Teaching in the digital age: developing tuition together – school cooperation project in the project SKILL.de

The object of the SKILL school cooperation project is to support teaching staff in the implementation of their tuitional aims, with and via digital media, in such a way as to correspond to the individual development objectives of the school. In this sub-project, it is not only processes of tuitional development that are being researched, but also developments of collaboration in the teaching staffs.

Improving the way phases in teacher training mesh together is one of the objectives of the overall project SKILL.de. The cooperation project Developing Tuition Together looks into how teaching staffs can be supported specifically in the development of digitalisation-related skills for their tuition. To this end, individual training concepts for each single project schools are being created and tested, and evaluated by means of accompanying research. Tuitional elements developed in the university teaching formats of the project SKILL.de can then be tested in school practice, developed further together with the teachers, and made available for the further training of upcoming teachers. In particular, as well as improving cooperation between school and university, the project aims to accompany, promote and ensure cooperation structures within the teaching staffs on a long-term basis. Collaboration in the school cooperation project also aims to encourage and support the implementation of the media development plans at school level.

The accompanying research looks into differential developments in the teaching staffs and into the possibility of supporting domain-related self-concepts, contributive formation of intention and purposive deployment of digital media in their own tuition by encouraging collaboration and having a favourable influence on the formation of sustainable collaboration structures.

Sample

As project schools, twelve schools of various different types which were interested in such a cooperation were selected throughout Lower Bavaria. Their teaching staffs are now accompanied and supported with a school-specific focus throughout the project and are prepared to enter into an exchange with the university. The schools differ in size and location and have different thematic development focuses. Some of them are operated by the state, others in private trusteeship. Twelve other schools of the same type and with similar structural characteristics were able to be recruited for the research as accompanying schools.

Implementation of project and status of work

The study has been designed as a longitudinal intervention study with 3 survey periods in the 3 years of the project term. Those surveyed include all the teachers at each of the 24 schools and their headmasters or headmistresses.

A cooperation agreement was initially signed with all 24 schools. At the beginning of the 2019/20 school year, an initial survey was conducted online at the schools to evaluate the school's initial situation (MZP I). Over the course of the winter, a kick-off event was then held with each of the twelve project school colleges at the respective school. These kick-off workshops made it possible to ascertain individual training needs and development goals, and to identify existing forms of collaboration as well as those that the teachers felt could be used in the future. The evaluations of these workshops formed the most important basis for the initial versions of the precisely tailored in-service training concepts that were developed for each of the twelve project schools in the course of spring 2020. Then the project work was greatly changed by Corona. Access to the schools was no longer possible. All support services for the schools took place online. The teachers were heavily burdened, so that the originally planned in-service training concepts could only be implemented in a rudimentary way. Instead, advanced training courses for online instruction were required. The project reacted with appropriate offers, which, however, had to lead to a change in the accompanying research. The project work with the schools ended in early summer 2023.

Publication

A publication on the results of the three survey years is currently being prepared.

Project leadership: Professor Jutta Mägdefrau
Project work: Petra Mayrhofer,  Lothar Löschenbrand