Month: May 2021

Training myself

In my recent posts, I have explored the possibility of professional development for GR supervisors. In fact, exploring it so well, I’ve written a course proposal to deliver online training for GR supervisors, incorporating discussion groups, reflection and engagement with the literature in a heutagogical approach.

https://spark.adobe.com/page/ZnNZ3V7gn2RsR/

Reflections and black holes

As I’ve been thinking more about this, I’ve been reflecting on my own supervisory holes, and one that keeps on raising its ugly head is that I don’t know how to help my students with their writing. Writing is commonly given as the biggest challenge that my students face. They hate writing, hate sharing drafts and hate reading the feedback. To be honest, I’ve hated reading and giving feedback and wondered how we can be at such a mismatch.

When I look into the water, do I see myself reflected back?https://pixabay.com/photos/trees-water-reflection-nature-3956633/

Formally writing formal writing

Last year (oh horrible year of the pandemic and Melbourne lockdowns), I decided to start an informal writing course for my students and ran a 6 week (then 7, then 8 week) weekly get together to discuss elements of a paper and writing. We covered some weekly topics below- and I’ve started up again this year with a new one ‘titles’.

  1. Writing, why do we love it or hate it?
  2. Abstracts
  3. Literature reviews- how to map the gap
  4. Effective literature reviews
  5. Writing methodology and result sections
  6. Conclusions
  7. Editing and proofreading
  8. Figures and tables

How did I run this course and find all these materials? Simple; I followed someone awesome on Twitter (@WriteThatPhD; thanks Dr Mel!), and copied some exemplars, and followed the links to some papers. There is a good example below- a nice link to an article, a well regarded journal article, and a line-by-line examination of the structure. A nice hook we saw in lots of abstracts is the ‘here we show…’ section, straight after the knowledge gap. General feedback from students ‘super helpful’, ‘helps me with my writing’, ‘love the structure’.

I’ve expanded my horizons (and google searches) and have come across a Coursera offering ‘Writing in the Sciences’. I’ve done the first week already (along with 224, 598 others), and find the material very useful. I’m not sure whether to direct my students to this course, or to use this material thoughtfully when giving feedback!

A friendly screenshot: full details at https://www.coursera.org/learn/sciwrite

But what does this mean for my professional development?

This is important and underpins my theorising on encouraging academics to be continually learning and upgrading practice and reflecting on the process.

In reality, I have found an example of ‘enculturation’ and I’m using skills in exemplar management to display how ‘things are done’ in science (Lee et al, 2007). I’m encouraging my students to become members of a disciplinary community and I’m reinforcing ‘critical thinking’ skills by analysing texts and helps ’emancipation’ by debating approaches and content.

Lee & Murray (2015)

I’m moving through a form of adult learning, which Mezirow (1991) refers to

moves the individual towards a more inclusive, differentiated permeable (open to other points of view), and integrated meaning perspective

Mezirow (1991) p. 7

Surely a good thing. And while I can start to chart these circles of reflection, practice and change myself, the challenge is to help my GR students understand that this is happening to them, as an intentional or unintentional, consequence of their graduate studies (Stevens-Long et al 2012). Perhaps the heutagogical framework I have investigated needs to be thought of in the context of transformational learning. Once more into the literature I go…

References

Lee, A. (2007). Developing effective supervisors: Concepts of research supervision. Information Services, 21. https://doi.org/10.4314/sajhe.v21i4.25690

Lee, A., & Murray, R. (2015). Supervising writing: Helping postgraduate students develop as researchers. Innovations in Education and Teaching International, 52(5), 558–570. https://doi.org/10.1080/14703297.2013.866329

Mezirow, J. (1991). Transformative dimensions of adult learning. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.

Stevens-Long, J., A. Schapiro, A., and McClintock, C. (2012). Passionate Scholars: Transformative Learning in Doctoral Education. Adult Education Quarterly, 62, 180.

Training the trainers!

Not a post about shoes, but more about the challenge of providing flexible, online, relevant and (yes, you guessed it) essential training at the University. Here, I want to consider how best to deliver learning to the professoriate.

The discussions by my learned colleagues Heather Gaunt, Solange Glasser and Matt Absolom have crystallised how the structure and pedogogy of teaching underpins the learning that can be done, and importantly for this discussion, the possibilities of authentically engaging the learners.

Here, I want to consider the thorny topic of training the Professors. This is a very real issue for the University more broadly, and I’m sure many who are reading here would have shared a coffee with a colleague, complaining about the mandatory training delivered online. Sigh. Tedious, but necessary. But there are other areas where ongoing and professional development is essential as the world, regulatory requirements and graduate attributes change. Modifying delivery, making it flexible and making it accessible is important and imperative.

I’m talking about PhD training (graduate researchers in UMelbourne-speak). The Australian Council of Graduate Research has listed 6 principles of best practice, and at number 5 we can find the one relevant to this discussion.

Supervisors must provide guidance to graduate research candidates in the design, conduct and timely completion of the research project, support in publication and dissemination of research findings, and advise on the acquisition of a range of research and other skills as appropriate to the discipline and the background of the candidate.Supervisors also play a critical role in the development of both research and transferable skills to equip candidates with graduate attributes relevant to the breadth of employability opportunities open to post doctoral candidates. (Graduate Research Good Practice Principles, n.d.)

The 2016 Australian Council of Learned Academies (ACOLA) review found that Australia-wide, we have a robust and transparent graduate researcher training program, which made excellent contributions to knowledge, underpinned by a strong examination process and development of research skills (McGagh et al., 2016). However, the gaps were seen as making links to industry and and thus making research more relevant to Australia’s economy. This leads to a priority to drive confidence in the quality of GR students, by (amongst other things), increasing professionalism of supervision.

The last priority is the one we need to focus on. It is clear- there is a real and present need to adequately train our GR for the professional world. Students need professional, transferrable and disciplines specific skills. How can we equip GR supervisors to deliver these skills? Professors are excellent at delivering technical and discipline specific training and have great exemplars in how to deliver this training as they were trained this way themselves. But how do we encourage the professoriate to help students develop other areas? Refer them to other experts or train the professors to deliver other skills?

A thread on Twitter has captured my interest of late, and has sparked lots of discussions from academics and researchers on Twitter about what needs to be explicitly taught to GR students. Lots of grist for the mill, but what is the best way to present these gems across a discipline and institution? How can we support supervisors with platforms and mechanisms to support their GR students in these areas?

Professional development for GR supervisors is improving but there is still a way to go. I propose that a different framework should be approached, and have developed a padlet to note these ideas.

My reading has taken me the style of instruction which underpins subjects or courses to deliver content. I’ve wandered briefly into rhizomatic learning (eek!) but reading more about heutagogy makes me think this is a better approach. An excellent review by Moore (2020) considers lifelong learning and reviewed literature to apply heutagogy to adult, higher education and professional development, and specifically references development of extra skills of faculty (= professors). While noting a lack of critical studies which examine the value of assessment in heutagogical approaches, I think there is much to examine for utility to higher education. Of particular note is the focus on learner autonomy, which is certainly appropriate for the professoriate!

References

Graduate Research Good Practice Principles. (n.d.). ACGR. Retrieved May 2, 2021, from https://www.acgr.edu.au/good-practice/graduate-research-good-practice-principles/

McGagh, J., Marsh, H., Western, M., Thomas, P., Hastings, A., Mihailova, M., & Wenham, M. (2016). Review of Australia’s Research Training System. Report for the Australian Council of Learned Academies.https://acola.org/research-training-system-review-saf13/

Moore, R. L. (2020). Developing lifelong learning with heutagogy: Contexts, critiques, and challenges. Distance Education, 41(3), 381–401. https://doi.org/10.1080/01587919.2020.1766949