Page 11 - Professional Learning Framework for the Teaching Profession - June 2016

Learning through practice
Listening to the students to know and understand what they truly need. They are the driving and guiding force behind my practice. Working with students — I learn what works and doesn’t over time. Through trying certain techniques, adjusting them until I find what works.
—Member of the Teaching Profession
Members of the teaching profession have identified that the most significant and powerful professional learning that informs their practice is teaching alongside learners. Educators understand that their teaching and leadership experiences are key sources of learning within the context of their practice. Professional learning and efficacy are strengthened by critically reflecting on professional practice. Learning from professional practice can involve experiential, transformative, relational and reflective learning. Professional autonomy is essential for supporting and advancing educators’ practices in response to the evolving nature of teaching and learning.
Conceptual framework for ongoing professional learning
A conceptual framework for ongoing professional learning has been designed based on the feedback received from members of the teaching profession regarding their sustained engagement in highly diverse and complex forms of professional learning. This conceptual framework (Figure 6) provides a lived theory of action for understanding the complex, holistic, interrelated, self-directed, contextual and evolving nature of relevant and meaningful ongoing professional learning. The lived theory of action of the various forms of professional learning engaged in by the teaching profession is depicted in Figure 6, and is by no means exhaustive.
ONTARIO COLLEGE OF TEACHERS
PROFESSIONAL LEARNING FRAMEWORK 7