Examining the influence of professional development on tutors’ teaching philosophies

ABSTRACT

This paper reports the findings of a qualitative study examining the influence of professional development (PD) on tutors’ teaching philosophies. It found that tutors construe their role in three ways: as transmitter, facilitator, or reflexive practitioner. The findings suggest most tutors, prior to a PD program, hold a teacher-focused conception of teaching and learning (that is, as transmitter) but shift toward a student-oriented conception following the completion of the PD program (facilitators or reflexive practitioners). Epistemic shifts among tutors were attributed to three specific features of the PD program: workshops, peer mentoring, and peer networking. This study provides insights into PD features that cultivate student-oriented teaching philosophies reflecting contemporary pedagogical strategies that promote experiential and constructivist teaching approaches.

KEYWORDS:

• Tutors
• teaching assistants
• professional development
• tutor training
• teaching philosophies

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes

1 Tutors is the term used in Australia. In other contexts, the term refers to teaching assistants (or graduate teaching assistants), graduate student instructor, casual academics, sessional staff, or teachers.

Additional information

Funding

This project has been funded by Faculty of Business & Economics Research Grant, The University of Melbourne.