Teacher Leader Development: A Narrative Inquiry
•
1 like•690 views
This document summarizes a narrative inquiry into the development of senior teachers in two secondary schools in Singapore. It describes the country's teacher development initiatives from 2001-2015. It then provides background on 5 teacher participants and outlines the research design, which involved individual narratives and analysis of patterns in their experiences. Key themes that emerged include the community and systems that supported participants, the tools and rules of the accreditation process, and tensions in navigating various roles and platforms for teacher development. The document concludes by discussing identity formation in learning communities and recommending a more sustainable, social-based approach to senior teacher development.
Recommended
More Related Content
What's hot
What's hot (20)
Viewers also liked
Viewers also liked (15)
Similar to Teacher Leader Development: A Narrative Inquiry
Similar to Teacher Leader Development: A Narrative Inquiry (20)
More from Lloyd Yeo
More from Lloyd Yeo (20)
Recently uploaded
Recently uploaded (20)
Teacher Leader Development: A Narrative Inquiry
- 1. Teacher Leader Development: A Narrative Inquiry into Senior Teacher Development in two Secondary Schools in Singapore CRPP Conference 2015 3 June 2015 Lloyd Yeo St Gabriel’s Secondary School
- 2. Teacher Development Movement in Singapore: 2001-2015 2001: Edu-Pac & Master Teacher Scheme 2009: PMTT & LT Scheme. Teacher Development Centre / AST and Professional Learning Community initiative 2014: WP Seminar 2014: Growing Our Teachers, Building Our Nation: Belief in students, self, others and something larger Teacher Leaders’ Programme (TLP)
- 4. School A and School B Schools Students Teachers Ratio of STs/LTs: Staff (2012) Ratio of STs/LTs: Staff: (2015) 1164 92 1:23 (4) 1:30 (3) 1248 98 1:98 (1) 1:19.6 (5)
- 5. Background of participants Name / School Yrs Education Career trajectory Main rationale for joining ST Mr Yong 24 yrs Tr ST (20th yr) Area of interest: outside subject Ms Hari 17 Yrs Pr Tr Ed Sec Tr ST (9th yr) Already doing the job Ms Chen 20 yrs Tr MM ST (20th yr) Sense of Stagnation Ms Yip 22 yrs Tr ST (20th yr) Sense of Stagnation Mr Row 23 yrs Tr MM VP LT (20th yr) Passion for Subject Mean: 21.2 yrs Median: 22 years
- 6. Research Design Individual NI a. Selection of individuals b. Face-to-face c. Field Notes Origins/Sta rt/ Self Field text a. Storification/ Re- storification b. Clarification c. Approval for Analysis a. Pattern-identification b. Reconceptualize and reinternalize new understandings as a community of teachers Reflexive: Researcher role / peers/ anonymity Research Text Mediational tool for community learning Surface vs. deep
- 7. Potential Tr Ldrs Tr Ldr Appt and Identity Accreditation Standards and Write-out Family Sch Leader Cluster/ Subj Chapters HOD ST Colleagues Portfolio Interview Panel Systems Roles and responsibilities Assumptions: Tensions and internal contradictions as principles of self- organization of an activity system and enablers of continuing devt
- 8. Subject: The Potential TL Stagnation / Learning/ Contribution Desire to Learn More/ Self- efficacy Ms Chen: The idea started when I wanted to step down from a management role. I had enough of running departments and evaluating them. I felt stagnant. I felt I wasn’t spending enough time in teaching. I just grab-and-go Ms Yip: I just wanted to get out of my CCA. I got fed up and tired of it because I felt I was not contributing and learning. Mr Yong: I was a GEO 1A3 officer for so long and already doing the job. I never saw it as additional burden and just thought I would just apply Ms Hari: My worst enemy was myself because even despite the constant encouragement, I needed more confidence
- 9. Community: Family, School Leaders, Cluster / Subject Chapters at AST Mr Row: Sir, you are wasting your time here Mr Yong: It was School Leader encouragement and their systematic and more structured way of preparing me STUDENTS SCHOOL LEADERS FAMILY Mrs Hari: was concerned it would take me away from my motherly duties. TEACHERS Ms Yip: AST:You better go. It is good for you. Keep an open mind I look to her as a teacher who can make it and she said, ‘just try’.
- 10. Rules and Tools Beliefs Action The Written Level:/ Mr Yong: They helped to vet and re-organize my accreditation standards and write-outs into various headings. There were so many people helping me to vet – the ST, my HOD and the VP. Even then I was not clear. I eventually adopted a template that I had I had come: What did I do? Why did I do it? How did I go about doing it? What have I learnt? What have the boys /mentee/ teachers learn? How can I do it better? The Reflection/ Ms Yip: We usually take reflections for granted and say it is ‘bo liao’. We are already so busy You reflect when you type. I was unknowingly writing my beliefs down as well. This really helped me when I had to do the accreditation forms and translate my beliefs into actions and verbalize them at interviews. The Interview
- 11. Rules and Tools The Interview Ms Yip: And I always tell myself “Wah! So many things to do”. “Jing Joi Mik Kia” (Hokkien for so many things). I realized that it was my life’s work of what I did as a teacher for the past 1o to 20 years. These were the things that we had been doing and what we were about it. It actually forces you to reflect on your journey and how we have grown as teachers. To have deep meaning, you must see it as a journey. Then it will be meaningful. You have to go through it. Don’t just listen or ‘tia’ (hokkien for listen’. Ms Hari: I had to plan everything by standards, look back and old emails and it was very time-consuming. But it also made me realized that I had done so much in my career at the school and grown so much as well. Ms Hari: It looked kind of ridiculous in a strange way. There I was with 2 large portfolio files and the SHs/ HODs were going with just a thin writeout.
- 12. Rules and Tools The Interview . Prep Sessions, Mock Interviews and Books/ Mr Yong: They also held sessions where they prepared me for the kind of questions I would be asked at the interview. These helped me think about what I wanted to say and to organize my thoughts. Ms Hari: They directed me to some books by Stephen Covey to familiarize me with some of the Learning Organizational tools and terminologies I could use. Emotional labour of interviews/ Bilingualism/Mr Yong: I just could not articulate my thoughts and put them into words. I was quite tongue tied. I was discouraged and disappointed because I had put so much effort and yet failed. Language and Beliefs/ Ms Yip: At the post mortems, I was told to be myself and phrase things in the way I did . To start with my beliefs and then rationalize and explain why I did certain things. I saw the interview process in a whole new light The Interview OJT and Scoping/ Ms Chen: Another important milestone was my experience of taking on the role of SCM for 10 weeks. This was baptism by fire and this gave me confidence
- 13. Division of Labour The Division of Labour ifor ST Development is enacted through different platforms, positions and histories as a complex web in relation to each other. Mentoring, Subject Teaching, Form Teachership, Programmes Mr Row: Sometimes it is like a ball of confusion. So many platforms and so many people involved. Mr Yong: At one time, I thought of leaving because after a while I am tired of doing just progammes year after year. I am never the School Coordinating Mentor and hardly do mentoring . SSDP/VP LT/STs HOD Cluster Schools Zone AST/Subject Chapters
- 14. Towards a sustainable and social-based approach to ST/LT development. Teacher Career Cycles: The disenchanted (who can be re-enchanted), the quiet ones, the introverts, the resistors and reprobates. (Day, 2012; Hargreaves & Fullan, 2012) Role negotiations and development Identity Formation in Learning Communities for ST devt:/ Activity Ball of Confusion and the band played on….and Ms Yip: Focus on the journey and reflect on the journey. This will make things more meaningful Discussion/ Recommendations Proff communities/ bureaucracy, Loci of Control, time and privacy to navigate fault lines (Lieberman & Miller, 2008)
- 15. Identity Formation in Learning Communities for ST devt to growing altriusm for adult learning in multiple and authentic teacher communities : Ball of Confusion and the band played on….and Ms Yip: Focus on the journey and reflect on the journey. This will make things more meaningful Dispositions Hardware/ Structures Each colleague as valuable Honoring Tr knowledge Human learning in proff practice and relationships Inquiry stance for evidence-informed conversations ST Empowerment & Agency Clarity of purpose Collective focus on mentoring and classroom practice Theory of Action & Participation Problem solving dispositions Practice in mentoring and observation Platforms for mentoring, sharing, dialogue, critique Routines and forums for sharing, dialogue, co-creating Participatory methodologies / facilitation for real commmunity Tr empowerment Regularity of conversations/meetings to build collegial relationships and inquiry based on trust and openness Guided reflection n teaching through reflection on learning Multiple entry points Reflection and internalization (over the long haul) Discussions/Recommendations Ball of Confusion and the band played on….and Ms Yip: Focus on the journey and reflect on the journey. This will make things more meaningful
- 16. Day C., (2012) New lives of teachers . Teacher Education Quarterly. 39(1), 7-26 Hargreaves, A. & Fullan, M. (2012). Professional capital: Transforming teaching in every school. New York, NY: Teachers College Press. Leana, C.R. Lieberman, A. & Miller, L. (2004). Teacher leadership. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass. Lieberman, A., Hanson, S. & Gless, J. (2012). Mentoring teachers: Navigating the real-world tensions. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass Schon, D. (1983). The reflective practitioner: How professionals think in action. New York: Basic Books Little, J.W. (1995). Contested Ground: The basis of teacher leadership in two restructuring high schools. Elementary School Journal 96 (1), 47-63 York-Barr, J. & Duke, K. (2004). What do we know about teacher leadership? Findings from two decades of scholarship. Review of Educational Research, Fall 2004, 94 (3), 255-316. Education Service Professional Career Plan 2001. http://www.moe.gov.sg/media/press/2001/pr26092001.htm#ANNEX A Selected References
Editor's Notes
- The aim of this case study is to investigate the formation of senior teacher and lead teachers’ dentities in a secondary school in Singapore. Using a narrative inquiry approach, this study examines how five Singapore teachers chose to enter Senior Teacher and Lead Teacher teaching track . Using a collective Narrative Inquiry research approach and CHAT theory to frame this study, this paper seeks to explore why teachers grow into such teacher leadership roles and proposes to examine their attitudes towards classroom teaching, professional development of others and the role that teacher preparation programs play in their development into such roles. The findings demonstrate that factors linked with teacher career cycles, identity formation, altruistic or intrinsic factors play important roles. Such factors as the peer support, development and role negotiations also play an important role in overcoming obstacles and self-doubts in their new roles.
- 2001: This is part of the teaching track under the Education Service Professional Development and Career Plan (Edu-Pac) announced by Minister Teo Chee Hean in April this year. Master Teachers will operate beyond the school, at the cluster level. Master Teachers are experienced expert teachers whose role will be to help develop teaching excellence through mentoring and demonstrating good teaching practice and model lessons. Their contributions will go beyond their classrooms and schools and will extend to helping other teachers in the cluster to teach better. 5. The Ministry of Education (MOE) plans to eventually have 3 to 4 Master Teacher posts per cluster, or a total of about 160 Master Teacher posts nationwide. Master Teachers will be appointed on renewable 3-year terms. enior Teachers are good experienced teachers who serve as mentors and role models to younger teachers within their schools, sharing with them their teaching expertise and content knowledge. 7. MOE will be doubling the number of Senior Teacher posts in schools. With the increase, there will be typically 1 Senior Teacher post for every 5 classroom teachers. A typical primary school will have up to 11 Senior Teacher positions, while a typical secondary school will have up to 9 Senior Teacher positions. http://www.moe.gov.sg/media/press/2001/pr26092001.htm#ANNEX A
- Focus on the LT and ST position
- The research perspective that underlies the study is phenomenology, which focuses on how individuals put together the phenomena they experience in order to make sense of the world (Patton, 1990). From this perspective, the only reality is the reality each individual comes to know and experience. The researcher attempts to enter the conceptual world of the participants to understand it as they do and to portray that understanding so that it will be insightful and illuminating for others. Given its phenomenological perspective, this study attempts to understand the
- Golombek: Golombek and Johnson (2004) argue that engaging in narrative inquiry bring emotions to the surface and are linked to cognition because they create and mediational space where teachers draw on various resources to help reconceptualize and reinternalize new understandings of themselves as teachers.
- Activity Theory (Vygotsky, 1978; Engestorm, 1987, 2001, 2003) may be utilized as one approach to study this phenomenon. Originating from Russian scholars, Lev Vygotsky developed Marxian political theory on collective exchanges and material production to develop a psychological framework to understand the relationship between individuals in their social environment. We picked it for a number of reasons: 1. Its compactness. This model is the smallest and most simple structural form that still preserves the essential unity and integral quality of any human activity, in this case NI. 2. It highlights contradictions as sources of learning and development. Its real practice and value is the process of working through some of such contradictions even though these are experienced negatively by participants who always wish to see the activity system "running smoothly". But change is the only constant in a system. An activity is actually a system whole in the sense that all elements have a relationship to other elements. It is the fundamental context of study. The relation between subject and object is mediated by tools (or instruments), that between subject and community is mediated by rules (norms or constraints), and that between object and community is mediated by division of labor. b. Each of the mediating elements is historically formed and opened to further development. Ever since an activity is formed, the corresponding mediating elements are continuously reconstructed. This development is driven by different contradictions, it is not a smooth and linear process but uneven and discontinuous one. c. An activity has an active subject (an individual or collective), who understands the object (motive) of the activity. However, not all participants (community) involved in an activity necessarily understand the motive of the activity in which they are participating or even recognize the existence of one. d. As the contradictions (structural tensions) of an activity system are aggravated over a period of time, some individual participants begin to question and deviate from its established norms. What is a Poincare Map? A Poincaré map differs from a recurrence or time-based analysis because space and a reference point, not time, determines when to plot a point. In Poincaré section S, the Poincaré map P projects point x onto point P(x). In mathematics, particularly in dynamical systems, a first recurrence map or Poincaré map, named after Henri Poincaré, is the intersection of a periodic orbit in the state space of a continuous dynamical system with a certain lower dimensional subspace, called the Poincaré section, transversal to the flow of the system. More precisely, one considers a periodic orbit with initial conditions within a section of the space, which leaves that section afterwards, and observes the point at which this orbit first returns to the section. One then creates a map to send the first point to the second, hence the name first recurrence map. The transversality of the Poincaré section means that periodic orbits starting on the subspace flow through it and not parallel to it. A Poincaré map can be interpreted as a discrete dynamical system with a state space that is one dimension smaller than the original continuous dynamical system. Because it preserves many properties of periodic and quasiperiodic orbits of the original system and has a lower dimensional state space it is often used for analyzing the original system. In practice this is not always possible as there is no general method to construct a Poincaré map. A Poincaré map differs from a recurrence plot in that space, not time, determines when to plot a point. For instance, the locus of the moon when the earth is at perihelion is a recurrence plot; the locus of the moon when it passes through the plane perpendicular to the Earth's orbit and passing through the sun and the earth at perihelion is a Poincaré map. It was used by Michel Hénon to study the motion of stars in a galaxy, because the path of a star projected onto a plane looks like a tangled mess, while the Poincaré map shows the structure more clearly. Tools: Features of a narrative. Sequentiality (p. 43); Unique sequence of events, mental states, happenings involving human beings as characters of actors 2) Factual Indifference (p. 44) Can be “real” or “imaginary”: sequence of sentences determine overall configuration of plot, not its truth or falsity 3) Departures from the Canonical (p. 47). Forging of links between exceptional & ordinary: stories are told to give meaning to the exceptional behaviour that deviates from norm, culture 4) Dramatic Qualities: Pentad (p. 50). Actor, Action, Goal, Scene, Instrument, Trouble, Moral stance Britzman: Commonalities = a discourse that is authoritative and monolithic. To speak and act as if there is one monolithic culture of teachers, students, or schools is to take up a discourse that is at once authoritative and impossible. Within any given culture, there exists a multiplicity of realities – both given and possible – that form competing ideologies, discourses, and the discursive practices that are made available because of them. It is within our subjectivities that we can make sense of these competing conditions even as these competing conditions ‘condition’ our subjectivity in contradictory ways. http://degreesfiction.wordpress.com/2012/05/03/uncanny-and-creepy-detours/ Calndinin 2010: 1) Tensions for identifying problems, “cracks” and “fissures” on the seemingly smooth surface of the story. (What are your tension-filled moments?) 2) Tensions for inquire into the narrative threads, themes 3) Tensions for co-composing inquiry space and co-composing field/research texts (metaphor of the grey stone, p.84) 4) Tensions for engage in NI in relations in wide-awake/ethical ways (p.83) Tensions for co-composing field text and research text: Recognize and acknowledge the multiplicity and interactions and reverberations of each story, Participant’s story told to himself, to the inquirer; the stories the inquirer told of him/herself, and the stories an inquirer tells of participants. Uncertainty in naming 5) Tensions for an ethical enquiry: Dominant stories vs. personal stories; Authoritative discourse vs. internal persuasive discourses; Vulnerability Uncertainty in naming
- http://blog.photoshelter.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/10/amazing-portfolio1.jpg http://www.oxbridgeacademy.co.za/wp-content/uploads/2014/11/Accreditation_page.jpg http://www.firstediting.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2011/10/technicalwriting.jpg
- http://blog.photoshelter.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/10/amazing-portfolio1.jpg http://www.oxbridgeacademy.co.za/wp-content/uploads/2014/11/Accreditation_page.jpg http://www.firstediting.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2011/10/technicalwriting.jpg
- http://blog.photoshelter.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/10/amazing-portfolio1.jpg http://www.oxbridgeacademy.co.za/wp-content/uploads/2014/11/Accreditation_page.jpg http://www.firstediting.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2011/10/technicalwriting.jpg
- Lieberman & Miller: 2004Individual teacher leader roles and organizational realities and how they bump up against the norms of schools as bureaucracies;
- Lieberman & Miller: 2004Individual teacher leader roles and organizational realities and how they bump up against the norms of schools as bureaucracies;