Paired teaching for faculty professional development in teaching

TL;DR

This paper examines how paired teaching, where an experienced instructor collaborates with a novice, can effectively promote the adoption of research-based instructional strategies through professional development.

Contribution

It identifies key factors such as instructor approach, prior experience, course structure, and assignment sequence that influence effective learning in paired teaching settings.

Findings

Novice instructors' approach impacts learning outcomes.

Course structure and sequencing facilitate RBIS adoption.

Previous teaching experience mediates professional development effectiveness.

Abstract

Paired (or co-)teaching is an arrangement in which two faculty are collaboratively responsible for all aspects of teaching a course. By pairing an instructor experienced in research-based instructional strategies (RBIS) with an instructor with little or no experience in RBIS, paired teaching can be used to promote the adoption of RBIS. Using data from post-course interviews with the novice instructors of four such arrangements, we seek to describe factors that make for effective professional development in teaching via paired teaching. We suggest that the novice instructor's approach to the paired teaching and their previous teaching experience are two aspects which mediate their learning about teaching. Additionally, the structure of the pair-taught course and the sequence of teaching assignments for the novice both likely play roles in lowering the barrier to novice instructors adopting RBIS. We discuss these results within the framework of cognitive apprenticeship.