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The emergence of the Teaching Assistant as reflective practitioner: a well-established norm, a new reality or a future aspiration?
Janet Collins and Neil Simco
Paper presented at the 2004 British Educational Research Association Annual Conference, University of Manchester.
Focusing on the new arrangements for teaching assistants in English primary schools, this paper explores the extent to which reflection is an important, valued and worthwhile concept for a new breed of teaching assistants. Using the established Schon concepts of reflection, it considers the extent to which opportunities are available for reflection –in and –on action (Schon 1983, 1987) and goes on to explore the implications of models concerned with levels of reflection for the work of teaching assistants. The paper goes on to suggest that skills and performance are valued implicitly in the new arrangements in England, but there is a danger of the power of reflection not being recognised as a mechanism for the enhancement of those skills and that performance. The paper concludes by citing a number of specific questions for further empirical work.The issues raised in paper this are illustrated by examples provided from evidence collected during a series of semi-structured interviews with a group of eight bilingual teaching assistants. The teaching assistants work in the same large multicultural primary school in the centre of England.
The emergence of the teaching assistant as a key member of the education profession has been most marked since about 2000, but the origins of this move can be traced back to the early 19890s. Before we consider the place of reflection in the work of teaching assistants, it is important to first consider the strengthening of this role that has occurred over the last 25 years or so. Thomas (1992) argues that the Warnock Report (1978) is the origin of the gradual enhancement of the role of teaching assistants in schools across this period. The inauguration of a policy which integrated more and more children with special educational needs into mainstream settings, together with moves to enhance the involvement of parents in schools (for example the Education Reform Act , 1988, which gave parents more `say’ in the way in which schools were run) led to more adults working in schools. The majority of teaching assistants start byworking in school as volunteers, often because of a desire to support their own children. Gradually the teaching assistants become part of the school community and are encouraged to spend increased amounts of time in the school and to take on greater responsibilities.
I started this job when my children were at school, basically I had nothing else to do at home so because I couldn’t speak English at that time so it was ideal for me to go to help out in the classroom where my children were, that’s how I started. Later on I was offered a job just to fill maternity leave for six weeks.
(Shehnaz)
Nevertheless, some commentators (e.g.Thomas, 1992) distinguish between two such groups, staff working with children with special educational needs and parents.
The significance of the inclusion of children with special educational needs (SEN) in mainstream classrooms as a factor in raising the number of teaching assistants continued into the 1990s. Lee (2002) singles out the first Code of Practice on the Identification and Assessment of children with Special Educational Needs as being particularly important as, for the first time, pupils who were deemed to have learning difficulties not sufficient for the issuing of a statement were entitled to formal recognition and the provision of support.
An increase of teaching assistants is also related to a growing awareness of the needs of children who have English as an additional language (EAL). Although immigration is nothing new, UK society has become much more linguistically and culturally diverse in the last 50 years, largely owing to economic immigration, but also because of the arrival of significant numbers seeking asylum and to the increasing globalization of the economy. To a greater extent than in the past, incomers have felt able to retain many aspects of their cultural heritage, including their language. This has meant that the linguistic and cultural diversity of the UK is probably greater than ever before. In the greater London area, for example, the number of home languages reportedly exceeds 350 (Baker, and Eversley,2000). A significant number of students attending schools in England and Wales are bilingual. ProvisionalPupil Level Annual School Census (PLASC) figures for Englandin 2004 suggest that approximately 11% of primary pupils and 9.1 % of secondary pupils have English as an additional language (DfES, 2004). The law has developed to reflect cultural, ethnic and religious diversity. The Race Relations Amendment Act 2000, for example, highlights the need for institutions to re-evaluate and put in place policies to eliminate discrimination. Bilingual teaching assistants often have access to the children’s preferred language and insights into the culture of the local community. This places them in a powerful position with regard to communication and mediation for both children and their parents.
They are happy that we know their language and then sometimes they will not go to their own teachers they come to us for help because they know they can speak to us in our own language and they can explain themselves better than they can to the teachers.
(Shehnaz)
Lee (2002) and Sage and Wilkie (2003) both cite a further factor in the proliferation of the number of teaching assistants in England in recent years. This is concerned with the recruitment and retention of teachers. Concern about recruitment and retention has been widespread in the first few years of the new century and has led to a plethora of initiatives from the Department for Education and Skills (DfES) and the Teacher Training Agency (TTA). For example, new arrangements for early professional development linked to induction and the first five years of teaching were developed by the DfES and the TTA in 2002. Within initial training the broadening of routes into teaching to include flexible and employment-based routes represented significant attempts to enhance teacher recruitment. Whilst there is some evidence of success in enhancing recruitment and retention (TTA 2003), concern about teacher supply is one factor which has created pressure to recruit more teaching assistants, in order both to make teaching a more attractive profession and, on one analysis, to ensure that the there are sufficient numbers of education professionals in schools to achieve the Government’s agenda of raising standards particularly in Literacy and Numeracy. Teaching assistants have effectively been linked to the raising standards agenda and as such have become centre stage in the Government’s agenda for education.
Since 2002, the Government has been developing proposals for workforce reform throughout the public sector. Within education, plans for workforce reform are well developed and focus particularly on the development of an enhanced role for teaching assistants. Standards for Higher Level Teaching Assistants (HLTAs) have been published by the TTA, and organisations have begun assessing HLTAs against these standards. It is interesting to note the similarities between the standards for the award of QTS and the HLTA standards. Additionally, in 2004 the TTA has awarded contracts for bidders for developing training for aspiring HLTAs over a fifty day period. In short, there is a further professionalisation of teaching assistants and recognition of their contribution to the education service.
Thus there has been a gradual enhancement of the role of the teaching assistant in England over a long period of time, at first as a partially unintended consequence of educational reform in the 1980s, latterly as an increasingly high profile policy shift. A review of the literature and our own research in this field leads us to suggest that there are at least six empowering circumstances which need to be in place if there is an adequate opportunity for teaching assistants to develop as reflective practitioners. In this sense we see anempowering circumstance as a set of conditions which need to be present if reflective practice is to become a reality. Within this paper we focus mainly on reflection–on–action (Schon 1983), reflection that occurs after the event, a retrospective consideration of the characteristics, successes and weak points of the teaching and learning activity that has occurred. Schon (1983) distinguished between two kinds of knowledge: ‘technical rationality’ and ‘experiential knowledge’. Technical and rational knowledge is the more abstract knowledge which professionals learn from sources outside themselves; for example the ‘facts’ and ‘theories’ they encounter during training or from reading authoritative texts. Experiential knowledge is the knowledge professionals develop through their own experiences and engagement in professional activities. Schon argued that practitioners are not limited to gaining abstract knowledge, but suggested they can also gain knowledge through experience. Reflection, he argues, is an important vehicle for drawing upon this knowledge derived from practice.
Following Schon, in this paper, reflection is defined as solving problems through organised and careful thinking about possible alternatives and then choosing the most appropriate course of action (or inaction). However, reflection is more than simply reviewing events. Reflection involves interrogating an experience by asking searching questions about that experience (Bourner, 2003).
In order to arrive at a perspective on the extent to which reflection is an important, value and worthwhile concept for teaching assistants it is important to identify the empowering circumstances which allow reflection to occur. We believe that the extent to which these circumstances are present will define, potentially, the quality, quantity and type of reflective practice that is apparent in today’s teaching assistant workforce. Whilst there is not yet a large literature relating to teaching assistants that which there is suggests that there is considerable variation within these empowering circumstances. It appears, for example, that the role is enacted in different ways in different contexts. It is also apparent that the deployment of teaching assistants varies considerably from one school to another. Because there appears to be considerable variation in the empowering circumstances for reflection, we go on to argue that there is also considerable variation in the characteristics and depth of reflective practice.
We now wish to consider the empowering circumstances one by one.
- Personal qualities such as experience, open-mindedness,responsibility and whole-heartedness.
Open-mindedness, responsibility and whole-heartedness are three qualities which Pollard (2002) identified as being characteristic of reflective teaching. Here we argue that these personal qualities are as important to teaching assistants as they are to teachers. Moreover, as many untrained parent helpers and teaching assistants in schools exhibit highly levels of reflection, we argue that these are qualities which can be held irrespective of the context in which people work. Reflection is not necessarily something learned on a course. Nevertheless, whatever a person’s starting point, reflection can be identified and developed in a similar way to that in which one might identify and develop critical thinking. Both require the individual to go beyond what is given (be it reading or experience) and to ask the difficult question of what is being presented and to learn from the answers to the process. Both can be identified, taught or encouraged and assessed.
They’re just children, don’t put so much pressure on them, let them enjoy their childhood if they do good in SATS there’s too much pressure. There is lots of pressure and the kids get upset and the parents get anxious.
They start so early, three and four and they start, that structure starts at that age doesn’t it, I mean in the rest of Europe they don’t start school six do they; they have three years of nursery where they can just play.
There have been lots of studies [which] said that early childhood tests don’t bear any resemblance to what the child will achieve in later life
(Conversation between Sirat, Shehnaz and Robina)
Open-mindedness is one of a number of qualities which individuals may need to begin to make sense of their environment. First, teaching assistants need to be open-minded enough to continue learning and acquiring new skills and experiences throughout their career. Second, they need to recognise the perpetually changing climate in which they work and to be open-minded enough to constantly adapt to it. Third, they need to recognise their own changing agendas, needs and wants and more importantly the changing agendas, needs and wants of the children they teach. Finally, they need to be open-minded enough to be able to work within complex changing situations and to act and react to circumstances when prior knowledge is of no help.
Whole-heartedness could be defined as meaning with enthusiasm and energy. Certainly, the experience of being in a classroom is significantly enhanced if the person in charge is enthusiastic about their work and about the subject they are teaching. However, whole-heartedness can also mean with ones’ whole self. As Bolton (2001, p 11) argues, reflective teachers, ‘do not leave their personalities, their souls, their senses of humour, their fragilities outside the classroom’.
Like reflective teachers,reflective teaching assistants are prepared to bring as much of their whole selves into the teaching situation as is appropriate. Reflective teaching assistants are comfortable and confident with who they are and are able to respond to the children and the subject they teach in a genuine and open manner.
You want somebody there that will help your child so there is more feeling and you’re more companionate towards the other children where as you, I think [teaching assistants have] got more time to spend with the individual child or with a group of children that are struggling you tend to put them under your wing and just concentrate on them.
(Sirat)
Responsibility in reflective practice relates to what Nias (1989 p 160) refers to as the ‘individualistic, solitary and personal’ nature of primary teaching. Teaching assistants work with other professionals in the classroom. Nevertheless, much of their work is with small groups of children often outside the classroom and consequently they empathise with the notion that working with primary aged children requires ‘a high level of self-expenditure’ (Nias, 1989, p 160) and a high level of confidence in who you are as well as what you can do.
I only do literacy I don’t do maths, science or anything else, and I get to do my own planning and carry out my own lessons, but I do sit with the teacher like once a week and we talk to each other about ideas and the lesson plans I’m using and what worked and what hasn’t worked and how I should go about doing it next time, and if it hasn’t worked why and what the teacher needs to do and what I should to make that work or amend it or if she hasn’t then why, or if the children are not picking up what I am doing then we talk to each other and see how we can improve the lesson and how to go about doing it next time.
(Robina)
As illustrated above, reflection can be related to a number of personal qualities which are exhibited by teaching assistants and teachers alike. However, as the rest of this paper will demonstrate, reflection can be empowered or inhibited by a range of circumstances.
2. Clarity of the role of teaching assistant, including how this role is perceived by others.
One factor which links to the quality and characteristics of reflection is concerned with clarity of role. Here, we argue that if the role of the teaching assistant is clear, then it is more likely that reflective practice will become apparent. Yet, it is apparent that for a variety of reasons a clearly defined role, or set of roles, may not yet have widespread currency in schools, even though in policy terms much work has occurred through the remodelling of the workforce agenda. Here the DfES issued guidance in 2003, (following the reaching of a national agreement with unions and professional associations) which aimed to clarify respective roles of teachers and support staff and to define the circumstances where support staff may carry out work linked to the core teaching and learning functions of schools (DfES 2003). The National Re-Modelling Team (NRT) is currently working with LEAs and schools to implement the workforce reform agreement. It will be important that further research is undertaken to investigate whether, over time, the national re-modelling agenda has led to greater clarity of roles for teaching assistants. At the current time, there is an explicit recognition that there is some lack of clarity in roles and responsibilities. The DfES comment:
There are now many more support staff employed in schools, working alongside qualified teachers in a wide variety of roles. For some time there has been uncertainty about what duties and activities these support staff may or may not undertake. (DfES 2003, p.5)
The emergence of teaching assistants in England as a major part of the education profession has been both dynamic and rapid. It is also significant that there is a proliferation both of titles and roles. Lee (2002) identifies classroom assistants, learning support assistants, special support assistants, special needs assistants, specialist teacher assistants, general assistants, nursery nurses, bilingual support staff and administrative support staff. However, this list is far from definitive(see for example, Hancock and Colloby, in press).