Abstract:

Instructional consultation provides a viable way of enabling faculty to implement learner-centered teaching by providing targeted, customized support. Although not without limitations, instructional consultation has been shown to improve teaching effectiveness. It has been found that consultation not only improves teaching effectiveness, but that the effects of consultation persist beyond the consultation process. Additionally, consultation has been found to have positive benefits on teaching effectiveness for both young and older faculty. While the instructional consulting process might be familiar to experienced educational developers, the process might prove elusive to those who are new to educational development.

In this presentation, we propose a potential consultation framework consisting of three interrelated and iterative components: exploration, modeling, and reflection. The primary focus during exploration is on information gathering, weighing options, and goal setting. In the modeling component, the educational developer demonstrates a task or how to think through a task. Reflection involves faculty examining their practice and thoughts to improve their teaching practice.

Acting as coaches, developers monitor and regulate the faculty members’ progress, provide guidance, motivation, and feedback throughout the learning process (coaching and scaffolding). They guide faculty members’ attention to various options to consider (exploration) and demonstrate how to perform or think through tasks (modeling). Developers make room for and provoke faculty members’ reflection, and participate as reflection partners with faculty members (reflection). The value of the proposed model is in operationalizing in concrete ways the instructional consultation process, particularly for those new to educational development.

Keywords:

Instructional consultation, educational development, faculty development.