Proceedings of The International Virtual Conference on Education, Teaching and Learning
Year: 2020
DOI:
A Corpus triangulation for developing and supporting teachers’ professional competencies
Sofia Cramerotti
ABSTRACT:
The aim of this contribution is to present some aspects regarding teachers’ professional practice. The focus is on the importance to adopt a corpus triangulation in data gathering: the researcher and the practitioners (novice teacher and expert teacher). The novice teacher is a teacher at the beginning of her/his career. She/he has a great benefit from peer to peer observation with an expert teacher assuming the role of tutor/mentor in the school context. Scaffolded by researcher’s input (coming from literature, knowledge about teachers’ competencies and professional standards), it is fundamental collect information based on the concrete experience on the field through a co-reflection between peers and promote self-reflective practices in novice teachers about their professional development and areas of growth. But this triangulation needs a common framework that would identify and describe the teachers’ competencies in all their roles. For this reason, I have aggregated a Syllabus of competencies according to Italian and international standards. The different competencies are divided in specific behavioral indicator (acted behaviors). Using this Syllabus can create self-evaluation and co-reflection with a peer in a co-collaborative comparison. The researcher guarantees that this Syllabus comes from evidence based research. For teachers, it is an exercise for practicing introspection, relationship building with peers and a helpful occasion for deep reflection on their effectiveness. At the same time, it is a framework that guide data gathering coming from three different sources: a corpus triangulation that help and promote a whole vision about really useful competencies of today’s teachers.
Keywords: framework-syllabus; novice/expert teacher; self/co-reflection; teaching practice.