Integrated Continuing Professional Teacher Development (CPTD) Model

CPTD (Continuing Professional Teacher’s Development) is the method of recording and reporting the skills, qualifications and knowledge acquired by teachers when they work. The purpose of this model is to present a holistic and integrated approach to current initiatives of educator development. This approach connects efforts of the Basic Department of Education, which is the custodian and regulator of educator development in South Africa. The model is made up of 4 Tiers or levels which sequentially feed into each other in a progressive manner. The first Tier represents the fundamental principles of CPTD at the Department of Basic Education. The aim is to constantly improve the quality of teaching and learning by empowering, motivating and training educators using a standardised CPTD programme. The second Tier ensured that the principles set by the Department of Basic Education are advanced through a statutory body within the sector, known as South African Council of Educators (SACE). There is mandate is monitor and manage the CPTD system as the core function to enhance the teaching profession in South Africa. In order to uphold the educator/ teaching profession, SACE prescribes that each educator produce a Personal Development Plan (PDP) file as part of the CPTD system and Portfolio of Evidence (PoE). This PoE provides evidence for the three-year development cycle, with accumulation of required CPTD points. This process of collection and maintenance of professional development points is stored in an Integrated Quality Management System (IQMS), an electronic/computer system managed directly from the SACE offices. The system is access control and login details are provided by SACE to educators who complete. More details about the outcomes of the CPTD programme are discussed under Tier 4. The third Tier represent execution stage which is incumbent on the Education District Offices. The intervention and the role of the Education District Offices (EDS) is to ensure compliance at school level including registration of all educators within the schooling system with SACE. The EDS is also required to keep data of how many educators have gone through CPDT programme in line with PDP so as to meet the mandate of the Department of Basic Education with regard to professionalization of the education system. As such, they role is further to provide coordination of CPTD activities at district level, including enrolments of educators on CPTD programmes, sourcing and organising CPTD events and workshops. The 4th tier in this integrated model culminates in the attainment of the objectives of CPTD programme. At this level, implementation, having been coordinated already at Tier 3, is now “practicalised” through involvement of selected schools, school management teams and targeted beneficiaries – who are the educators. The completion of the level is attained through three important outcomes:1.Improved quality of teaching and learning2.Producing of Personal Development Plans and PDP files for educators3.Improved educator’s Knowledge, Skills and Abilities (KSAs – Competencies)

A design approach to mathematics teacher educator development in East Africa

Mathematical functioning in sub-Saharan Africa remains persistently weak in global terms. This limits the flourishing of young people and communities in the region. Moreover, affordable, effective ways to address the issue are not well established. This paper analyses outcomes from a blended learning ‘Mathematical Thinking and IT’ course, iteratively adapted for East African primary mathematics teacher educators. The course adopted theoretical approaches derived from the mathematics, teacher and technology education literatures. It aimed to address the problem of low mathematical functioning by equipping participants for their own work, and also for supporting local collaborative teacher development workshops. The reported study asked, ‘What are the affordances and constraints of the adapted course and the available technology for mathematics teacher educator development in this context?’A variety of qualitative tools were used to track the course’s impact on the ten mathematics teacher educator participants over six months, as they attempted to transfer course learning to their home professional context. The analysis adopted an ethnographic lens. Outcomes suggested participants with a broad mathematical and pedagogical capacity for change, including critical levels of reflection, made significant progress in their technological, mathematical and mathematics pedagogical expertise. However, teacher educators without such a threshold capacity appeared not able to re-envision practice. Free subject-specific software was appreciated by all participants, but not yet reliably accessible in these teacher educators’ institutional contexts. The reported study evidences the potential for affordable, sustainable, development of many mathematics teacher educators in this context, but further research is needed. Similar courses should take account of local technological and education constraints

Instilling Competence: Emotional Preparation for Experiential Learning

As the prominence of experiential learning (EL) increases in management education, so do pressures on educators to adopt new, and less defined modes of classroom instruction. The incorporation of hands-on practice with standard pedagogy places expectations on educators to include assignments with emotional or ethical aspects. It is often assumed that as subject matter experts, educators are naturally equipped to manage EL. This article challenges the idea of such competence and readiness. It presents a stepped, self-awareness framework with guiding questions that educators can use to determine their own suitability and readiness for EL. To build competence, suggestions for educator development are included with each step. Examples from practice are presented to illustrate the use of the framework.

Exploring Freirean Culture Circles and Boalian Theatre as Pedagogies for Preparing Asset-Oriented Teacher Educators

Background/Context Teacher educator development remains an undertaking that is both understudied and underavailable as an explicit professional path, despite scholarship suggesting that teacher education's transformative potential hinges on teacher educators’ pedagogical work. Purpose, Practice, & Participants This article reports on a qualitative study that explored the development of teacher educators who expressed deep commitments to educational equity for minoritized youth. Fifteen current and prospective teacher educators participated over three years in situated adaptations of two critical pedagogical approaches: Freirean culture circles, where participants engaged in critical dialogue around conflicts encountered in their teacher education work that involved issues of inequity, particularly deficit-based ideas of P–12 students and their families, and Boalian theatre (or teatro), interactive role-play where participants dramatically re-enacted these conflicts and imagined potential responses to them. This study examines the ways in which these critical pedagogical spaces facilitated participants’ development as asset-oriented teacher educators. Research Design & Data Collection This research represents an ethnographic self-study, as the authors engaged in culture circles and teatro as participant-researchers. To study these spaces of critical teacher educator development, the authors collected ethnographic data, which included semistructured interviews with each participant, field notes, and audio/ video recordings of dialogue and role-play, as well as participant written reflections. Findings/Results Through their engagement in culture circles and teatro, participants came to recognize some of the micro-pedagogies of asset-oriented teacher education, grappled with the relational dimensions of teacher learning, became familiar with possible tools of asset-oriented teacher education, and interrogated the social, political, and historical dimensions of the work. In doing so, they understood each area as linked both to specific settings and individuals and as connected to more common dilemmas that may play out across teacher education contexts. Conclusions/Recommendations While cautioning against widespread, mechanistic implementation, the authors recognize culture circles and teatro as offering special promise for the development of asset-oriented teacher educators. In particular, findings suggest that these critical pedagogies support the conditions for learning—particularly spaces that center participants’ identities and experiential conflicts—that can cultivate complex understandings about, and tools for engaging, the contingent work of asset-oriented teacher education. Such spaces seem particularly well equipped to cultivate critical understandings deemed essential for transforming the field of teacher education.