There are many subjects offered in Zambian colleges and universities of education and some of these subjects are psychology, theory and practice, history and philosophy, sociology and many others. All the mentioned subjects above are very important to a teacher for effective teaching and learning in the teaching fraternity. For a teacher to teach effectively there is a need for that teacher to have studied the important subjects mentioned above. However this academic paper is meant to discuss the importance of sociology to a teacher in the teaching professional. Sociology is a subject which was coined by a French sociologist called Augustint Comte in 1837. The very term sociology is made up of two words and these words are socio and logy. Socio is a Latin word which means society while the term logy is a Greek word which means science. Therefore the term sociology according to Collins (2004: 854) “ is the study of society and how it is organized”. Sociology is a social science which studies the social relationships between people as individuals and as groups in the society.
In other words sociology is the scientific study of behavior in groups having the purpose of discovering regularities and order. Sociology is important to the teacher Holt (1995: 7), “ because it contributes to the knowledge and understanding of various differences in human interaction which could be used in decision making.” It is sociology which enables the teacher to develop un understanding of individual differences to detect what has gone wrong to a pupil or pupils or other groups of adults persons which may affect the performance of a pupil or pupils in a classroom or school set up. Due to those challenges, the performance of a pupil may go down. For instance a pupil who has been doing very well in class start to perform badly, sociology in this case will help the teacher to find out reasons as to why the performance of that particular pupil is going down and once the problem is discovered, the teacher will advise that very pupil or pupils of whose performance is going down so that the effort may be regained. Without the application of sociology in this way, there would be no effort of discovering a problem and the performance of pupils would just continue going down.
Another importance of sociology to a teacher according to Ferrante (2011: 7) is that, “ it offers the framework to help him or her understand how social forces come to be and how they affect sense of self, our relationships”. The teacher will use various kinds of teaching strategies suitable for the learners. Having known his or her pupils very well due to the good teacher-pupil relationship, the teacher will develop some various teaching methods suitable for teaching learners. It is sociology that would help the teacher coming up with different teaching strategies suitable for the learners. In the very connection, sociology will also help the teacher use suitable teaching materials for teaching learners according to their level ability of learning as well as understanding. Sociology will help the teacher prepare suitable teaching materials which are accurate for teaching learners. It is sociology that develops the teacher-pupil relationship, because of sociology the teacher will know what to jock with pupils and those that are not supposed to be spoken as jocks by the teacher.
James (1995: 5) “ through socialization, the teacher will know what the pupil like to learn and the rates at which pupils are capable of grasping the concepts.” It is sociology that will help the teacher tell his or her pupils what that teacher condones the pupils to be doing in class and those things which the teacher do not Condon in the classroom for example if the teacher do not Condon noise in class pupils will know that. If the teacher-pupil relationship is very good, pupils will feel secured and they learn very well because they will have no fear for that teacher where they will even start to participate as lessons progress. In a situation where the teacher-pupil teacher relationship is very good, pupils begin to like the subject which that teacher teaches them. The other importance of sociology to the teacher Routledge (1975: 6) is that, “ it helps the teacher know the individual differences among pupils.” There are many challenges of which pupils face in different Zambia schools. The teacher will use sociometric which is under sociology to study the individual differences among pupils.
In studying the differences among learners, the teacher will first wish to know the background of the pupils he or she is dealing with. Having known the pupils background the teacher would now advise the pupils on matters patterning their challenges. The other importance of sociology to the teacher Stephen (2001: 2) is that “ it will help him have an understanding on how people behave”. In short it helps the teacher to be more tolerant and compassionate. Sociology will help the teacher understand the reasons as to why pupils behave in the manna they behave and in this way the teacher will not punish learners instead advise the way they should be behaving. For example pupils who are brought up by the single parent behave differently from those who are brought up with double parents. In most cases those brought up by single parents especially women parents may isolate themselves from their friends because their friends would have things of which their single parents are unable to provide them with. Sociology will be able to help the teacher provide the counseling to such pupils. Sociology also helps the teacher William (2008: 3) “ to relate well with his or her fellow teachers and participate in social life and step back and analyze the broader meaning of what is going on.”
This subject makes the teacher-teacher relationship good. This very sociology helps the teacher to behave in an extra ordinary way or in a unique way. In the same connection, sociology equips the teacher with respect towards each other as well as to the people in authority. The teacher will know what to jock to his or her fellows. The teacher will bear in mind that, if he or she jock in the other way then the colleagues would be offended. In short teachers will know individual differences among them. Sociology helps the teacher suit in the society. The subject matter deals with sharpening or making the teacher suit in a society.
The teacher is able to copy up the well being of the people in any society regardless of that society setup. This happens so because of sociology of which teachers learn in various higher institutions of learning like colleges and universities of education. The teacher is able to adjust him or herself in the society having a reason of suiting into that given society. The other important of sociology to the teacher is that it increases the awareness of people with complex process involved in social intercourse such that it allows them to deal with situations more effectively realistically. Finally sociology helps teachers in many ways of which some of them are discussed above. Without this subject, there would be chaos in schools because teachers will have no understanding on how pupils learn and behave.
REFERENCES
Routledge (1975) Beyond Sociology of Development. London: Rout ledge and Kegan.
Stephen. M (2001) Discipline Sociology. United Kingdom: Nelson Thornes Publishers.
William. K (2008) Sociology in a Changing World. United State: Wadsworth.
James. M (1995) Sociology a Down to Earth Approach. United state: A Simon & Schuster Publishers.
Ferrante (2011) Seeing Sociology as an Introduction. Lengage Learning: Wads worth.
Holt (1995) The Study of Human Relationship. Fifth Edition. New York: Harcourt brace
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