A radical re-modelling of induction- the staff experience

Much is written about the transition of new students into university but there is a smaller body of knowledge about the staffs’ perceptions of the process. How students are inducted into an institution is critical to their level of familiarity and engagement and the development of their knowledge and skills. This paper explores an extended transition process offered to a group of students from the viewpoint of the staff team involved. The findings showed how staff had to move away from their usual roles in transition; for the most part they enjoyed the challenge of delivering the curriculum in this way. Staff did acknowledge the messiness of the programme, and recognised the new transition did impact on other responsibilities they had committed to, but at the same time as this was a new initiative, the problems were quickly put down to a “quick new learning curve” that could be rectified with careful planning

Exploring the Implementation of A Professional Learning Communities in Malaysian’s Schools

Part of the Malaysian Education Blueprint 2013-2025 outlines teachers’ transformation into their profession of choice. To enable this transition, Professional Learning Communities (PLCs) has been established to assist in developing high quality teachers who can achieve their full potential. One of the key elements of PLCs is peer coaching. However, even though the implementation of PLCs spans a large number of schools across the country, findings show shared values and practice dimensions contained within peer coaching as a core element only show moderate to low levels of engagement among teachers (Abdullah et al., 2014; Ismail et al., 2014). Therefore, this ongoing study will investigate whether peer coaching benefits teachers and contributes to their professional development. This mixed method approach study will consider teachers’ perspectives on peer coaching implementation, commitment and self-efficacy using questionnaires (Mowday et al, 1979; Rajab, 2013; Schwarzer et al., 1999). Teachers' observation on the implementation of peer coaching will be collected through semi-structured interviews with the teachers to explore the role of supporting the peer coaching programme in schools and to consider how the findings relate to the use of peer coaching as a PLCs strategy. This study will also explore how peer coaching is practised by secondary schoo

Using a Clean Feedback Model to Facilitate the Learning Process

Effective and informative feedback is an essential part of learning and improving performance that is influenced by a number of issues, such as time constraints, ambiguous communication and emotional barriers (Hattie, 1998). Feedback should facilitate the learning process and the teaching performance. Accordingly, in this article we examine the “clean feedback” model developed by Walker and Doyle (2006) and explore its impact on the learning experiences of a purposeful sample of eleven beginning physical education teachers undertaking a one year postgraduate Qualified Teacher Status course at a post-92 university in the North West of England. After two days of staff and student training in using the model, the data in the form of lesson evaluations and self feed- back were collected at staged time intervals during their second placement school. The findings indicate that the model has improved the students’ ability to give and receive both positive and negative feedback and to improve students self awareness and understanding of their own learning and teaching styles. The implications of our findings are discussed in relation to the observation and feedback of the beginning teachers and mentors might be improved on such courses for physical education trainee teachers

Co- Creating a Blended learning Curriculum in Transition to Higher Education: A Student Viewpoint.

Involving students in the design and development of their curriculum is well established in Higher Education but comes with challenges and concerns for both the staff and students. This is not a simple concept and understanding more about the experiences of the student co-creators supports others in developing this aspect of curriculum design. This small scale project uses the individual and collective voices of five second year students who worked with one programme team to co-create a transition module to support new learners entering university. The study explores the co-creation experience and the student’s response to the feedback their co-created curriculum received when it was run for the first time. The study was designed to consider if co-creation of a module was beneficial to the students involved in its co-creation. The findings explored issues in relation to the experience, the actual design of the materials and how this could be developed. The students enjoyed the co-creation, felt appreciated and listened to and felt that this was a positive learning experience. They realised how difficult it is to please everybody and gained a much better appreciation of building learning experiences for others to use. The research highlights the fact that with regards to curriculum development within universities that students should be involved in co-creation as they have an understanding of the requirements of learning form a student perspective. Whilst student satisfaction cannot be necessarily be measured directly, the anecdotal comments from students involved in this project as they graduate are the values they place on the opportunities afforded to them

Carefully supporting autonomy – learning coaching lessons and advancing theory from women’s netball in England.

Back to Netball (B2N) is an initiative that encourages women, whose engagement has lapsed, to return to regular Netball participation. This study explores what aspects of coaching practice within B2N are perceived to be effective. A thematic analysis of semi-structured interviews with 28 B2N participants and 6 coaches was undertaken. Analysis identified four pertinent themes; 1) participants personalising sporting experiences through choice, 2) coaches facilitating and / or directing participants to relevant opportunities, 3) critical considerations of autonomy; a need for balance, 4) caring as a coaching ethic. The subsequent discussion considers autonomy and care as two relevant theoretical explanations. Within the discussion, it is posited that autonomy supportive behaviours and caring relationships may be symbiotic features of successful coaching. A novel interdisciplinary theoretical contribution is therefore made by connecting Self Determination Theory with the burgeoning recognition of coaching as a caring practice

Back to Netball: Motivations for participation in a female focused Netball sport program.

Background: Back to Netball (B2N) is a UK female national sports program that has been found to engage large number of females in the sport netball. This study sought to understand the participant motives for engaging in this program. Methods: Qualitative methods were used following an initial quantitative survey, which was part of a wider project (outside of this manuscript). Survey participants comprised of 374 females aged 16-68. Participants completed an online survey to capture demographic data. Interviews were conducted with 28 participants either still engaged or no longer engaged in B2N. Analysis involved both inductive and deductive thematic analysis to explore participant perceptions of their coach. Results: Initial motives for engagement were focussed on physical health motives and social motives. The coach was also found to be important in providing opportunities for competence development. Therefore, competence development was found to be an important factor for engagement. Participant motivations moved from an extrinsic concern with losing weight to a more intrinsic foci including socialising opportunities and feelings of competence. Conclusions: As a team sport B2N stimulates social engagement, competence, and other motives. Coaching is also a key facilitator for engagement in B2N. This research has implications for future practitioners and policy makers aiming to engage women in sport and physical activity

Primary Care Staff's Views and Experiences Related to Routinely Advising Patients about Physical Activity. A Questionnaire Survey

Background: United Kingdom public health policy has recently re-emphasised the role of primary health care professionals in tackling increasing levels of physical inactivity within the general population. However, little is known about the impact that this has had in practice. This study explores Scottish primary care staff's knowledge, attitudes and experiences associated with advising patients about physical activity during routine consultations. Methods: A cross-sectional questionnaire survey of general practitioners (or family physicians), practice nurses and health visitors based in four health regions was conducted during 2004. The main outcome measures included: i) health professionals' knowledge of the current physical activity recommendations; (ii) practice related to routine physical activity advising; and (iii) associated attitudes. Results: Questionnaires were returned by 757 primary care staff (response rate 54%). Confidence and enthusiasm for giving advice was generally high, but knowledge of current physical activity recommendations was low. In general, respondents indicated that they routinely discuss and advise patients about physical activity regardless of the presenting condition. Health visitors and practice nurses were more likely than general practitioners to offer routine advice. Lack of time and resources were more likely to be reported as barriers to routine advising by general practitioners than other professional groups. However, health visitors and practice nurses were also more likely than general practitioners to believe that patients would follow their physical activity advice giving. Conclusion: If primary health care staff are to be fully motivated and effective in encouraging and supporting the general population to become more physically active, policymakers and health professionals need to engage in efforts to: (1) improve knowledge of current physical activity recommendations and population trends amongst frontline primary care staff; and (2) consider the development of tools to support individual assessment and advice giving to suit individual circumstances. Despite the fact that this study found that system barriers to routine advising were less of a problem than other previous research has indicated, this issue still remains a challenge