1. A Teaching Development Journey
Skills, Collegiality and Accountability
J. Brown 2012

2. Theories on effective teaching…
Frances Fuller’s (1969) stage model of teachers’ concerns is still valid and helps predict teacher burnout. The third, highest stage is when teachers take the perspectives of their own students and teach to reach each one at their current level of development
Martin Haberman’s (2011) “Star Teacher” model argues that teachers’ beliefs are more important than either their graduate degrees or their years of teaching experience (8% of lessons were)

3. Practical skills: Master teachers…
Model and require respectful behaviour, always
Are experts in their subjects, but also…
Know how they are learned by their students
Use a variety of strategies to address different learners (audio, visual, tactile, affective, etc.) and promote many ways of knowing and doing
Add emotion, drama, humour to their classes
Connect each day’s content to previous content
Structure their lectures; make objectives clear to students; review key concepts to conclude

4. Master teachers (2)… Promote independent, critical thinking regularly
Expect misunderstandings and check for them
Assess students’ progress continuously (Q. & A.)
Know their students’ strengths / weaknesses early in the term and intervene accordingly
Use assessment information to adjust the content of their courses and their teaching strategies
Expect their students to work at least as hard as they do, and rarely, if ever, blame them for failure

5. How can Lingnan faculty begin such a journey?

6. Establish shared purposes
Consensus amongst faculty members is necessary to (re-) establish the shared purposes of teaching in the programme
Recurrent dialogue needs to take place about those agreed purposes, specific students’ progress and the various teaching strategies that best enable good progress to occur
Adopt a “critical colleague” ethos to share in your experiences of teaching and learning

7. A metaphor might be canoeing…

8. Canoe journeys require that…
Everyone is in the boat on time
Everyone does their fair share of paddling
Loads are distributed evenly
Someone looks for obstacles ahead
Someone coordinates the strokes
Everyone knows the destination, but someone steers – from the front or the rear!
Each day’s paddling ends before sundown

9. Monitor teaching developments…
Monitoring can be collegial and supervisory
“Critical colleagues” can work in pairs, trios or as entire departments (webs of development)
Documentation of teaching can be done from multiple perspectives, not just one
Self-monitoring can be documented (e.g., the Personal Construct Psychology paradigm)
HoDs can verify that monitoring has occurred

10. Do some collegial observations…
A step toward community (not common) teaching practices (DuFour & Eaker, 1998)
Perhaps six observations per term, by invitation
Between 30 and 40 minutes long
Documented - but paper to the observed teacher
Rubrics can be used – highly recommended, and don’t re-invent them! (“Look-For” lists)
Post-observation coffee breaks to discuss
Oral reports to others in the canoe, later on

11. The presence of a colleague helps us all focus our teaching and adopt another’s perspective
By the end of term, all faculty members could have done six collegial observations (and been observed six times), generating enough info
Faculty members can write self-reviews that draw upon colleagues’ thoughts
Best practices in teaching can be shared more quickly and consistently

12. Meet accountability requirements…
HoDs can write summary reports for review by department members, leading to updated course syllabi
External, third parties’ requirements can be met by such summary reports
Improvement goals can be (re)set by faculty members and departments, linked to the LU Mission, programme outcomes and specific course outcomes.

13. A cycle of continuous development
Programmes, course syllabi
Teachers Teaching
Students’ Learning
Assessment of Learning
Review and Modify

14. Thank you! 
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