EMERGENT THEORY: "IN THEIR OWN WORDS"

For many teachers a “theory” is the preserve of academics, intellectuals or those who are removed from the classroom experience. Yet every teacher is driven by a personal theory of how their professional world is constructed. Without that theory there could be no connection between intention, action and outcome. Our personal theories are shaped by a complex amalgam of parts of formal educational theories, professional experience, ‘common sense', received wisdom, educational policies and a wide variety of other influences. We are often only tacitly aware of our own personal educational theory unless we are questioned or otherwise challenged to reflect upon our beliefs.

By attempting to explain – explicitly – the collective values, beliefs and opinions of practitioners we believe we can establish an emergent theory of how we can best develop the teaching and learning process in East Lothian .

In order to present this emergent strategy in a meaningful manner each element will be presented discretely but linked with other associated elements . By presenting the ideas in this way it is hoped that a much clearer link can be established between this emergent theory and eventual action strategies . It should be noted here that almost all respondents placed great stress upon the impact of culture on teaching and learning. We believe that the following elements combine to form a strong cultural foundation upon which the implementation phase can be built, supported and evolved. For that reason there is no separate description under the heading of Culture.

1. PROMOTE A NON-DEFICIT MODEL

In the words of the respondents the key to promoting quality teaching is to adopt a non-deficit model towards teachers' practice . All too often the Scottish psyche focuses upon the negative whereas it was agreed by all respondents that the complexity of the teaching process is always under-estimated . A key principle of this theory is that the teaching process is a very complex and sophisticated activity, which requires incredible skill to perform effectively .

2. UNAPOLOGETICALLY FOCUS UPON TEACHING – NOT TEACHING AND LEARNING

It was felt that too often we focus upon the notion of teaching and learning, whereas if we are truly serious about our profession our central focus should be upon the teaching process without any apologies , whilst at the same time recognising that our place as learners is of vital importance in enabling progress to be made. No other profession seems to have a problem with recognising that their own practice is of prime importance if the service they provide is to be improved.

For that reason, the major theme of the project is to promote outstanding teaching in East Lothian .

3. CELEBRATE DIVERSITY – THERE'S NO SUCH THING AS “BEST PRACTICE”

It was recognised that two teachers can teach in adjoining rooms whilst adopting very different teaching methodologies yet both achieve outstanding outcomes . If our central purpose is concerned with outcome we should enable people to find different ways of enabling that outcome to be achieved . For that reason this theory will attempt to celebrate diversity as opposed to seeking to impose uniformity . Teachers in East Lothian believe that quality does not equate to sameness and that we should seek to reinforce the notion that students need to experience different forms of teaching, otherwise it is unlikely their full potential will be reached. Notions about “best practice” immediately suggest that anything else must be something less than best!

4. TEACHING AS AN INTERACTIVE FEEDBACK LOOP

A definition of Formative assessment suggests that it should be “an interactive feedback loop” between the teacher and the student. All respondents felt that we needed to explore ways in which students could close that loop , i.e. too often the feedback is a one way street i.e. from teacher to student. Whereas it was felt that teachers have much to gain from feedback about their practice from the students .

5. “TELL ME HONESTLY HOW I'M DOING”

There was deep dissatisfaction amongst some respondents about the failure of Staff Development and Review Procedures to meet the needs of those who wanted a more honest external reflection of their practice than the current approach which merely focussed upon what they had done and their development needs, as opposed to any qualitative discussion of their practice .

6. HAVE FAITH

Faith here can be defined as the having a fundamental belief in the willingness of teachers as professionals who are committed to improving their practice. By having faith in teachers' ability we start to create a much more positive culture within which people can explore and develop their practice, as opposed to a culture which reinforces the negative and is seeking to establish blame wherever possible.

7. PERSONALITY/THE MAGIC INGREDIENT/THE HIDDEN SOMETHING

Every respondent sought to define that ‘magic ingredient' which made some teachers outstanding practitioners. They all used words such as ‘personality', ‘charisma', that ‘indefinable something'. As we explored this emerging theme through the research phase it became apparent that many of the characteristics which we were describing could belong to broad the concept of emotional intelligence . Nevertheless, the question arising from such a perception is whether emotional intelligence is a fixed ability, or whether we can do something to help teachers develop their own emotional intelligence

8. STICKING POINTS

It was recognised that teachers often make rapid progress over their first few years in teachin g but that progress slows and eventually, for many teachers, plateaus . The key intention of our East Lothian strategy will be to enable teachers to continue with their professional development by overcoming the obstacles to change which often occur in the course of a teacher's career and which often result in their professional development ‘sticking'.

9. USE LEVERS – GO WITH THE FLOW – CREATE A MOMENTUM

By adopting a positive perspective on teachers' willingness to change, we should seek to identify levers for change which make the best use of teachers' interests. By ‘going with the flow' we make best use of people's innate professional momentum, as opposed to confronting them with alternative models of practice which are very unlikely to be adopted. As we create a critical mass we generate a momentum which is likely to take every member of the community forwards together.

10. DECONSTRUCTION, REMODELLING AND IMPLEMENTATION

Teachers and Headteachers often feel overcome by external initiatives which do not appear to have any coherence, yet which often appear to be framed within the same area or reference. It would be our intention to deconstruct each external initiative and to establish areas of commonality. In this way it is much more likely that real action can be derived.

11. FIRE-AIM-FIRE - ACTION THEN MODIFICATION

As identified earlier in this paper, generic initiatives relating to teaching and learning are perceived to have had very little impact . However, small-scale direct projects such as formative assessment, mental maths and other projects directly focussed on changing a relatively small aspect of one's practice are more highly regarded. Consequently, a key aspect of our strategy will be to adopt small-scale projects focussed upon teachers' practice. By using a ‘fire-aim-fire' approach it is more likely that people will be won over by the change process as they can see it having a beneficial effect in their practice as opposed to the lengthy ‘aim-aim-aim-fire' approach which often is lost in rhetoric and planning before any actions take place.

12. NO SUCH THING AS CONTINUOUS PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT

We recognise that the notions of continuous professional development is unlikely over a 40 year career. Therefore, teachers need opportunities to consolidate their skills without feeling any associated guilt . We should encourage people to experiment with their practice but also challenge the notion of teachers becoming ‘stuck' in their practice. We should explore a variety of means in which we can overcome such obstacles to change whilst recognising that these opportunities should happen within existing budgets.

13. ROLE MODELS

Every respondent reflected upon the importance of having had a significant role model in shaping their professional practice. A key element in the relationship between an individual and a role model in the notion of shared values. Yet it is important to reflect upon the feeling that someone who could be a good role model for one person would not necessarily suitable for another. The fundamental principle is that people need to select their own role model. We believe that we should seek to establish a means whereby individuals can be helped to select their own role model from a group of volunteers within East Lothian .

14. FUNNEL FUNDING – HOUR GLASS APPROACH

So many initiatives are derived from separate sources within the Scottish Executive. These initiatives often come with associated ring-fenced funding. To simplify the process for the purposes of this theory these initiatives are then dropped /parachuted onto the Local Authority and expected to be delivered, without any reference necessarily being made to any other initiative. Many of these initiatives form a Venn diagram, in that they often overlap to a greater or lesser extent . This results in unnecessary repetition – a guaranteed source of irradiation and despair amongst teachers.

It was apparent from respondents that we need to adopt a much more systemic perspective towards the implementation of these initiatives. A metaphor which was supplied during the interview phase was one of a funnel or hourglass. In other words, we should attempt to collect these external initiatives in a funnel or open topped hourglass. These initiatives should go through the “deconstruction phase” as described earlier in this paper and then funnelled into coherent and “joined up” actions, which then open out into the wider schools' arena.

15. TEAM BUILDING

A key area which was constantly referred to was the notion of collective or team achievement. Working within a school is fundamentally a group activity and although the teaching process itself can often be characterised as an isolated professional experience the reality is often the reverse. By capitalising on the collective enterprise of teachers we believe that significant change can take place within East Lothian . Under-pinning this strategy is a belief and faith in our teachers.

16. PROFESSIONAL CURIOSITY

We believe that given the creation of a professionally curious culture under-pinned by a supportive and connected culture that huge potential can be released within East Lothian . By promoting an action research culture where teachers are encouraged, trained and supported to undertake research in to their own and their schools practice that a virtuous cycle of development can be established and sustained.

17. REACTIVE OR PROACTIVE STAFF DEVELOPMENT?

A recurring theme in interview phase was the feeling that centralised CPD provision made a very good attempt to meet the needs of teachers but that it lacked a vision or focus. It was suggested that much more could be achieved by a staff development strategy which concentrated on fulfilling the strategic needs of the authority – as opposed to meeting the diverse needs of individuals.

18. PROFESSIONAL WISDOM

The concept of professional wisdom is foreign to may programmes to improve the teaching process. All respondents mentioned that teaching expertise is a complex combination of formal educational theory, emotional intelligence, subject knowledge and wisdom. For us the definition of wisdom is best represented by the accumulated experience. However, it does not necessarily follow that many years teaching leads to professional wisdom. To make best use of experience the successful practitioner will be continually modifying and developing their practice in response to how they see children responding to their practice . We believe there is a need to re-invest in the notion of professional wisdom , which in turn will rewarded by an active engagement with the change process by more experienced teachers who often ‘hunker down' when faced with external initiatives.

19. A RISING BOTTOM LINE

Everybody seems to understand the idea of the bottom line in terms of acceptable practice . For example, there is a bottom line in relation to classroom communication skills. Some people will be well above the line whilst others may be closer to the line but whose practice is still acceptable.

One of the problems with teachers who ‘stick' is that the bottom line is constantly rising, although not necessarily in a predictable or smooth manner. This phenomenon means that a teacher's practice, which was once deemed acceptable , may be overtaken by a rising bottom line.

20. KNOWLEDGE UPGRADES

The speed of the emergence and discovery of ever-expanding knowledge about the neuropsychology of the brain and the associated impact upon teaching methodology makes it almost impossible for an individual teacher to keep up to date.

There is a need to protect teachers from invalid and unreliable educational research, which has the potential to influence practice in an inappropriate manner. At the same time there is a need to explore, filter and present valid, reliable and manageable new knowledge about the brain in a concise and meaningful manner, which teachers can consider integrating into their daily practice.

21. THE STEPPING STONE APPROACH

There was a common recognition that the initiatives related to teaching and learning, which have been most successful, have been focussed, and relatively self-contained, e.g. formative assessment, mental maths. This links with the Fire-aim-Fire principle in that teachers want to take concrete action then reflect as opposed to spending huge amounts of time given over to working out a solution, planning its implementation, and only then get down to action. In this way we should not be afraid to use off-the-shelf products , which we use strategically to initiate change in teachers practice . In this way it would be possible for different clusters and schools to adopt a variety of projects, relevant to their own needs but which fit within our overall strategic intent. In this way we can use discrete initiatives as ‘stepping stones', where they can be used to good effect but what matters is how they help us to move forwards. How