Tony Burkin Session

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Professional Capital By Michael Fullan
Types of learning
Metanoia - moving above and beyond what we are thinking. Shifting thinking to a higher level. Transformational learning - Light bulb moments. Can be challenging. New mindset.
Orthodox - learning ‘stuff’, becoming better at doing things. Informational learning, useful but not overly exciting.
What is teaching practice?
pedagogy
strategies
everything that happens during the day in and out of school
reflecting
interacting with parents, staff, kids
relationships
mindset
not just in the classroom
mistakes/changes
the what, the how and the why e.g. we all teach recount writing but the how varies

teaching practice vs professional practice
teaching practice
professional practice
  • positive behaviour management
  • curriculum knowledge
  • instructional practices
  • formative assessment
  • in the classroom mainly
  • Ministry of Ed directed
  • outside of school/community image
  • outside of the classroom
  • code of ethics
  • admin side
  • reflecting
  • PD
  • open practice
  • high standards
  • journaling
  • critiquing practice
  • reflect on and test practices
  • planning
  • Teachers Council directed
Interesting, food for thought when thinking about teaching practice vs professional practice. Each lean on each other to be successful. All part of working as a team and providing high quality education to all children. I think when we are professional we are more productive teachers as the atmosphere around us is more positive which allows you to focus on classroom based practice. When I meet the obligations of the professional side I feel more competent in my classroom practice because I have reflected on and changed my teaching practice. I also feel more confident in approaching my colleagues to share ideas and reflect on my practice also. I found it really interesting how Tony talked about if we neglect professional practice for a number of years our teaching practice suffers over time as we are not taking that time to reflect and improve on our practice. I think that reflecting and being open to change is vital to our teaching practice as teaching is constantly changing at it is easy over time to become out of date!
Reflective questions: reflected on these every 15 mins. How would this work collaboratively? Do you have the freedom to influence and change things every 15 mins? Possibly in small group teaching but not sure how it would be managed in a collaborative team.
what’s happening?
what’s not happening?
How can I influence what’s not happening?
Need to have a structure to reflect. What are my fencepost questions?
  • What am I not happy with/why am I not happy?
  • What can I change?
  • How am I going to implement it?
When I reflect it tends to be about the aspects I am not happy with or parts the kid didn’t get/buy into. Is this effective reflecting? Should I also be reflecting on what worked well and feed this forward into future teaching - probably! I will try and reflect using the ‘military headings’ to focus on positive aspects of my practice that work well to use these again in the future.
Prochaska’s Model of change
  1. Pre-contemplation Reflecting Stage
  2. contemplation
  3. preparation
  4. action (repeat) Inquiry Stage
  5. maintenance (repeat)
  6. termination
Life-long learning - continual improvement. Need to action what we are learning.
The right questions only emerge when we go to action - use this in inquiry teaching with the kids? what are the questions that come up as we start investigating? Do you need a ‘problem’ to use this approach?
Inquiry is not about finding answers. It’s not even about asking questions. It’s about discovering the right questions through disciplined action.
Goals vs Inquiry

GOAL

INQUIRY

  • SMART criteria
  • directed outcome
  • moving into action
  • unstructured
  • learning as you go

Inquiry leads to goals. Are we goal setting too early, do the children have time to carry out an inquiry into their learning or do teachers do this on their behalf?
Professional journal - records a learning trip, what I’m learning as I’m actioning new practices and recording new findings.
3 Crucial Professional Practices:
  1. reflecting -cognitive and passive. Disciplined
  2. inquiring - cognitive, deliberate, disciplined action
  3. journaling - cognitive, deliberate, disciplined action

commitment to those sets apart the serious professional who practices teaching from non-professional educators, teachers who play at teaching and gifted amateurs. Body and theory of knowledge which empowers you as a professional.
Very interesting session and given me lots to think about when reflecting on my teaching practice and professional practice. I will definitely be using the 3 key questions in the future!

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