Bridging disciplinary boundaries through facilitated teaching partnerships

Abstract

In times of increasing workload, even the most well-intentioned of staff may struggle to dedicate time to reflect on and develop their teaching practices. One accessible and important way to engage in this work is through conversations with colleagues. Prior work suggests that even informal conversations can help several dimensions of teaching and learning – enabling colleagues to better manage practicalities, improve their practice, be reassured about their approaches, vent about events, and transform their mindsets. We describe a structured model for facilitating collegial conversations that might not otherwise happen organically. Participants of the ‘Teaching Partnerships Initiative’ (n=14) were assembled into duos or trios with similar teaching and learning interests, but different academic disciplines. With support from an academic developer, participants worked together to articulate their goals and progress then reflect on both over four to six months. Projects included enhancing engagement of online learners, developing more inclusive assessments, and creating interactive activities. Here, we present reflections from three participants on the impact that this work has had on their teaching development, both immediately and approximately 18 months after the initiative. Participants reported multiple benefits, including prompting changes in practice, affirming existing practice, receiving peer feedback from an ‘outside’ perspective, having accountability, and creating tangible teaching resources (activities and assessments). Alongside participant reflections, we present facilitator perspectives and contextualise our results within the wider academic development literature. We also discuss recommendations for future initiatives based on our findings, including intentionally partnering colleagues from different disciplines, balancing structure and flexibility, and providing choice for participants to focus on topics driven by their own specific interests.