Published Paper Details:

The Open University assesses pupil-teachers in two phases- 1). Theory and 2). Practical activities. Further Practical activities categories- (i) Practical/Application-oriented assignment; (ii) School-based Practical work; (iii) Workshop-based practical work, and (iv) Practice Teaching: To improve skills in teaching, the B.Ed. trainees are required to undertake pre planned teaching under the supervision of teacher educators engaged by the study center concern with the universities. Every trainee presents 40 model lessons (20 in each of the two teaching subjects). Indira Gandhi National Open University (IGNOU) B.Ed. curriculum has emphasized on above different kinds of supervised activities at distance trainees level. It incorporates school and field based practicals under the supervision of mentors. The programme centre based activities take place through the supervision of counselors. Peer interaction also play a major role in performing various kinds of competency development exercises. Such curricular norms IGNOU are followed by other state Open Universities like Uttar Pradesh Rajarshee Tandon Open University (UPRTOU) adopting course wares of the IGNOU. It is clear from the analysis that according more than average trainees they prepared practice lesson plans according to norm of B.Ed. course. The perusal of Table: 1 reveals that 73 to 77 percent IGNOU trainees prepared 16 to 20 lesson plans in each subject, where 59 to 63 percent trainees of UPRTOU were abided by such norm. Such fact reveals that while around 40 percent UPRTOU trainees did not meet teaching lesson plans requirement, around 23 percent IGNOU students remained untouched by such norm. The lesson plans were mostly supervised by the mentors (88%). According Table: 3, such dcentralised practice is more prominent in the case of IGNOU than that UPRTOU. Table: 11 revealed that 82 percent found it more relevant to their school teaching practices and 83 percent stated it empowering them in their subject teaching. Table: 13.B revealed that a large majority of trainees (72 to 84 percent) perceived practice teaching training most effective in making them competent in many respects competencies.