The analysis of Principle’s, Supervisior’s and Teacher’s perception of the term “Teacher”

Abstract

Teachers are among the fundamental elements of education. The teacher has significant roles both within the society and the school. The place and importance of the teacher, particularly in the success of the students, cannot be denied. In this context, teaching as a career is a distinctive profession that requires professionalism. The profession of teaching requires expertise, as well as the support of both principals and primary education supervisors from time to time. For this reason, collaboration and cooperation among the teacher, the principal and the supervisor is inevitable for the success of the teacher, and consequently, the success of education. In order to maintain this collaboration and cooperation, it is necessary that principals, teachers and primary education supervisors act being aware of the expectations and needs of the others. The success of teachers and consequently the accomplishment of students can be maintained through utilizing the perceptions of principals and supervisors towards teachers. The aim of the present study is to determine the perceptions of primary school supervisors, primary school principals and teachers towards the teacher through the use of metaphors and discover the roles expected of the teachers. The study is a descriptive research study intended to determine and analyze the present situation. In the study, a qualitative research method was used to collect, analyze and interpret the research data. The sample group of the study consisted of 51 educational supervisors on duty in the province of Konya, 73 primary school administrators (65 headmasters and 8 deputy headmasters) and 154 teachers employed in the three central districts located within the borders of the metropolitan municipality in the academic year of 2008-2009. The research data was collected by requesting the participants to complete the sentence “A teacher is like ......, because.......” in written form. The collected data was analysed through content analysis. The metaphors produced by the participants were divided into 13 themes as; incompetent, devoted, hardworking, enlightening, shaper, leader, inefficient, cheap labour, monotonous, inconsistent, lazy, aggressive and crushed, by also taking the explanations into consideration. The results of the analyses showed that educational supervisors, principals and teachers perceived the teachers as individuals showing (1) positive (devoted, hardworking, enlightening, shaper and leader) and (2) negative (incompetent, inefficient, cheap labour, monotonous, inconsistent, lazy, aggressive and crushed) attitudes. When these two findings are interpreted together, it can be seen that supervisors, principals and teachers perceive teachers both as enlightening and shaping leaders who work devotedly without expecting any return in spite of all sorts of difficulties, and also as incompetent, inefficient and lazy individuals. The findings reveal the view that, besides the positive roles expected of the teachers, there are also teachers who cannot adequately meet these expectations. Furthermore, it can be stated that in order to perform the roles expected of them, teachers need to be authorized in accordance with their responsibilities, to have a better economic status and to be respected within the society. Suggestions: (1) School-based research studies should be conducted in order to determine the points that prevent the authorization of teachers in accordance with their responsibilities, (2) It should be maintained that primary education supervisors and school principals endeavour to understand the teachers and provide the required support in education and teaching activities (3) Senior managements, particularly principals, should create democratic environments in order to maintain the participation of teachers in the administration of schools and take the requests and suggestions of teachers into consideration.