“Teachers who continue to learn throughout their professional careers display the humility of knowing that they don’t know, which is the highest form of thinking they will ever learn”
-Dr. Art Costa (2008)
It is important that our teachers, especially beginning teachers, practice continuous learning. One way to promote life-long learning or continuous learning is through professional development. Interestingly, Dr. Costa (2008) also points out that reflective practices promote professional development. Hence, my previous post about reflective practices is still relevant and connected to this new post.
I decided to focus my last e-journal entry for this course on the professional development of teachers. The main reason is that I see this topic as crucial for me as a future educator and also for the existing ones. Again, I will write this journal addressing our existing teachers as well as our future ones and for myself (Just imagine that I am also talking to myself).
Seminars. This is the most common professional development activity that teachers are required to attend to, right? How do your seminars or even workshops happen? Would you mind to take a short time to reflect on the activities you have experienced in your seminars/workshops?
Lectures. Sounds very familiar right? This is the most common methodology when I am thinking of seminars. I have searched the meaning of seminar and google dictionary says “a conference or other meeting for discussion or training.” The meaning states “discussion or training”, yes, there may be the usual open forum where the participants are asking the resource speaker about the topic. And normally, a few only asks. There is no much collaborative and effective discussion since the usual authoritative approach of speaking and program are present.
Well, I am not against that much of the lecture mode in professional development but I am not into it. For me, effective professional development promotes “re-imagining” as what Sachs (2007) has insisted. Though there may be a combination of many practices, I find this concept much relevant and effective. According to her, continuous professional development as re-imagining is transformative, (Sachs, 2007) meaning, there will be a lot of challenges in the existing schemas of the teachers and it would require them to reflect and transform their practices and even their own schemas.
The approach in our typical seminars, though may provide new information to our teachers, are not that transformative. Yes, this may seem to help our teachers, even me, on having factual knowledge. But for me, it is more important that the procedural and metacognitive skills of our teachers are being developed.
Now, how can we do that?
Simple. I propose 3 major skills or efforts that a teacher must do to promote continuous professional development and thus, life-long learning. These are collaboration, metacognition, and participation. I think by these 3 main acts of a teacher, life-long learning is promoted.
Collaboration. There are varied ways of collaboration. In fact, Dr. Costa (2008) promotes collaboration on almost more than half of her six domains of continuous Inquiry. I don’t know if I have the license to share with you the texts of Dr. Costa but I would suggest that you see it yourself. You just search Teachers as Continuous Learners. Anyways, we teachers want our students to collaborate with each other. Why? Because we want to make their learning experiences effective right? Hence, the same goes for us, teachers. It is important that we continuously collaborate with others, from colleagues to our students. How? First, you open your mind on endless possibilities regarding teaching and learning. Be humble as what Dr. Costa (2008) has said. Effectively communicate with your colleagues about the problems they undergo and try to help each other to solve that problem. Be a teacher who continuously seeks improvement. Lastly, interact and collaborate with your students, their parents, and even other community members. We will learn a lot by merely considering the thoughts, ideas, and even knowledge of our learners and other people around us. I know how evident competition for promotion is in your office. But this must not lead to compromising our own personal development and even the learner’s learning.
One thing I could also add here is to consider attending training that promotes collaborative discovery and construction of knowledge. This is not to promote but I know a company that really provides a unique teacher’s training experience. Luckily, I am part of the pioneering group of this emerging company. In fact, I am studying their unique kind of approach in teaching. So, see it yourself. Kindly visit Balaiwari PH website.
Metacognition. I really like what Dr. Costa (2008) has said in his paper–“A teacher metacognitive processes may be the most important component in his or her professional portfolio of skills and awareness”. It is imperative that our teachers know how to think on his/her own thinking. Basically, it is about knowing your own learning and knowing your own cognitive capabilities and improvement. It is an ability that is developed through critical reflection on your own experience. Hence, we will also go back from what I have discussed in my last post. In addition, I think this is also developed through critical and creative thinking of a teacher. I believe that if you want to develop your students become critical thinkers, you must also be a critical thinker. Hence, if you want your students to acquire metacognitive skill, you must then practice metacognition. And this one is one of the many skills that I am still practicing. Practice improves our skill. So start or continue practicing.
Participation. Lastly, participate. Participate in every learning opportunities you can afford to attend. In fact, every teaching class is a great opportunity, you just have to critically participate in the construction and discovery of learning by yourself and by your colleagues. If there are discussions regarding your students and teaching practices, participate. Participation is not equal to attendance. It is more of being active, collaborative, and contributive. It is much like joining a discussion while having your own perspective and considering the other perspective. In fact, in every class, I would like to participate with the co-construction of knowledge. Perhaps, being a facilitator of a learning experience is an act of participation. You cannot participate in your student’s learning experience by lecturing. Never! 🙂 Instead, you can participate in collaborative discussion, inquiry, construction, and discovery of knowledge.
There are a lot of opportunities for professional development. You can see from what I have shared that professional development is not only acquired through formal and authoritative events for professional development. It is mostly acquired through everyday collaboration, participation, and metacognitive practices. Hence I suggest for our teachers and even for prospective teachers like me that we should treat our everyday experiences in our school, classes, and daily interaction with other people as an opportunity for learning. Just remember that this opportunity will be nothing if we do not put our attention to learning if we do not collaborate well, if we do not participate actively to the learning experience, and if we do not reflect.
I hope that somehow, I was able to share all my thoughts in this courses. Thank you for tuning in. I hope you find the same interest in my other post. God bless us all!
Online Life-Long Learning 