Abstract:
The study consisted of the following objectives: 1) to investigate the desirable characteristics of moral teaching monks in schools under Phichit Primary Educational Service Area Office 1; 2) to compare the opinions of administrators and teachers toward the desirable characteristics of moral teaching monks in schools under Phichit Primary Educational Service Area Office 1, classified by personal factors; and 3) to propose the guidelines for developing the desirable characteristics of moral teaching monks in schools under Phichit Primary Educational Service Area Office 1. The study used a mixed-methods research approach, with a group sample of 140 persons used for collecting quantitative data. The research instruments were a questionnaire with a reliability scale of 0.97. The obtained data were analyzed by way of frequency, percentage, mean, standard deviation (S.D.), t-test, and One-way ANOVA. The qualitative approach employed semi-structured interview by collecting data with 9 key informants. The acquired data were analyzed by way of content analysis.
From the study, the following results have been found:
1) The desirable characteristics of moral teaching monks in schools under Phichit Primary Educational Service Area Office 1 are found to be overall at a high level (x̄ = 3.97, S.D. = 0.71). When all aspects are taken into account, it is discovered that the aspect with the highest level of mean is teaching skills (x̄ = 4.39, S.D. = 0.92), followed by personality (x̄ = 3.94, S.D. = 0.79), human relations (x̄ = 3.90, S.D. = 0.10), and the teaching and learning management (x̄ = 3.85, S.D. = 0.83). The aspect with the lowest level of mean is morality (x̄ = 3.75, S.D. = 0.85).
2) The comparison of the opinions of administrators and teachers toward the desirable characteristics of moral teaching monks in schools under Phichit Primary Educational Service Area Office 1 is carried out by classifying the personal factors which are gender, position, educational level, and work experience. The study discovered that administrators and instructors of varied gender, position, educational level, and work experience have different opinions with no statistical significance at the 0.05 level, denying the hypothesis.
3) The guidelines for developing the desirable characteristics of moral teaching monks in schools under Phichit Primary Educational Service Area Office 1 are found as follows: On teaching skills, in which the teaching plan should be prepared in accordance with the curriculum, the promotion of media to convey knowledge on Buddhism in accordance with the curriculum, and the subjects in Dhamma studies; On the teaching and learning management, the teaching should follow the sequence of the curricular framework with correct teaching techniques, and the learning essences must be relevant to the current education; On personality, in which the moral teaching monks should maintain a proper behavior as well as having code of conduct in teaching and social manner, and the robe must be properly worn according to the Dhamma-vinaya in order to instill faith in students and coworkers; On human relations, in which the collaboration between monks and school administrators should be fostered in order to strengthen the network of teaching and learning management; On morality, moral teaching monks should have example characteristics in moral behavior as well as conveying the body of knowledge derived from direct experience.