Flexible Teacher CPD Programme Vision & Next Steps
Based on our history of designing and implementing courses related to Global Competence for diverse groups of teachers, the Flanders-based University College Leuven-Limburg (UCLL) team is delighted to be leading Intellectual Output #4 of the GCTE project: developing a new Flexible Teacher CPD Programme to help Teacher Educators (TEs) and their Trainees be more Globally Competent and foster this competence in their students.
A PAINFUL TIME FOR LEARNERS & TEACHERS
Approximately 19 months following the Global Competence in Teacher Education (GCTE) project launch in September 20219, global events have made it indisputably evident that we need to better prepare learners and teachers to embrace flexibility and innovation. We must urgently help them (and ourselves) learn to work across differences in order to find the sustainable solutions that are needed in times of great uncertainty. Indeed, the COVID19 crisis has shown that our education systems worldwide are underprepared and predictable in our coping mechanisms. Teachers have had significant growing pains adapting to the new learning and teaching models of the pandemic times. Many teachers and students alike are overwhelmed with COVID19-related changes. The pandemic has amplified the importance of our Global Competence in Teacher Education project and its aims.
BUT ALSO AN OPPORTUNITY FOR A NEW APPROACH
In this context, we propose that during this time of change, instead of trying to teach many little things, this is an opportunity to focus so that we instead teach the most important things deeply and richly. This is our chance to be creative and adapt to the different skill levels and life circumstances of learners and teachers. To do this, the key issue is not lowering standards for teaching. Rather it is teaching for and from a different standard, one that focuses on the knowledge, skills, attitudes, and values that can enhance Global Competence.
Preparing future teachers to be more Globally Competent and foster this competence in their students does not require a completely new curriculum. Instead, it requires combining instructional strategies for active learning with global issues and then weaving these into the existing curriculum. We believe that in order to scale Global Competence, professional development that will help Teacher Educators do this — and thereby transform themselves, their teaching, their classroom, their schools, and, ultimately, their students — is crucial. The challenge, however,is how to provide access to this type of professional development to all teachers to use. The GCTE project proposes to do this through a Flexible Teacher CPD Programme that we are currently brainstorming.
ACTIVE LEARNING & CRITICAL PEDAGOGY AS OUR BASIS
Seven building blocks form the core center and heart of what we want to emphasize in our Flexible Teacher Training Programme. Each of these is related to learning beyond the classroom through exploring, combining and experimenting. They are:
After investigating the current situation of teaching and learning, we were able to identify several push and pull factors that play an important role in what is being taught, how it is being taught and why it’s being taught. The scale of this is spread across the macro, meso, and micro levels. All in all the most tangible factor at hand is what the initial teacher training curriculum looks like and what is being expected from the teacher trainees.
Educators and education systems worldwide are reassessing the knowledge, skills, attitudes and values students need to succeed in this rapidly changing world. Despite this, many if not most education systems — including in some of the partner countries involved in this project (the UK, Italy, Belgium, Greece) — are built around the traditional banking system. Our goal with the Flexible Teacher Training Programme is to go beyond “teaching to the test” and instead use critical pedagogy and the inquiry stance of teachers as the literature and stakeholder testimony indicates is necessary to develop Global Competence. Beyond the immediate environment of teaching and assessing, the Programme will allow TEs and their trainees space for understanding and appreciating, communicating across cultures, and keeping in mind the collective well-being of the learners and the teachers in the Global Competence development process.
A NEW PLATFORM FOR NEW & EXISTING CONTENT, SELF-ASSESSMENTS
To be able to do this we are developing the GCTE Teacher CPD Programme on a web-based training platform that features an inspirational data bank enriched with hands-on, actionable materials and examples plus an e-portfolio self-assessment tool for TEs and teacher trainees to use to gauge progress against their self-selected goals.
The platform will host newly created and specially curated existing content. Concerning the former, we anticipate five different level-based versions (nascent, beginner, progressed, proficient and advanced) of 12 lesson plans being developed by UCLL alongside our project partners. Concerning the latter, although a number of TE-endorsed, effective, and openly-available resources for developing global competence at scale already exist, they are dispersed. Our opportunity is to bring these together on one platform that provides access to professional learning for all TEs, trainees, and teachers.
To anchor all of these resources on a developmental framework, we are using the ASCD’s Globally Competent Learning Continuum, which also resonates with the OECD’s definition of Global Competence. The continuum identifies the dispositions, knowledge, and skills that educators need to teach students from diverse backgrounds and prepare all students to thrive in a global society. It is a tool for self-reflection and self-guidance for educators wishing to reflect on their own level of global competence and to learn the characteristics included in higher levels to advance along the continuum. The three categories of this continuum, namely “Teacher Disposition”, “Teacher Knowledge” and “Teacher Skills” with the different elements and levels defined under each category, will be the basis for creating lesson plans for teacher trainers and organizing existing resources.
A pilot will run in October 2021 using Collaborative Online International Learning (COIL) in several European countries to gauge the usefulness of the Flexible Teacher Training Programme. Then, following any necessary adjustments, it will launch for TEs, educators and learners worldwide in 2022, coordinated on an ongoing basis by UCLL.
To learn more and to follow our progress, register your interest or contact Output Leads Dima Bou Mosleh and Gorik Van Helleputte.
Approximately 19 months following the Global Competence in Teacher Education (GCTE) project launch in September 20219, global events have made it indisputably evident that we need to better prepare learners and teachers to embrace flexibility and innovation. We must urgently help them (and ourselves) learn to work across differences in order to find the sustainable solutions that are needed in times of great uncertainty. Indeed, the COVID19 crisis has shown that our education systems worldwide are underprepared and predictable in our coping mechanisms. Teachers have had significant growing pains adapting to the new learning and teaching models of the pandemic times. Many teachers and students alike are overwhelmed with COVID19-related changes. The pandemic has amplified the importance of our Global Competence in Teacher Education project and its aims.
BUT ALSO AN OPPORTUNITY FOR A NEW APPROACH
In this context, we propose that during this time of change, instead of trying to teach many little things, this is an opportunity to focus so that we instead teach the most important things deeply and richly. This is our chance to be creative and adapt to the different skill levels and life circumstances of learners and teachers. To do this, the key issue is not lowering standards for teaching. Rather it is teaching for and from a different standard, one that focuses on the knowledge, skills, attitudes, and values that can enhance Global Competence.
Preparing future teachers to be more Globally Competent and foster this competence in their students does not require a completely new curriculum. Instead, it requires combining instructional strategies for active learning with global issues and then weaving these into the existing curriculum. We believe that in order to scale Global Competence, professional development that will help Teacher Educators do this — and thereby transform themselves, their teaching, their classroom, their schools, and, ultimately, their students — is crucial. The challenge, however,is how to provide access to this type of professional development to all teachers to use. The GCTE project proposes to do this through a Flexible Teacher CPD Programme that we are currently brainstorming.
ACTIVE LEARNING & CRITICAL PEDAGOGY AS OUR BASIS
Seven building blocks form the core center and heart of what we want to emphasize in our Flexible Teacher Training Programme. Each of these is related to learning beyond the classroom through exploring, combining and experimenting. They are:
- the OECD’s PISA Global Competence Assessment Framework,
- the OECD’s Future of Education and Skills 2030 recommendations,
- Beames and Brown’s four dimensions of Adventurous Learning,
- Roots and Shoots’ nine Compassionate Leadership Skills and Traits,
- the Model of Learning Objectives based on Heer’s Taxonomy for Learning, Teaching, and Assessing: A Revision of Bloom’s Taxonomy of Educational Objectives,
- UNESCO’s four Pillars of Learning, and
- the EU’s Entrepreneurship Competence Framework.
After investigating the current situation of teaching and learning, we were able to identify several push and pull factors that play an important role in what is being taught, how it is being taught and why it’s being taught. The scale of this is spread across the macro, meso, and micro levels. All in all the most tangible factor at hand is what the initial teacher training curriculum looks like and what is being expected from the teacher trainees.
Educators and education systems worldwide are reassessing the knowledge, skills, attitudes and values students need to succeed in this rapidly changing world. Despite this, many if not most education systems — including in some of the partner countries involved in this project (the UK, Italy, Belgium, Greece) — are built around the traditional banking system. Our goal with the Flexible Teacher Training Programme is to go beyond “teaching to the test” and instead use critical pedagogy and the inquiry stance of teachers as the literature and stakeholder testimony indicates is necessary to develop Global Competence. Beyond the immediate environment of teaching and assessing, the Programme will allow TEs and their trainees space for understanding and appreciating, communicating across cultures, and keeping in mind the collective well-being of the learners and the teachers in the Global Competence development process.
A NEW PLATFORM FOR NEW & EXISTING CONTENT, SELF-ASSESSMENTS
To be able to do this we are developing the GCTE Teacher CPD Programme on a web-based training platform that features an inspirational data bank enriched with hands-on, actionable materials and examples plus an e-portfolio self-assessment tool for TEs and teacher trainees to use to gauge progress against their self-selected goals.
The platform will host newly created and specially curated existing content. Concerning the former, we anticipate five different level-based versions (nascent, beginner, progressed, proficient and advanced) of 12 lesson plans being developed by UCLL alongside our project partners. Concerning the latter, although a number of TE-endorsed, effective, and openly-available resources for developing global competence at scale already exist, they are dispersed. Our opportunity is to bring these together on one platform that provides access to professional learning for all TEs, trainees, and teachers.
To anchor all of these resources on a developmental framework, we are using the ASCD’s Globally Competent Learning Continuum, which also resonates with the OECD’s definition of Global Competence. The continuum identifies the dispositions, knowledge, and skills that educators need to teach students from diverse backgrounds and prepare all students to thrive in a global society. It is a tool for self-reflection and self-guidance for educators wishing to reflect on their own level of global competence and to learn the characteristics included in higher levels to advance along the continuum. The three categories of this continuum, namely “Teacher Disposition”, “Teacher Knowledge” and “Teacher Skills” with the different elements and levels defined under each category, will be the basis for creating lesson plans for teacher trainers and organizing existing resources.
A pilot will run in October 2021 using Collaborative Online International Learning (COIL) in several European countries to gauge the usefulness of the Flexible Teacher Training Programme. Then, following any necessary adjustments, it will launch for TEs, educators and learners worldwide in 2022, coordinated on an ongoing basis by UCLL.
To learn more and to follow our progress, register your interest or contact Output Leads Dima Bou Mosleh and Gorik Van Helleputte.
