UCOL National Teaching and Learning ConferencePalmerston North: 2 October 2009

Peter Coolbear

Meaningful reflective practice: the mark of a professional tertiary teacher

Oct 2009

Current change drivers

Quality of teaching and learning has never been a hotter issue – framed in value for money terms ….

“effectiveness”; “performance”; “completion rates”

Increasing value on the student/learner voice

Oct 2009

Current change drivers - 2

Increasing whole-of-institution perspective

• New Tertiary Education Strategy• Performance based funding framework• SA and EER• Governance accountability

Oct 2009

Where do tertiary teachers fit into this?

Tertiary teachers: professionals or journeymen/women?

Oct 2009

So what makes a professional teacher?

Critical reflective practice:

Reflection-in-action

Reflection-on-action

Donald Schön 1983

Oct 2009

But … do we know how to do it?

“ A generalisation that seems to apply to teaching .. Is the fact that there is relatively little concern for the effect of reflective practice on the subject of the professional’s action…. Since improvement in learning …. is deemed central to the purposes of these professions, this seems a surprising omission…”

Jennifer Moon (1999)

Oct 2009

Meaningful critical self - reflection

Self - reference

Self - reverence

Oct 2009

Self-reverence

“ The students we get these days are nowhere near as well prepared as they were 10 years ago”

“ They just want to be spoon-fed”

“ They just want to muck around at the back”

“ They only enrolled here to meet the girls on the nursing programme”

Oct 2009

Self-reference

“ Well that went well: there was some really great interaction in that class”

“ What a great day – I got a great buzz out of those sessions”

“ I’m really excited about this new technology”

“ I find post-structuralism really fascinating”

Oct 2009

Meaningful critical self-reflection

“ Well that went well: there was some really great interaction in that class and the formative assessment demonstrated that the group really understood those key concepts”

“ Jack’s question at the end worries me: he’s just not got the point – and I bet he’s not the only one: would group discussion help? How do I get the right groups together and get them to help each other? How will I know if this is successful? Who might I ask for advice on this?”

Oct 2009

A key assumption

We believe education research and evidence-led innovation has an important role to play in improving outcomes for learners

“Nothing wins an argument like evidence”

Austen Banks, Chair COMPETENZ

Oct 2009

Key question – how strong is the evidence?

We “know” a lot of the basics about what supports learner success – need to convert anecdote to evidence – authoritative, generalisable research that can’t be ignored.

Oct 2009

Pragmatic choices

Evidence that identifies the most effective interventions when institutions need to make choices

Oct 2009

So what are the characteristics of a high performing professional tertiary teacher?

• Empathy: Understands the changing motivations, aspirations and learning needs of each student in the class

• Reflection-in-action: Is equipped with and uses a range of teaching / learning support strategies to meet those needs

Oct 2009

So what are the characteristics of a high performing professional tertiary teacher?

• Critical self reflection-on-action: Gathers evidence within their own teaching and learning environment to review their own personal effectiveness

• Emancipatory: Shares information about progress and learning strategies with students

Oct 2009

But …. Our National project funding experiences show us that

we are not good at this:

• Too many EoI’s weak on evidence base:– Didn’t demonstrate the need to do work– Didn’t have robust strategies in place to collect

evidence of learner benefit

• Many Good Practice Publication Grant applications have no proof of their “proven good practice”

Oct 2009

So what do we do?

• Use the evidence already available– Student completion data– Student satisfaction / evaluation data– Participation data– Assessment data

Oct 2009

So what do we do?

• Systematise the informal evidence– Students’ stories have validity– Student contributions to class discussion– Student preferences for different activities– Employer feedback– Alumni feedback

Oct 2009

So what do we do?

• Develop new sources of evidence– Student engagement – e.g. AUSSE– Critical incident questionnaires– Graduate surveys– Employer surveys

Oct 2009

And then …..

• Triangulate the data!

Oct 2009

“The impossibility of education”

Research in education is not easy

Approximate answers to the hard questions have more value than accurate answers to the easy ones

Jane Davidson

Oct 2009

Back to the beginning – tertiary teaching as a profession

Issues about teachers having agency:

• Professionals are positioned to take leadership; journeymen / women are followers

• Evidence informs what they do, how they do it and how they are valued