Identifying professional learning needs

Alongside the national resource: evaluation and improvement, schools should use the professional standards and professional development review arrangements to understand the professional learning needs of their staff.

The professional standards for teaching, leadership and assisting teaching describe the skills, knowledge and behaviours that characterise excellent practice and support professional growth.

All practitioners should be driven by the overarching set of values and dispositions included in the professional standards for teaching, leadership and assisting teaching (the professional standards). These values and dispositions as well as the 5 professional standards themselves are central to how we want all our practitioners to develop. The use of the professional standards to reflect on individual practice should inform individuals’ professional development review and lead to the development of an individual professional learning journey for every practitioner. This in turn will support schools to deliver on their school improvement priorities.

The purpose of professional development review (formerly known as performance management) is to secure effective teaching and leadership for the benefit of the learner, the practitioner and the school. It does this by supporting practitioners to continuously develop themselves as committed professional learners, through reflection, collaboration and innovation and fulfil their role in the school as a learning organisation.

Professional development review should create a learning environment that supports practitioner wellbeing, professional development and continuous review. This encourages practitioners to have affiliation to and agency in achieving the school vision and supporting the delivery of the school’s development plan.