It takes more than just experience for an educator to be successful. Apart from being able to teach well, a successful educator must be able to impact the lives of individual learners through motivation, persuasion, interaction, and influence.
Rapid technology change is a fact of life. Educators may find themselves struggling to keep up with the ever-changing education technology and keep their competitive edge and not lag behind.
As the saying goes, “A good educator is also a good learner”. One must constantly keep up with these changing technology and social contexts by acquiring new knowledge and skillsets to best design teaching and learning.
Here are 5 Ways MAEd Helps Educators Progress in Their Careers:
1. Acquire skills to teach at a higher level
There are different ways of teaching and managing different groups of learners. It is important to create study materials that appeal to learners and adopt the right instructional methods that engage different age groups. The MAEd develops the instructor’s knowledge and inquiry to promote student learning. More importantly, instructors/teachers are better able to assess the quality of their own work and that of colleagues and take steps to improve it when necessary.
For trainers who deliver professional development programmes in an organisational setting, the MAEd programme empowers you with leadership skills and the ability to review and develop curriculum and educational policies, train your trainers, and manage to teach and learning effectively.
2. Go beyond rote learning
The traditional method of rote learning is effective as it helps students learn faster through memorisation and repetition of the same concept. However, this method neglects the importance of developing one’s soft skills such as problem-solving, decision making and critical thinking skills. Therefore, it is important that educators include these soft skills development within the classrooms.
Through MAEd, educators will be able to better understand different perspectives, which allow them to create student-centric lesson plans and materials that provide a context for learning in many areas and lead to a deeper understanding of challenging concepts.
3. Open doors to new roles and opportunities
A master’s degree prepares one to take on higher-level leadership roles and positions within an organisation. In fact, many educators aspire to advance in their careers because they want to create a higher standard of practice and make an impact in the education system. Hence, acquiring an MAEd can help open your doors to more career opportunities.
Earning a master’s degree in education is investing in yourself and your profession. The MAEd also exposes you to more flexible and transferrable skills that can be applied outside the classroom settings. For instance, these skills could be applied in areas such as counselling, corporate training, and coaching at different organisations.
4. Stay relevant in the digital era
Technology has created new ways for students to learn. We see a sharp increase in online courses and webinars. This has also altered how teachers can teach most effectively, and raised issues about teaching and learning challenges.
With this shift, educators will have to adapt to new teaching methods and be able to tackle new issues such as lower participation rates, low attention spans and learners’ motivation. Teachers and trainers must enhance and upskill themselves through further studies to learn how to ride the new waves of instructional technology.
5. Make an impact
As an educator, it is their responsibility to create effective teaching and learning environments that will positively impact learner outcomes. A conducive learning environment that takes care of learners’ overall well-being, such as encouragements and incentives, would motivate learners to work hard and achieve their goals.
A master’s degree in education helps deepen and broaden an educator’s perspectives and equip you with the skills to develop innovative solutions and establish your authority in the field of education.
Master of Arts in Education (offered by the University of Nottingham)
This is a unique modular and flexible programme designed to reflect the needs of individuals or organisational cohorts. While each module has its particular focus, all are concerned with investigating contemporary educational issues in the light of economic and social contexts, appropriate literature and the shared experience of course members.
A hallmark of the programme is the University’s commitment to equality and diversity and the flexibility to meet the needs of individuals and organisations. The overall purpose is to deepen and refine the students’ capacity for critical reflection on their practice as well as on the mental models which inform their work.
If you are interested in finding out more about the Master of Arts in Education, please click here to visit the programme page.