About the author: Jim Knight is a research associate at the University of Kansas Center for Research on Learning. This article originally appeared in the November 1997 issue of Stratenotes, a newsletter for SIM Professional Developers.
From the outset, the humanist educator's efforts must coincide with those of the student to engage in critical thinking and the quest for mutual humanization. The educator's efforts must be imbued with a profound trust in people and their creative power. To achieve this, the humanist educator must be a partner of the students in...relations with them.
--Paulo Friere
Our lives are enriched immeasurably by open and free conversation. In authentic dialogue, we open ourselves to new ideas, new friends, new worlds. Through conversation, we grow and learn, we express compassion, we touch others and let others touch us. In conversation, we live the experiences of our lives, in spirited, moving talks around kitchen tables, beside fireplaces, at summer cottages, in winter lodges, in automobiles, in classrooms, and, we hope, in training sessions.
Recently, the Center for Research on Learning has conducted research on how to increase the amount and quality of dialogue occurring during training sessions. The result is Partnership Learning, a method for planning and delivering staff development sessions in which memorable conversations take a central role. Partnership Learning is a simple, yet powerful, training methodology involving several core principles that are embodied in six easy-to-learn training strategies. This article provides a brief overview of the partnership principles and strategies so you can consider whether they might be useful methods to try out in your training sessions.
The partnership principles are foundational, guiding benchmarks you can use to make training decisions. Combined, the nine principles listed below represent a new mindset for training, a mindset focused on developing an authentic partnership between teachers and staff developers.
The principles of Partnership Learning are embodied in six partnership strategies. These strategies, described below, are each instructional methods that can be woven into any training session.
Thinking Devices. When using a thinking device, a trainer presents a provocative object to a group of learners (the object might be a film clip, story, vignette, audio clip, work of art, song, photograph, or other provocative object) and then elicits participant responses to and dialogue about the object through the use of question recipes (described below). Thinking devices can be used for a variety of teaching purposes, including introducing major sections of content or surfacing and/or validating prior knowledge of participants.
Question Recipes. Question recipes are
When using question recipes, a trainer draws from a list of 10 questions that he or she uses routinely during the session to promote dialogue. Example question recipes are "How do you see this working?" "Tell me more about that..." "What would prevent you from doing _____ ?" "How do you feel about _____ ?"
Cooperative Learning. Cooperative learning involves group learning activities that are mediated by learners and in which learners are given specific roles to perform. An example of cooperative learning is jigsaw, a two-part activity. During jigsaw, participants are divided into small groups in which they learn a portion of content being covered during the session (for example, a few pages of a training manual), with each group learning a different portion of content. Following this, new groups are created with each new group containing at least one member from each original group. In these new groups, participants, in sequence, teach the specific information they mastered to the members of the new group so that all of the information covered by the original groups is covered in the new groups.
Experiential Learning. Experiential learning involves structured learning activities that simulate the practice about which participants are learning. For example, teachers who are learning about the Sentence Writing Strategy could be asked to write a short paragraph and then discuss the strategies they used to create correct sentences. Similarly, teachers learning about the Test-Taking Strategy might be given a test to complete at some point during a workshop and then be prompted to discuss how they felt about and strategically approached the test.
Reflective Learning. Reflective learning involves activities that prompt participants to consider and explore how learning can be applied to their personal or professional lives. Examples of reflective learning include providing teachers with time to create Unit Organizers for content units they are planning to teach.
Effective Stories. Effective stories are short anecdotes or narratives that staff developers include in their sessions to enhance delivery of content. Stories can provide background information, examples and nonexamples, advance information, analogical anchors, personal or group contexts for learning, and so on.
Study of Partnership Learning shows that it is significantly more powerful than traditional training. During research on Partnership Learning, two groups of teachers were trained in two strategies (Visual Imagery and Self-Questioning). The first group received Visual Imagery training that used Partnership Learning methods and Self-Questioning training that used traditional methods. The second group received the opposite: Visual Imagery training that used traditional methods and Self-Questioning training involving Partnership Learning methods.
The results consistently show that Partnership Learning training, when compared with more traditional one-directional training, is a more effective method for engaging participants, communicating content, building an expectation of implementation, and creating an enjoyable experience.
| Figure 1 | ||
| Research Question | Partnership Learning (scores out of 7.0) | Traditional Training (scores out of 7.0) |
| Enjoyment | 5.22 | 3.13 |
| Comprehension | 4.58 | 3.75 |
| Engagement | 5.22 | 3.19 |
| Implementation | 5.07 | 4.0 |
One result especially illustrates the power of partnership. At the end of the Visual Imagery and Self-Questioning training sessions, participants were asked which strategy they were more likely to use. Regardless of whether they received Visual Imagery or Self-Questioning training using Partnership Learning methods, the teachers chose the strategy presented using Partnership Learning methods by a greater than 3 to 1 ratio.
Research suggests that the partnership strategies and principles can make a difference in the way we manage training sessions. What's more, the six strategies mentioned above are easy-to-use and simple to build into any training session. Indeed, you may be using some or all of the strategies already.
Partnership Learning is a simple way to create a setting in which teachers can freely, openly, and honestly explore, criticize, enthuse, and grow as they learn about new and old ways to teach. However, at its core, Partnership Learning is meant to be something more basic than a training methodology. Essentially, Partnership Learning is a philosophy or simple belief about training. In truth, if you go into each session open and expecting to be delighted by what teachers will teach you and honestly believing that every teacher has good ideas to share, then you are most likely already using Partnership Learning. What is more, chances are that as you conduct your training sessions, as you learn with the teachers you are training, your life is enriched immeasurably by open and free conversations.
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