6.1 Identify and plan professional learning needs
Graduate-level: Demonstrate an understanding of the role of the Australian Professional Standards for Teachers in identifying professional learning needs.
Australian professional standards have been carefully designed as a descriptive benchmark for teachers to evaluate and reflect on their professional knowledge, engagement and practice throughout their teaching career. The standards have four levels, including graduate, proficient, highly accomplished and lead (AITSL 2017). It considers teachers as thoughtful persons intrinsically motivated to understand and differentiate children’s learning, set achievable goals, plan and monitor actions, and reflect on their professional thinking against this standard (Griffin 1997 p. 35). It doesn’t mean that teachers should technically follow the directions from other professions but reflect on the underlying reasons and recapture experience to evaluate and establish their teaching strategies (Stremmel 2007, p. 2).
The evidence I have that shows how I have met this standard at a graduate level is an assignment completed in the course “Critical Perspective of Education”. This course opened up a deeper level and has made me understand the importance of being a reflective practitioner. It also discussed practical approaches that could inform aspects of teachers’ professional knowledge, practice and engagement.
During my placements, reflective journals were written every week to help me identify my personal learning goals and modify teaching practise against the standards. I have attached two journals I wrote during my third placement. It demonstrates how I use the standards as a tool to inform and reflect my teaching practice.
Reference
Australian Institute for Teaching and School and Leadership (AITSL) 2017, Australian professional standards for teachers, Australian Government, viewed 20 September 2020, <https://www.aitsl.edu.au/teach/standards>.
Griffin, BJ 1997, ‘Helping student teachers become reflective practitioners’, The Teacher Educator, vol. 33, no. 1, pp. 35-43.
Stremmel, AJ 2007, ‘The Value of Teacher Research: Nurturing Professional and Personal Growth through Inquiry’, Voices of Practitioners, vol. 2, no. 3, pp. 1-9.
Evidence 6.1: Reflective journals
6.3 Engage with colleagues and improve practice
Graduate-level: Seek and apply constructive feedback from supervisors and teachers to improve teaching practices.
Self-reflection is an ongoing learning process for the pre-service teacher to modify and improve their teaching practice. Crow and Smith (2005, p. 493) suggest that interaction with professional practitioner adds a valuable additional dimension to individual reflection, and it allows inexperienced teachers to learn from these professions who have funds of knowledge and find out weakness and strength in their practice. Feedback provided by these experienced practitioners can help pre-service teachers to better reflect and modify their teaching practice, thereby achieving personal goals. Feedback can be both formal and informal. It occurs unconsciously between teachers in the teaching process (e.g. behaviour, language used and teaching philosophy) and from time to time more consciously through conversations with colleagues. Knight (2010, p. 97) stated that formal feedback (such as written feedback) appears to make the conversation more likely to lead to insight and professional learning. As a pre-service teacher, I valued the opportunity to teach and always invited my mentor to observe the teaching sessions. The evidence below demonstrates my ability to actively seek and apply constructive feedback from my supervising teacher to improve teaching practices.
During my placement in primary school, I was lucky to meet a supportive mentor, and he wrote many positive and constructive feedback regarding the lessons I prepared. By reflecting on the feedback from my mentor, it can be concluded that all the lessons I taught were well-prepared and highly relevant to the curriculum. In contrast, classroom management was considered as a challenge in the first part of my placement. Therefore, I did a lot of research online and strived to find out ways to manage or quiet the classroom. I have attached an observation form written by my mentor regarding a history lesson I taught about past and present. I also put a piece of comment from my final report, which shows that my mentor recognised my achievement in managing the classroom.
Reference
Crow, J & Smith, L 2005 ‘Co-teaching in higher education: Reflective conversation on shared experience as continued professional development for lecturers and health and social care students’, Reflective Practice, vol. 6, no. 4, pp. 491-506.
Knight, S, Meyer, L & Sampson, J 2010, ‘It’s all right for you two, you obviously like each other: recognising challenges in pursuing collaborative professional learning through team teaching’, in Beyond Reflective Practice, Routledge, pp. 96-103.
6.2 Engage in professional learning and improve practice
Graduate-level: Understand the relevant and appropriate sources of professional learning for teachers.
The evidence demonstrates my understanding of the relevant and appropriate sources of professional learning as I actively participated in professional teams and was responsible for my teaching career. I valued the opportunity to learn and enjoyed shared-experience from other skilled practitioners. I have attached the learning material I got from the workshop as a reference to analyse students’ writing (annotations of a student writing sample as evidence for achieving standard 6.4).
Another evidence which shows how I met this standard at a graduate level is a 'one plan' strategy I learned from a professional learning experience. I was lucky to be invited to attend an Early Years Educator’s Hub, and I was taught to write a ‘One Plan’ for children with disability. This plan is based on my observation of a child who has been diagnosed as both Attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and autism spectrum disorder (ASD). This plan includes all the details about the child, including barriers to learning, functional needs, adjustments made, and goals achieved. I consulted with other teachers and parents and sought advice from them to support his learning. I’ve attached the plan below, which shows all the efforts I put into supporting this child and a piece of feedback from my mentor in my placement.
Reference
Brown, N, Bower, M, Skalicky, J, Wood, L, Donovan, D, Loch, B, Bloom, W & Joshi, N 2010, A professional development framework for teaching in higher education, Research and Development in Higher Education: Reshaping Higher Education, vol. 33, pp. 133–143.
6.4 Apply professional learning and improve student learning
Graduate-level: Demonstrate an understanding of the rationale for continued professional learning and the implications for improved student learning.
The evidence which demonstrates my ability to use the knowledge acquired from professional learning is an annotated student writing. The professional learning experience I had in my placement was a staff meeting which gathered all teachers from the two campuses. The annotations of a student working sample (as attached) reflect how I incorporated knowledge learned from professional meetings into my teaching practice. I commented that this student could make fair use of linking and binding conjunctions on his work. His writing demonstrates that he has a solid understanding of a complete sentence structure. And he was able to use the past tense to recount his weekend. His work was in good sequence.
I was also able to come up with ongoing learning experience that enriches and co-construct children’s understanding of the sentence’s components and how to build up informative sentences by considering when, where, what and how. The use of sentence-building cards shows my ability to adopt various strategies to improve children’s learning of writing sentences.
Another evidence which shows how I met this standard at a graduate level is a 'one plan' strategy I learned from a professional learning experience. I was lucky to be invited to attend an Early Years Educator’s Hub, and I was taught to write a ‘One Plan’ for children with disability. This plan is based on my observation of a child who has been diagnosed as both Attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and autism spectrum disorder (ASD). This plan includes all the details about the child, including barriers to learning, functional needs, adjustments made, and goals achieved. I consulted with other teachers and parents and sought advice from them to support his learning. I’ve attached the plan below, which shows all the efforts I put into supporting this child.
Reference
Brown, N, Bower, M, Skalicky, J, Wood, L, Donovan, D, Loch, B, Bloom, W & Joshi, N 2010, A professional development framework for teaching in higher education, Research and Development in Higher Education: Reshaping Higher Education, vol. 33, pp. 133–143.