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Cluster based CPD – what works

I was at a conference this week for schools from the East Midlands and we had a table discussion about cluster-based CPD. I was commenting that there is lots of evidence about the principles of good collaborative CPD that could form a foundation for structuring cluster-based CPD and there was lots of interest in this. In a nutshell key factors in successful collaborative CPD are:

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    • the use of external expertise linked to school-based activity
    • observation
    • reflection and experimentation
    • an emphasis on peer support
    • scope for teacher participants to identify their own CPD focus
    • processes to encourage, extend and structure professional dialogue
    • processes for sustaining the CPD over time to enable teachers to embed the practices in their own classroom settings
    • recognition of individual teachers’ starting points.

Some on the table wanted to see the full report which comes from CUREE’s involvement in The Evidence for Policy and Practice Information and Co-ordinating Centre (EPPI-Centre). Through this work we have been at the forefront of bringing together CPD research evidence which might be numerous or hard to locate and interpreting and synthesising the results. EPPI reviews make reliable research findings accessible to the people who need them and here is a link to one of these reviews on collaborative CPD.

The impact of collaborative continuing professional development (CPD) on classroom teaching and learning: How do collaborative and sustained CPD and sustained but not collaborative CPD affect teaching and learning? (2005)

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Effective Mentoring and Coaching resources - Users Forum

Submitted by Alison Halford on Fri, 09/04/2010 - 12:47

Previous reviews have looked at the impacts of sustained, collaborative CPD in primary and secondary schools on teachers and students. The aim of this fourth review is to identify the common characteristics in specialist provided sustained collaborative CPD that reports positive impacts. This will help to identify factors which are important to the design of specialist led collaborative CPD.

What do specialists do in continuing professional development (CPD) programmes for which there is evidence of positive outcomes for pupils and teachers? (2007)

Submitted by Alison Halford on Fri, 23/07/2010 - 16:57
You might want to have a look at the recent enews article on collaborative CPD http://www.curee.co.uk/node/2256?utm_source=Newsletter&utm_medium=Suppor... If you don't generally receive the newsletter contact michael.hawkins@curee.co.uk Alison Halford Assistant Director - CUREE

Submitted by Serena (not verified) on Wed, 09/02/2011 - 15:11
This was a question asked to Philippa and she responds "Indeed it does. Collaborative professional development of the kind found in coaching and mentoring relations is connected with substantial improvements in both teaching and learning. This is the heartening conclusion of systematic reviews of the research. The systematic reviews found that peer support was a particularly effective tool in professional learners’ CPD because it created a sense of responsibility for one’s fellow-learners, engendered trust between learners, and enabled a feeling of greater professional security to develop, which allowed risk-taking to take place. Observation was another essential learning technique. Interestingly the review found that it was as important to observe other people, not necessarily experts – and have the chance of examining possible interpretations afterwards – as it was to be observed and receive feedback from specialists."