Teacher Training and Development Project

Bev Rogers Unit 81522
Background and context
The situation in which this project takes place is a secondary school of about 950 students. The school is located in an area of high unemployment and poverty and has been viewed poorly in the community in past years. The current school is the result of an amalgamation of two schools in 1995. Having addressed major organisational issues in past years, the school is well-placed to be considering its process for training and development for teachers, in the longer term.

It has been accepted by the staff, in general, that the students benefit from good methodology. With significant improvements in behaviour management in the school, many teachers seem ready to explore aspects of their teaching, so long as it is done in a way directly relevant to their teaching. It is useful to read this feedback as meaning the practical usefulness of what is done has to be obvious at most points of the program.

The 81522 course: Designing Instruction for Open and Distance Learning has covered areas which are highly relevant to the situation of teacher development in the area of instruction. Many of the principles for design of distance learning apply equally to learning in a classroom. The training and development program for teachers needs not only to enable learning by teachers about what learning is and how to improve teaching, but also needs to cater for very busy professionals for whom after school training and development sessions seem not to be very effective.

The problems with many distance education courses ( Naidu 1994) are similar to the problems with teacher training and development using current processes:

The use of a distance education design may provide the opportunity to create a training and development program which addresses the above, because the solutions are possible within the context. With a clear design and program, resources and support can be built around the program and feedback can be built into it. Such a school program has the advantage of mixing good distance education methodology with face to face interaction.

One of the other key problems for teacher training and development is that there is often very little, if any learner control over the topics and they are most often reflective of department (state) priorities, not local needs. A system which built a program around learner control of area of learning, the ability to pick up new aspects when ready, and a clear instructional design, might provide teachers with a meta-cognitive approach necessary for teachers as alluded to in Landa's Algo-heuristic model. .
 
Overview
This project is based on the idea that training and development for teachers would benefit from the use of instructional design principles, in the development and implementation of the training and development program. It also includes the notion that the program ought to be conceived as operating over a longer time scale (i.e. a number of years) and afford the opportunity for teachers to engage in aspects of the program of relevance at particular times. The program would incorporate the aspects covered by the concept map shown.

The whole program would use the school's intranet as the basic resource with links to the resources of the teacher reference library and a structure for peer support groups within the staff. The program developers would develop various 'lessons' within each part of the concept map with hypertext links to other relevant concepts throughout the program. This also provides a structure on which to build and add other topics - eg key competencies - where do they fit?  The concept map would be modified and sub-maps developed for some sections of it, where this proved useful.

Content and Objectives
The content to be covered would include:

The objectives of the whole unit or program, are to enable teachers to articulate their understanding of learning, and how that informs their teaching. This means that the objectives will have different outcomes for different people with the emphasis on teachers developing a personal understanding of learning and a framework to which they can add other elements eg key competencies. Other objectives include the expansion of learning strategies and teaching strategies so that at the point of decision about what to use, the teacher is more informed.  Therefore the content requires a focus on both procedural and strategic knowledge.  Specific performance objectives are not appropriate in the current teaching culture in general, and would not be conducive to teacher motivation in engaging in the program. However, there are aspects of the program - eg teaching concept mapping, which might lend themselves to teacher self-evaluation of performance. In other aspects, the actual objectives do need to be negotiated in an acceptable form, which make it clear what outcomes are expected from the point of view of the teacher. The evaluation and assessment of the objectives needs to be done in a fashion which encourages involvement.

One of the other key objectives of the unit would be the development of skills amongst the planners and designers in developing training and development programs or sessions for teachers, which do not model the poorest teacher methodology. I believe current practice reinforces poor methodology in that it gives teachers no other experience of how something might be taught. In fact I suspect much T and D assumes that the topic is not being 'taught' but that teachers are being 'informed' of the policy or procedure and already have the skills to relate it to their teaching. Adult learning strategies (for example in Dewar 1996 page 6) are not often employed.

Instructional Strategies
In the article about situated cognition, Brown et al are critical of what they see as the primary concern of schools being the transfer of abstract, decontextualised formal concepts in a way such that the activity and context in which learning occurs as ancilliary to learning. They claim that making use of the social and physical context enables learning to be embedded. This has a bearing on teacher learning, since the same concerns apply. How often do teachers have an opportunity to engage in professional development in the physical setting of a classroom, and have an opportunity to see the applications to this context?

The instructional strategies to be used would involve teachers in practical applications of learning theories and problem solving within the teaching context, using new knowledge about strategies and models of learning. The program would need to incorporate a way of gaining information about 'where people are at' in terms of existing knowledge. A combination of teacher choice of 'in depth activity' within the TD program, and the backup of a resource which enables easy access to 'missing bits' of knowledge might provide for a range of backgrounds. Perhaps a personal checklist might help staff target areas of learning.

The development of  'lessons' using Reigeluth's Elaboration model might provide an opportunity for teachers to see how they could provide for synthesis and integration of information during a topic or course. The focus on the practicality of lesson strategies is crucial in getting teacher 'on board' in making changes to teaching.

The use of technology has its own problems in terms of familiarity of teachers.  However, the department (state) requirements are that teachers are familiar with network software and internet/intranets. In the particular context of the project the staff have been involved in some very positive developments in this area and are keen to explore more. The use of a combination of intranet and face to face would still need to be carefully managed. The choice of media here would be reflecting a need to make the T and D generally available at a time which suits, and not restricted to limited 'sessions' after school.  The intranet can be made available via internet with the domain name of the school site, opening up after school and out of hours use.

Ongoing Development
The experience of the student-free day on March 2nd provides a beginning to the development of an on-line training and development program.
 

References

To be developed as an on-line resource:

Brown et al   Situated Cognition and the Culture of Learning

Dewar T (1996) Adult Learning Online
                          http://www.cybercorp.net/~tammy/lo/oned2.html
Naidu S (1994) Applying learning and instructional strategies in open and distance learning
                         Distance Education Vol 15 No 1 1994 http://www.usq.edu.au/material/unit/resource/naidu/snaidu.htm