Teacher’s professional knowledge and methodics as possible factors of their personal equation in the assessment of pupil’s knowledge

Abstract

A group of 56 mother-tongue and history teachers and, a group of 60 mathematics and chemistry teachers of higher classes of the primary school, took part in an investigation where their professional knowledge and methodics were assessed on a scale from 1 (unsatisfactory) to 5 (excellent) by education specialists and their school heads. The statistical analysis of the subject marks that those teachers had given to, their pupils showed no effects of estimated professional knowledge on the influence of the personal equation in the marks. Estimated teacher’s methodics, however, showed strong effects on their marking strictness and marking leniency. The teachers with higher standards in methodics give generally higher marks, and the teachers with lower standards in methodics give generally lower marks to the pupils. This reinforces the general opinion in practice that the teachers with better teaching methods are more lenient, while those with inadequate teaching methods are more rigorous in their knowledge assessment of their pupils.