Successful Teacher: Personality and Other Correlates

Book excerpt: The question of what makes a good teacher has been asked by practitioners, policymakers, and researchers. Teachers are important drivers of student success in the immediate term, such as academic success. Nowadays, the education process is influenced by various factors which can all have a strong effect on the quality of teaching and learning. Having the intention to create high-quality teaching and learning, it is very important to clearly determine what those factors are, and what kind of effect they have on the education process. Different teacher characteristics and competencies have been distinguished in the literature as being relevant predictors of their instructional quality. Even though educational psychology has emphasized the significance of the personality role in the education process, the empirical evidence on the relationship between teacher characteristics and instructional quality is not yet conclusive. Certainly, there is much more to find out.