Evidence Set 3: Professional Engagement
Context
Professional relationships are a critical component of good teaching, as our colleagues help us to mutually develop our teaching (Farrell, 2001). Professional development is an imperative part of teaching as we continue to adapt to the ever-changing needs of society and younger generation. It is necessary for all teachers to have the tools and resources to further their own learning as well as professional relationships that can relied upon for support, further learning through observation, and constructs such as professional learning communities.
Professional Learning Communities are another important aspect of the professional engagement requirements of teaching. Whether casual or established within the school community, engagement of colleagues in this manner is supported by evidence to be an integral part of educational reform. The individual and collective knowledge, skills and capacity of teachers and school staff is proven to promote and improve student learning (Stoll, 2006).Over the past year this has been my primary focus for my personal development.
Action
One goal I set out was to improve my professional engagement in staff meetings. I attend every staff meeting with the intention to gain a better understanding of the school community and I accepted the opportunity to attend a curriculum review debrief meeting where my mentor gave me the opportunity to provide my own input. My mentor is new to her role as the English Curriculum Leader and values my input as a pre-service teacher, asking me to draw on current teachings from the university to enhance the curriculum quality and delivery, and also asking for my opinion and advice on the reading lists. I relied on my understanding of the SACE requirements as well as my own personal learning to recommend texts and discuss options for curriculum delivery. See Figure 1 for minutes from this meeting.
Figure 1: A screenshot of the minutes from the curriculum review staff meeting I attended. FA: 6.1, 6.2, 6.3
As a result of staff meetings, one applied technique our teaching team adopted was the use of ‘Positive Education Activities’ in the morning homeroom. These are implemented as a way of creating a positive environment, promoting well-being, and the feeling of belonging and getting students to work together and practise reflection. These activites were based off the PERMAH framework, which takes well-being, which can be seen as vague and abstract, and transforms it into 'pillars' which can be measured, and have obvious and tangible outcomes from using techniques to work on the indivudal pillars (Allen, 2022).
Figure 2: A screenshot of the positive education activites based on the PERMAH framework, which was implemented as a result of professional development sessions. FA 6.4
In order to assist my colleagues with behaviour management, I follow organisational procedures in terms of documentation in order to provide observations of behaviour to support further planning and intervention for this behaviour. Using the procedures and policies put in place by the organisation gives me and my colleagues a sense of accountability and they are put in place to help us abide by legislative requirements. A colleague made a request for me to document behaviours in the classroom from certain children and I wrote up a report as per my school’s policy to assist in communicating with the parents, other teachers, and school leadership, as seen in Figure 3.
Figure 3: Incident report written to support colleagues in overcoming challenging behaviours. FA: 7.2,7.3
The secondary education setting is one that lacks parent involvement in my experience, so to ensure I have open and honest communication with parents and caregivers, I ensure I always introduce myself in a way that is easy to understand and also shows my passion for the curriculum area. This helped parents and caregivers who were intimidated by education due to personal reasons, an accessible introduction to what their student was learning about.
Figure 4 : A screenshot of the SEQTA lesson organiser from the parents’ view. Outlined are my lesson intentions, success criteria and lesson checklist to aid students working from home. In the bottom half of the screenshot is the introduction to parent. FA: 7.3
In order to keep my teaching techniques and my knowledge of current legislative, organisational, and administrative requirements, I am a member of the Australian Education Union (SA Branch). I keep up to date with all email communications as well as advertised workshops and seminars on their website, to identify professional development opportunities. I have also previously engaged in SAATI (The South Australian Association of Teachers of Italian) as a provisional member in my studies.
Figure 5: My acceptance into the AEU (SA Branch). FA: 7.4
Results
My engagement in staff meetings, curriculum reviews and other staff discussions has enhanced the techniques I use in my classroom, as I have implemented a Positive Education focus in my homeroom classes. My homeroom has started to come out of their shells and be more engaged in the activities as the weeks go and I am able to compare techniques with my fellow homeroom teachers as we see different students interact with the activities. We have since refined the activities to be more play-based as our students find these easier, I apply an appropriate amount of cognitive challenge to encourage higher-achieving students to participate.
I have built a solid rapport with my colleagues as well as parents and caregivers in terms of behaviour management. A parent commented that my introduction sent out to parents made her feel at ease as her child did not cope well with change, and this communication allowed them the chance to prepare for the change in staff. The requested report mentioned in the action section of this set was used for a conversation with the students, their parents and leaders and we devised a plan moving forward for the involved students to make better choices, and students were encouraged to broaden their friendships. The students responded well and were apologetic when they were able to see their behaviours written out. This situation provided me with an insightful perspective into different procedures teachers can follow when dealing with issue behaviours. As a result of this activity, I have worked with my colleagues to revise our procedures in the classroom, including removing the child and giving them an opportunity to de-escalate before a situation continues to an inappropriate level.
I continue to be involved in the Australian Education Union resources and have implemented some of the ideas available on their website to my teaching, my personal well-being and my relationships with staff and colleagues.
Evaluation
Professional Engagement is an essential part of the teaching profession. Relationships with my colleagues are a huge priority for me as I transition through the stage of my career. My goal to become more involved as an early career teacher in staff meetings and discussions led me to provide valued contributions to the curriculum review of my current school and be more valued as a member of the teaching team. My increased involvement has provided me with the opportunity to critically reflect on my own teaching as I now understand the techniques, perspectives, and experiences of my colleagues.
In the future, my priority in terms of professional engagement would be to involve parents and caregivers more in the classroom. I am considerate of current constraints on parents in terms of time, however, I would aim to plan my lessons with parents’ involvement in mind, where appropriate. Research confirms that parent involvement is linked to a range of student achievement and engagement indicators such as improving grades, improving attendance, increased homework completion, and lower dropout rates in the secondary years. The research also suggests that parent involvement in homework activities is the most effective type of involvement (Smith, 2011). With this in mind, I would try to implement activities in class that could be taken home and easily involve parents, while being considerate that not all parents have the luxury of time to complete such activities.
Standards
6.1 Identify and plan professional learning needs.
During the curriculum review discussions, our teaching team were able to identify areas for improvement that were required for the teaching staff. Areas of improvement were noted for further exploration for further Professional Development sessions.
Figure 1: I identified my professional learning needs and appropriately chose a session to suit my goals.
6.2 Engage in professional learning and improve practice.
I engaged in professional learning workshops on ‘Positive Education.’
Figure 1: As above
6.3 Engage with colleagues and improve practice.
By working with my mentor teacher and the teachers in my office, we identified areas for improvement during teaching area meetings which were then complied for use in the curriculum review.
Figure 1: As above
6.4 Apply professional learning and improve student learning.
Design of Positive Education activities which are then implemented into our homeroom classes as a form of encouraging engagement and community.
Figure 2: The application of my learning in the professional development session, as a positive education focus in pastoral care.
7.1 Meet professional ethics and responsibilities.
While I have no relevant evidence for this, I have upheld the code of conduct in every position I have held, and I meet the requirements of teacher registration.
7.2 Comply with legislative, administrative, and organisational requirements.
I complied with the requirements of my administration team and the school by completing the necessary documentation of inappropriate behaviour.
Figure 3: Complied with organisational requirements to complete documentation about behaviours in the classroom.
7.3 Engage with the parents/carers.
Use agreed-upon programs such as SEQTA to communicate changes in the classroom to parents and caregivers. In this case, I notified parents I would be the teacher for the next 6 weeks of the term, which allowed parents an opportunity to engage with student learning as well as understand the changes in their child’s learning environment. I also wrote reports about behavior to support parent and leadership conversations.
Figure 3: Complied with organisational requirements to complete documentation about behaviours in the classroom, used in communication with parents.
Figure 4: A screenshot of my communication to parents at the start of the unit.
7.4 Engage with professional teaching networks and broader communities.
Figure 5: Engaging with The Australian Education Union, including reading all free communications and regularly identifying if there are any new workshops that would be beneficial to my teaching and personal learning.
References
Allen, K.-A., Furlong, M. J., Vella-Brodrick, D., & Suldo, S. M. (2022). Handbook of Positive Psychology in Schools: Supporting Process and Practice. Taylor and Francis. https://doi.org/10.4324/9781003013778
Smith, J., Wohlstetter, P., Kuzin, C. A., & De Pedro, K. (2011). Parent involvement in urban charter schools: New strategies for increasing participation. School Community Journal, 21(1), 71-94.
Stoll, L., Bolam, R., McMahon, A. et al. Professional Learning Communities: A Review of the Literature. J Educ Change 7, 221–258 (2006). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10833-006-0001-8
T Farrell, Critical friendships: colleagues helping each other develop, ELT Journal, Volume 55, Issue 4, October 2001, Pages 368–374, https://doi.org/10.1093/elt/55.4.368
