Resilient Pupils, Teachers & Schools: Developing reseach informed practice

RESILIENT PUPILS, TEACHERS & SCHOOLS: DEVELOPING RESEARCH INFORMED PRACTICE

Institute of Education University of Cumbria Saturday 5 November 2016 Carlisle

Welcome

Colleagues Welcome to this conference. This one-day event is focused on the concept of ‘resilience’ for teachers, learners and schools. With keynotes from two leading thinkers on resilience, the day is designed to support the development of research-informed practice by teachers, as well as other school leaders and educational researchers. Using the full capacity of our Learning Gateway building, the conference programme includes time for dialogue and sharing of current good practice in schools to support subsequent practical action planning.

The two high quality provocative keynotes will be followed by round table group discussions and expert panel sessions.

This conference is part of a programme of events, collaborative research projects and Masters level programmes organised by the Institute of Education at the University of Cumbria. We aim to support the development of research-informed practice by teacher teams and schools through long term collaborative partnership.

RIPLE (Research Initiative for Professional Learning in Education) is the educational research group at the University of Cumbria. RIPLE provides a supportive network of teacher researchers across our educational partnership. See www.cumbria.ac.uk/RIPLE We hope you will enjoy this conference, find it a useful professional development activity, and become a proactive member of the RIPLE network.

Pete Boyd Prof of Prof Learning University of Cumbria

Sally Elton-Chalcraft Reader in Education University of Cumbria

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Keynote Address Professor Qing Gu Nottingham University

Resilient Teachers, Resilient Schools: Building and Sustaining Quality in Testing Times To teach, and to teach at one’s best over time, has always required resilience. At a time when the contemporary landscape of teaching is populated with successive and persisting government policy reforms that have increased teachers’ external accountabilities, work complexity and emotional workload, understanding why and how many teachers are able to sustain their capacity to be resilient and continue to work for improvement is an important quality retention issue.

Using rich illustrations from real teachers in real primary and secondary schools, I will discuss what resilience is, why it matters, and how it may be built and nurtured in different organisational settings. I will also demonstrate why resilient quality is central to the existing majority of teachers who stay in teaching to continue to make a difference in their careers, regardless of shifts in policy, workplace, professional and personal circumstances.

Whilst much has been written over the years about teacher stress and burnout, there is little research which reports on the conditions which are essential for teachers to sustain their commitment and effectiveness over their professional lives, in contexts of challenge and change. We have found from extensive research into teachers’ work and lives over the last decade that resilience in teachers is more than the ability to ‘bounce back’ in extreme adverse circumstances. Rather, what counts is ‘everyday resilience’ which enables them to respond positively to the unavoidable uncertainties inherent in their everyday professional lives and through this, sustain their commitment, wellbeing and effectiveness.

Speaker Profile

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Qing Gu (Dr) is Professor of Education at the University of Nottingham. She has led and contributed to a range of international and national research projects, including Department for Education funded projects on the Evaluation of Teaching Schools, Outstanding Primary School Leadership; and The Impact of School Leadership on Pupil Outcomes. She is author of Teacher Development: Knowledge and Context (Continuum, 2007); and co-author of Teachers Matter (Open University Press, 2007), The New Lives of Teachers (Routledge, 2010), Successful School Leadership: Linking with Learning and Achievement (Open University Press, 2011), and Resilient Teachers, Resilient Schools (Routledge, 2014).

Keynote Address Professor Barry Hymer University of Cumbria Developing Resilient Learners Creating a school and classroom culture that nurtures resilience and grit 21st century educators know that longterm success relies more on mastery virtues like grit and resilience than on superficially plausible and historically dominant concepts such as ‘ability’ or ‘potential’ – both of which have been found to be deeply contestable in definition and yet entrenched in practice.

This recognition of the role of resilience and grit lies behind current political and cross-party interest in the UK in notions of ‘character’ (where the gap between research-informed diagnosis and prescription is sometimes alarmingly large), and also underpins much contemporary evidence in such areas as meta-cognition (which has a particular role when the task’s challenge level is high), feedback and mindset.

Barry will offer a definition of the terms ‘resilience’ and ‘grit’ and show how these can be distinguished from moral and civic virtues before identifying a number of research-derived admissions and implications for school and classroom practice. Throughout, he will offer reallife examples to illustrate broader theoretical principles, and offer a few suggestions for nurturing resilience and grit in the mainstream primary and secondary classroom.

Speaker Profile Dr Barry Hymer is Professor of Psychology in Education at the University of Cumbria in Lancaster. He has been interpreting and researching learning theory as it relates to classroom practice since he became a professional educator in 1983.

Over this period he has acquired extensive experience in schools, initially as a primary and secondary school teacher, subsequently as an educational psychologist and since 2004 as an independent consultant, academic and researcher. He is concerned always to relate evidence-based theory to classroom-based practice, and he has worked with many thousands of reflective educators in pursuit of this aim - often as part of extended action research projects.

Barry has particular interests and expertise in the related areas of motivation, mindset, talent development and independent learning. He has toured and worked closely with Prof Carol Dweck, originator of mindset theory, during the summers of 2010, 2013, 2014 and 2016. He has created and leads the Osiris Mindset Programme – a one-year intervention aimed at introducing and embedding growth mindset practices in schools. Amongst his early books, Barry co-edited the influential Routledge International Companion to Gifted Education (2009) and his more recent books are the Growth Mindset Pocketbook (Hymer & Gershon, 2014) which has sold over 35,000 copies to date, and Learning Teaching: Becoming an inspirational teacher (with Pete Boyd & Karen Lockney, 2015) – described by Prof John Hattie as “The perfect book for those who want to make the most of their opportunity to enhance students’ brain power.”

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WANT TO KNOW MORE? F i n d o u t m o r e : w w w . c u m b r i a . a c . u k / M A E d u c a t i o n

To find out more about the MA Education: Professional Practice www.cumbria.ac.uk/MAEducation

Contact the programme leader pippa.leslie@cumbria.ac.uk

www.cumbria.ac.uk

Conference Programme Time

Session

Room

09.30

Registration and refreshments

LG Foyer

09.50

Welcome

LGLT

10.00

Keynote & Discussion

LGLT

Prof Qing Gu - Resilient Teachers, Resilient Schools

11.00

Round table groups

LG

Responding to the keynote / sharing practice on teacher resilience

11.30

Panel question & answer session

12.00

Lunch

13.00

Keynote & Discussion

LGLT

Refectory, Skiddaw Building LGLT

Developing Resilient Learners

14.00

Round table groups

LG

Responding to the keynote / sharing practice on pupil resilience

14.30

Panel question and answer session

LGLT

15.00

Plenary

LGLT

15.30

Close

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Developing research-informed practice through a collaborative research and development project In partnership with schools and school alliances the Institute for Education at the University of Cumbria is involved in research and development projects with teacher researchers.

Collaborative action research is a wellestablished approach to effective professional learning for teachers and for leadership of change in schools. Our collaborative research and development projects share the key characteristics of effective professional learning which include: sustained engagement with a learning issue, building collaboration and trust, critical engagement with external knowledge, opportunities for classroom experimentation and evaluation, and support from school leaders (Teacher Development Trust http://tdtrust.org/about/dgt).

In our collaborative research and development projects teacher researchers focus on an aspect of learning, teaching and assessment that is important to their particular school context and work alongside a research mentor provided by the university.

Contact: pete.boyd@cumbria.ac.uk

Panel: Question & answer sessions These sessions will be an opportunity for conference delegates to raise any questions that have emerged during the day with a panel of University and school based colleagues.

WiFi Access For WiFi connection in the Learning Gateway, please use the following login details: Guest account User Name: Resilience.Cumbria Guest account Password: November2016 Profile name: UoC-Visitor

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Dates for your calendar Institute of Education University of Cumbria Public Lectures Thursday 1 Dec 2016 17.00 to 19.00 Carlisle Campus Something Wrong with the Eleven Plus?

Prof Hilary Constable Visiting Professor University of Cumbria Thursday 26 Jan 2017 17.00 to 19.00 Lancaster Campus Thawing the tension between theory and practice using non-Western educational epistemology: Critical examinations of the role of academic theories in educational practice improvement Prof Noriyuki Inoue University of San Diego / Waseda University Tokyo Thursday 2 March 2017 17.00 to 19.00 Lancaster Campus Muslims, Schooling and the Question of Self-Segregation Dr Shamim Miah University of Huddersfield

One-day conference events for teachers and school leaders Saturday 18 March 2017 10.00 to 16.00 Carlisle Campus The Teacher Researcher: developing research-informed practice Keynotes: Prof Dame Alison Peacock & Prof Carey Philpott

Teacher Education Advancement Network (TEAN) Thursday 11 & Friday 12 May 2017 Birmingham, UK TEAN (Teacher Education Advancement Network) annual conference For details of the TEAN conference and other TEAN events and resources go to www.tean.ac.uk

RIPLE seminars: developing research-informed practice Wednesday 19 October 2016 16.30 to 18.00 Video Conference: Carlisle Lancaster and London Learning Conversations: teacher inquiry into adult-child dialogue: Prof Pete Boyd Wednesday 16 November 2016 16.30 to 18.00 Video Conference: Carlisle Lancaster and London Judging the Quality of Teaching: local and European perspectives on the evaluation of teaching: Dr Paul Cammack Wednesday 7 December 2016 16.30 to 18.00 Video Conference: Carlisle Lancaster and London Quality Feedback: teaching for the promotion of task-focus, process engagement and selfregulation: Prof Barry Hymer Wednesday 25 January 2017 16.30 to 18.00 Video Conference: Carlisle Lancaster and London Promoting 'Fundamental British values' and anti-racism: Sally Elton-Chalcraft Wednesday 8 March 2017 16.30pm to 18.00 Video Conference: Carlisle Lancaster and London Philosophy for Children (P4C): Building Character through Dialogue: Georgia Prescott and Jane Yates Wednesday June 07 2017 16.30 to 18.00 Video Conference: Carlisle Lancaster and London Mindset Matters: teacher and learner mindsets: Pippa Leslie 10