Vietnam - 60% would-be teachers poor at anger management: poll

Virtually 60 percent of pedagogical students do not know how to control their anger, says a research project on students’ soft skills.

The project was conducted by a group led by Dr Huynh Van Son, a psychology lecturer at the Ho Chi Minh City University of Education, on 1,089 pedagogy majors at five local universities.

Fifty-seven percent of those polled said they were unable to control outrage while 56.4 percent admitted they had no idea how to release negative feelings, according to the results released at a conference on soft skills for pedagogy majors last week in Ho Chi Minh City.

Almost 60 percent find presentation the hardest part in teamwork whereas 52.3 percent think their ideas are always right and thus will fight for them at all costs, revealed psychology college lecturer Nguyen Hoang Khac Hieu, a research group member who is with the Ho Chi Minh City University of Education.

Practically half of the respondents confessed they often failed to resolve team conflicts, the researcher said, adding nearly two thirds said they tended to let emotional factors affect their studies and work.

Local students are usually weak in soft skills, which prevents them from working effectively in a corporate environment, delegates said at the conference.

This problem becomes more critical to pedagogical students who will teach future generations, they remarked.

Their observation is absolutely justified as a mere 53.2 percent of the students surveyed showed a proper understanding of the concept ‘soft skill’ although the majority regarded it as “essential.”

Dr. Tran Van Hieu, teaching psychology at Hue University of Education, said pedagogical schools should develop a close link between the teaching of soft skills and that of technical knowledge.

A lecturer at the Ho Chi Minh City University of Education, Dao Thi Duy Duyen suggested making soft skills an optional subject in the curricula of pedagogy majors.

Dr. Hieu worried that there would be no time for it because schools are already grappling with their official schedules.

TUOI TRE

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