Teaching Enhancement Cycle

STEP 1: Decide on the purpose of your evaluation

To begin you will need to decide on an area or areas of your teaching practice you would like to either develop or to investigate. You begin by reflecting on your current teaching practice then you decide on the purpose and intended outcomes of your investigation. There are two parts to this initial process: a) Self appraisal and b) Deciding your purpose.

a) Self appraisal

The links below will take you to two recognised exercises that will help you to begin thinking about and reflecting on your current and desired approach to teaching. You can choose whichever suits you best and the findings of these exercises will not be viewed by anybody other than yourself.

1. Teaching Perspectives Inventory (TPI) – Pratt & Collins

The TPI is a free online self evaluation that allows university lecturers to consider themselves and their teaching practice across five perspectives of good teaching: Transmission, Apprenticeship, Developmental, Nurturing and Social Reform. It is an easy to use tick box questionnaire with 45 questions that  takes about 10 minutes to complete. The results are immediate and sent directly to your email address. Results are easy to analyse and an overview of each of the perspectives allows you to reflect on your own approaches to teaching.

• Teaching Perspectives Inventory

2. Flinders University Self Evaluation Inventory and Appraisal forms

These two exercises can be printed out. They consist of a series of tick box, self evaluation, questions across the following themes: Student contact, student collaboration, Active learning, Feedback, Time on task, High expectations, Diversity. Each section ends with a reflective question that leads to action.

• Flinders questions for self appraisal (.pdf format) 
• Flinders self evaluation inventory (.pdf format)

b) Deciding your purpose

Now that you have reflected on your approach to teaching, you will need to decide on what aspect or aspects of your teaching you would like to gather evidence on and/or improve. Use the findings of your self appraisal exercises to do this. Findings from student surveys may also help you here.

Complete Section A of the TEC Action Plan form Purpose of Evaluation to help you establish the purpose and intended outcomes of your evaluation (the rest of the TEC Action Plan will be completed by you later). Please feel free to contact the LIU if you require any assistance with this.

• TEC Action Plan form (.doc format)