Is Ongoing Teacher Training Remolding Classroom Practices?
Is Ongoing Teacher Training
Remolding Classroom Practices?
Educationalists believe that teachers are those people who “exist for the well-being of their students” (Goodlad and McMannon (Ed.), 2004, p.96), and the way they work with them influences the quality of the learners’ outcomes and their achievement. Teachers are expected to reproduce their practices onto their learners; they play the key role in the implementation of the curricula, and they assume the responsibility for any school reform. In this respect, teachers may be considered the agents of change in their schools and in their societies.
Believing in the need for educational change to cope with the progress the world is experiencing, the National Center for Educational Research and Development (CERD) in Lebanon commenced a new national curriculum on the threshold of the new millennium. Back then, a number of short term workshops were administered to teachers of different disciplines to train them on using acknowledged up to date teaching methods with the intention of remolding their classroom practices. In 2004, CERD, in collaboration with the World Bank and the French Embassy in Lebanon, launched the Ongoing Teacher Training Project (OTTP) to ensure that teachers across the country would have access to training that sustains their growth and professional development.
Since then, teacher trainers were selected to put the project in motion, and teacher training centers have always been busy accommodating for varieties of workshops to upgrade teachers’ skills across the country with a range of techniques that can easily be implemented in their classrooms. However, despite the efforts already invested in this project, hardly any comparable efforts have been invested in monitoring its effectiveness. As a teacher trainer, while I acknowledge the vital role this project is playing at the level of teacher professional development, I question the ultimate effectiveness of such training in the absence of data pertaining to the level of implementation of the new teaching techniques in school settings.
The Necessity for Teachers’ Professional Development
Before the advent of educational technology and the changes that information technology necessitated especially in concepts related to teaching and learning, teachers were regarded as the sages that students looked up to as they learn from them. The new approaches to education have changed this view and have transformed teachers to guides who direct students’ approaches to learning and leave traces on their way of thinking. Above all, teachers are now expected to equip learners with the cognitive skills and strategies they need during their process of learning which in itself prepares them for life.
According to Goodlad (1997) education is an ever-present phenomena that pervades in an individual’s daily life, and its role is to “balance the tension between personal autonomy and responsible citizenship” (p. 20). This view on education suggests that educators too are all lifelong learners who must undergo continual development. They ought to be remolding their perception of teaching to cope with changes and prepare their students to acquire strategies and skills necessary for growth and achievement.
This requires that teachers themselves be equipped with the strategies that help them deal with students. Even though teachers learn as they reflect on their practices in the classrooms, they also need to be exposed to the theory and new techniques which they can use during their practice. As such, ongoing support for teachers is vital if successful outcomes are to be achieved at a school level. Ganser (2000) contends that pedagogical knowledge supports academic knowledge to meet the diverse students’ needs in a constructive manner, and having accessibility to activities and resources is paramount for teacher development which has to be job-embedded and which has direct effect on classroom practices.
Since teachers’ professional development that includes focus on skills makes instruction more effective (Ganser, 2000), teacher professionalism, the body of knowledge that teachers acquire, and the level of skills they possess as well as their commitment, become crucial to training programs. Moreover, the teachers’ ability to make decisions independently and to adapt to situations and be able to function adequately according to their learners’ needs, abilities and preferences, are bound to surface and call for attention and strategic intervention.
The Lebanese Case
Such views require more structured thinking of the development of teachers in Lebanon, their professional growth, and their direct effect on their teaching approaches. This necessitates a review of the quality of teacher education that should prepare teachers to hold those major responsibilities in an era of information technology that requires skillful management of knowledge. This might be one of the reasons that have made the launching of the OTTP a hit in the educational society.
We have to realize that short term workshops that instruct teachers what to do are ineffective and do not lead to change if consistent follow-up and support are not available (Ganser, 2000; Ponte, 2005). True to its original objective, the OTTP started with a unique perspective. It sought to allow teachers in Lebanon to move beyond their own schools and connect with teacher educators and other teachers of the same discipline in order to gain the power of the outside knowledge they need for their own classroom practices. The OTTP then raised the hopes of the educational community that a new era of growth and development may have started. It seemed that the training that some teachers participated in when the new national curriculum was implemented in its initial phase has implanted the seeds that are to sprout and mark a new era in the educational development in Lebanon.
Given that educational development cannot be a prepackaged model delivered to teachers, and that it is a process that needs planning, time, and practice, the trainers at the teacher training centers have dug deep to work on innovations in teacher preparation programs. They were perceptive that teachers need both the theoretical background and the practical tools to help them work smarter (Hammerness et al, 2005), so they tried to design the activities that promote teachers understanding of how to cope with the changing world around them. They aimed at raising the standards of teachers' abilities to be capable of steering their own profession since it is basic to develop a vision for teachers’ practices, and a disposition about how to practically use this knowledge with students.
However, the concern that has surfaced after four years of work on the OTTP is that the level of progress that schools all over the country have achieved in classroom practices may have fallen below expectations. In a comparable context, Lieberman and Miller (1999) cite the difficulty teachers go through while linking what they have learned to practice; and at the level of the country, it seems that data about direct monitoring of school development as a result of implementation of the methods acquired during the workshops pertains mainly to results of official exams which do not reflect their actual professional development.
Reports submitted by educational inspectors who visit schools, and who partly attend some of the workshops held at the teacher training centers, are never communicated to the trainers who need feedback to reconsider and improve their training practices that enhance classroom implementation. The major source of feedback teacher trainers depend on is the trainees’ reflection on their own experiences with the new methods- bearing in mind that the number of participants stays minimal if compared to the total number of public school teachers in the country. Thus, in the absence of statistics about the expected change in classroom practices, the OTTP does not seem to integrate in the educational system, and criteria for evaluating its effectiveness still lag behind.
Possible Steps for Implementation
Based on my personal experience with teacher training, I design activities (see Appendix A for criteria) that have been proven effective with students before they are to be shared with teachers in ways that “facilitate retrieval and action” (Hammerness et al, 2005, p.366). The aim is to ensure that such activities are easily implemented in the classroom and they enable students to acquire the strategies that lead to skill development (see Appendix B for sample activities).
The topics dealt with during the workshops focus on developing techniques that enhance learners’ critical thinking. These techniques address language-specific activities that involve different language skills and areas; study skills are emphasized through training teachers how to plan, manage classroom instruction and coordinate within or across subject matters; the role of motivation and its effects on learning is highlighted separately and throughout the different activities. Such topics and activities are introduced and practiced within the sessions to give trainees selected clues for implementing them in their own classes.
However, because of “the isolated nature of teaching” (Wisniewski, 2004, p. 188), I strongly believe that each teacher ought to have the freedom to shape what to teach according to their own understanding of the concepts. However, the risk here is that while teachers may be aware of different teaching strategies and techniques, any inadequate critical analysis of the technique or the content may impede their implementation. Thus, through OTTP, teachers of like minds and probably similar experiences are trained to collaborate, expand their repertoire and receive the necessary intellectual stimulation that reflects on classroom achievement since individual efforts of trainers or trainees may not be sufficient in this respect.
Circulating teaching techniques and classroom activities and making them accessible to wider varieties of teachers can be done through observation and mentoring. Lieberman and Miller (1999) emphasize the fact that teachers learn by observing as well as by being observed. Teachers learn by mentoring others, and from being engaged in creative tasks that deepen and expand their experiences. In this way, classroom practices become shared experiences that are accessible to others and classroom implementation of varieties of techniques is guaranteed.
Resorting to observation and mentoring ought to be considered as an option that trainers can employ as follow-ups for workshops to ensure the effectiveness of their work at the training centers. By observing and being observed students reap the benefits because both trainer and trainee are collaborating to produce what serves the learners best.
Final Reflection
Better quality learning requires “quality teachers” who are aware of what, how, and why to work on teaching techniques and develop students’ skills. Consequently, in order to beget the much needed educational reform in Lebanon’s educational system, the need for teacher guidance and mentoring will persist, and the need for OTTP will never become obsolete. Teachers’ professional development needs to be monitored to manage and enhance students' achievement, and in the absence of sufficient reflection on their experiences, teachers may not be able to bring their knowledge to the appropriate professional level that ensures adequate implementation and consequently better quality learning and skill development on the learners’ side.
For this reason, a different level of communication ought to be established among the educational community and the administrative body at the ministry of education. The ministry of education has to appoint a body of professionals whose responsibility is to establish a fair and sound system of accountability that does not threaten teachers and hinder their work at schools. Such a system has to provide surety for implementation of techniques that serve students’ growth while learning.
This could be done by involving teachers in clarifying standards, designing curriculum, developing rubrics, and analyzing student work. Such activities strengthen teachers’ skills and professional knowledge and consequently improve students’ learning.
We all aim at bringing up better skilled generations who can cope with the changing world and serve the country at their best capabilities. So pooling our ideas as educators and implementing what is workable for students will in the end secure acceptable standards in teaching and learning.
Wisniewski (2004) says “Ideas are like seeds… No one knows which [ones] are powerful enough to influence the future of our profession” (p.189). In this sense, no matter what ideas are circulated within meetings and workshops, the prospective success of the OTTP will remain a bone of contention among the educational community as long as students’ actual development and achievement are not practically and clearly assessed and acknowledged.
References
- Ganser, T. (2000). An ambitious vision of professional development for teachers. In National Association of Secondary School Principals. NASSP Bulletin 84(618) pp.6-7.
- Goodlad, J.I. (1997). In Praise of Education. New York: Teachers College Press.
- Goodlad, J. I. & McMannon T. J. (Eds.). The Teaching Career. Amsterdam Avenue, New York: Teachers College Press.
- Hammerness, K. et al. (2005). How teachers learn and develop. In L. Darling-Hammond and J. Bransford (Eds.). Preparing Teachers for a Changing World: What Teachers Should Learn and Be Able to Do (pp.358-389). San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, A Wiley Imprint.
- Lieberman, A., & Miller, L., (1999). Teachers Transforming Their World and Their Work (chapter 4). Amsterdam Avenue, New York: Teachers College Press.
- Ponte, P. (2005). A critically constructed concept of action research as a tool for professional development of teachers. Journal of In-Service Education 31(2) pp. 273-295.
- Wisniewski, R. (2004). Today is tomorrow. In J.I. Goodlad and T. MacMannon (Eds.), The Teaching Career (pp.184-220). New York: Teachers College Press, Colombia University.