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Session 1. Teacher Competency Frameworks
Objective. Compare public teacher frameworks, judge them against design criteria, and draft a one-page framework of 6-8 competencies with observable descriptors for a school or cluster, together with a plan to test it.
A framework can be an honest mirror or a weapon, and the words on the page are almost the same in both cases. What changes is who wrote it, how it is introduced and what it is used for. This lesson goes beyond the key ideas: how to introduce a framework so that teachers lean towards it, and how to turn a vague hope such as 'encourages thinking' into a descriptor two colleagues could check in the same lesson.
Key ideas
One picture of good teaching for the whole system
- If induction, appraisal and training each use a different idea of good teaching, teachers receive mixed messages and the system pulls in three directions. A competency framework is a shared language: it says what teachers know, do and are committed to, and what that looks like as they grow.
- It is a tool for growth and for fair conversations. It is not a checklist to rank or punish people, and a framework used that way is quickly ignored or feared.
- Your leadership question: what do we want every teacher here, from a first-year colleague to a methodist, to be able to recognise in their own lessons?
Three public frameworks, three purposes
- The Australian Professional Standards for Teachers (AITSL) have seven standards in three domains (professional knowledge, professional practice, professional engagement), described at four career stages: Graduate, Proficient, Highly Accomplished, Lead.
- The Teachers' Standards in England are a short statutory baseline of eight standards plus conduct, used for trainees and for appraisal. The UNESCO ICT Competency Framework for Teachers (version 3) is not a whole-teacher model: it describes technology-related competencies across six aspects of practice and three levels.
- Lesson for leaders: frameworks differ because their purposes differ. Ask what a framework was built for before you copy anything from it.
Design rules: few, observable, growth-oriented
- Few: 6-8 competencies fit on one page and in a teacher's head; 40 descriptors per stage do not. Observable: write what can be seen or shown (pupil work, a plan, a question asked), not 'has a good attitude'. Staged: three or four stages with a clear step between them.
- Growth-oriented: each descriptor should tell a teacher what to try next, and should include evidence of pupils' learning, not only teacher actions. Local: link to the national curriculum framework and to ministry regulations that apply to your school, and never contradict them.
- Trade-off: a long, complete framework feels fair but is not used; a short one is used but leaves gaps. Start short and add only what teachers ask for.
Consult, test and review before you adopt
- Map who is affected: teachers of each stage, new colleagues, methodists, the head, the district office, and sometimes parents or the board. For each, write the likely worry (for example 'it will be used to judge me') and one way to involve them.
- Test before adoption: two people observe the same lesson separately and read it against the framework. If they disagree by more than one stage on a competency, the wording is not clear enough yet.
- Promise a review date (for example after one year) and say in writing that for the first year the framework is for conversation and planning, not for ratings or pay.
From hope to descriptor
Introducing a framework as a mirror
The first meeting decides the meaning. If the head hands out a finished document and a form, teachers read it as inspection. If the head says, 'Here are two public examples; help us write a page that describes the teaching we are proud of,' teachers read it as their own work. Start with strengths: ask each person to bring one lesson moment that went well and to say what a visitor would have seen.
Then begin small: two domains in the first term, written by teachers who volunteer, tested in a lesson study or a peer visit. Add domains only when the first two are used. In the first year say, in writing, that the framework is for conversation, not for ratings or pay. A promise that is kept in year one makes year two possible.
Turning hopes into descriptors
Most first drafts contain hopes: 'develops critical thinking', 'is creative'. Apply three questions to each. What would I see or hear in the lesson? What would a pupil say, write or do? Could two colleagues agree it happened? 'Develops critical thinking' becomes 'asks at least two questions in a lesson that need a reason, and pupils give a reason aloud or in their notebooks'.
Between stages, change one thing at a time: how often, how independently, or how widely. A Beginning descriptor may say 'with a planned prompt', an Established one 'across most lessons and adjusted to what pupils say', and a Leading one 'and helps colleagues do the same'. Avoid stage words such as 'good', 'very good' and 'excellent'; they cannot be checked.
Examples from the classroom
Three meetings in Samarkand
Scene. Deputy head Dilnoza invites six volunteers to three 45-minute meetings. At the first they list moments of good teaching from their own lessons; at the second they group them into seven headings; at the third they write descriptors for two. When she tests 'classroom climate' with two observers on the same Grade 6 lesson, they differ by two stages, and the group rewrites it as 'pupils speak without being laughed at and the teacher intervenes within one minute if they are'.
Insight. People who write the words trust the words; testing finds the unclear ones before they cause conflict.
One cluster, five schools
Scene. A methodist in Bukhara works with five rural schools. They agree on six shared domains but each school adds its own subject examples: a primary school adds a phonics routine, a school with a cotton-picking autumn adds how it keeps learning going when pupils are absent. At the cluster day, teachers from different schools use the same words for the same things. New teachers who transfer between the five schools meet one framework, not five.
Insight. A shared core with local additions gives common language without erasing local reality.
Lesson study before appraisal
Scene. In Tashkent a head decides to use the new framework first in a lesson study with three volunteers, not in appraisal. They plan one Grade 7 lesson together on the domain 'checking understanding', watch it, and discuss which descriptors helped them see things. Two months later, five more teachers ask to join. The head waits until the second year to link the framework to appraisal conversations, and tells staff so in a note.
Insight. Using the framework for learning first builds the trust that appraisal later depends on.
Common pitfalls
- Copying a famous framework in full and expecting teachers to use it without having a say.
- Writing descriptors about teacher character ('is caring') instead of visible teaching and pupil work.
- Making the framework so long that nobody can remember it.
- Using the framework for ratings in year one, after promising it was for growth.
Draft the One-Page Framework
- Open the Activity Kit table that compares the three public frameworks and the design criteria card. Read in silence. (6 min)
- Pairs (12 min): score each framework 0-2 on the five criteria (few, observable, staged, growth-oriented, local fit). Note one thing you would borrow and one you would leave behind, and why.
- Trios (15 min): using what you know about your own school, choose 6-8 competency domains and write them as short headings on the blank framework sheet. Agree which two matter most for pupils' learning this year.
- Trios (13 min): for those two domains write descriptors at three stages (Beginning, Established, Leading) in the form 'I can ... and my pupils ...'. Test each with the question: could two observers agree that they saw it?
- Gallery (5 min): swap sheets with another trio and leave one comment on a descriptor that is not yet observable.
- Part B, stakeholder map and test plan (25 min): in your trio list six stakeholders, their likely worry and one way to involve each. Then plan a reliability test: which two lessons, which two observers, which two domains, and when you will compare readings.
- Alone (9 min): write your leadership task from the Kit and name the one person you will ask to challenge your draft.
Your facilitator will guide you through this activity in the session.
Questions to discuss
- Which descriptor did your trio find hardest to make observable, and how did you rewrite it?
- What would the most sceptical senior teacher in your school say about this framework, and what is your answer?
- Where would a framework help most in your system: induction, appraisal or training plans, and why there first?
Reflect
- If a visiting colleague watched your lesson, which three things would you want them to notice? Are those in any framework you know?
- Who in your school has the most credibility with teachers? How could they help write the framework?
- What official documents must your framework respect, and who can confirm this for you?
Try it tomorrow
- Take one lesson plan of your own and underline each phrase in your draft framework that you could see in it.
- Rewrite two vague phrases using the three questions: see, pupils produce, two colleagues agree.
- Ask a colleague to read your descriptor without context and tell you what they would look for in a lesson.
Further reading and links
A framework earns trust when it is short, observable, tested by two readers and promised to be for growth first.