Helping Teachers Develop

Sara Bubb

• Publisher: SAGE Publications Ltd
• Year: 2005
• Print ISBN:
  9781412918992
  9781412918985
• eBook ISBN:
  9781446229552
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Education
• Subtopic: Education General

?Helping Teachers Develop is a positive, uplifting, encouraging publication... very good value for money. It is the sort of publication we need in the profession and it is well worth being part of every head teacher or staff development tutor?s collection of really useful books. I have to confess, even before I had finished reading it for review I was using Helping Teachers Develop with my trainee teachers? - Peter Stammers, in the Journal of In-service Education

`The book explores ways teachers at all levels can mentor others and improve their careers. [It] also contains guidance on ways to cope with having your lessons observed and how to make constructive comments as an observer? - Michael Shaw, Times Educational Supplement

`This is another excellent and accessible practice guide from someone who, unusually, understands both the classroom teacher from long years of practice and the theory. The chapter on "observation of teachers" should be read by every headteacher, deputy and teacher who engages in monitoring classroom practice. Note, a few inspectors would benefit too! It?s one to read and then refer to on a regular basis if you work in schools or PGCE departments? - Tim Brighouse, Chief Adviser for London Schools

Helping teachers develop - whether they?re trainees, newly or recently qualified, in their first three, ten or twenty years, and whether they?re superb or struggling - is vital for the profession, for the millions of children who?ll learn more as a result.

Schools have to take greater responsibility for staff?s continuing professional development (CPD) but there is little real help for the people who develop teachers. The best teachers will be expected to mentor trainee and newly qualified teachers (NQTs) and share good practice with all colleagues.

Drawing directly on real-life experience and the latest research, this book will help people in a mentoring, coaching, advisory or management role to:

o develop teachers, through understanding adult learning and the CPD cycle

o meet needs from the range of professional development activities

o carry out observations and give oral and written feedback in a range of situations

o help and monitor planning and other parts of the job

o help teachers develop their careers.

Using examples from current practice, Sara will take you though every stage of CPD, from what professional development is to how you can support and monitor staff in your own school. There are photocopiable materials for you to use.

The guidance in this book will be essential for mentors, induction tutors, CPD/staff development coordinators, people with advanced skills or excellent teacher status, and all those with a leadership and management role in schools or local authorities.

Sara Bubb is the UK?s leading induction expert and has vast expertise in the CPD field. She runs many courses for different levels of school staff, assesses trainee and advanced skills teachers and is the new teacher expert for the Times Educational Supplement.

Sara has been seconded from the Institute of Education to the DfES as the consultant for the Chartered London Teacher initiative. She is the co-author, with Peter Earley, of Leading and Managing Continuing Professional Development and Managing Teacher Workload.

1

Helping Teachers Develop – Why?

• Why we should help teachers develop
• It’s good for you too
• What is an effective teacher?
• Stages that teachers go through
• Structure of the book

It is fashionable to say that teaching can be the most rewarding profession there is – and it can be. We can all give examples of the pleasure of helping a child grow in knowledge and understanding, and achieve their potential. But what about the teacher? They shouldn’t be excluded from the benefits of lifelong learning because of their workload and desire to give, give, give. Growth and change are part of all our personal and professional lives, and teachers need to embrace them; not just to do a better job, but to enjoy doing it. Supporting teachers in their development – trainees, newly or recently qualified, in their first three, ten or twenty years, and whether they’re superb or struggling – is vital in improving the quality of teaching and learning in our schools.

Why we should help teachers develop

Helping teachers develop? Why should we? Don’t we have enough to do teaching children?

I’m sure the fact that you’ve started reading this book means that you don’t need to be convinced of the reasons for helping teachers develop. For the sake of the profession, for the teachers being helped – for the millions of children who will learn more as a result – it must happen. But teaching isn’t easy, and getting better at it isn’t just a matter of experience, of trial and error. Not that it isn’t happening already but some opportunities to further teachers’ development are not being fully exploited.

Not only is helping teachers develop an intrinsically good thing but the government also wants to see more coaching of teachers by teachers. Its Five Year Strategy for Children and Learners (DfES, 2004a) plans to boost demand for coaching and other forms of continuing professional development by turning teacher appraisals into teaching and learning reviews. The idea is to make sure teachers receive the development that matches their needs and that career progression and financial rewards go to those who are continually building on their own expertise. It says: ‘The record on tackling the development needs of teachers will be critical to school self-evaluation and assessment’ (2004a). School self-evaluation and the short-notice inspections every three years mean that people need to have an accurate picture of the quality of teaching and learning in their schools – and be constantly looking for ways to improve it.

Who needs developing? I hope this book will be useful for people helping any teacher develop, whether they’re a trainee, NQT, experienced or excellent teacher, because the principles are the same. Statistically, you’re most likely to be working with new teachers: in 2004–5 there were 17,450 people training to teach in primary schools and 20,820 training for secondary schools (DfES, 2005a) and every year about 20,000 teachers go through their induction year.

There is more school-based training going on than ever before, and though it is mostly well intended, not all of it is good. Phil Revell, teacher and journalist, found that a quarter of his sample of trainees found no welcome mat in their placement schools: there was no tour of the school, no information pack, no induction process to introduce them to the school and its procedures (2005b: 27). However, something’s going well because everyone – inspectors and heads – agrees that new teachers are very effective.

The department seems to have little or no camaraderie and they are phenomenally unwelcoming to student teachers. I get bullied by one class teacher and criticized for the most trivial things by the others. They never have a good word to say about anything I do.

Even where schools have a statutory duty to provide support, monitoring and assessment for teachers in their induction year the picture is patchy. Newly qualified teachers should have:

• A 10 per cent lighter teaching timetable than other teachers in the school;
• A job description that doesn’t make unreasonable demands;
• Meetings with the school ‘induction tutor’ including half-termly reviews of progress;
• An individualized programme of support, monitoring and assessment;
• Objectives, informed by strengths and areas for development identified in the career entry and development profile, to help them meet the induction standards;
• At least one observation of their teaching each half term with oral and written feedback;
• An assessment meeting and report at the end of each term;
• Procedures to air grievances at school and local education authority level (Bubb et al., 2005: 252).

But in 2002, research found that a quarter of new teachers weren’t getting their whole entitlement (Totterdell et al., 2002) and I’m not sure it’s any better now; in fact it may be worse. Some people have fantastic experiences and couldn’t want for better support but here are four new teachers’ rather shocking views of their induction tutors:

Teacher A:	‘My induction tutor is a bitch who has reduced me to a nervous wreck. It’s got to the point where I can’t teach in front of her because I’m convinced I’ll fail.’
Teacher B:	‘My tutor is constantly on my back and tells me off when I don’t do exactly what she says.’
Teacher C:	‘Mine is never there. He has a mug with ‘‘I’m so effing cool’’ on it and a picture of a guy in a hammock smoking a spliff. He calls the kids half-wits.
Teacher D:	‘I am not getting on well with my induction tutor’s forthright manner. She treats me as if I am a total newcomer (I have been working in informal education for seven years). She does not seem to believe in any basic mentoring feedback methods and really only gives positives or achievements in written feedback after verbal negatives. She has made me cry twice and often does not accept any of my version or explanations for events. I feel that she is watching my every move for something she can pick up on, rather than things she can put as achievements.’

Even potentially strong NQTs in supportive schools with trained induction tutors don’t find things easy. Rosie Warden, who was featured on Teachers’ TV, is a case in point. She really enjoyed her PGCE course and finished on a high with good experiences on teaching practice and lots of positive feedback. She thought she’d spend her first year consolidating her learning and going from strength to strength. She’d been warned that the children were ‘challenging’, but on visits to the school she’d always seen experienced teachers, so didn’t fully appreciate what she would be up against: ‘The reality is that behaviour management has been tough for me’.

But what about staff who don’t take responsibility for their development? We’ve all met people who see training as time off, who think they’ve nothing more to learn, who are unreflective, and who don’t consider how their professional development might affect pupils. ‘New Professionalism’ is not new but an expectation right from the word go. One of the standards for Qualified Teacher Status is that:

Teachers are able to improve their own teaching, by evaluating it, learning from the effective practice of others and from evidence. They are motivated and able to take increasing responsibility for their own professional development. (TTA, 2003: 12)

People need to have wider professional effectiveness to cross the threshold, taking ‘responsibility for their professional development and use the outcomes to improve their teaching and pupils’ learning, and make an active contribution to the policies and aspirations of the school’ (DfES, 2004c: 3).

Part of the reason why some people don’t take their own development seriously is that in many schools it’s not thought through well enough. If ‘personalization’ is what we’re expected to do for pupils how can CPD be personalized for staff? How does one marry up tensions between what an individual wants to develop with school improvement and national initiatives? England’s GTC says there should be an entitlement to CPD throughout a teacher’s career and one that is not linked solely to school targets. Its Teachers’ Professional Learning Framework says teachers need the opportunity to:

• Have structured time to engage in sustained reflection and structured learning;
• Create learning opportunities from everyday practice;
• Develop their ability to identify their own learning and development needs and those of others;
• Develop an individual learning plan;
• Have school-based learning recognized for accreditation;
• Develop self-evaluation, observation and peer review skills;
• Develop mentoring and coaching skills;
• Plan their longer-term career aspirations (2003: 6).

It’s good for you too

Many people who work in a mentoring role enjoy it, saying it’s the best part of their many roles and they get a lot from it, as this induction tutor says:

In the vast majority of cases, they’re young people who are enthusiastic, enjoy their work, and you know I find it very refreshing and I learn from watching them. I think this is the thing that’s perhaps surprising, an experienced teacher can go and watch an NQT and still pick up some tricks. (cited in Bubb et al., 2002: 68)

Until now, however, helping teachers develop has been a rather low-status role with few financial rewards. Things should change now that professional development is back on the agenda. The DfES, GTC and Training and Development Agency for schools (TDA) have placed an emphasis on well-planned and high-quality continuing professional development (CPD) for teachers as a way of raising standards of teaching and learning, and retaining high-quality staff. There’s more of a focus on CPD for all staff – not just teachers but support and admin staff too – and a greater link with performance management through ‘teaching and learning reviews’.

There are also career progression and rewards because progress on the upper pay scale will depend not only on teachers showing that they have developed themselves but also that they are coaching and mentoring less experienced teachers. Those hoping to gain the new excellent teacher status will also have to demonstrate that they have provided regular coaching and mentoring to colleagues. People achieving the grade of excellent teacher will be expected to be involved in:

• The induction of newly qualified teachers;
• Professional mentoring of other teachers;
• Sharing good practice through demonstration lessons;
• Helping teachers to develop their expertise in planning, preparation and assessment;
• Helping other teachers to evaluate the impact of their teaching on pupils;
• Undertaking classroom observations to assist and support the performance management process; and
• Helping teachers improve their teaching practice including those on capability procedures.

Collaboration within and between schools is the name of the game. CPD will increasingly be school based, with people coaching and mentoring others. Sounds interesting, but is it going to work? It could just be too cosy and result in staleness unless there’s agreement on what an effective teacher is.

What is an effective teacher?

Before one starts helping teachers develop it is important to have a clear understanding of what an effective teacher is. This seems simple but in fact it’s the subject of much debate. Teachers who have been in the profession a long time will be aware of the fashion element to this but you need to have some knowledge of the current OfSTED criteria for teaching and the standards for higher-level teaching assistants, qualified teacher status, induction, threshold, subject leaders, SENCOs, headteachers and excellent teacher and advanced skills teacher status.

As a taster, let us look at the induction standards which, like those for QTS, are organized under the following headings:

	1.	Professional values and practice;
	2.	Knowledge and understanding;
	3.	Teaching:
		(a) Planning, expectations and targets
		(b) Monitoring and assessment
		(c) Teaching strategies and behaviour.

As well as meeting the QTS standards consistently, NQTs must meet these six standards. They must:

1. Seek and use opportunities to work collaboratively with colleagues to raise standards by sharing effective practice in the school;
2. Show a commitment to their professional development by identifying areas in which they need to improve their professional knowledge, understanding and practice in order to teach more effectively in their current post, and with support, taking steps to address these needs;
3. Plan effectively to meet the needs of pupils with specia...

Table of contents

• Cover Page
• Title
• Copyright
• Contents
• List of figures and tables
• Acknowledgements
• List of abbreviations
• 1 Helping teachers develop – Why?
• 2 How to develop people
• 3 Professional development activities
• 4 Observation
• 5. Other ways to help
• 6 Helping teachers develop their careers
• References
• Appendix
• Index