Microsoft Word jep-vol. 7 No. 14 2016

2. Materials and Methods 
The study was conducted in Sokoine University of Agriculture, Faculty of Science, and department of education 
in January 2015. From a total of 501 undergraduate student teachers, samples of 216 second year and 135 third 
year students for the 2014/2015 academic year were the subject of the study. The two classes were selected 
because these student teachers were expected to have better experience and exposure to teaching practice 
program from their previous year (hence first year students were ruled out). In order to get better representative 
of the subjects, all student teachers who were willing to take part in this study and had experience with teaching 
practice (i.e. 2
nd
and 3
rd
years) were selected. Self-administered questionnaire were used to collect data given and 
were filled by the student teacher in a classroom setting under close supervision to avoid influence of one’s 

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Journal of Education and Practice
www.iiste.org
 
ISSN 2222-1735 (Paper) ISSN 2222-288X (Online)
 
Vol.7, No.14, 2016 
115 
results by other subject.
3. Ethical Issue 
As to the ethical issue the following ethical and moral concerns were addressed; harms and benefits were 
assessed for the wellbeing of research participants, informed consent were secured (participant understanding of 
what it means to participate in the study were ensured), privacy and confidentiality were kept (participants’ 
identities and the data were protected). 
4. Results and Discussion 
The characteristics of the undergraduate teachers who participated in this study are shown in Table 1. It can be 
observed that nearly one-third of the second year and one-half of the third year student teachers were males. The 
number of students teachers were on average similar between subject combination in both gender except for 
those taking mathematics and informatics.
4.1 Name and Curriculum Contents of Education Degree Program 
In Tanzania the name for the degree programs for secondary education teachers is either BSc/BA with education 
or B.Ed. Table 1 shows the perception of the student teachers on the naming of the BSc education degree 
programs. About 50% of the respondent strongly agreed to the name BSc with education given to their education 
degree program and 76% argued that the name BSc with education is an appropriate name referring the actual 
professional of the individual and also the program prevents secondary schools from loosing teachers. These 
respondents thought that the name is their identification of the profession. On the other hand 15% of the 
respondents argued that the name makes no sense as it gives them no chance to join other jobs and also currently 
the BSc with education degree program is less respected among the society than other non-educational degree 
programs. These, give less professional satisfaction.
Table 1: Characteristics of the students’ teachers by subject combination and gender 
Table 2 also provide summary of the general attitude of the students’ teachers on the current naming of 
BSc with education by teaching subjects (e.g. BSc (Chemistry/Biology). About, 73% agreed on the naming of 
the degree program by teaching subject, however, 27% of the respondents disagreed with the naming mainly 
because it gives no attention to satisfy the needs and interest of the student teachers. It is also pointed out that the 
new naming system mainly emphasize on producing a greater number of teachers than qualified specific subjects 
teachers. Moreover, Table 2 indicates that most of the respondents (37%) see the curriculum content of the 
education degree program emphasis equally on the knowledge of subjects matter, teaching and practical skills 
approaches. It is argued that a teacher can not address the knowledge of subject matter to the students unless an 
appropriate teaching method is used. Also having more knowledge of the subject matter is thought to be the base 
to produce competent technologist. About 20% of the respondents saw that the curriculum content emphasizes 
more on the teaching skills and experience since it is what is needed during their education training program 
while 4% noted to emphasize less on the knowledge of the subject matter than practical skills.

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Journal of Education and Practice
www.iiste.org