Sharing and speaking about African music : professional development with Swaziland primary school teachers

The teaching and learning of Indigenous African music is characterised as a holistic integrated experience where music, dance and theatre are inseparable, seen as an integral part of culture. The transmission of this experience is absorbed through participation in cultural activities from childhood in the community. In African societies, both traditional and contemporary, musical arts education and the understanding of culture are fundamental to life, community and society. It is through musical arts, that Africans embrace spiritual, emotional, material and intellectual aspects and knowledge of both the individual and the community. This paper reports on an in-service program (August 2006) offered at the Centre for Indigenous African Instrumental Music and Dance Practices (CIIMDA), Pretoria, South Africa. For the purpose of this paper, the one week professional development course undertaken by generalist primary school teachers from Swaziland is highlighted and proves worthy for these teachers to implement what they learnt in the classroom. As a position paper, I contend that the understanding and participation in indigenous cultural musical arts practices, enlightens learners about their cultural heritage and further enriches their understanding of African music and dance that can be adopted, adapted and applied to primary schools in Swaziland. This paper summaries some key findings of interview data from ten participants in relation to the intensive program. By offering such in-service professional development programs, teachers are able to reach their wider communities where they will continue to share and speak about African music, dance and culture.

Working and learning in vocational education and training in the knowledge era : final report of the professional development for the future project

This Report summarises the outcomes of the phases of the Professional
Development for the Future Project and presents the implications of this research for professional development of staff in Vocational Education and Training (VET), as they become knowledge workers.

These shifts are occurring within the knowledge era. Distinguishing features of this era are summarised into four broad areas:
- the importance and value placed on knowledge in organisations
- the time span of discretion
- the complexity of relationships, and
- the ubiquitous nature of information and communication technology.

It is within this context that work is currently performed, and understanding this context provides the foundation for considering new capabilities required in the knowledge era.
Key capabilities required of knowledge workers to work effectively in the
knowledge era were drawn together from an analysis of the theoretical literature and the results of interviews with knowledge workers. The core capabilities identified include:
- adaptive problem solving – becoming designers as well as problem -
solvers
- rapid knowledge gathering and sharing with others
- discriminating between relevant and irrelevant information, and
- understanding and working effectively with the organisation’s culture.

Knowledge era characteristics and knowledge worker capabilities have been mapped to each other illustrating conceptual linkages between these two areas.

Professional development themes drawn from interviews with knowledge
workers are presented. While global trends in knowledge work have been well documented, the impact of these trends on the capabilities of workers, and the ways in which knowledge workers develop these capabilities is less well understood. Their learning methods challenge our current thinking in relation to the ways in which workers acquire skills and knowledge. Some of the professional development methods include seeking exposure to new ideas from a wide variety of sources, embracing intense learning opportunities, and using relationships to increase knowledge.

‘Thought pieces’ (see p17 ff) commissioned for this Project, as well as
subsequent interviews with the authors, provided further insights into the
professional development of knowledge workers. The implications of these insights are an extension of earlier themes and emphasise:
- the emergent nature of knowledge work
- the importance of relationships that facilitate knowledge sharing
- coherent conversations and dialogue
- collaborative work and generosity.

A key insight is the shift from thinking about knowledge work in terms of
borrowed knowledge to an emphasis on generated knowledge within a context.

Data from focus groups of the Project provide further insights for knowledge worker professional development. These augment the perspectives of the earlier data analysis but also add greater emphasis to:
- the clear and direct relationship between professional development and
work and career aspirations of knowledge workers,
- the relationship of professional development to the organisational
mission, and
- the issues of managing and leading knowledge workers and their
development.

As part of this analysis the defining features of organisational life in VET were reviewed in relation to effective professional development of knowledge workers.

The final section of the Report revisits the core dimensions of the Project.
Concise commentaries on working and learning in the knowledge era,
professional development in the knowledge era, and leadership and
management in the knowledge era are presented.

The Report concludes with a discussion of the enablers of professional
development for knowledge workers in VET. This discussion is introduced by a re-statement of the VET sector’s positioning in the knowledge era and the consequences of this for VET managers an d staff in terms of complexity, uncertainty and diminished prospects for accurate predictiveness. The enablers comprised:
- integration of information technology into socio -technical systems
- greater understanding of the organisation from within
- connecting staff to the organisation’s fundamental identity
- connecting to the work and career trajectories of workers
- establishing work structures which integrate the use of professional
development resources with knowledge work
- providing workers with the autonomy to design their own professional
development activities
- building professional development into the iterative nature of knowledge
work, and
- creating organisational contexts that value intuitive thinking and working.

Professional development needs to be thou ght of in a much broader context in the knowledge era. What each VET staff member knows and shares will become increasingly central to their work, and in that sense all VET workers require capabilities for knowledge work. This report accurately describes t he VET context, the capabilities required, and the organisational enablers that will promote ‘knowing’ and thus embed a new style of professional development within VET.

Health promotion and health education in schools : trends, effectiveness and possibilities

This report involved an extensive literature review as well as discussions with ten leading school health and traffic safety education researchers and practitioners. The findings of the report show that despite health promotion and health education activities occurring in all Victorian schools, school health related initiatives could be improved by focusing on cognitive outcomes and involving appropriate components of Health Promoting School (HPS) framework. Providing teachers with professional development and utilising interactive resources that complement the curriculum is also important. The report recommendations outline ways to improve the Health Promotion and Health Education and provide a potential framework for delivering TSE provision in schools.

QTP in Victoria: listening to teachers leads to quality professional development

How do you get information and communication technology working for authentic learning across the curriculum? It depends on quality professional development. The author draws on her research and evaluation work on a Quality Teacher Program pilot project by the Victorian Department of Education and Training to explain why listening to teachers is leading to just that.

Music teacher education partnerships as professional development

This paper reports my reflections of a school and university partnership carried out in Semester One 2008 by the Bachelor of Teaching (Primary/Secondary) music education specialist at a University in Melbourne. As students have a specific 'situated learning' experience at a primary school, their five-week visit during the ten-week semester acts as onsite professional development by both the music teacher and myself. Here students are able to reflect and discuss both content and pedagogical knowledge. They are also given the opportunity to teach small groups whilst being mentored by the music teacher and myself. I contend that by universities providing such opportunities as good exemplars of best practice in music education as a form of professional development students can only improve teaching and learning and be better prepared when entering the teaching profession.

In this paper I report on my pre-service music education students' experience as school based music teaching and learning as an effective form of professional development. My reflections are supported by my observational notes are informed by self study methodology I consider the link between tertiary and school partnership as a way forward to improve both the teaching and learning of music education. Universities in Australia are increasingly encouraged to forge pathways with schools where students and teacher educators have the opportunity to observe best practice, engage in teaching and learning onsite and reflect on both content and pedagogical knowledge. Such practice promotes educational praxis for a sustainable future.

Assuming responsibility : teachers taking charge of their professional development

The paper reports on some of the findings of an extensive study undertaken in Victoria as part of a national Science, ICT and Mathematics Education in Rural and Regional Australia (SiMERR) project. One of the significant findings of the study was the extent to which teachers in the schools where the study data were collected took responsibility for many aspects of their own professional development. This was not at the expense of, but rather was in addition to, their involvement in school- and region-based professional development activity. The study also identifies some of the challenges faced, mostly related to the location of their schools in a rural or regional setting.