The education of becoming a science teacher begins with the bachelor’s degree in this stream. The teacher education course structure along with a science major or minor is selected by the interested candidates.
The education classes are conceived and designed in a fashion, which keeps the students abreast with the contemporary preparation techniques and methods to teach physical science, general science and biology to high school and middle school students. The general course format incorporates the techniques to fabricate classroom research, utilizing technology within the class premises and developing human relation skills.
U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics approximates that the growth of employment opportunities in teaching field will shoot up by 13% during the decade 2008-2018 (www.bl.gov). The location of the teachers and the subjects taught by them will certainly play a major role in determining the boom in employment opportunities. The chances of science teachers obtaining a better job profile are almost guaranteed, as there is a lack of competent personnel in this area.
The aspirants who want to become science teachers must have the zeal within them to share the knowledge they have gathered to the youth and children. It is also mandatory that he/she hail from a science background. There are few methods of science education of teachers along with certain licensing work, which can be understood as the text proceeds.
The completion of Bachelor’s Degree and a teacher education program is necessary to be eligible to teach at any school, public or private. The bachelor degree programs permit you to major in any particular branch of science along with additional training courses that are explicitly designed for training in teaching. Courses on methodology of teaching and educational philosophy could be taken up by the students along with the major in science if they want to have an edge over others in this competitive world. The study program also includes providing the feel of actual classrooms to the budding teachers of tomorrow by giving them the opportunity to teach the students in supervised classrooms.
The teaching of science subjects is not bounded until the school level only, it continues until graduate and postgraduate levels. Those science teachers enlightening college students with their knowledge of science are called professors. The completion of a Ph.D. or Doctor of Philosophy in an aspirant’s area of specialization is necessary for becoming a professor in a reputed university or institute. The whole duration of the doctoral program is segregated into various phases. One of the most important phases is the teaching phase where almost every university expects their new professor recruit to have spent at least a year as a teaching apprentice during his doctorate course. Normally it takes around 6-7 years to complete the doctorate course in your area of expertise, like physics, organic chemistry, zoology, which includes the detailed research of the subject along with the submission of the final dissertation, which acts as the witness of your hard work.
As mentioned earlier maximum number of institutes offers the job to the candidates who have completed their Ph.D. but there are few colleges which provide jobs if the applicant has a master’s degree along with some handy experience in teaching. The duration to complete the masters’ degree varies from person to person, in general being 2-3 years.
If you aim to be a teacher in a public school, all the states necessitates the presence of a license with you. The license offered to the teachers can be of various types. The type of license is determined by the educational qualification of the candidate, the experience he has and the level he wishes to teach. The license is verified by the board of education of the state and the requirements for each state differ. The candidates do not need a license to be teaching at a private school though. The universities and the colleges too do not demand a license from their recruits.
If someone goes through an internal churning and feels that he needs to change his stream and become a science teacher, it is not the end of road for him/her. There are entirely different training methods adopted to train students from non-science major streams to turn into a science teacher. Most of these programs train the students by allowing them to teach in a classroom under supervision of senior and experienced men in the field. The completion of the certificate course and the premier experience as a teacher goes side by side.