The 360-Degree TPD Review – Part 1 (21.02.18 – 23.02.18)

Feedback is a gift. Ideas are the currency of our next success. Let people see you value both feedback and ideas.

 This quote by Jim Trinka and Les Wallace expresses the essence of the three-day TPD Review that took place in Bengaluru with over 40 participants of CLIx across all domains, members from partner organisations, namely, MIT (USA), ITfC and RVEC, and faculty members from CUT (South Africa) and Ambedkar University (Delhi).

 

Discussions: An exchange of knowledge

The CLIx calendar had been marked almost two months in advance, blocking 21–23 February 2018 for the Teacher Professional Development (TPD) team to review each of its four courses and present an analysis and the way forward. The process began almost a month before the last of the face-to-face trainings for 2017–18 ended on 25 November 2018. The idea was to review every aspect of the courses and share the findings in this workshop.

The TPD team had a research question about the efficacy of the face-to-face workshops. They were to analyse the observation reports, map them to the session plans and overall objectives and suggest improvements.

The second crucial tool was the course teams’ self-review of the content and design as per a rubric. The aspect of leveraging technology was also to be analysed as a part of this self-review. A subject TPD expert would do a similar review of the course and recommend any necessary changes.

The third (qualitative) and fourth (quantitative) tools aided analyses of the Communities of Practice and tracked the teachers’ engagement in the respective course’s Telegram group in each state.

Quantitative analyses of the TISSx runs and of the face-to-face feedback forms were done to identify patterns of engagement and suggest the way ahead.

A crucial element of the evaluation process was to take into account teachers’ opinions about the course. Those who were engaged, those who were not and those with sporadic engagement were randomly chosen from each state so that the sample had at least 10 teachers per course.Detailed interviews were conducted of the sampled teachers to gauge their reception of CLIx.

Inclusion is key: The Implementation team speaketh

The Implementation teams also presented their take on the effectiveness of the TPD runs in 2017–18 and the recommended actionables for 2018–19 at the overall and the state levels.

The evaluation process was intense and time-consuming and required brutal honesty. Gosh, did the review live up to these expectations and more!

Anusha Ramanathan, Curriculum Consultant, English  and TPD team