Reflections of a lifetime of learning from a National Teaching Fellow

I have learned as much from my own lived experience of learning than I have done from improving the scholarship of my teaching. Opportunities to combine the two: pausing to critically reflect on our practice, can be hard to create alongside our intensive teaching and assessment schedules.

Learning from experience

At school, my own experience reinforced that learning could be really exciting but much depended on the teacher. My sixth form report concluded that:

 ‘Belinda bubbles with enthusiasm: she is occasionally too hasty, however.’

I think that probably still sums me up, but students and colleagues tell me that my contagious excitement about learning together is what they most value in me. However, I have learned that my enthusiasm needs careful harnessing. New students told me they found it a bit ‘scary’ at first. Quiet words exchanged with individuals as we move through our teaching spaces can be very effective and usually more inclusive. I still need to make a conscious effort to shut myself up in order to allow more time for learners to think and to talk. But I have found inviting and drawing together students’ ideas and experiences requires a lot of skill, sensitivity and quick thinking, which, occasionally, I have lacked.

During my early career teaching in a secondary school in an area of relative social deprivation, I worried about those for whom learning is something to be endured. Trying to provide enjoyable, diverse learning opportunities in a subject I have always loved, proved much more difficult than I anticipated but I did succeed in almost eradicating the desire for excuse notes. I continue to worry about inclusivity in higher education, especially when I see students all attempting the exact same tasks, despite vast differences in their prior experience and capabilities.

My touchstone has always been inclusive, collaborative learning: sharing perspectives and experiences, enhanced through valuing difference and our multiple interpretations. A first year Physical Education student, described as ‘particularly difficult’ by some colleagues, approached me three years later at graduation:

 ‘I was such a pain in your first year sessions, why did you put up with me?’

Having pointed out that she had already secured a teaching job herself, I suggested we both need to value active participation in learning, however differently it might be expressed.

I learned from the minimalist feedback on my own, carefully crafted first assignment as a new student in HE:  

              FAIL.  PLAGIARISM is a serious academic offence Belinda!

I hope I have been more kind, trying to put myself in the place of whoever will receive feedback. Fortunately, nowadays, understanding why we must reference our work is something students in HE learn before they submit assessments. But there remains a well-documented lack of consistency in our expectations of learning from secondary to tertiary education. Having said that, I still have much to learn from my friends who teach in schools, especially in their success creating inclusive learning environments.

Learning from others

Sharing experiences of teaching with colleagues is essential. I was made a University Teacher Fellow when the Sally Brown was Pro-Vice Chancellor at LBU. She was the first person I had met who was even more enthusiastic about teaching than me. Crucially, she also knows everything that has been published (or even said!) by anyone about assessment, teaching and learning and so began a never-ending process of me familiarising myself with that vast evidence base. There were many opportunities to learn from the visiting experts, including Royce Sadler.  After listening to him, I completely redesigned my materials to generate regular formative feedback as part of students’ learning experiences, thus developing the capacity to make sound judgements about the quality of their own and their peer’s work before summative assessment. This is such a vital life skill: I had been letting my students down.

Now, working with our Centre for Learning and Teaching, led by Ruth Pickford, I am an Educational Developer and review claims for Advance HE Fellowship, so I appreciate the richness and diversity of teaching talent across all the subjects at LBU. When Graham Gibbs published ‘Dimensions of Quality in Higher Education’ in 2010, I read it avidly. But we still don’t seem to have learned the lessons very well: his call for a better focus on evidence- based practice and his conclusion that it’s our human resources that make the difference. Too often we teach alone and yet Team teaching need not require more resource. Excellent teaching is still not rewarded in universities in ways commensurate with its impact on student experience, not to mention our own experience.

What my NTF means to me

Our university has some very active NTFs amongst its present and past staff. Their values seem to be what they have in common: able to inspire new and experienced staff alike and tirelessly supporting colleagues locally and nationally, as well as creating transformative experiences for their own students. I feel rather daunted to be amongst them.

In my application for NTF I evaluated some of the projects I have led to create a more inclusive student experience. Reading the detailed feedback from the three reviewers, they appreciate my, not-always-successful, endeavours to be a better teacher and valued what I had learned. Hitherto, I have concentrated most of my efforts within my own university: there always seems so much still to do and learn. Now I will be able to enjoy even more opportunities to keep learning from others about teaching and perhaps share my experiences more widely.

Team teaching is great fun and usually leads to better learning for our students as well as ourselves. How can we offer this opportunity more widely?

Having studied Physical Education at university, Belinda taught in secondary schools before joining Leeds Beckett, eventually becoming Head of Subject in the Carnegie School of Sport. Currently seconded to its Centre for Learning and Teaching, she leads on aspects of educational development and policy and the Advance HE Fellowships scheme.