Available Podcasts
Podcast #1 The Teaching Improvement Agenda (Book Review): This podcast examines a new book by Professor David Lynch and fellow authors from around the globe, entitled The Teaching Improvement AgendaWhat Matters and How Teaching Excellence Is Achieved. Listen as we explain what teaching improvement requires, how it is achieved, and how to maintain it in your classroom and school. Based on studies involving real schools and real teachers, The Teaching Improvement Agenda is focused on what really matters for teachers and leaders in today’s schools.
Podcast #2: What Principals of High Achieveing Schools Do?: What are the effective strategies they employ? Read the published paper here
Podcast #3: Exploring a Model for Effective Teacher Professional Learning: This podcast examines the landscape of teacher professional learning (PL) in Australia, focusing on the need for data-informed decision-making in the design and implementation of effective PL models. The podcast proposes a cyclical model of data-informed PL, which involves three key components: data-informed instructional decision-making, co-planning, and co-implementation. The model emphasizes the importance of sustained, job-embedded PL communities where teachers work collaboratively to identify problems of practice, analyze relevant data, plan and implement strategies, and reflect on their impact. The paper also discusses the importance of principal leadership in facilitating teacher collaboration and fostering a culture of openness and critical reflection.
Podcast #4: Examining Community of Practices for Teaching Improvement: This technical paper proposes a theoretical schema for establishing and sustaining a community of practice (CoP) focused on teaching improvement. The authors argue that a CoP can be understood as a group of people who share a craft or profession and that such groups are crucial for the professional growth of individual members. The authors utilise the Theory of Planned Behaviour to identify three key components that are crucial for establishing a CoP: attitude, subjective norms, and perceived behavioural control. The paper goes on to propose an Activation Schema, which outlines the elements necessary for establishing a CoP, including self-interest, a circumstance of concern, raised awareness, opportunity through activity, and support. Finally, the paper highlights the importance of a ‘broker’ who can effectively orchestrate and align these elements to facilitate the establishment of a CoP.
Podcast #5: A Strategy for Improving Teaching Practices Across a School, Based on the Establishment of a Community of Practice: The podcast builds on previous work that explored the role of data-informed professional learning cycles and conceptual schemas for CoPs. The strategy outlined in this paper combines three evidence-based principles: data-informed decision-making, co-planning, and co-implementation. It identifies four key operational elements: client-centric teaching logics, team teaching, individual teacher professional learning plans, and a coaching, mentoring, and feedback (CMF) regime. The podcast argues that these elements, when orchestrated effectively by school leadership, create the necessary conditions and arrangements for whole-school teaching improvement.
Podcast #6: Reading Intervsions. How to Teach Reading in Classrooms Effectively: This podcast, based on research experience from the Literacy Care website explains the importance of using scientific and evidence-based reading interventions, as opposed to programs that are not backed by research. It outlines a five-level hierarchy to classify the efficacy of reading interventions, with Level 1 being the most effective, supported by randomised control trials. The excerpt then identifies eight fundamental principles that underpin effective reading interventions, such as the need for multisensory, alphabetic and grapho-phonemic instruction, as well as direct, explicit, repetitive, and drill-like instruction. Finally, it emphasises the importance of Response to Intervention, where the program is adapted based on the child’s individual needs and responses.
Podcast #7: A New Model for Preparing Teachers Pt1. Teacher education in Australia, like most developed countries, is in crisis. Government reports cite inadequacies of traditional models of teacher education. Teachers and their employers argue that they are poorly prepared for modern classroom work. In this podcast, we explore a new model for preparing our future teachers.
Podcast #8: A New Model for Preparing Teachers Pt2 : This podcast further explores the new model outlined in Podcast #7 by discussing Teaching Schools, Resident Teaching Consultants and Portal Tasks.
Podcast # 9: A Critique of NAPLAN. NAPLAN (National Assessment Program for Literacy and Numeracy) causes some consternation in teachers who work in schools. This podcast provides a brief analysis of the 2019 Australian Curriculum, Assessment and Reporting Authority (ACARA, 2019) Report to highlight how the discourse reasoning and analysis around NAPLAN have contributed to particular conceptual and ideological positions concerning the role and function of NAPLAN in ways that divert the focus from fundamental policy goals.
Podcast #10: Helen Timperley's Research on Using Assessment Data to Inform Teaching. This podcast explores a published paper by Helen Timperley of the University of Auckland focused on using assessment data to inform teaching practice. The full paper can be found HERE
