Trusting teacher professionalism and collegiality: engaging/supporting/consulting the profession
The bedrock of the successful development and implementation of the Study Design was the FOSC’s trust in teachers’ professionalism – their knowledge and professional judgment in matters of English curriculum design in ‘creating’ a Design capable of meeting, within reason, the needs of all students in the diverse range of senior English courses they had taught up until then. This was reflected in the extensive statewide consultation program undertaken by the English project team, with the likes of Jan Osmotherly, Jennifer Haynes, Helen Parr and others, which made provision for any teacher who wanted to have a say about the way the development was progressing the chance to do so.
As the Design was implemented teachers recognized the importance of collegiality in their teaching of it, and the great benefits of teachers learning from one another. This applied both to in-school moderation procedures and the mandated statewide verification processes, the consensus moderation of the Presentation of an Issue and Writing folio CATS. Teachers described the verification days as the best form of professional development they had undertaken before or since. There was generous praise for both VCAB and the Department in providing opportunities for such.
Similarly, teachers contributed generously to providing ideas, resources and strategies to the compiling of the Course Development Support Material, designed to assist teachers in developing their own ‘customised’ courses, and in offering strategies for teaching them.
VATE, too, provided a number of professional ‘spaces’ to allow teachers to share their work and to comment on how they were ‘traveling’ with teaching the Design – professional in-services, workshops at state conferences, forums, Idiom itself.
Suggested reading list (items available in VATE office):
- English course development support material, VCAB (Victorian Curriculum and Assessment Board), April 1990: ISBN 0 7306 1205 8
- English: Managing Oral Work in VCE English 3 and 4 and Procedures for Assessing the Oral Communication CAT, VCAB (Victorian Curriculum and Assessment Board)
- Video: Oral Presentation: Using Variety, Flair and Imagination, Video Education Australasia, 1991 (VHS): ISBN 1 875592 03 2
- Ferguson, Tony, Proposal for ESL Reference Group