Reflective questions

These reflective questions will support you to consider and plan your professional learning, development and practice related to the Professional Standards.

They should not be seen as prescriptive or as a list to be completed. The questions are intended to provide prompts for reflection and self-evaluation.

Using the Professional Standards to plan and support professional learning and development

• How will I use the Professional Standards to inform and support me when planning my professional learning and development?
• How will I use the Professional Standards to support me to identify areas of learning and development to enhance my knowledge, understanding and practice?
• What aspects of the Professional Standards do I find most challenging? Why? How could these challenges be addressed?
• How can I use the Professional Standards to support my self-evaluation process in preparation for a Professional Review and Development discussion?

Assessing your Professional Values

• How are the Professional Values reflected in my Professional Actions?
• How have my Professional Values been developed and informed by knowledge and experience?
• How do I critically reflect on my assumptions, beliefs and values?
• Who am I as a teacher? What has influenced me? What sustains me?

Assessing your development needs

• What development needs do I have concerning enhancing my subject/ content knowledge and pedagogical expertise? How do I plan my professional learning to enable me to develop in these areas? What support would I require to meet those needs?
• In what ways do I engage with professional literature, theory, research and policy to challenge and inform my thinking and practice?
• What informs my thinking when planning my priorities for future professional learning and development?

Reflecting on your professional learning

• As a result of my professional learning, how has my practice developed to improve outcomes for all learners? How do I know? What evidence of impact do I have? What does this tell me about my practice?
• How do I critically reflect on my learning with a focus on impact and how do I share this with my colleagues to lead improvement across the school and/or wider community? What evidence do I have of this impact?
• How do I know the impact of my teaching on learners? How will I systematically gather and analyse evidence of impact?
• What impact has my professional learning had on my colleagues or others in my educational community?

Developing accomplishment and expertise

• What areas of accomplishment/ expertise would I like to develop?
• What professional learning will I engage in to support my development in this area?
• Would Masters-level learning support and inform me in this development?
• As I develop accomplishment and expertise in a specific area how do I share this with colleagues and lead developments within and beyond the school community?
• How could I use the GTC Scotland Professional Recognition Framework to support my professional learning and to recognise and develop accomplishment/ expertise in specific areas?