Approaches To Cultivating Teacher's Practical Teaching Capability In The University Of Applied Sciences

With its popularization in China, higher education has increasingly become diverse. The classification of universities and their characteristic development have drawn more and more attention. Universities which aim at cultivating applied talents urgently needed in our country will take on fast-growing track which has never occurred in its history.As is well known, compared with cultivation of academic talents, cultivation of applied talents emphasizes practicability, applicability and technical ability. It not only has to create and constantly improve its major course system concentrating on developing students'practical abilities, but also has to develop a practical teaching team grouped by teachers with double professional qualifications. These teachers have both rich theoretical knowledge and high level of professional practical skills, and their practical teaching capability is crucial in guaranteeing the quality of applied talents cultivation. However, in recent years, most of the teachers enrolled by the universities of applied sciences are newly graduated from universities. Although owning solid theoretical background, they lack practical skills and working experience thus cannot meet the needs of applied talents cultivation. Therefore, how to cultivate teachers'practical teaching capability is an issue attracting more and more attention.This paper firstly analyzes successful experience of some foreign universities and the latest research achievements made by Chinese scholars in cultivating teacher's practical teaching capability. Based on a survey through questionnaires collected from thirteen universities of applied sciences in Anhui province, this paper, by using Factor Analysis, makes an empirical study on the factors that affect teacher's practical teaching capability in the university of applied sciences. It concludes that low degree of teachers'acceptance of practical teaching, lacking of authorities to certify teacher's practical teaching capability, no working experience, limitation of finance and human resources, as well as the unsound system of cultivating teachers'practical teaching in universities, are the major factors that hinder the improvement of teachers'practical teaching capability. On the basis of these findings, this paper explores the approaches of cultivating and improving teacher's practical teaching capability so as to better the quality of applied talents cultivation in the universities of applied sciences. The approaches include strengthening teacher's acceptance of practical teaching, taking advantage of university-enterprise cooperation, intensifying on-the-job training, establishing the assessment system of practical teaching capability and so on.