What Does Teaching Excellence Mean to You?
Ultimately the goal of any reflective practice is to identify what you are doing well and where you would like to make improvements. For this to be an effective and useful process, it is necessary to have a goal in mind. Consider the following questions for personal reflection:
- What does an excellent teacher look like?
- What are the characteristics, attributes and skills that make them excellent?
- What does this teacher do in their practice that other, less effective teachers do not do?
Although definitions for teaching excellence vary in the literature, Centennial has developed a framework of teaching excellence competencies which you can use to think about your own teaching practice. The Teaching Excellence and Quality Framework (TEQF) is based on quality assurance standards (Grabove et al., 2012) and research literature focused on 21st Century teaching competencies and quality dimensions in higher education (Johnson et al., 2016; Pozarnik & Lavric, 2015; Fullan and Langworthy, 2013; Van Der Worf and Sabatier, 2009; Tigelaar, et al., 2004). Nine foundational teaching competencies were identified from the research literature (i.e., Learning Facilitator; Curriculum and Assessment Contributor; Content Expert; Lifelong Learner and Scholar; Communicator and Collaborator; Entrepreneur; Knowledge Curator; Global and Digital Citizen; Academic Leader), and have been mapped for your reference below (Figure 3):
In the next few activities, you will begin to think about your personal definition of teaching excellence. As you go through the activities, refer back to the Teaching Excellence and Quality Framework for additional inspiration. Does your definition of teaching excellence include any of the above foundational teaching competencies? What may be new or different with your own definition?
Activity
What Values Do You Bring to Your Role as Faculty?
Fundamental to being a reflective practitioner is identifying the values that you bring to your teaching practice. This is an essential beginning, as it provides a strong foundation for all of your actions and can offer a reference point to guide your reflective practice journey.
Activity