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Aims of the course:

Participants will gain a deeper understanding of

1. The role of PD on developing teachers’ PCK

2. Principles and attributes of effective PD

3. Relevant STP resources to support teaching and learning

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What are some potential areas of challenge as you design and carry out PD for your workshop participants?

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What are some potential areas of challenge as you design and carry out PD for your workshop participants?

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What ideas extended your thinking about PD?

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What ideas extended your thinking about PD?

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How do the readings connect with your experiences in conducting courses?

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How do the readings connect with your experiences in conducting courses?

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What questions do you have on designing PD?

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What questions do you have on designing PD?

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My (ex)school experience using the structure of "knowledge->internalisation->adoption      ->reflection" parallels the elements highlighted in Darling-Hammond's article where importance is placed on teacher collaboration and building PD around teachers' practices.  The timetabled time and organisation by subject and level for the year also facilitates that intentional, discipline-specific PD space.

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The PD focus/direction for whole school and department level is often determined by the school. How much of this school-level PD focus/direction is in line with individual needs assessment done only once annually is unsure. Coupled with unevenness in readiness level and varying needs among teachers can be challenging. So at times, a teacher may be overwhelmed with many pieces of PD (e.g. whole-school on e-Ped, specific self-effective PD assigned by MMs). Conversely, PD experiences do not eventually value-add some teachers.

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(1) Unsure of the entry level of teacher participants. (2) Open-mindedness and reception of teacher to the content communicated. (3) Teachers' conviction to change practice.

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Very often we do not have that deep understanding/knowledge of certain areas assigned to us. Yet we have to be seen as 'experts' in delivering the content/material. When doing/designing PD, how much of it comes from our 'knowledge' of content and how much of it comes from our facilitating knowledge construction of participants?

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In school, we use the adult learning principles as a guide when planning PD activities such as sharing or workshops for our teachers. During PLC sessions, we make time for teachers to engage in collaborative enquiry to investigate, challenge and improve their practices and at the same time reflect more deeply individually and in groups.

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Effective PD supports sustained learning which enables teachers to make changes to their professional practices.

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1) Developing course content which facilitates application of learning effectively for participants.
2) Facilitating the PD to optimise learning.

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Reading up on literature while preparing for a session for an area which we are not familiar with is quite overwhelming, not sure what to adopt and how to frame the session appropriately. Do you have any suggestion or experience to share?

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The professional development program at my ex-school consists of four components: STP PCP sharing sessions facilitated by both LTs and STs, annual Learning Fest, open classrooms, and TTT sharing sessions. Our VP also shared mentoring skills with LTs and STs.  When leading and organizing sharing sessions, our initial focus is on the principles of adult learning theory.  It is essential that the sharing materials are relevant and practical to the teacher's own teaching experience. Additionally, we allow them to learn at their own pace and in a way that is comfortable for them.

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It is crucial that teachers take ownership of their own professional growth and view it as their responsibility. Unfortunately, in some cases, teacher agency is overlooked during professional development. However, I believe that if PD programs are designed to address the problems that teachers encounter, they will be more engaged in their own learning, since adult learners are problem-solving driven learners.

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Teachers are always very busy with marking, teaching supplementary classes, and doing CCA. They were unable to attend the workshop.
There is a wide variety of backgrounds and profiles among participants, as well as different teaching experiences. Their own resources are sometimes used to judge things.

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Teachers prefer tangible examples over theory, so how do you balance theory and practice?

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We considered andragogy principles when designing PD in my ex-school. We intentionally highlighting the intent of the PD focus, e.g. Lesson Study, mentoring, Assessment Lit, etc. to make the teachers see the relevance and value of learning. We adopted blended learning approach to offer them flexibility and autonomy to learn. Collaborative stance was adopted when designing the PD to create time for them to share their experiences to co-construct knowledge and time is set aside for them to reflect on their learning gleaned as well as how they could apply the learning to their context readily.

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Effective PD helps teachers to move towards changing classroom practice that leads to positive student outcomes. In view of the time constraint and PD emphasis by the different stakeholders/ organizations, it is crucial to streamline the PD efforts across AST, CPDD, SEAB and the school level, in strengthening/ deepening the practices towards mastery for effectiveness.

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Teachers need adequate time to learn, practise, implement and reflect upon new strategies in order to see changes in their practice. It requires sustained duration to see positive outcomes. Our learners are diverse, likewise our teachers. Do we provide sufficient time for teachers to learn / to meet the different readiness of teachers in our midst?

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How to encourage all teachers to take ownership of personal growth? How to ensure sustainability of PD that facilitates changes in practice and positive school culture?

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•Ex-school PD experience
•In the cluster, there are NLC activities where 2 leaders ( 1 HOD + 1 LT) leads representatives from each school to engage in theme discussions, explorations, and practices based on the focused topics discussed by all HODs of the cluster . Afterwards, they share and learn from each other. Knowledgeable others may be invited to give theme presentations when necessary. The learning outcomes are brought back to each school's teachers for sharing, some brought the ideas to school PLC, they lead department teachers to practice.

• PLC is the main battleground for school-based professional development (PD), planned by SSD and Teacher Leaders using the "Seeding, Planning, Applying, Reflecting and Celebrating, SPAR@" framework developed by AST. Teachers in each PLC group discuss teaching needs during the seeding phase, review literature, and discuss good teaching practices. Based on specific circumstances, effective strategies are determined and implemented in classroom teaching practices. PLC time is set aside for sharing and reflection every week, with open classrooms available for peer observation. The year-long PLC activities conclude in Term 4, followed by sharing during the Xingnan Learning Day in January of the following year.

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The school has given teachers the autonomy to decide the direction of their professional development (PD) based on their needs. This is commendable as it allows teachers to take ownership of their own learning, have a proactive attitude, and meet their professional needs. However, there is room for improvement in the following areas:

1. Due to the fact that teachers may change levels they teach each year, the timeframe for PLC is typically limited to 1 year, which may restrict teachers from conducting more in-depth research and exploration on their chosen topics.

2. Some teachers solely rely on PLC as their PD platform, which may result in a disconnect with external best practices. For example, Differentiated Instruction (DI) where literature by Tomlinson is used as guidance, teachers may not integrate it effectivly with the STP. This poses a challenge for the leader in charge of PD, who needs to balance between meeting teachers' needs and providing targeted courses to make PD more systematic, professional and effective within teachers' busy schedule.

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Providing effective PD is not an easy task, 2 challenges as below:
1.Lecturer to have a keen understanding of teachers' learning needs, in-depth knowledge of MOE curriculum, relevant topics knowledge and teaching strategies, so as to make the PD systematic and effective.
2. Teachers in schools are very busy, how to attract teachers to look up from their busy work, be willing to accept new ideas, refresh their thinking, reflect and try in the classroom? It is a big challenge for teachers to have sufficient time for reflection and classroom experimentation.

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1. How to provide high-quality courses to motivate teachers to sign up and have ownership to learn?
2. How to ensure teachers practice and reflect on their classrooms after attending courses?

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The ALP is central to the courses that ELIS conducts as well as when working with teachers in different contexts. ELIS emphasises the need to be mindful of the ALPs when designing and enacting PD. In particular, it is important to role model these principles during PD sessions, so that we 'walk the talk'.

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I appreciated the explicit comparison between pedagogy and andragogy in the reading provided. It is important to bear this mind, as we have many years of experience in the classroom with students, so pedagogy will be more familiar and intuitive. Now that we work closely with teachers, andragogical principles has to be thoughtfully and meaningfully used.

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While teachers may want to learn and feel that there is a need to learn, many external factors may pose challenges, particularly as they try to balance the many demands on their time, energy and attention. The question is then, how do we design PD meaningfully, while keeping in mind these various challenges.

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TLP3 Leveraging the STP to design effective PD

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I believe strongly in the power of collaborative learning, especially when we understand the different needs and readiness levels of adult learners. I centre my own PL and of others through the mantra of 'malufirst, then malutogether. We need to walk the talk when trying out new ideas, invite critique, and then invite our colleagues to share their own experiences no matter what their capacity is. Teacher feel much safer too when we can also share our failures and challenges, so that they know they are not alone in the learning process.

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I always wonder how school-wide PL is coordinated across all subjects in school. While SLs usually set the direction, through the SSDs, and the TL team, I think sometimes teachers are caught between adhering to school-wide PD focus, versus their own learning needs, which may be beyond what the school focus covers.

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Finding the sweet spot. We know we can't meet every teacher's needs. Thus, pre-learning surveys, or analysis is key. I do this via vignettes, narratives and lesson sharing online so that I could identify common needs, as well as the unique needs of individual teachers. Surveys do help but what has worked for me so far are brief narratives on their challenges, successes and their learning needs for the PL session. Once that is done, its really down to negotiating with participants the learning outcomes, and opening possibilities for on-site PL or COP. Yet, I know we still can't meet everyone's needs all of the time.

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While Mrs Chua tells us that we should not over-provide, we also understand the nature of learning and the environment that our teachers operate in. They are very busy. How, then, can we effect change at the systemic level to protect teachers' entitlement for PL? Not only giving the time to learn, but the time to make sense of their learning, and apply them in their classrooms.

Is centralised PL sustainable? Should we focus on developing more 'experts' and TLs in our areas so that we can....breathe a bit more!!!

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With more schools moving into FSBB, some teachers told me that their days are rather long and as such they can't really attend some of the PD conducted by MTTs in the afternoon. Need to find some creative ways to engage teacher-leaders and help one another grow professionally.

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Comparing pedagogy, andragogy and heutagogy 

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Comparing pedagogy, andragogy and heutagogy 

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https://www.uis.edu/colrs/teaching-resources/foundations-good-teaching/pedagogy-andragogy-heutagogy