A STUDY OF ATTITUDE TOWARDS TEACHING PROFESSION OF PROSPECTIVE TEACHERS

CASIRJ Volume 4 Issue 3 ISSN 2319 – 9202
International Research Journal of Commerce Arts and Science
http:www.casirj.com Page 601
A STUDY OF ATTITUDE TOWARDS TEACHING PROFESSION OF
PROSPECTIVE TEACHERS
BY DR. AMITA MAHESHWARI
Abstract
The present investigation is an exploratory one which aims at studying the attitude towards
teaching profession of prospective teachers. The study was conducted in Rohilkhand region and
covered 400 B.Ed. prospective teachers (200 each from govt and self-financing colleges). When
attitude towards teaching profession of prospective teachers was considered as the dependent
variable; the variables like gender, academic background and economic status were considered
as independent variable. The mean tool used was Teacher Attitude Inventory (TAI) developed by
S.P.Ahluwalia (2006). Result revealed that prospective teachers of self-financing colleges i.e.
female, science, middle economic status, high economic status or total were showing favourable
attitude towards teaching profession than govt colleges. On the other hand, male, arts, commerce
or low economic status prospective teachers of govt colleges and self-financing colleges, no
significant variation was yielded between them.
Introduction
An attitude is an important concept to understand human behaviour. Attitude is positive or
negative feelings that an individual holds about objects, persons or ideas. Generally it is defined
as a complex mental state involving beliefs and feelings. According to Allport(1954), attitude is
“A mental and neutral state of readiness, organized through experience, exerting a
directive or dynamic influence upon the individual’s response to all objects and situations
with which it is related.”This definition focuses attention upon attitude as a generalized pattern

in perception or action as integration of various experiences. Attitudes are formed through
experience which means they are learned. Although attitude of people tend to be relatively
stable, they can be modified to some degree.
Attitude towards one’s profession is important both by way of professionals pride as well as
determining the level of commitment towards the profession. One’s attitude towards his/her
professions has an impact on his performance. The same is true for teaching profession also.
Teaching profession is one of the profession interactions with the largest number of individuals.
Teachers, particularly secondary teachers are responsible for nurturing younger minds and
enabling them to realize their fullest potential. Attitude towards his profession have an effect not
only on their students, but also his performance. A positive attitude would help create a
favourable and enriching atmosphere for both the teacher and students. A negative attitude would
render the task of teaching and consequently learning on the part of students, both unpleasant and
tedious. Attitude of would be teachers towards teaching profession is developed during their
training period. The prospective teachers must receive first of all a good training in the basic
skills of his occupation;otherwise he will have to improvise everything that has been collected by
the experience of generations and by scientific investigation. A substantial body of research has
shown personal perceptions and beliefs to play a significant role in a carrer
development(Bandura, 1997). These days there are two types of institutions offering B.Ed.
training-Govt.institutions and Self-financing institutions. These training institutions denote a real
and holistic perception of prospective teacher for that task they are required to perform and to
continuously upgrade their professional skills. Therefore, the researcher wants to study is there
any difference in attitude towards teaching profession between B.Ed. prospective teachers of
Govt.institutions and Self-financing institutions?
Review of Literature
Some studies in relation to attitude towards teaching profession are discussed as follows-
A study in 1971, NCERT reported that attitude of teachers differed under different management
and on the basis of their sex. Futher, Goyal (1981), Srinivason (1992) and Singh (1987) found
that sex did not differ significantly in their attitude. While Mohanty (1990) contradicted it. He
reported that 74% of the male and 86% of the female pupil teacher were interested in the field of
education. A high percentage of both male and female i.e. 90% and 62% respectively, has

decided on teaching. Similarly, Magar (1992) found that male trainees had shown better attitude
towards teaching profession than female trainees. Contrast findings were found by Dodeen and
his Colleogues (2003) and Duatepe and Cikla (2004) in which female teachers having more
positive attitude towards the teaching profession than the male teachers. Further, Tapodhan
(1991) revealed that sex had main effect on professional attitudes.
Rao (1986) found that in total and upper-lower socio-economic status groups the male
prospective teachers had a significantly favourable attitude towards teaching profession. Further,
White and Burke (1992) indicate,preservice teachers have strong favourable feeling towards their
profession. They perceive teaching both as a science and arts.
Saxena (1995) and Magar (1992) found that private colleges have better attitude towards the
teaching profession than govt colleges. Further, Wong and Wong (2004) reported that student
teachers had generally positive perceptions of teaching and held certain expectations of teaching
as a job. Further, Zayapragassarazan and Pughazhendi(2007) observed that there was an overall
favourable perception among the student teachers of the different education colleges of
Pandicherry and Karaikal region. There was no significant difference between male and female,
language and science group, arts and science group, arts and language B.Ed. student-teachers
perception of teaching practice programme.
In view of the above contradictionsin this area, the present investigation was conducted to
investigate the attitude towards teaching profession of B.Ed. prospective teachers of govt.
colleges and self-financing colleges on controlling their gender/academic background/economic
status or margining them altogether.
Objective
To know the attitudetowards teaching profession of B.Ed.prospective teachersof govt and self-
financing colleges on controlling their gender/academic background/economic status or total.
Hypothesis
No meaningful variation exists in the attitude of B.Ed. prospective teachers of govt. colleges and
self-financing colleges towards teaching profession on controlling gender/academic
background/economic status or merging them altogether.

Design of the study
Survey method was used in the present study, to examine the attitude towards teaching
profession of B.Ed. prospective teachers in relation to their gender, academic background and
economic status. When attitude towards teaching profession of prospective teachers was
considered as the dependent variable, the variable like gender, academic background and
economic status were considered as independent variable.
Population
The entire population here refers to the B.Ed. prospective teachers studying in government and
self-financing institutions of Rohilkhand region. The Rohilkhand region comprises of 8 district
namely- Rampur, Pilibhit, Jyotibaphulenagar, Shajahanpur, Bijnor, Budaun, Moradabad and
Bareilly.
Sample
Considering the objectives and hypothesis the ‘multistage random’ sampling technique was
found to be most suitable for this study. Out of 8 districts, only 3 districts i.e. Bareilly, Badaun
and Moradabad were selected randomly. Four hundred B.Ed. prospective teachers (200 each
from govt and self-financing colleges) from 3 govt colleges and 5 self-financing colleges
constitute the sample of the study. This sample was further divided into the following
subsamples. In case of govt colleges, 100 male, 100 female, prospective teachers, 77 arts, 70
science, 53 commerce prospective teachers, 40 low economic status (below Rs5000), 105 middle
economic status (5000-10000) and 55 high economic status (above Rs 10000) prospective
teachers were taken. While in case of self-financing 100 male, 100 female prospective teachers,
70 arts, 70 science, 60 commerce background prospective teachers, 56 low economic status, 84
middle economic status and 60 high economic status prospective teachers were studied.
Tools
Teacher Attitude Inventory (TAI)-The scale developed and standardized by S.P.Ahluwalia
(2006) was used in this study. This is a Likert type scale consisting of 90 items. The reliability of
the scale was determined by split-half (odd-even) method and found to be 0.79 (corrected to
0.88) for a sample of 239 prospective teachers. The test-retest reliability coefficients after the
interval of 3 months and 9 months were found to be 0.59(N=102) and 0.64 (N=290). The validity
of the scale was both content and concurrent validity.

Procedure
The teacher attitude inventories were personally administered on 400 B.Ed. prospective teachers.
The scale were scored and tabulated systematically for statistical calculation.
Statistical Treatment
To analyse the collected data, various statistical techniques used such as Mean, SD and ‘t’ value.
Results and Discussions
The details of the calculations are given in table below-
Categorise of
B.Ed.
Prospective
teachers
Govt. College Self-financing College ‘t’ Value
N Mean SD N Mean SD
Male 100 239.80 37.20 100 243.80 32.78 0.81
Female 100 228.10 41.56 100 255.70 30.11 5.38**
Arts 77 243.10 46.71 70 247.80 30.61 0.73
Science 70 217.20 31.57 70 248.60 36.75 5.42**
Commerce 53 242.80 31.05 60 253.40 27.37 1.91
LES 40 252.20 38.98 56 248.20 32.94 0.53
MES 105 223.90 40.51 84 244.50 35.43 3.72**
HES 55 239.80 33.12 60 258.50 23.39 3.47**
Total 233.90 39.78 249.80 31.95 4.40**

**Significant at 0.01 level
When prospective teachers of govt colleges were compared with that of self-financing colleges,
on controlling gender (male/female), female prospective teachers of self-financing colleges had
shown higher attitude. Hence, the null hypothesis concerned is rejected. On the contrary, male
prospective teachers both govt and self-financing colleges were found to have almost similar
attitudes. Therefore the null hypothesis concerned are retained. Further, when the results were
examined on the basis of academic background (arts/science/commerce), science prospective
teachers of the self-financing colleges were found to score higher than there govt colleges
counterparts. Hence the null hypothesis concerned is rejected. On the contrary, arts and
commerce prospective teachers of govt colleges and self-financing colleges, no significant
variation was yielded between them. Here the null hypothesis is accepted. Where as, on
controlling economic status (low/middle/high) consistent findings have been reported by low
economic status prospective teachers of govt and self-financing colleges. On the contrary, middle
and high economic status prospective teachers of self-financing colleges had exhibited better
attitude towards than their respective counterparts. Therefore, null hypothesis is rejected.
Further, total (without controlling any variable) prospective teachers of self-financing colleges
were showing favourable attitude towards teaching profession than their govt colleges
prospective teachers. Hence, the null hypothesis concerned is rejected. Magar (1992) also
reported that self-financing colleges prospective teachers had better attitude than govt colleges.
Perhaps the reason may be that in self-financing institutions or the schools where they go for
practice teaching are for better than the govt institutions. There facilities might be enhancing
their attitude towards teaching profession.
Conclusion
In the present investigation, prospective teachers of self-financing colleges i.e. female, science,
middle economic status, high economic status or total were showing better attitude towards
teaching profession than govt colleges. On the other hand, male, arts, commerce or low
economic status prospective teachers of both colleges do not differ significantly with respect to
their attitude.

Educational Implications
1. The attitude of a candidate for into the teaching profession should be examined carefully
before selecting them for teacher-training. He who wants to enter in this profession
because of his interest in this profession, who wants to serve the society and to live
peaceful, the candidate who is honest, simple and moral in his character as well as in his
deeds, should be regarded as a suitable person to perform this job.
2. At the time of selecting candidates for teacher-training due to the lack of comprehensive,
standard and reliable tools, it is possible that a number of candidates may get admission
in the training institutions, who later prove to be unsuitable for the teaching profession, or
who do not have desirable characteristics. Thus, it is the responsibility of teacher
educators and curriculum constructors to being about a change in such trainee’s
characteristics and feelings towards teaching profession.
3. The results of the present study show that prospective teachers of self-financing colleges
possess better attitude towards teaching professing than govt colleges. This may be
because of teaching in self-financing college in more challengingwith innovative methods
being adopted every now and then and also better facilities, conducive for teaching are
provided in such institutions. The need of the hour is to recognise the lacunas in the
educational practice and management being carried out in govt college and try to emulate
those being followed in the private institutions.
4. For the sake of quality of teacher education, infrastructure facilities, library, sports and
teaching practice school, adequate staff members must be provided to different B.Ed.
colleges. The teacher educators of teacher education institutions should be oriented on
different topics and innovations in education, for improvement of quality of teacher
education in general and improvement of performance of student-teachers in particular.
In this context, findings of the present study may be helpful to counsellors, teachers,
managements, research scholars, students, parents, curricular planners and members of
guidance bureau.

References
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Persons with Disabilities: Predictions for the success of the Inclusion. College Student
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4. Duatepe,A.&Cikla,O.A.(2004) : The attitude towards Teaching Profession of In-service
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13. Tapodhan, H.N. (1991) : A Study of Professional Attitudes of Secondary School Teachers
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teachers towards Teaching Practice Programme. Educational Tracks , Vol-6, No-6.

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