Abstract: Against the backdrop of the continuous improvement of the modern vocational education system with Chinese characteristics, vocational undergraduate course teachers bear multiple responsibilities such as knowledge transmission, practical guidance, and industry integration. The traditional competency model is no longer able to fully characterize its complex quality structure, and there is an urgent need for theoretical updates and structural reconstruction. This article is based on the iceberg model and combines the characteristics of vocational undergraduate teacher positions to construct a three-layer nested competence structure model, including explicit areas (teaching skills and curriculum implementation), latent areas (educational philosophy and professional identity), and foundational areas (motivation driven and personality traits). The model systematically reveals the evolutionary logic of teacher competence from the outside in and layer by layer. The study has clarified the relationship between various abilities and their driving mechanisms for teaching behavior, providing a clear and logically rigorous theoretical framework for the competence enhancement of vocational undergraduate teachers.

Key words: Iceberg model, Vocational undergraduate program, Teacher, Competency structure, Terminology reconstruction, Teacher quality