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Unit 3: Types of Teacher Education—In-service, Pre-service, Distance

(ii) surveyors, course planners, curriculum developers, course writers, editors, reviewers, course Notes
coordinators, tutors, counsellors, evaluators, and graphic artists;
(iii) audio producers, script writers, evaluators special effects personnel;
(iv) video producers, script writers, special effects personnel, evaluators;
(v) educational technologiest, technical staff of various types, specialists in integrating the
media-inputs; and
(vi) facilitators of various services librarians, laboratory staff etc.
3.3.3 Distance Teacher Qualities of Trainer
By implication, those very skills should be expected from the finished product—the trained distance
educator. A distance teacher trainer should be—
(i) Skilled: The teaching materials (print, audio, video etc.,) in distance education are more visible
to greater numbers of people of various walks and levels of life. They have to be of a very high
standard for the credibility of the system and they have to be socially and pedagogically
relevant for their social and pedagogic utility. Such materials can be produced if the personnel
employed to produce them are skilled people. A very high standard of academic and technical
skills is, therefore, expected of the trainers.
(ii) Co-operative: There are hardly any tasks and roles in the system of distance education which
can be carried out in isolation from other tasks and roles. Most of these tasks and roles,
however, dissimilar they may be and seem to be, are inter-linked and inter-related for purposes
of making the finished product a success.
(iii) Flexible: Rigidity of views and attitudes is a major hurdle in the making of distance education
acceptable and successful. Flexibility on the other hand, not only helps the trainees to adapt
themselves to the new situation and roles, but also in collaborating with others in efficient,
frequent, readjustments of various kinds.
(iv) Patient: Some people believe that it is only at the early stages of the development of distance
education institutions that the workers have to face anxieties, frustrations, delays and failures.
3.3.4 Selection of the Training Programme
Having thus very briefly touched upon the scope of training, we need to list a few basic principles
and specific activities that may be used to differentiate the various training types and the
corresponding activities according to the needs of the specific groups of the personnel.
1. Scaling the Scope of the Programme: First and foremost the trainers or the training institution
must measure the scale and judge the scope of the programme for which training is to be arranged—
the training programme should suit that scale and scope objectives, a training programme of two
days may be enough to enable the personnel involved perform their tasks satisfactorily.
2. Short and Long-Term Advantages of the Programme: The second consideration is the short-time
and long-time advantages of a training programme. It may be that the scale and scope of training
programme impose limited objectives and activities on it.
3. Catering Both Institutional and Individual Needs: Both needs of the individual participants and
those of the institute should be catered to. Though a training programme always aims at achieving
objectives for an institution to reinforce an existing distance education system or modify and
improve such a system, the building blocks of that reinforcement and or changes are the individuals
who come forward for the training.
4. Linking Past Activities/Events with Future: As state above, training should not be 'once-in-a-life-
time affair', it should build links with the training events that have gone before it, and create scope
for other training events that may be linked to it in the future.
5. Providing Model of Acceptable and Desirable Behaviour: To cover the affective domain, training
should modify the behaviour patterns expected of distance educators. This objectives can be achieved
by practicing what is preached about its characteristic features—it should be systematic, well planned,

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