The Power of Practice: Effective practice-based teacher learning models

Group Submission Type: Formal Panel Session

Proposal

As educators, we aim to provide quality education to all learners. Evidence suggests that improved teaching is the critical driver of student learning and in closing achievement gaps. Teacher learning is an active process in which teachers engage in activities that lead to a change in their knowledge, beliefs, and teaching practices. While teachers are expected to be experts in learning, there isn’t adequate data and research that centers on teachers’ learning processes.
Typical efforts to improve classroom instruction focus on professional development and universally effective teaching techniques. They equip and enable teachers to teach literacy and numeracy using existing and UDL- and Gender-Equity –driven teaching and learning materials packages. However, materials, preparation, and training are inadequate. For the investment in quality TLMs that follow global competencies to be effective input into education systems, teachers need to be equipped and enabled to teach responsively. This means that teachers also need constant opportunities to reflect on, analyze, and learn from experiences in light of theory, research, and professional expertise (Heller, 2022).
Increased attention to creating an enabling learning environment for all learners, as evidenced by USAID’s commitments to Universal Design for Learning and inclusive education, has created an opportunity to integrate the continuous practice of effective teaching techniques into professional development. These techniques set teachers and instructional leaders up for targeted and meaningful coaching exercises that greatly improve in-classroom teaching. The sector is likely to benefit from additional evidence, deeper exploration, and practice with adaptable coaching frameworks that support contextualization of the sub-skills that make up professional teacher competencies of effective teachers.
We aim to support the dissemination of practice-based training on effective teaching techniques that create more inclusive literacy and numeracy classrooms. This panel is also an opportunity to build a shared vocabulary of effective teaching techniques and offer examples of terms that have been adapted for specific country contexts. Through the sharing of our experiences in Uganda, Zambia, Tajikistan, Colombia, the Dominican Republic, South Africa, and Malawi, we aim to provide some of that additional evidence of the exploration, contextualization, and localization of practice-based teacher training in country contexts. We also hope to surface more examples of practice-based teaching training in USAID and other organizations’ project implementation across multiple countries and contexts.

Sub Unit

• General Pool

Organizer

• Prakrithy Pradeepkumar, Chemonics International

Chair

• Audrey Spencer, Chemonics International

Individual Presentations

• Camps to Classroom: Practice-based teacher training for literacy in Malawi - Terry Giles, Chemonics; Audrey Spencer, Chemonics International

• Practice-Based Teacher Training in Uganda and Zambia - Daniel Omaya, Promoting Equality in African Schools PEAS