School-based teacher professional development

Created Feb. 7, 2024 by Vincent Kizza

This Unit covers some of the popular CPD methods including:-

  • Coaching and Mentoring
  • Lesson Observations
  • The Learning Walk
  • Action Research

Coaching and Mentoring


Benefits of coaching and Mentoring

To the school 
• Assists in the transfer of teacher learning to pupil
learning
• Helps embed change
• Gives individuals greater ownership of their development
• Promotes an atmosphere of mutual trust and respect
• Improves organisational communication
• Strengthens culture and ethos

To the individual
• Reduces feelings of isolation
• Increases confidence and self-esteem
• Provides an accelerated rate of learning
• Improves personal skills
• Improves problem analysis
• Reduces frustration
• Creates an opportunity to reflect on work roles and career
• Creates friendship

To the coach or mentor
• Offers insights into current practice
• Increases reflectiveness
• Benefits their own professional development
• Improves problem analysis
• Raises awareness of different approaches
• Improves self-esteem.

Principles of coaching

EFFECTIVE COACHING IS ESTABLISHED ON THE KEY PRINCIPLES OF
AWARENESS Once an individual becomes more aware of themselves and
others, then it becomes easier to manage and change actions.
RESPONSIBILITY Change will only be really effective when an individual can take ownership for their development.

Key skills of effective coaching

THE KEY SKILLS OF EFFECTIVE COACHING ARE
1. EFFECTIVE QUESTIONING 

Questions that arouse curiosity, stimulate interest, clarify concepts, emphasize key points, enhance problem-solving ability, encourage
thinking at higher cognitive levels or motivate the search for new information
2. ACTIVE LISTENING 

A way of listening that focuses entirely on what the other
person is saying and confirms understanding of both the content of the message and the emotions and feelings underlying the message to ensure that understanding is
accurate.
THE STEPS OF EFFECTIVE COACHING INCLUDE
SETTING A GOAL: What do you want?
GRASPING THE REALITY :What is happening now?
CONSIDERING OPTIONS:What could you do?
MAKING CHOICES :What will you do?

The coaching/mentoring relationship Partners should:
1. Get on well together to create a compatible working
relationship
2. Respect each other and work as equals
3. Be in agreement about the purpose of the relationship
4. Be committed to the relationship and be genuinely
interested in each other’s progress
5. Have realistic expectations about results
6. Not blame or criticize, balancing the celebration of success
with the permission to fail
7. Speak honestly, giving constructive and purposeful feedback
8. Approach each another easily and create time and attention
for each other
9. Actively question and listen
10. Be willing to debate, argue and discuss

Qualities of a coach/mentor A more effective coach will be:
• Emotionally intelligent
• A good listener
• Organised, patient and understanding
• Enthusiastically persuasive
• Good at their job
• Down to earth and realistic
• Prepared to do things urgently
• Able to offer a different perspective
• Open to other points of view
• Realistic
• Relaxed and laid back
• Approachable

Coaching and Mentoring becomes more effective when the school:
1. Develops a climate of collaboration in which professional learning can flourish and in which individuals feel comfortable to express their desire to change and improve.
2. Identifies professional learning needs that really do need to be met in order to raise standards and attainment.
3. Develops processes and procedures to support the coaching and mentoring that are based upon best practice.
4. Redefines people’s work roles so that the  coaching/mentoring function is integrated and receives sufficient time and priority. This is especially significant in the context of school change within the Remodelling agenda.
5. Selects coaches and mentors who possess personal and professional qualities of the highest order (see next page) and provides ongoing training and development.
6. Ensures that the individuals involved appreciate the responsibility they have for each other’s professional development and places the control of this development with the individual.
7. Defines the scope of the coaching relationship and where it fits within broader school development.
8. Evaluates the impact of the coaching work at both individual and organizational level.

Lesson observation(Study)


The Learning Walk

A procedure to support school and individual evaluation and monitoring is the Learning Walk. It is a strategy for peers to work together to provide feedback and information on a negotiated focus. It involves an organised tour through a school’s learning areas to provide feedback on teaching and learning in an particular area of focus. It is different from evaluations and is the least threatening approach to introduce visiting into the school culture. It can be done with colleagues from other schools, or as an in-house exercise.


Action research

CPD is all about improving the work you do.
• Improving the work you do is all about learning to do things in new ways –
professional learning. Effective professional learning starts from the point of view of the learner. Most teachers and school staff know a great deal already but also have issues they seek to resolve or improve. The Action Research process provides a systematic approach to support this quest. Action Research is CPD in one of its most effective forms.

Action Research is systematic enquiry designed to yield practical results capable of improving a specific aspect of practice and made public to enable scrutiny and testing . Action research is a term which refers to a practical way of looking at your own work to check it is as you would like it to be. It is open ended and does not begin with a fixed hypothesis. It begins with an idea that the teacher develops. The research process is a developmental process that involves identifying a problematic issue, imagining a possible solution, trying it out, evaluating it, and changing practice in the light of the evaluation. Action research is a form or self-evaluation.Action research helps a teacher to formalise their learning and give a clear and justified account of their work, not on a one-off basis, but as a continuing regular feature of their practice.

Why do Action Research?

  •  Getting involved in research can encourage dialogue between colleagues about teaching and learning, and persuade teachers to dig beneath the surface of classroom activities in ways that are meaningful to them and have the potential to address real issues.
  • As reflective practitioners, greater ownership of the evaluative process can be achieved, by becoming systematically self-assessing, alongside, and feeding into, external assessment processes.
  • Action research methodology offers a systematic approach to introducing innovations in teaching and learning. It does this by putting the teacher in the dual role of producer of educational theory and user of that theory.
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