Page 113 - The SpeakTeach method - Esther de Vrind

We can also apply this strategy to promote innovation of a teacher’s repertoire building on the teacher’s existing practice (Janssen et al, 2015; for empirical studies see: Janssen, Westbroek & Doyle, 2014a; Dam, Janssen, Van Driel, 2013; Janssen, Westbroek, Doyle & Van Driel, 2014b; Janssen, Hulshof & Van Veen, 2016). In order to promote modular innovation in education, it is important to first describe the existing teaching practice and the innovative approach at a comparable level of abstraction. Teachers often say that innovative proposals are not practical. This is because the desired approach is often presented abstractly and as a stand-alone whole. As a result, it is not clear how to transform the abstract ideas and goals efficiently into concrete classroom activities that fit in with the existing classroom demands and other goals (Doyle & Ponder, 1977; Janssen, Westbroek, Doyle & Van Driel, 2013; Janssen et al., 2015; Kennedy, 2016b). For this reason, both the existing teaching practice and the desired situation must be formulated in terms of comparable modules, or building blocks, at the same level of description (Janssen et al., 2015; Simon, 1996). A module, or a building block is a recognizable lesson segment of a regular lesson series. For language lessons building blocks could be input (reading texts or listening fragments), exercises (for instance focused on grammar or vocabulary), speaking activities and feedback (see chapter 3, 3.2.2).
Subsequently, if the current and desired situation are represented in similar building blocks, modularity helps to show the differences and how these can be reduced by adapting and recombining the existing modules (Janssen et al., 2013). In this way, teachers can innovate and expand their current teaching repertoire by selecting and recombining building blocks that already exist in their current teaching practice. The possibility to recombine the building blocks and use them in different sequences makes the innovative teaching approach flexible (see chapter 3, 3.2.3). This flexibility is intended to help teachers to integrate new repertoire stepwise into their existing practices in a way that is time-saving and consistent with their own aims, by using their existing repertoire (perhaps in a different order). As a result, different learning routes can be followed to arrive at the innovative teaching practice.
Principle 2: Self-evaluation of existing teaching practice as a starting point for an adaptive learning route
Reflection on practice has been widely accepted as an important ingredient in professional development trajectories (Marcos, Sanches & Tillema, 2011). Many programs encourage
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