The essence of staff development for enhancing teachers efficacy in Moses Kotane East area project office

Abstract

The study was about the essence of staff development for enhancing teachers' efficacy in Moses Kotane East Area Project Office. The study sought to answer the following research questions: What is the significance of staff development in schools? Which major factors necessitate staff development in schools? What are the characteristics of an effective staff development initiative? The researcher opted for both qualitative and quantitative research methods. Both the questionnaires and interviews were administered for data collection. The study was conducted on a sample of respondents randomly selected from the population. Data were collected and analysed using different statistical techniques. ln order to conform to requirements in social sciences research analysis, SPSS version 14 was used for data analysis. Frequencies, percentages and tables were used to capture raw scores and to depict response rates, as well as to facilitate data analysis, interpretation, and recording. To assist the researcher to analyse qualitatively derived data, Textually Oriented Data Analysis (TODA) strategy was used . The findings revealed that staff development was essential, not only for institutional and curriculum development in the school, but also for personal staff growth and empowerment. Staff development is necessary for the acquisition of required skills for effective teaching. Schools should have a staff development teacher who focuses on helping teachers develop skilful teaching in a non-judgmental way. The findings further revealed that coaches for Maths and Literacy need to be introduced in schools to assist teachers with lesson plans and model lessons and that continuous training of teachers is necessary and should be done by experts and not by every person who claims to understand what effective teaching is all about. Finally, Networking with other schools and organizations should be encouraged to ensure inter-sectoral collaboration amongst specialists who have an interest in education. Mentoring programmes that orient new employees, foster executive development and improved job performance should be encouraged in schools.