doing your daily work.

Second, your vision and mission statements let others have a snapshot view of who you are and what do you want to do. It enhances your image as being competent and professional. This makes collaboration easier.

It can be very helpful when you are being recruited to a school. It can explain your goals to interested agencies in a clear and concise manner.

If the school has a vision and mission statement of its own, both the parties involved can have a mutual understanding and acceptance of common elements of focus. It can strengthen the school culture by better alignment with its own vision and mission; improve decision-making with clarity about "big picture;" and, enhance cross-functional relationships through a shared understanding of priorities.

DIFFERENCE BETWEEN VISION AND MISSION STATEMENTS

Individuals summarize their goals and objectives in mission and vision statements. Both of these serve different purposes for an individual but are often confused with each other. Both serve important, yet different roles as core elements of a strategic plan.

While a mission statement describes what a teacher wants to do now, a vision statement outlines what a teacher wants to be in the future. The Vision Statement focuses on the future; it is a source of inspiration and motivation. A vision describes your ideal future state. A mission statement captures how you are going to realize the vision. The Mission Statement concentrates on the present; it defines the students, critical processes and it informs you about the desired level of performance. Your mission will answer three questions - what you are going to do, who you are doing it for and how you are going to do it.

Comparison chart

Mission Statement versus Vision Statement comparison chart
	Mission Statement	Vision Statement
About	A Mission statement talks about HOW you will get to where you want to be. Defines the purpose and primary objectives related to your student needs and school values.	A Vision statement outlines WHERE you want to be. Communicates both the purpose and values of your teaching.
Answer	It answers the question, “What do I do? What makes me different?”	It answers the question, “Where do I aim to be?”
Time	A mission statement talks about the present leading to its future.	A vision statement talks about your future.
Function	It lists the broad goals for which you strive. Its prime function is internal; to define the key measure or measures of the individual’s success and its prime audience is the person himself.	It lists where you see yourself some years from now. It inspires you to give your best. It shapes your understanding of why you are working here.
Change	Your mission statement may change, but it should still tie back to your core values, customer needs and vision.	As you evolve, you might feel tempted to change your vision. However, vision statements explain your career’s foundation, so change should be kept to a minimum.
Developing a statement	What do I do today? For whom do I do it? What is the benefit? In other words, Why I do what we do? What, For Whom and Why?	Where do I want to be going forward? When do I want to reach that stage? How do I want to do it?
Features of an effective statement	Defines the purpose and values of the Teacher: Who are the teacher’s primary "clients" (stakeholders)? What are the responsibilities of the teacher towards the students?	Clarity and lack of ambiguity: Describing a bright future (hope); Memorable and engaging expression; realistic aspirations, achievable; alignment with school values and culture.

 

HOW DO YOU CREATE VISION AND MISSION STATEMENTS?

Armed with a better understanding of vision and mission statements, it's time for you to develop them for yourself.

LEARN WHAT IS IMPORTANT TO YOU

1. Think about what's important to you- your values, strengths, passions, people etc. One of the first steps you should take when developing the vision and mission will be to define the issue(s) that matter most to you. How do you go about doing so?

ASK YOURSELF

• What is your dream for your students?
• What would you like to see change?
• What kind of community (or program, policy, school, neighborhood, etc.) do we want to create?
• What do you see as the students’ major issues or problems?
• What do you see as your major strengths and assets?
• What do you think should be the purpose of your teaching?
• Why should these issues be addressed?
• What would success look like?

2. Start building a mental image of what you want your life to look like. There are a variety of ways to do this. You could:

draw a picture of your ideal future.

Mindmap your ideal future.

Use a vision planning tool such as http://www.mentoringgroup.com/html/articles/mentee_2.html.

3. Start drafting out your visions using the notes you have made. As you are looking at potential statements, remember to keep them broad and enduring. Vision and mission statements that are wide in scope allow for a sense of continuity with a community's history, traditions, and broad purposes. Vision and mission statements that are built to last will guide efforts both today and tomorrow.

After you have brainstormed a lot of ideas, you can assess critically the different ideas. You can also ask yourselves the following questions about vision statements:

• Does it give hope for a better future?
• Will it inspire me to realize my dreams through positive, effective action?

A final caution: When developing a vision, remember that less can be more; keep it short, and you will remember it longer.

Mission Statements

The process of writing your mission statement is much like that for developing your vision statements. The same brainstorming process can help you develop possibilities for your mission statement. Remember, though, that unlike with vision statements, you will want to develop a single mission statement for your work. After having brainstormed for possible statements, you will want to ask of each one:

• Does it describe what you will do and why you will do it?
• Is it concise (one sentence)?
• Is it outcome oriented?
• Is it inclusive of all your goals?

Considering all of the above, you can decide on a statement that best meets these criteria.

Features of an effective mission statement are:

• Reflects the purpose and values of the individual
• Defines the primary "clients" (students)
• Defines the responsibilities towards these "clients"
• States the ways in which the responsibilities will be fulfilled

Mission statements are not static and need to be re-visited as we grow and our circumstances change. So even if you have created one in the past here is an opportunity to reflect on and re-craft a mission that gets you up each morning excited and full of purpose.

For a new teacher, the vision statement will be formulated first as it will guide the mission statement and the rest of the strategic plan. For an experienced teacher where the mission is established, sometimes the mission guides the vision statement and the rest of the strategic plan for the future.

Next, you have to decide how to use these statements. There are many, many ways in which you may choose to declare your vision and mission statements. To name just a few examples, you might:

• Add them to your letterhead or stationary
• Use them on your website/blog
• Give away T-shirts, or bookmarks, or other small gifts with them
• Use them when you give interviews
• Display them on the cover of your profile/annual report

...and so on. Again, this is a step that will use all of your creativity.

If there is no downside to having a clear Vision and Mission, why do some teachers not have them? Some of the reasons I've heard are:

• "It takes too much time to develop them."

• "I can’t ever reach a consensus on a few."

• "Everyone here already knows what I do, so what is the benefit of writing a statement  about it?

• "I have my goals - who needs a Vision or Mission?

• "I don’t have time to take my focus away from my real job to focus on it."

• "Actually defining my Vision and Mission will mean changes in my work - who has time to  deal with more change?"

In my opinion, none of these reasons outweigh the benefits of having a well-written Vision and Mission statement. If a teacher cannot define his/her "reason for existing (Mission) or "where he/she is going" (Vision), how can he align Students, learning processes, and evaluation of student performances towards a successful future? So, it's never too late for a teacher to define his Vision and Mission.

 

 Teacher Competence

  Since teaching is much more than a task, and involves values or assumptions  concerning education, learning and society, the concept of teacher competences may resonate differently in different national contexts.  The range and complexity of competences required for teaching in the 21st century is so great that any one individual is unlikely to have them all, nor to have developed them all to the same high degree. Attention must therefore be focused also on the competences or attributes of an education system or of a teaching team.

Teaching competences are thus complex combinations of knowledge, skills, understanding, values and attitudes, leading to effective action in situation.

 

                               The National Council of Teacher Education has identified ten teacher competencies for making the teachers professionally content. One of the first and foremost obligations of teacher is to ensure that whether the parents and the community are accepting the importance and usefulness of their efforts. Clarity of thought, deep understanding of educational theories and through knowledge of various educational trends, pedagogical methods, techniques etc. 

Teacher Competencies have been categorized on the basis of purpose being completed by these. These are as follows: 

               (1)Contextual Competencies

                      One of the first and foremost obligations of teacher is to ensure that whether the parents and the community are accepting the importance and usefulness of their efforts. For this teacher should have the ability to understand various context such as historical background, present status of socio- economic, cultural, linguistic and religious context of the family milieu and the community profile. They should be able to conduct surveys for finding out reason for poor enrolment, poor performance and causes of certain problems like wastage and stagnation etc. which hinder the process of education .

(2) Conceptual Competencies

The teacher should have competencies identified under it : Clarity of thought, deep understanding of educational theories and through knowledge of various educational trends, pedagogical methods, techniques etc.

·     They should know significant characteristics of child development at different stages to enable them to transact curriculum effectively.

·     They should have knowledge of classroom organization and management too which would help them in organizing curricular and co-curricular activities quite effectively in and outside classroom.

·     Concepts and educational implications of globalization, modernization, liberalization and privatization have to be understood by teachers.

(3) Content Related Competencies

                             These includes are-

Ø Full mastery over the content of the subject that they have to teach.  

Ø They should find out the hard sots and gaps in curriculum which require explanation and elaboration.

Ø They should identify such areas from the curriculum where there is enough scope for undertaking joyful activities, individual and group learning etc. 

(4) Transactional Competencies

                         Educational transactional competency refers to the skill of day to day teaching to achieve educational objectives effectively through meaningful interaction between teachers and pupils and the environment by using different methods, activities and technology in an integrated and effective manner. Thus it implies that the teacher should be able:

Ø To organize verity of activities such as storytelling, singing, games, field visits, celebration of national, social and cultural events to make teaching learning process joyful, participatory and relevant.

Ø To prepare appropriate teaching aids and other teaching learning material to support and enhance the effectiveness of teaching-learning process.

Ø To integrate continuous evaluation while transacting subject content.

Ø To use continuous evaluation approaches to diagnose weakness and strengths of the teaching learning strategy.

Ø To identify the weaker and, brighter children in order to adopt remedial measures and undertake enrichment programmers. 

               (5) Educational Activities Related Competency.

            The curricular activities are expected to promote cognitive development of children as well as non-cognitive development. So here the competencies required by a teacher are:

·           Ability to organize curricular and co-curricular activities for achieving educational objectives.

·           Ability to organize social and cultural activities like morning assembly, days celebration etc. 

               (6) Competencies to Develop Teaching Learning Material

        It includes:

·        Ability to develop interesting teaching aids for making teaching learning process easy, interesting and activity based.

·        Ability to develop textual and self-learning material for children as per their age and nature.

·         Ability to adapt/adopt the teaching learning materials to meet the educational needs of children with special needs including children from disadvantaged groups and working children.

·        Knowledge as how to develop work-books and activity books.

·        Ability to use electronic gadgets like Computers, CDs etc. to make teaching learning process more effective and interesting. 

(7) Evaluation/Assessment Competencies

                                            It involves the ability of a teacher to continuously judge and verify the level of achievement of prescribed competencies and objective laid down in the curriculum on the part of students is generally referred to as Evaluation Competency.

Ø Teachers should be able to carry out continuous evaluation in a systematic and formal manner.

Ø Ability to maintain observation records to evaluate likes and dislikes habits, value and attitudes of the children.

Ø Ability to diagnose the problem that children face in comprehending what is taught.

Ø Ability to undertake action research.

(8) Management Competencies

                                  It involves the skill of the teacher to achieve high quality educational objectives in minimum time, energy and money through appropriate and effective use of educational aids and active participation of available human resources. Every teacher is a manager of a particular class or group of students.

Ø Teacher should have the skill of classroom management including total teaching as well as subject teaching in the class. 

(9)    Competencies Related to Working with Parents

                                  It is the ability of a teacher to get the co-operation of parents and their involvement for achieving the objective. It implies the ability to discuss various problems that children with their parents face and suggest some workable solution. 

(10)              Competencies Related to Working with Community and Other Agencies.

                               To improve the standard of education in schools, teacher needs to seek co-operation and support of members of the community as well. Teacher must have the ability to work towards bringing school and the community as close as possible and inter-related. Teacher must be able to understand the role of the community in the development of the school and community at large can contribute to regular and effective functioning of the school and its continuous growth.

                   Thus, the above mentioned competencies are significant and need to be developed among teacher to make them professionally competent. It will help to improve quality of education.

…………………………………………………………………………………………………

 

The professional competencies needed for a good teacher and for his teaching may be classified under the three major competencies namely

 Instructional Competences, Organisation Competences and Evaluative Competences.

Instructional Competences

Conceptual Competence

Context Competence

Transactional Competence

Competences to develop teaching learning materials.

Competences related to use of latest information and

Communication Technologies in Teaching Learning

Process

Organization Competences

Competences related to identifying resource.

Competences related to mobilize resource.

Management Competence

Adjustment Competence

Competence related to organization co- curricular activities.

Competence related to working /dealing with parents.

Competence related to working with community and community members.

Co-ordination Competence

Evaluative Competence

Construct evaluative items. Conduct tests.

Assessment procedures.

Interpretation of results.

Acquired with new trends in evaluation

It is the primary task of any nation that it should give highest importance and highest effort in producing  good teachers. In order to do so, it should provide ample opportunities to the teachers & teacher educators to be well equipped with the professional competences and adopting the professional ethics

 

EDU 403.11 MODULE 2

2.4 E-Twinning

          E-Twinning was created to give schools the opportunity to learn from and with each other. It promotes the awareness of the multilingual and multicultural society.

          The E-Twinning action is an initiative of the European Commission that aims to encourage European schools to collaborate using Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) by providing the necessary infrastructure (online tools, services, support). Therefore, teachers registered in the eTwinning action are enabled to form partnerships and develop collaborative, pedagogical school projects in any subject area. They can develop their project and collaborate with teachers from other European countries.

          The primary workspace for the eTwinning action, is the eTwinning Portal (www.etwinning.net) and it is available in twenty-five languages. Teachers registered in the eTwinning action, also called eTwinners, find each other, communicate, share resources and collaborate through the eTwinning platform.

          eTwinning is a free online community for schools in Europe which allows teachers to find partners and collaborate on projects within a secure network and platform. 

It will:

• enrich learning and motivation of pupils and staff
• access high quality professional development and ready-made resources
• raise standards across the whole school community
• gain recognition for the commitment through eTwinning awards and the International School Award.

Formation: The project was born in 2005 and it has been integrated in the Lifelong Learning Programme since 2007. Its main objectives were to give opportunity for all students to learn and practice ICT skills and to promote awareness of the multicultural European model of society. By June 2012, more than 20 000 projects have been developed between two or more schools across Europe, the total number of registered teachers is close to 170 000 and the number of involved schools is more than 90 000.

          The main concept behind eTwinning is that schools are paired with another school elsewhere in the country and they collaboratively develop a project, also known as eTwinning project. The two schools then communicate using the Internet (for example, by e-mail or video conferencing) to collaborate, share and learn from each other. eTwinning encourages and develops ICT skills. Being 'twinned' with a foreign school also encourages cross-cultural exchanges of knowledge, fosters students' intercultural awareness, and improves their communication skills.

          eTwinning can be defined as a long term partnership where at least two primary or secondary schools from at least two different states or nations use ICT to carry out some form of pedagogically relevant activity together. It can take place at several levels: an exchange between two individual teachers, two teams of teachers or subject departments, two librarians or two head teachers.

          The eTwinning vision foresees educational partnerships where a large number of teachers, school managers and support staff will engage in a multilevel activity. The intention is that the staff of two schools interact for an extended period of time. A wide range of disciplines, curriculum topics or even staff related professional development should be involved.

          eTwinning is a way for schools to work towards the “school of tomorrow”, i.e. a school that evolves with time, is open to the outside world, is ruled by flexible learning processes and is computer literate. For teachers it is a good opportunity to practice more interactive methods of teaching, to compare pedagogical approaches, to get to know other countries’ school systems and to share their resources and ideas.

          eTwinning will be a way to familiarise students and teachers with the efficient and responsible use of ICT for pedagogical purposes.

          eTwinning is an effort to establish human contact beyond frontiers and across cultures. It enhances their capacities for cooperation, understanding and intercultural dialogue, and of course the development of ICT skills.

          eTwinning is synonymous with a relevant use of ICT at school that can help to overcome the challenge of digital literacy. A school partnership offers a multitude of openings for all the school staff interested in international contacts.

For teachers, there are many possible benefits from being involved in eTwinning:

• Motivating their students by doing something innovative, new and exciting
• Teaching and learning from different surroundings about different cultures and thus achieving cultural awareness
• Using ICT facilities to shorten distances and allow students and teachers to reach the farthest end of Europe and explore what otherwise would not be possible
• Learning about the different educational systems in different countries
• Exchanging pedagogical ideas with other teachers and thus enriching their own experiences
• Showcasing educational practices in their schools to parents, school authorities and many others
• Enhancing the knowledge of a particular subject or field by cooperating on a full scale basis in their school with a cross-curricular approach
• Improving their knowledge of foreign languages
• Improving their own teaching methods by comparing and applying different approaches

How will eTwinning contribute to the training of teachers?

          One of the objectives of the eTwinning action is to improve teacher knowledge and skills in the use of ICT and to make it a part of their pedagogical daily life.

          More importantly, they will learn by doing and benefit from sharing the knowledge and skills from the whole Community of participating schools. Language is the first and most important reason for twinning and exchanges. It is a particularly appropriate means of promoting linguistic and cultural diversity.

          eTwinning is basically a teacher-oriented initiative, which aims at stimulating teachers to plan joint projects with other schools for their pupils. Motivated teachers can do excellent things with everyday resources, and ICT resources are already a standard part of school equipment.