I live and work among teachers. My partner is a great teacher, I have close friends who are teachers, I train teachers, I spend every single day of my life with teachers! One of the things we keep on talking about is professional development. Is CPD really important for educators? What makes a great seminar really great? Finally, when reading a teacher’s CV, how can we know that the courses and seminars that they have attended really have an impact on their way of teaching?
Text by: Elizabeth Veliou
To start with, I have worked with teachers with zero experience who were natural talents when it comes to teaching, and I have also worked with teachers who had many years of experience, had attended many prestigious courses and seminars, but in reality their teaching methodology was nothing different from the old way, polished with some elaborate use of technology or fancy games to teach grammar. To me, a great teacher is the one who always thinks about “the two Ls”, Life and the Learner. When you attend seminars, get certificates, buy supplementary material and spend your time on studying new methods and techniques, you should only ask yourself two questions: Is this going to help my students? Is it going to have an impact on their lives? As I have always said and believed, teaching is an act. It cannot be politically neutral, it must be thought-provoking, it should change lives and mentalities. Teaching grammar through a fun game, provides students with a few minutes of entertainment. Teaching grammar through a short film, a story or a work of art, not only makes the lesson memorable but also creates critical thinkers. If you collect certificates just to enrich your CV or raise your value in the job market, then, something is really wrong.
So, why is CPD important? Do we really become better teachers for our learners after completing a course or attending a seminar? Well, yes and no. Yes, if we truly implement those new ideas and methods in our teaching, adapting them to the needs of our students. No, if we like collecting certificates and advertising ourselves but our lessons lack any kind of innovation or provide no special experiences to our students. Yes, if our teaching makes a statement to the wrongdoings along with developing language skills. No, if we just gamify traditional teaching methods with no impact on the life of our students, just to give our lessons a spark.
How can a teacher choose the right seminar? The first thing that one should take into consideration is the speaker/trainer. In our days and time there is something really dangerous called “social engineering”. There are people who claim to have knowledge, credentials and experience but in reality they ran unsuccessful businesses, have no recognized qualifications and their influence is the product of a fake world that they created for themselves in the social media. So, search for qualified professionals who have a long history in the field, or have really achieved something important as educators.
The second thing we should take into account is the content of the seminar or the course. Is it research based? Has the method/programme/activity presented been piloted at a language school and are the results of it documented? Anyone can suggest anything and tell you that it works. However, only things that have been tried and tested in real classrooms, with visible results, can really be helpful to a teacher.
All in all, CPD is surely needed and should be valued by all teachers. However, not everything that is offered out there is of good quality or useful to us. As it happens with all things in life, we need to research, filter and choose wisely. In the end, we become are choices, so we have to be proud of them.
