The Meaning of Professional Development
In the eye of an educational institution
Could you conduct a workshop for our teachers?
We often get calls or emails from schools and colleges asking whether my team can conduct a one day workshop for their teachers and make them “better”.
Some even use my Nepali lingo, “hamro teachers lai babbal banaauna paryo”.
I politely respond: No, we cannot do that.
For me, that’s an unrealistic expectation and problematic mindset to approach a teachers’ professional development (PD).
After working with almost 50 schools and colleges in the last few years, I find this expectation and mindset of school leaders/admins as a huge reason why most PDs are ineffective and a complete waste of everyone’s time.
Often, I see in the faces of the teachers, a complete lack of enthusiasm and curiosity - because they are now used to seeing a one-off teacher trainer (like me) come to their school, doing a one-off workshop, presenting some world changing ideas in teaching and learning, and then vanishing off into oblivion.
Then, may be certificates. A few photos and videos for the social media with a caption “la hernus, hami le regularly hamro teacher haru lai training dinchaun” We regularly give training sessions to our teachers.
Till another trainer visits, probably next year. And then the cycle continues.
What does a PD communicate to teachers?
Sharing here a twitter thread posted by Sarah Cottingham, author of the book: Ausubel’s Meaningful Learning in Action, 2023.
(The bolds are mine.)
What is your school's professional development communicating to teachers?
Everything your professional development in school *is* and *does* sends a message to teachers about their role and what it means to improve.
The 'one and done' model of PD: this communicates
"Teaching is easy. Do what I told you and learning will improve."High stakes observation communicates
"it's possible to see learning from a snapshot".And perhaps the most well meaning,
Telling teachers to use techniques at particular times (no matter the situation) communicates:
"learning is a predictable, linear process"
"differences in subjects don't matter"
"your judgement isn't necessary"These messages are simply not true of teaching. Why?
Teachers operate in a dynamic complex system.
On a macro level, curriculum changes, students change, pedagogical practices come and go. On a micro level, knowledge students have changes day-to-day, an explanation from a teacher can improve understanding, create misconceptions etc.
PD must give teachers the understanding of how to improve in a complex system.
'One and done' PD or mandating techniques at specific times disregard the way the system functions. They massively oversimplify the system - like trying to use the same key in every door of your house.
The only sane way to improve in a complex system underpinned by uncertainty is to respect the uncertainty - embrace it in fact as a beauty of the system.
PD needs to send the message that in our school:
We take multiple evidence-led perspectives to guide our teaching whilst appreciating that context (students, the subject, the content etc) is key, so we will support you to test approaches out and figure out what works when.
What message is your school communicating to you?
Like Sarah said, if your school is focusing on “one and done” model of professional development, they are telling you that improving teachers is not their priority. They will keep conducting the one-off workshops or training sessions or seminars as a way to break the monotony, give you some entertainment, and entice you to stay in the school.
The message is clear. “We give you so many trainings (even though they are sporadic, disconnected, and irrelevant to the problems teachers are facing), you better improve your teaching methodology.”
Subscribe to Sarah’s substack here:
This happens in corporate too. Managers approaching the L&D team to get their team or an individual 'fixed'. Professional development training should be individualized, continuous and have the involvement of the line manager.
By all means roll out training to groups, but to put the learning in practice, as appropriate for each individual, needs a lot more work and thought.