One Day Seminar – for Existing Members of Appraisal Connector™

Friday 2nd September – Full Day Seminar 
Only $25.00 +GST per person. Refreshments and lunch provided. 
Please bring your laptop or tablet.

APPRAISAL CONNECTOR
Connecting Appraisal with Professional Learning, Reflection and Teacher Growth™

From Inquiry to Sophisticated Professional Inquiry: Accelerating the Shift to Self-Directed Teacher Learning Using Appraisal Connector™

We recently received the following email from a Principal whose staff we had worked with focusing on using Appraisal Connector™:

“Thank you for showing us how to shift gears with this fabulous vehicle. We thought we were doing well but knew we were missing something. We were still in first gear – you’ve helped us get to 5^th! Appraisal Connector is like this enormous drill allowing teachers to bore deeply into their practice. Teachers are still buzzing over the things you shared, they’re taking greater ownership, another 11 have opened their journals up to me, and since you were here 3 days ago, I’ve read 2 professional journal entries from teachers who a week ago could only write professional diaries.”

Fundamental differences exist between inquiry and sophisticated professional inquiry.

Through sophisticated professional inquiry teachers become fully-fledged self-directed learners; through inquiry few rarely do. Appraisal Connector™ simplifies this shift.

Sophisticated professional inquiry involves deep work. Rather than coming up with answers, deep work surfaces the right questions. Creating breakthroughs; systematically analysing, critiquing and challenging one’s own teaching practices; being guided by the principle of intelligent failure; understanding why tweaking and modification do not constitute innovation; recognising the principle of writing to learn underpins effective reflective journaling; and developing clarity and insight into how one’s beliefs and assumptions have changed or are changing, are some characteristics of sophisticated professional inquiry. Sophistication does not mean harder – it means teachers becoming confident self-directed learners – and Appraisal Connector™ simplifies the shift.

In this one-day seminar designed for schools currently using Appraisal Connector™ you will learn how to use Appraisal Connector™ to:

• Simplify supporting teachers to becoming more self directed in their learning;
• Streamline the acceleration of teachers’ learning – how Appraisal Connector™ can abridge what a teacher might learn in two years to one year.
• Ensure teachers do not confuse wondering with reflecting – a confusion frequently rendering teaching as inquiry ineffective and impeding the shift to self-directed learning;
• Ensure teachers do not confuse reflection and inquiry – another confusion often rendering teaching as inquiry ineffective and impeding self directed learning;
• Guarantee teachers construct Professional Journals – not Professional Diaries;
• Ensure teachers do not confuse goals with inquiries; to help teachers set goals when the focus should be a goal, and inquiries when the focus should be an inquiry;
• Simplify the integration of personal goals/inquiries with school wide goals and targets;
• Foster a culture of professional curiosity in ways that strengthen your school’s professional capital and collegial inquiry; and
• Provide the right answers to questions such as, “How much should I be writing for a reflection?”, “How regularly should I be doing it?”, and “What’s the point of writing everything down when it’s already in my head?

To register for this free seminar, enrol below, or e-mail office@interlead.co.nz with the names of those attending. If you would like to know more please contact one of our consultants – Tony, John or Judith. Or call Andrew Ormsby on 021 222 1700.