Training the Teacher Trainers

1
Learning and Skills Council Skills for Life
Quality Initiative 2005-06
Training the Teacher Trainers One Day Event
Observer and Assessor Training
2
Aims and Objectives
OA.1

• Aims
• For participants to
• further develop observer and assessor accuracy in
  assessing assignments
• enhance observer and assessor effectiveness in
  identifying trainee teacher strengths and areas
  for development.
• Session Objectives
• By the end of the session participants will have
• practised giving effective oral and written
  feedback on observation
• experienced the process of standardising feedback
  on written assignments
• identified key good and bad practice points when
  giving oral feedback on observation of teaching.

3
Being observed
OA.2

• In pairs, discuss
• when you were last observed teaching?
• what kind of observation was it?
• what did you learn about effective teaching?
• comment on the experience of receiving
  feedback.

4
Comments from Ofsted
OA.5.1

• Trainees generally benefit from constructive
  feedback on their written work Annotations on
  draft assignments give productive guidance on how
  trainees can improve their work. Feedback from
  mentors is of more variable quality, and
  sometimes lacks sharpness or fails to set clear
  targets. The effectiveness of feedback on
  teaching is often undermined by an over-reliance
  on a tick-list approach, with little use of more
  detailed professional comments.
• Ofsted (2006), para. 26 The initial training of
  further education teachers

5
Stages of Learning
resource no. OA.7.1

• Stage 1 Unconscious incompetence
• Stage 2 Conscious incompetence
• Stage 3 Conscious competence
• Stage 4 Unconscious competence
• Taken from
• Reay, D. G. Understanding How People Learn
• (The Competent Trainers Toolkit Series), Kogan
  Page.

6
Randall and Thornton
OA.7.2a

• Quotations about Observation and Feedback
• All observation, inasmuch as it involves
  interpretation, involves some level of judgement.
  If we examine the practice cycles in terms of a
  helping cycle, the term non-judgemental means
  that we value the teachers views and ideas that
  we use them as the starting point of the process
  of helping. We may well judge that certain
  things done by the teacher are wrong, misguided,
  and we may tell them so .. However, we will
  attempt to provide such feedback in a
  non-punitive manner.
• continued

7
Randall and Thornton
OA.7.2b

• Quotations about Observation and Feedback
  (continued)
• On pussyfooting and clobbering
• The advisor should be honest and truthful in
  giving feedback, but this feedback should be free
  of any hint that it is in any way punitive. It
  is not the teacher who is being examined but the
  way that the lesson was taught. A problem in
  the lesson is not a fault in the teacher and
  this needs to be clearly signalled to the
  teacher.
• Quotations taken from
• Randall, M. and Thornton, B. (2001) Advising and
  Supporting Teachers, CUP