a questions of fundamentals

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A question of fundamentals: teacher standards and teacher preparation 2014 Australian Teacher Education Association (ATEA) Conference ACU North Sydney Dr Gavin Hazel (HIMH)

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A question of fundamentals: teacher standards and teacher preparation. Presentation by Dr Gavin Hazel, Hunter Institute of Mental Health for the Australian Teacher Education Association (ATEA) conference 6-9 July 2014, Sydney.

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Page 1: A questions of fundamentals

A question of fundamentals: teacher standards and teacher preparation

2014 Australian Teacher Education Association (ATEA) Conference

ACU North Sydney

Dr Gavin Hazel (HIMH)

Page 2: A questions of fundamentals

CONTEXT

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Links to 2014 ATEA presentations

• Menter: Only Connect • Wang: Relating emotions … • Hudson and Hudson: Mentor feedback… • Kreiwaldt: Underplaying learners’ perspectives… • Goepel: Do teachers’ professional standards create

teacher professionalism • Papatraianou and Le Cornu: A social network

perspective… • BRiTE workshop • Wyatt-Smith: Profiling productive shifts in teacher

education

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• Codification of a set of professional standards for teachers and school leaders

• The standards articulate what teachers are supposed to be doing

• These standards are joined to the accreditation of teacher education programs

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• Measures of Effective Teaching Project (2009-2014)

• Sutton trust (2001): Improving the impact of teachers on pupil achievement in the UK

• OECD (2011): Building a high-quality teaching profession

• The Hamilton project: Identifying effective teachers using performance on the job (2004)

• International and national quality teaching and learning performance models currently in use (Charmers, Lee, and walker, 2008)

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• Measuring teacher effectiveness: A look under the hood in teacher evaluation in 10 sites (Doyle and Han, 2012)

• Evaluation of teacher preparation programs: purposes, methods and policy options (2013) – National Academy

• Measuring what matters: A stronger accountability model for teacher education (Crowe, 2010)

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Assumptions

• That the quality of instruction/quality teaching plays a central role in student learning.

• That quality and performance are connected in teaching

• That teacher preparation programs positively contribute to the quality of instruction.

• That quality of instruction is an expression/exemplar of professionalism.

• That achievement testing directly measures student learning and indirectly measures quality of teaching.

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CONTEXT: What are the outcomes of schooling?

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Means versus Ends

• What happens in school?

• Why do we send children to school?

• How do we prepare teachers for this work?

• Are the means we are using connected to the ends we wish to achieve?

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What is the Nature of Education?

• Kuhn:

- Education to instil knowledge

- Education to develop skills

- Education for selection

- Education for citizenship

- Education for thinking

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Bruner (1994)

• We send our children to school to learn things they might not learn without formal instruction so they can function more intelligently outside school.

• If so, recommendations for school reform should explicitly appeal to and implement our best current understanding of what learning and intelligence are. In the public debate on school reform, this is seldom the case.

• Common recommendations – raising standards, increasing accountability, testing more, creating markets in educational services – are psychologically atheoretical, based at best on common sense and at worst on naïve or dated conceptions of learning.

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Real world outcomes: Student Goals (Chester, Finn, Petrilli, 2013)

More critical

• Good study habits and self discipline

• Strong critical thinking skills

• Strong verbal and written communication skills

Important

• Prepared for college

• Strong social skills

• Identifies interest and pursues their talents on their own

• Strong self esteem

• Love of learning

• A strong moral code

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UNESCO Education for All Goals (2000)

Quality is at the heart of education, and what takes place in classrooms and other learning environments is fundamentally important to the future wellbeing of children, young people and adults. A quality education is one that satisfies basic learning needs, and enriches the lives of learners and their overall experience of living. (UNESCO, 2000, Goal 6).

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WHAT DO WE KNOW: The contribution that teachers make to student outcomes?

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Identifying what matters (Hattie, 2003)

• Students 50% (variance of achievement)

• Home 5-10% (variance of achievement)

• Schools 5-10% (variance of achievement)

• Principals Accounted under school effects

• Peer 5-10% (variance of achievement)

• Teachers 30% (variance of achievement)

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Hattie (2003)

• It is what teachers know, do, and care about which is very powerful in the learning equation.

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WHAT IS EXPECTED: How do we represent this in practice?

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Responsibility of teachers

Significant responsibility in preparing young people to lead successful and productive lives.

Creating:

• Successful learners

• Confident and creative individuals

• Active and informed citizens

Page 20: A questions of fundamentals

National Professional Standards for Teachers (NPST)

1. Know students and how they learn 2. Know the content and how they teach it 3. Plan for and implement effective teaching and

learning 4. Create and maintain supportive and safe

learning environments 5. Assess, provide feedback and report on student

learning 6. Engage in professional learning 7. Engage professionally with colleagues,

parents/carers and the community

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The Standards

The standards identify the “key elements of quality teaching”

The standards also identify what is required to provide a “dependable and consistent influence on young people”

NPST

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Their development included a synthesis of the descriptions of teachers' knowledge, practice and professional engagement used by teacher accreditation and registration authorities, employers and professional associations. Each descriptor has been informed by teachers’ understanding of what is required at different stages of their career.

NPST

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Standards

• Define quality teaching

• Define teachers work

• Make explicit the elements of high quality effective teaching that will improve educational outcomes for students

NPST

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• (Improved) Teacher Quality = Improved Education Outcomes

• Educational outcomes include: Successful learners Confident and creative individuals Active and informed citizens

NPST

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Quality

There is less consensus on what ‘quality’ actually entails, especially when we move from conditions for quality (infrastructure, resources, teacher supply, course access, enrolment and retention) to the pedagogy through which educational quality is most direct mediated (Alexander, 2008, 1).

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OECD Indicators of QT1994

• Content knowledge • Pedagogic skill • Reflection • Empathy • Managerial competence

• Commitment • Love children • Set an example • Manage groups effectively • Incorporate technology • Master multiple modes of

teaching and learning • Adjust and improvise • Know the students • Exchange ideas with other

teachers • Reflect

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The international debate about the quality of education practice has been dominated by those who operate in the domains of policy, accountability and funding rather than in the area of practice, quality has tended to be conceived not as what it actually is but how it can be measured (Alexander, 2008, 3).

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When learners themselves are asked about educational quality they tend to talk not about test scores but about the felt experiences of learning, dwelling especially on their attitude to tasks set and the degree to which they find the context of peer and teacher-student relationships supportive and rewarding (Alexander, 2008, 3).

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Accountability

• We want to know that the things we do will make a difference

• How do we deepen our understanding of the science behind the standards?

• What is the quality of the evidence?

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• How do we bring these standards into our daily interactions with students?

• How does teacher preparation ground these practices?

• Where is the attitudinal component?

• How will these standards address attrition in teaching?

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Key questions

• Does the account of quality in the NPST attend to what really matters in teaching and learning?

• Are the classroom processes and outcomes that are truly transformative for our children adequately capture in the NPST?

• If not, what are implications for the accreditation of teacher preparation courses?

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WHAT IS MISSING: Teachers work

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Heckman (2008): More than cognitive skills • Cognitive abilities are important determinants of

socioeconomic success. • So are socioemotional skills, physical and mental

health, perseverance, attention, motivation, and self confidence. They contribute to the performance in society at large and even help determine scores n the very tests that are commonly used to measure cognitive achievement.

• IF society intervenes early enough, it can improve cognitive and socioemotional abilities and health of disadvantaged children.

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Life cycle skill formation is dynamic in nature. Skill begets skill; motivation begets motivation. Motivation cross fosters skill and skill cross foster motivation. IF a child is not motivated to learn and engage early in life, the more likely it is that when the child becomes an adult, it will fail in social and economic life. The longer society waits to intervene in the life cycle of a disadvantaged child, the more costly it is to remediate disadvantage.

Heckman (2008). Schools, Skills, and Synapses

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Key part of teachers work that go to the goals of schooling • Partnerships

• Relationships

• Server and return

• Intentional/unintentional learning

• Intentional/purposeful nature of teaching: Teaching is undertaken for a purpose

• Decision making

• Dynamic

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Things that make a difference

• Are these addressed in teachers work and quality teaching as described?

• What factors are left out of the description of teachers work?

• Is it a thin or thick description of lived experienced?

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APPENDIX

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Other Assumptions

• Significance and dynamic nature of relationships

• Centrality of development science to framing learning

• The complexity and significance of classroom interactions

• Change

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Potential criteria for assessing quality frameworks • Comprehensiveness

• Appropriateness

• Consistency

• Manageability

• Conceptual/empirical justifiability

(Alexander, 2008, 18)

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Quality - Effectiveness

“The word effective connotes some direct impact – or effect – on outcomes. In the case of teachers, this term is usually defined as the teacher’s contribution to student academic achievement test scores, though it is possible to measure other valued student outcomes such as high graduation rates; student motivation; academic efficacy beliefs; to other social, behavioural, or intellectual outcomes.”

(The national Comprehensive Centre for Teacher Quality, 2007)

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THE NATURE OF PROFESSIONALISM

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Classic definition of what constitutes a profession

• Specialised knowledge, expertise, and professional language

• Shared standards of practice

• Long and rigour process of training and qualification

• A monopoly over the service that is provided

• An ethic of service, even a sense of calling, in relation to clients

• Self-regulation of conduct, discipline, and dismissals

• Autonomy to make informed discretionary judgements

• Working together with other professionals to solve complex cases

• Commitment to continuous learning and professional upgrading

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Are teachers professionals in the way that practitioners of law and medicine are? Is there an agreed-upon knowledge base? Do teachers get the same respect and support from the public at large as do other professions? Is teachers’ conduct as discipline and their judgement as well founded? Are they allowed the same degree of autonomy and discretion?

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Professional

Performative • Expertise

• Effectiveness

• Efficacious

• Competence

• Proficient

Regulative • Accomplished

• Qualified

• Certified

• Specialised

• Trained

• Skilled

• Licensed

• Authority

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Questions

• Are the graduate or proficient standards the ‘minimum dose’ – the minimum efficacious practices that lead to educational outcomes?

• If so why – if these lead to the required outcomes what is the imperative to beyond these?

Page 46: A questions of fundamentals

• Definition of quality in terms of outcomes rather than process

• Process and relationships sit at core of schooling process