This post is the first in a series from our Curriculum Team here at Get Further. Each post in the series will shine a spotlight on an aspect of professional development for teachers in Further Education. Upcoming posts include:
- Why your teachers don’t implement your CPD focus and forget everything you tell them.
- Why your teachers seem to ignore your feedback from learning walks or observations.
- Why you should introduce video recording to truly develop your teachers and improve learning.
Developing professionals who teach in Further Education (FE) requires a delicate balance between a focus on individual improvement and achieving consistent quality amongst staff across an institution.
We are fortunate that Get Further’s tutors herald from myriad backgrounds, bringing diverse life experiences, goals and personalities. Without them, we wouldn’t be able to support students in FE to gain valuable qualifications in maths and English. Our tutors’ motivations align closely with Get Further’s mission and vision when they join us, yet a shared moral imperative alone will not achieve the desired outcomes for students.
A highly trained and supported teaching team is essential for student progress and achievement. In this blog series, we will explore the different avenues we use for improving Get Further tutors’ development and experience. This begins with their initial intensive two-day tutor training and continues throughout their time with us via our Tutor Academy – a professional development hub offering webinars, seminars and self-study resources. Additionally, our team regularly visits tutors’ sessions to provide feedback and opportunities to reflect.
The content of our training sessions is chosen to ensure our tutors hold a shared understanding. We aim to establish a high standard of tutoring quality that is our minimum guarantee for students and college partners. A consistent tutor team matters because we don’t want to leave student progress and achievement to chance – a roulette wheel of tutors ranging in approach and ability.
Central to our initial training are the following sessions:
- The Science of Learning – an introduction to cognitive science, memory, attention and the way we learn. It is essential all teaching staff hold a shared mental model of how learning happens and the activities and behaviours that best support it.
- Adaptive teaching – although students are more similar than they are different (as all humans are!), and we learn in predominantly the same ways, differences in initial understanding and performance must be addressed. We prepare tutors to predict, pre-empt and respond to the needs students present during a lesson, such as holding embedded misconceptions.
- The Heart of Tutoring – fundamentally, we don’t tend to learn from people we don’t like. Therefore, we support tutors to build strong professional relationships (not friendships) with students to ensure emotional buy-in which leads to academic success.
- Subject-specific training in modelling, questioning and feedback – the three most common things you’ll see in a lesson. We train tutors in the fundamentals and engage them in rehearsal scenarios to practise.
We recognise the limitations of human memory and know much of the training they receive will be quickly forgotten. We strive to avoid cognitive overload, offering regular opportunities for retrieval of key knowledge and engaging in scenario-based rehearsal to replicate the tutoring experience.
These two days of training are the foundations upon which our regular Tutor Academy webinars and self-study tasks develop. When we visit tutors to offer feedback on their tutoring and reflect with them, their initial training is the reference point for conversations. When we have video footage, a coach guides tutors to pay attention to the specific levers which will improve their tutoring the most (more on this to come in the fourth blog of this series!).
Imagine the alternative – sending teachers into classrooms without a shared understanding of the science of learning, adapting teaching, building relationships. Why would we leave the quality of teaching and the progress of students down to chance or the whim of the individual? Effective professional development creates the conditions for teachers to grow and thrive within the safe boundaries of a shared approach.
Think about your own role as a teacher or leader in a busy FE institution: is there a shared understanding of what makes good teaching and is there a common approach across your staff providing a minimum guarantee for all students?
Written by Ed Noon, English Curriculum Manager at Get Further.
In addition to training and upskilling our own tutors, Get Further proudly offers professional development for maths and English teachers in the Further Education sector. Our experienced Curriculum Managers, all former teachers, are committed to improving learning experiences and helping students achieve their full potential.
