Personal Development for Teachers

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www.merechats.co.uk Article : SecEd Newspaper 1 Personal Development for Teachers How do we differentiate between the personal and professional elements of teaching? Dot Struthers explains … When asked about their personal development, many teachers would probably think about CPD and associate it with training that they had on an INSET day. Here’s a simple definition which may help with the distinction between them. • professional development focuses on the technical skills and competencies such as subject knowledge, planning/structuring lessons, managing the learning process and transferring knowledge. personal development focuses on the personal skills and competencies such as managing your work life balance, your personal efficiency and your ability to connect, build rapport and inspire. Recent research has shown that 80% of CPD seems to be focussed on the development of the “professional” skills of teaching, ie the broadening of subject knowledge, teaching techniques or the structure of the curriculum. • Conversely the important personal skills, like self awareness, staying in control of ones emotions, being able to coach the best out of people and managing relationships seem to be taken for granted. Teacher training rarely covers the personal elements like understanding ones personality type and the impact this has on the learning experience, or how to deal with bad behaviour and conflict in the school environment. Yet this is the very knowledge that can help teachers fulfil their potential. In industry this distinction has taken a while to emerge, and it was factors like the cost of stress in the workplace which have brought the personal side into focus. And now companies go to great lengths to ensure their employees have all the resources they need to help them with their work life balance. Let’s hope we don’t have to burn our
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