1. Welcome Welcome Dr Sharon Tindall-Ford Deputy Head of School
School of Education
Welcome

2. Over last 5 years there has been an increasing focus on the quality of teachers
With lower PISA rankings, NAPLAN results stable but not increasing – teachers in schools and universities that graduate teachers are under increasing scrutiny
Teacher Education is in the spot light – just have to look at papers, social media 2

3. ‘Teaching teachers is certainly among the most demanding kinds of professional preparation teacher educators must constantly model practice, construct powerful learning experiences, thoughtfully support progress, understanding and practice, carefully assess students progress and understandings and help link theory and practice’
Darling- Hammond, Grossman, Rust & Shulman
The design of teacher education program, 2005)
Research shows us that teaching and teaching teachers how to teach is complex

4. School teachers play a pivotal role in the development of PST
What we need better address is that Teacher education is not “DONE” at Uni
For teacher education to be successful there needs to be a strong partnership between universities and schools
This poses challenges as schools and universities are two very different institutions which have different ways of operating with different pressures and different objectives
BUT for ITE to be successful we need to merge the two – what is called the The Third Space
WHY? Because what we don’t often recognize or acknowledge is that teacher educators are both at universities and at schools
School teachers play a pivotal role in the development of PST
It is a critical role that needs to be valued more and provided with appropriate support, workload and professional development
As an experienced teacher and a teacher educators– you innately know so much
– what is routine/ automatic for for you is not for most/ all PST
– even simple things like photocopying, changes in school times can be a challenge for the PST in the early stages of their ITE
What teachers naturally do like plan out scope and sequence so as to translate the curriculum so it becomes alive in the classroom what is automatic to an experienced teacher is not to PST
PST value highly their experiences in Pex – it is not surprising that it is what they value most in their ITE
But the experiences PST have on PEX can be very different in quality/ support and experiences
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5. “What Pre-service Teachers Say”
“My supervising teacher was great, he made it clear what was
expected of me and provided specific feedback on how to improve,
some written and some verbal but always providing 1 or 2 strategies for
me to consider and implement … helped my confidence”
“I got to plan lessons and team teach with my mentor teacher,
it was invaluable to see how to plan and then what it looks like
In the classroom then we discussed afterwards how it went and what
we could improve on”
There is a lot of research around Quality PEX and what makes a great supervising teacher
UoW has been involved in this research – just some of comments from PST
Basically what research shows is that, they know you are busy, they want to be a colleague –not be seen as a burden,
They want to understand why you do the things you do and for you to articulate this
Co planning and co teaching helps them understand what teachers do
They want no surprises – clarity on your expectations and the universities and that the expectations are aligned
They want time to discuss with ST what they see, how they feel and how to improve their practice
“She told me why she did the things she did in the classroom, the reasons
\things I would never have seen or understood unless she explained it to me”
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6. Partnership as ‘joiner’ work…..rather than bridging work
Professor Simone White
We need to think about our partnerships as not creating a bridge between university and school
Rather as leader in Aust in ITE Prof Simone White discusses the need to join together, seamlessly integrated to create a whole entity
A particular technique David Hockney uses – a joiner technique

7. School Community University
Hybrid (or third) spaces where academic and practitioner knowledge and knowledge that exists within
communities come together in new and less hierarchical ways in the service of teacher learning
(Zeichner, 2010, p. 89)
School
Community
University
3rd space as a site from which to assist pre-service teachers in negotiating, bridging and navigating across differences.
This integrated place has been called the “ third space”
Where university and schools – teachers ITE educators and PST meet and work together
Third or hybrid spaces
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8. Federal Government Initiative
“Action Now Classroom Ready Teachers” (2015)
Teacher Education Ministerial Advisory Group (TEMAG).
RECCOMENDATIONS FOR :
Initial Teacher Education Providers (Universities)
Pre-service teachers
Schools and Professional Experience
The Teacher Education Ministerial Advisory Group Report was released on 13 February It advocates for schools/ uni to work more closely together to produce class room ready teachers
The Advisory Group’s 38 recommendations seek to achieve improvements in both the content and delivery of initial teacher education courses in Australia.
The report makes very clear recommendations for increasing quality of PST PEX and the need to support PEX supervision in schools
Some of these changes are now starting to be implemented
A couple that maybe of interest and are having repercussions:
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9. Federal Government Reforms from TEMAG
Identify highly skilled teachers to supervise professional experience, and work with Initial Teacher Education
Identify highly skilled teachers to teach into Initial Teacher Education programs
School leaders actively lead the integration of pre-service teachers in the activities and culture of their school.
All Supervising teachers undertake Professional Learning in Mentoring/ APST
Professional Learning in mentoring/ APST is something that can be undertaken during 2017, could be as a group work together on the AITSL modules or could be PL in staff meetings, could be attending UoW mentoring workshop or new mentoring program that counts for 1 M Ed leadership subject
There is no specification on number of hours , how it is done
What we know is that good PL is not for mentoring for PST but for Early career teachers and does improve teacher practice and job satisfaction -
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10. Graduate Teaching Performance Assessment
All Final Year Students
Across ALL Australian Universities
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11. We look forward to working with you in 2017
We value the huge support you provide SoE and our PST
We want to continue to develop our partnership with Dapto and closer ties with you to improve our ITE
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12. Have a great productive day!