CANBERRA, Jan. 15 (Xinhua) -- Australian Education Minister Dan Tehan has called for teachers to be better equipped to control disruptive and abusive students.
Dan Tehan, who has served as the Minister for Education since August 2018, said he has been "staggered" by the abuse being levelled at teachers in the classroom.
"When I asked them ... if they have ever been verbally or physically abused (doing their job), nearly every single one ... put their hand up," he told News Corp Australia on Tuesday.
According to an Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) released in March 2017 Australian classrooms rank 63rd out of 68 countries, with more than 44 percent of students reporting a high level of disorder.
Tehan said that work had to be done on improving classroom management training for prospective teachers.
"The key thing is when you finish your teaching degree that you have the qualities and capabilities to be able to teach," he said.
"What we're not seeing is (graduates) with enough practical experience and knowledge of how they should operate in the classroom.
"It's about making sure that teachers understand the importance of having a clear objective for their lesson, making sure they have got the appropriate classroom management skills and are able to get the required classroom discipline so all students can learn."
Approximately 18,000 people graduate from Australian initial teacher education (ITE) courses every year.
The government in 2014 undertook an overhaul of ITE courses after a report revealed a high degree of variability in the quality of courses on offer.
According to the Department of Education, all 349 ITE programs on offer in Australia have met the stricter teacher accreditation standards that were introduced in 2014.
