Hey Teacher Tapp Community!
Itโs Week 30 and although the school year is coming to a close, we still have lots of questions to ask!
Want to help Teacher Tapp grow?
๐ฅ Invite your colleagues to join!
The best link to share is onelink.to/teachertapp โ it takes them straight to the app store! ๐ฒโจ
๐ Share us in your breakroom!
Print this poster and pin it up in your breakroom to help spread the word.
๐ฌ Weโd love your feedback!
What do you love about the app? What could be better? Let us know by emailing usa@teachertapp.com โ weโre all ears!
Now, time for the edu-data!
1. Professional development
Professional development or ‘PD’ is an important entitlement for all teachers: after all, just like the students we teach, we are always learning.
But how happy are teachers with the quality of their PD? The good news is that for most teachers, the PD is going well. 70% of elementary, 65% of middle and 57% of high school teachers agree that the PD they receive is helping them improve.
So what is good about it? Among teachers who DID agree that their PD was helping them improve, 62% reported that what they had completed was relevant to their subject or role. Another reason for finding it useful was specificity to needs (40%) and focused on student learning (39%).
And for those who did NOT agree that their PD was helping them improve? Their criticisms were focused on exactly that which those who felt their PD was helping them improve had praised: relevancy and specificity.
Research groups
Some schools operate research groups where teachers explore papers and perhaps even engage in their own school-based education research trialing out ideas.
2% of Teacher Tappers are already part of groups like this, but for the rest of you, does the concept appeal?
13% it is a ‘hard’ no – not interested.
16% a ‘soft’ no – something you might be interested in the future, but not at the moment.
20% would say yes, but it’s tentative – not quite sure yet.
A massive 52% would be happy to join!
Take note – leaders in school! If you don’t have a group like this already – perhaps it’s something that could be started!
Do you have experience of working in schools with research groups? Do you have tips on how to run them well? Get in touch through ‘contact us’ in the app – we would love to hear your ideas.
2. Coaching in schools
Coaching is one of many useful tools for developing staff and ensuring teachers continue to improve. Looking online at all of the blogs and podcasts about coaching, it might feel as if every school is running a program…but how common is it really?
It seems like it’s common, but not typical. Just over half (52%) of Teacher Tappers reported their school had a coaching programme for teachers, and of those, 17% were being coached, and 7% had a coach.
Do the best teachers make the best coaches?
Being a coach for another teacher is a tough job! Not only do you have to be able to help them identify what needs to be improved, but you also need to help that teacher work out what they need to do to improve. To do that job, do you need to be a great teacher? Should the best teachers be coaches?
Yes, say 31% of you, who strongly agreed with the statement ‘The best teachers should be coaches’. 47% slightly agreed, and then some weren’t so sure: 15% slightly disagreed, and only 6% strongly disagreed.
And we checked – this opinion DID NOT change when comparing teachers who have a coaching programme in their school, and teachers who don’t.
Perhaps those agreeing believe it takes a good teacher to spot what another teacher needs to do to improve – and maybe those disagreeing feel that just because YOU are a good teacher, it doesn’t mean you will automatically be a good coach.
Tell us your thoughts! Find us on social media @teachertappUS and share your ideas about who should (and shouldn’t!) be coaches…
Coaching around the world ๐
We also checked with our English Teacher Tappers – and they are very similar to the US – 47% have a coaching program in their school.
3. Caring colleagues
Sometimes those colleagues are coaches, but sometimes they’re your support network. When work feels tough, it’s your colleagues you lean on for support ๐. But how supported do you feel by your colleagues?
- 53% report feeling “extremely” or “very” supported by colleagues
- 44% feel “moderately” or “slightly” supported
- 4% say they don’t feel supported at all
This doesn’t change much when we take into account the type of school you teach in – elementary, middle, and high school teachers feel broadly the same.
Male teachers feel slightly more supported than female teachers (66% vs 50%) though we ARE a little light on the male teachers on our panel…so if you know a teacher who is a man then be sure to tell him to download the app!
๐ด๓ ง๓ ข๓ ฅ๓ ฎ๓ ง๓ ฟ Is this typical? Well, compared to the UK, it seems colleagues in England are more supportive.
- 67% report feeling “extremely” or “very” supported by colleagues
- 31% feel “moderately” or “slightly” supported
- 2% say they don’t feel supported at all
Crying colleagues
In rather sad news, 79% of teachers report seeing another teacher cry since the start of the school year ๐ข. And this is very similar to England (72%).
However, women are more likely than men to see a crying colleague (81% vs 60%), and that is also true in England (75% vs 64%).
Of course there could be lots of reasons to cry! We didn’t ask if they were happy or sad tears, or if they were about sad events, or unkind people. Should we be asking more questions about this? Let us know by getting in touch – the easiest way to do it is to go to ‘contact us’ in your app, and tell us your thoughts!
Daily Reads
We know lots of teachers on Teacher Tapp LOVE the daily reads! If you have ideas of reads we could feature, get in touch by emailing usa@teachertapp.com and we will check it out!
This week our most-read blog was from The Learning Scientists and about note-taking.
