Professional Supervision: A vehicle for facilitating change in teaching practice

Abstract

With the recent announcements that Institutes of Technology and Polytechnics are to face ‘quality checks’ by NZQA any research that evidences internal processes such as professional supervision, co-inquiry and action research into teaching practice will support and enhance the already keen focus that ITP’s have on student centred learning and quality teaching practice.

This Ako Aotearoa funded research project used group supervision to focus academic staff on unpacking and critiquing their world of teaching in an ITP. Three objectives drove the direction of the project:

1. to assist participants to critically examine patterns of student engagement that may limit or hinder teaching effectiveness,
2. to assist participants to examine more flexible and student centred teaching pedagogies and
3. to evaluate Professional Supervision as a change catalyst.

The safe environment and facilitated group process fostered constructive co-inquiry into teaching and learning challenges, hindrances and opportunities. The analysis and evaluation of this process yielded findings that clustered around student issues/responsibilities, institutional issues and teaching practice issues.

This research provides some insights into the challenges the researchers faced in setting up and facilitating this project, the positive outcomes as reported by the participants, and ideas about the potential to replicate this research in any tertiary setting.

Authors' bios

Michael O’Connell
Michael is a Senior Lecturer at UCOL teaching out of the School of Nursing. His special interests are mental health and the relationship dynamics faced by health professionals. He maintains an ongoing interest in research into professional practice issues and is a Clinical Supervisor for a number of health staff.

Janet Walke
Janet is a Senior Lecturer at UCOL, having worked in the education sector for 30 years and leads the delivery of the adult teaching qualification at UCOL. Her interest areas lie in assisting teaching professionals to reflect on and better their practice in a supportive environment.

Acknowledgements

We wish to acknowledge our colleagues who participated in this project and agreed to our use of all evaluative material. Our thanks to those that proofread and peer reviewed our work