University of Lincoln
The Peer Review of Practice Scheme
Staff Handbook
Peer Review of Practice
Staff Handbook
This version: October 2015
Educational Development and Enhancement Unit
University of Lincoln
Brayford Pool
Lincoln
LN6 7TS
Welcome to the Staff Handbook for the Peer Review of Practice Scheme
It is hoped that this Staff Handbook will provide you with some useful information about the Peer Review of Practice (PRoP) scheme: how you might engage with it and how to get most out of the process.
This Handbook is structured around four key questions with supporting material and documents included in three appendices. Please note that the documents in Appendices B and C are available as Word documents separately.
It might be that not all of your questions are answered by what is in this Handbook or what is available via the EDEU webpages. Your PRoP Coordinator will, at a mutually convenient time, be able to answer most of these questions. Feel free to contact staff in EDEU also via the mailbox: .
1 What is the Peer Review of Practice Scheme?
The Peer Review of Practice scheme (PRoP) is an enhancement scheme which aims to provide teaching staff with an opportunity to engage in dialogue and other mutually-supportive development activity around their teaching practice here at the University of Lincoln. It is intended to benefit staff in terms of extending their professional understanding of teaching, learning and assessment wherever they are in their career – either new to teaching or experienced. A secondary but nonetheless significant aim is that it will meet the need to provide evidence to external bodies, such as the QAA, that the University is actively pursuing enhancement of teaching and learning practice.
It is intended to be both collaborative and developmental. It is about enhancement of practice and seeks to provide a process which supports staff in their development of HE teaching practice and understanding of students’ learning; it is not an evaluation of practice tool where ‘teaching performance’ is judged and reported on.
2 How is the scheme relevant to your teaching practice?
PRoP moves away from a purely ‘observation of group teaching’ approach as it aims to reflect more closely the multiple ways and contexts in which tutors teach and students learn. Any aspect of teaching and learning practice can be reviewed.
It brings to the fore the important opportunity for teaching staff to engage in dialogue and discussion, and other mutually-supportive development activity, around their teaching practice.
It is more flexible as it provides more choice and support for teaching staff in terms of seeking an appropriate context and focus for review thus increasing the potential for enhancement of practice at individual, group and school level.
It aims to do all of this by formalising the role of a school-based PRoP Coordinator who will facilitate and support the process at a local level. The scheme will be a key factor in establishing a cross-University network for dissemination of good practice, mutual support and information-sharing.
A PRoP Toolkit has been developed to support staff in undertaking the reviews. This Toolkit comprises prompt sheets and guides which reflect a number of the contexts for HE teaching practice. It is envisaged that the PRoP Toolkit, as a resource, will be extended and developed as the scheme becomes more embedded and your suggestions for new materials here are welcomed.
3 What are the ideas behind the PRoP scheme?
PRoP respects the professional autonomy and individual resource of staff in terms of managing development and feedback on their own teaching and learning practice.
Supportive, structured and timely discussion and dialogue are seen as key tools in the PRoP process.
PRoP is a scheme where reviewees own the process and, as such, use it to benefit teaching practice in ways that matter to them and their students’ learning. It is based on the idea of ‘intelligent pairings’ but this does not preclude reviews taking place within trios or groups as agreed.
PRoP plays a significant part in the move to share and disseminate good and/or innovative practice across the disciplines within the University. With individual staff agreement, outcomes here can be fed back into the network of PRoP Coordinators and through the University’s Education and Student Life Committee (a sub-committee of Academic Board). It is hoped that, in a similar vein, outcomes can be shared at internal teaching and learning symposia and conferences – at College or institutional level.
PRoP takes place within an approach to teaching that is consistent with ideas around active forms of student learning (see Appendix A). These ideas are based on current thinking and research in higher education – generically and within the discipline.
The scheme acknowledges that teaching and learning takes place within diverse and fluid contexts and that the tutor does not have control over all contextual factors.
In line with feedback in the review of the previous scheme, bureaucratic procedures are kept to a minimum and will involve reviewees completing a Return Form (see Appendix B) for the PRoP Coordinator to provide information around participation and feedback on their experience of the review. The feedback here will be used inform the development of the scheme.
4 How will it work?
1. Individual teaching staff may initiate and manage their own review process but, as indicated earlier, the process will be supported and facilitated by the PRoP Coordinator within the school. This support might involve help with selecting a context for review (pair or group) and focus for review, ie., aspects for review. The Coordinator can also help where colleagues may wish to be reviewed by a member of staff outside the school who has a particular interest, or expertise, in a specific area of practice.
2. The aspect or area of practice for review can be decided at individual, programme team or school level following discussion and agreement with the PRoP Coordinator. Observation of teaching is one aspect for review and, although this takes place in a range of teaching contexts (lecture, seminar, lab, studio, workshop, tutorials and supervision meetings), it is not expected that colleagues will require this to be the focus year on year – unless this is what is wanted by the reviewee. Colleagues may decide to focus on any of the following for their review of practice: assessment protocol for a particular module; student module handbook; online teaching and/or support; distance learning materials; learning from placement guidelines; teaching and learning handouts, resources or worksheets. Equally – and where agreed with the PRoP Coordinator - the review can take place at group or school level and the focus for peer review could be themed in response to local and wider contextual factors, eg, student feedback via NSS.
3. The discussions that follow the review focus/aspect of practice are intended to be supportive in that they should support reflection and learning about practice. The PRoP Reviewer’s Notemaker has been developed as a tool to support this discussion – see Appendix C.
4. If undertaking an individual PRoP, reviewees may wish to have the outcomes of their review/practice more widely shared (at school or College level, or across the University). For this to happen, they can note this on their Return Form and then initiate discussions with their PRoP Coordinator who will be able to act as a facilitator here.
5. Individually, colleagues may wish to use the outcomes of PRoP to inform discussion at appraisal around professional development needs and institutional support for this and/or recognition and promotion. Again, this is at the reviewee’s behest.
6. A notional timeline for the PRoP process is outlined below and describes some of the activities that the reviewee might be involved in at any given point; it is hoped that this will support colleagues in initiating and managing the process.
5 A notional timetable for PRoP
The process takes place over the bulk of the academic year. However, the process could be completed in a shorter time-frame; much depends on the type of review that is being agreed (individual, team or school level) and the area, aspect or theme for review.
Task / Sept / Oct / Nov / Dec / Jan / Feb / Mar / Apr / May / June / July / AugPlanning the review (identifying focus and selecting reviewer)
Undertaking the review and discussion
Reporting the review
Sharing outcomes of review (optional) / Any time following completion of review
The following guidance is based on an individual review. A timetable for a larger team-based review (eg, at programme or school level) may be agreed with the PRoP Coordinator following discussion.
At the planning stage, you might be:
· Thinking about what aspect of your practice you would like to have reviewed;
· Thinking about who might be a useful reviewer in this regard;
· And/or: speaking to the PRoP Coordinator for ideas on aspects to review and possible reviewers;
· Approaching one or two colleagues to see if they would agree to review an aspect of practice;
· Agreeing the aspect for review and the reviewer; retrieving the notemaker and return form and completing some sections here;
· Accessing the PRoP Toolkit for materials to support the review;
· Agreeing dates and times, where applicable, for the review and the discussion that follows;
· Provide the reviewer with access to any materials (online or hard copy) that they may need to carry out the review (eg, assessment protocols and student briefing documents, student handbooks, teaching and learning resources/packs; student feedback proformas, etc.)
When undertaking the review and discussion, you might be:
· Being observed by your reviewer whilst teaching or supporting learning;
· Giving them access to Bb or other online materials at specific times
· Meeting with your reviewer following their review of materials; teaching, etc., to usefully discuss their thoughts and observations and share ideas;
· Recording some of these on the Reviewer’s Notemaker;
· Discussing the possibility of sharing some aspects of the review and discussion more widely and how this might take place;*
· Discussing the review and PRoP process and how this worked including the usefulness of the materials and what could be developed here;*
· Recording some of these comments and thoughts on the PRoP return form for the Coordinator.
At this stage, you will be:
· Recording some of the comments and thoughts from * above on the PRoP Return Form for the Coordinator;
· Sending the Return Form on to the Coordinator.
At this stage, you might be:
· Discussing with your reviewer and PRoP Coordinator if and how you would like to share your practice with others
· Engaging in activities (eg, Awaydays, cross-disciplinary events) at a local level (school/College)
· Engaging in activities at University level (eg, teaching and learning symposia)
· Engaging in activities to share more widely (journal articles, papers for HE conferences, etc).
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Appendix A
The approach to teaching and learning that underpins the Peer Review of Practice, and accompanying Toolkit materials, is based on the following ideas from the literature:
‘What the student does is more important in determining what is learned than what the teacher does,’ (Shuell, 1986).
Students’ learning and teachers’ teaching is socially-constructed, complex and contextual; in seeking understanding of it, we should aim to be descriptive and analytic rather than causal and explanatory
(Prosser and Trigwell, 1999).
Teaching is no longer about the transmission of knowledge. It is about supporting students to actively construct knowledge and negotiate and share meanings through discussion and different forms of collaboration (Dochy et al, 2005).
Good practice involves having respect for diverse talents and ways of learning
(Chickering and Gamson, 1987).
Learning and understanding occurs through interaction with others and dialogue assists and shapes understanding (Vygotsky, 1986).
Approaches to teaching which allow students to act, reflect, theorise and experiment will promote and support more meaningful learning (Kolb, 1984)
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Appendix B
Return Form for PRoP Coordinator
1 Who and what this form is for: Completion of this form will provide some general information to your School PRoP Coordinator around the nature and levels of participation within the school. Information taken from it will be anonymised and used in a general school report on the Scheme; the individual form remains confidential to the Coordinator and Reviewee unless the Reviewee indicates that they would like to share some aspect of their practice with others within (or beyond) the school.
2 When this form should be used: it should be completed following the PRoP review and post-review discussion and then passed to your School PRoP Coordinator/s
Appendix C
The University of Lincoln Peer Review of Practice Scheme (PRoP)
Reviewer’s Notemaker
1 Who and what this form is for: this form is intended to provide a partially-structured notemaker for reviewers and can be used as an aide-memoire. Although the notes here are being made by the reviewer, the notes should be passed to the reviewee following the discussion as they are ‘owned’ by the reviewee. The PRoP Toolkit prompt sheets can be used in conjunction with this Notemaker and should be accessed in advance of the review taking place.