Name of Reporter : PAMESA, JHONALYN S.

Course : Master of Arts in Education

Major in Administration and Supervision
Subject : ED 208- Modern Trends and Issues
Topic : Building Capacities of Educators and Trainers
Professor : Marvin Maigue, Ed.D.
Date of Report : January 21, 2024

Introduction

❖ Some educators attribute current unsustainable practices and lifestyles to a specific

deficiency in education systems worldwide – a lack of focus on helping learners to think
critically about their own lifestyles (UNESCO, 2014). To help address this situation, the
Global Action Programme (GAP) on Education for Sustainable Development (ESD) calls for
education to be reoriented towards providing opportunities for all learners to acquire the
knowledge, skills, values and attitudes needed to contribute to sustainable development.
❖ To achieve this objective and, thus, transform education systems it is essential to build the
capacities of teachers. GAP, therefore, made building the capacities of educators and trainers
one of its five priority areas (UNESCO, 2014).
❖ Focused professional development opportunities are an essential means to empower
educators to teach ESD.
❖ Effective educational transformation depends on motivating teachers to bring about change
not only in their instructional practices, but also in their surrounding school and community
environments.
❖ Through targeted development approaches, educators explore popular education theory
perspectives (Freire, 1970) that encourage learners to examine their lives critically and take
action to change social conditions

Essential characteristics are subdivided into four groups to reflect the wide range of
learning experiences:
Learning to know: understanding the challenges facing local and global societies and the potential
role of educators and learners.
⮚ Learning to do: developing practical skills and competencies for action in relation to ESD.

⮚ Learning to live together: contributing to the development of partnerships and acquiring an

appreciation of interdependence, pluralism, mutual understanding, and peace.
⮚ Learning to be: developing personal attributes and the ability to act with greater autonomy,
judgement and personal responsibility in relation to sustainable development. (Delors, 1996)
 Learning Theory and Trends in Teaching
⮚ A number of psychological and cognitive learning theories have contributed to the way in which
teachers approach the task of educating. For example, the behaviorist school of thought (Watson,
1913), tends to view the process of learning as one based on the individual’s response to their
physical environment – essentially a form of conditioned behavior grounded in a system of
rewards and targeted learning goals.

⮚ Cognitive theorists, on the other hand (Piaget, 1936), prefer to focus on the ways that humans
process information and advocate the idea that these processes affect our behavior and knowledge
of the world around us, not vice-versa. The most popular approach – that of the constructivists
(Bruner, 1986; Vygotsky, 1978) – suggests that the ability of individuals to learn relies heavily on
pre-existing knowledge and understanding, and the ways in which humans build on that
knowledge

RELEVANT CONCEPTS AND THEORIES IN TEACHER EDUCATION LITERATURE

 Initial teacher training/education: a pre-service training programme undertaken before

teachers enter the classroom, usually provided by a university or teaching/educating
facility.

⮚ Induction programmes: a supervised ‘apprenticeship’ learning opportunity designed to support

novice teachers while teaching, usually during the first year in the classroom, normally organized
by individual schools or as part of a university training programme.

⮚ Teacher professional development or continuing professional development: in-service courses

and training activities for practicing teachers offered by a variety actor including private
companies/institutions, colleges and universities or Ministries of Education

⮚ The learning theory most relevant to ESD is transformative learning theory (Clark, 1993), which
focuses on transforming individual perspectives through three dimensions:
(i) psychological – how individuals change their understanding of themselves.
(ii) convictional – how they revise their belief systems, and
(iii) behavioral – how they change the way they respond to their physical environment. The
behavioral dimension is relevant to ESD because it provides insights into how to reshape the
relationship between humans and their environment

Proponents of Transformative Learning Theory

⮚ According to Freire, teachers are required to foster and develop a critical consciousness
about what, why and how they teach their students.
⮚ Conscientization is, thus, not limited to the teacher but is also incorporated into the
methods they use to teach their students, and the skills they foster and develop among
them.
⮚ These include the ability to critically analyze information, pose questions that challenge
the status quo, and take action on political, cultural and economic issues that shape and
affect their lives.
⮚ Transforming individual convictions requires a process that Jack Mezirow (1991) labels
‘perspective transformation’. The action of deriving meaning and knowledge of the world
based on personal experiences undergoes a process of reflection, critical reflection, and
critical self-reflection.
⮚ Personal convictions/ perspectives normally consist of a set of beliefs, values and
assumptions experienced through day-to-day reality. They help people to organize and
make sense of the world around them but can also distort or limit what they are able to
perceive and understand.

TRANSFORMING TEACHER EDUCATION TO PROMOTE SUSTAINABLE

FUTURES

Four basic aims of ESD (USTESD, 2013):

1. Improve access to and retention in quality basic education.

2. Reorient educational priorities to apply ESD goals and objectives (3Ps);

3. Improve public understanding and awareness of sustainability

4. Provide training to different sectors within the learning community (USTESD, 2013: 7).

Ten principles for effective teacher preparation that have the capacity to address these
complex values and ideals: Issues and trends in Education for Sustainable Development

1. Student learning is the focus.

2. Clinical preparation is integrated throughout every facet of teacher education in a dynamic

way.

3. A candidate’s progress and the elements of a preparation programme are continuously

judged on the basis of data.

4. Programmes prepare teachers who are expert in content and how to teach it, and are also
innovators, collaborators, and problem solvers.

5. Candidates learn in an interactive professional community.

6. Clinical educators and coaches are rigorously selected and prepared and drawn from both
higher education and the P-12 sector.

7. Specific sites are designated and funded to support embedded clinical preparation.
8. Technology applications foster high impact preparation.

9. A powerful research and development agenda and systematic gathering and use of data
supports continuous improvement in teacher preparation; and

10. Strategic partnerships are imperative for powerful clinical preparation (NCATE, 2010: 5-
6).