Teacher Development Survey: Full Report

Tracey L. Hurd, Ph.D.
Children and Family Programs Director, UUA

"People have many needs—intellectual, physical, emotional, spiritual—but the faith community must keep uppermost in its mind the religious gifts that are no other institution's primary responsibility or intent. The potential for meaning making is so great, and our time together so short, that we must constantly ask ourselves, What religious needs can we serve...? Helping people develop spiritually and act religiously is our unique responsibility. Facilitating this religious growth and learning is what we as liberal religious educators can uniquely offer. Together, making meaning of life and living a life of meaning constitute the there we must make sure is there."

Judith A. Frediani, from The Essex Conversations

Contents

• Overview of the Survey
• Methodology
• Summary of Findings
• Implications of Findings
• Results of the Survey: Summaries and Details
• What is the current focus of teacher training and support efforts?
• What are the current formats used for teacher training and support?
• What do volunteer teachers request for support and training?
• What are religious educators' future visions for providing teacher training and support?
• Conclusion

Overview of the Survey

We are all continuously growing in faith. In daily congregational life, in religious education classrooms, whether as designated teachers or students, we are all together in the mutually enriching process of searching, exploring and creating faith together. The term "lifespan faith development" envelops the mutuality of teaching and learning in religious settings. Planning our lifespan faith development programs means attending to all who are participate. Teaching can be a path to spiritual growth and renewal. Our efforts to serve our congregations demand that we not only understand how lifespan faith development programs support participating children and youth, but also how they support the adults who teach.

In the fall of 2004, the Lifespan Faith Development group of the UUA conducted an on-line survey addressing issues of teacher development and training in UU lifespan faith development programs. The term "teacher" was used to signify adult leaders in faith development programs; it was not used for its traditional, classroom-based connotations. The purpose of the survey was to learn more about teachers in lifespan faith development programs. How do religious educators' attend to teachers? What do they do to frame, support and sustain teachers? What are some future visions of nurturing and supporting teachers? And how can we, as an association, support the ministry of teaching? We wanted to understand more about current practices and future visions to guide our future resource development and ensure that it is aligned with the practices, needs, and visions of congregations. Our general areas of inquiry included four main questions:

• What is the current focus of teacher training and support efforts?
• What are the current formats used for teacher training and support?
• What do volunteer teachers request for support and training?
• What are religious educators' future visions for providing teacher training and support?

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Methodology

The on-line survey was advertised through REACH-L and LREDA list serves, district UUA staff, and outreach to individual religious educators. It was available for completion for approximately three months. On-line survey software was used to design the Teacher Development Survey  and assure complete confidentiality and anonymity of responses. All participants provided information about their congregation size, religious education program size, and location (urban, suburban or rural). Although it was optional, 61% chose to provide their name and contact information. There were 140 responses, with a distribution from large, mid-size and small congregations and children/youth programs paralleling the distribution of congregation and program sizes in the Association overall.

The survey obtained information through multiple assessments. Often we inquired about one topic through multiple question formats. What and how questions are posed influences responses. For example, we often asked open-ended questions at the start of a section. This allowed participants to respond based on their own preconceptions and ideas. Later we provided more closed-ended questions, where participants could indicate how much the provided information applies or does not apply to their practice. Likert scale responses with five descriptors (e.g. always, usually, occasionally, rarely, never) were used for many closed-ended questions. Additionally, there was room for comments. We asked participants to rank-order (most likely to least likely) ideas or practices at the close of most sections of inquiry. By the time participants arrived at a question asking for the ranking of choices, they had been ushered through thinking about the overall topic through the previous questions.

For example, the content of current teacher training and development efforts were assessed through three venues: open-ended question; responses to twelve possible areas of focus with Likert responses (always, usually, occasionally, rarely, never) to the question, "How frequently do you focus on __?;" and a question inviting respondents to rank their top five content priorities. In general, we found consistency to answers within each topic, regardless of the type of question posed. This attests to the validity of the survey design.

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Summary of Findings

• Teaching is ministry and spiritual practice. Framing and deepening the experience of teaching as a faith building, soul-enriching practice is at the heart of religious educators' future visions—for teachers and their wider congregations.
   
• There are tensions between providing faith-deepening experiences for teachers and providing pragmatic resources for religious education programs. These tensions arise from scarcity of time, money and person-power.
   
• There is a need for efficient delivery of basic training materials about UU faith, child and youth development, multiple intelligences, behavior/group management, and for curricula that provide enriching experiences including stories, games, crafts, and music.
   
• There is a need to provide teachers with more in-depth background for specific curricula and programs, including connection to Unitarian Universalist faith.
   
• There is a need to provide avenues to connect teachers to each other and to their work in lifespan faith development programs thereby enhancing their spiritual and faith development journeys and strengthening their commitment to teaching.

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Implications of Survey Findings

Claiming the ministry of religious education as central to the ministry of our faith is an essential step towards enriching and supporting teachers and our congregations. While the mission of many religious educators is to support teaching as a faith development experience, often their time and attention is spent attending to the critical, pragmatic efforts of running a program. Connecting teachers to each other and to their work in lifespan faith development programs as part of their spiritual or UU identity development is at the heart of the future visions of religious educators. They are constrained, however, by available resources. The efficient delivery of basic training materials about UU faith, child development, multiple intelligences, behavior management, curricula, and enriching additional activities such as games or music, might free religious educators to concentrate more on the relational aspects of teaching in faith. At present, religious educators usually create their own training materials. Religious educators are interested in centrally developed materials, if they are well designed and usable. They are particularly interested in providing such materials on-line and in other home-use formats.

The results of this survey is a living document that will inform the Unitarian Universalist Association of Congregation's development of resources and materials about teaching in faith. Because of the generosity of the religious educators who completed the survey, we have volumes of comments about specific teacher development content and processes. We have details about priorities and pragmatics. Many religious educators provided contact information, which has allowed us to communicate with them directly. Some resources are already being shared through the Teacher Development web site. The wisdom and innovations of religious educators will both inspire and guide future resource sharing and development. It is clear that religious educators need truly quality resources that are sensitive to the constraints of volunteer teachers, congregations, and lifespan faith development programs. Understanding current practice and future visions, we are better prepared to support the efforts of religious educators and congregations, as we move towards a deeper embodiment of lifespan faith development.

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Results of the Survey: Questions and Data

Characterization of current approaches to preparing and supporting teachers.

When asked to respond to the request, "Briefly describe the content you focus on in your current approach to preparing and supporting teachers in your program," religious educators presented summary responses that painted a picture of both content and process. Some comments include:

• "Teachers learn by "doing" in our teacher training. We don't just talk about children's worship, we start with one, we play games for them to learn that they will then bring to the classes, we go on a scavenger hunt around the church to locate, rooms, and supplies. We also give everyone a teacher handbook, with outlines of their responsibilities and material about different kinds of learning styles, and developmental stages."
   
• "Team building ...Inspiration ...Safe Congregations issues/policies ...Classroom management ...Ritual/worship in the classroom ...Ages and stages ...Curriculum specific issues ...Logistical issues ...The how-tos and data issues .... These topics are covered in three types of trainings: 1) Team trainings for all team members to talk about ages and stages, their specific curriculum, specific concerns and issues, room use, and communications; 2) All leader orientation which includes team building, inspiration, worship, safe congregations issues, and general new information; and 3) New leader orientation which includes all the how-to stuff that returning leaders already know. This is also a time for reassurance, and more questions and answers. Leaders are encouraged to focus on their class members and to a lesser extent on the material to be presented. Most preparation work is done by staff and committee members to help facilitate the ability of leaders to focus on the class itself."
   
• "My approach is through memory. I invite those who are teaching for the first time to recall something they have learned and the details surrounding that learning. It may be from any time in their lives from learning to tie their shoes, riding a bike, learning quantum physics, anything. Invariably, they recall a person who was involved and the qualities and characteristics exhibited by that person or they identify some personal strength if they were learning alone, although independent learning is rarely recalled. Then we talk about the implications of that learning on how they will be with the children or youth of our congregation. The conclusion that usually emerges from these conversations is that they need to remember to model the kind of behaviors, attitudes, etc., that they valued. They need to be the kind of adults that they wish the children to become."
   
• "I encourage them to be creative, and to use curricula only as a guide. I encourage them to let the kids teach them and to be flexible about the RE time so as to take into account what is going on personally for the kids, and in the community. They can simply have worship with the kids, sharing time, candles, songs, and conversation. It's multi-aged and usually very meaningful."

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What is the current focus of teacher training and support efforts?

Summary. What is religious educators' primary focus in their current approach to training and supporting teachers? Religious educators indicated that they Alway s address:

• Safe Congregations Guidelines (64.2%)
• Logistics (57.5%)
• Unitarian Universalism (49.1%)
• Team Teaching (47.7%)
• Classroom Management (39.3%)
• Curriculum (32.1%)
• Supplies (30.5%)
• Developmental Characteristics of Children and Youth (25.2%)
• Worship (25.2%)
• Families (15%)
• Adult (teacher) Spiritual Development (15%)
• Anti-bias Education (12.6%)

When asked to rank their top five priorities in their current approach to preparing and supporting teachers, religious educators similarly responded: Unitarian Universalism, curriculum, team teaching; classroom management; and logistics. Covering the pragmatic, essential elements of the faith development program are indicated as the priorities of current teacher training and support practices.

Details. Analyzing the closed-ended questions in light of the qualitative data revealed a gap. The underlying pulse of many teacher training and support efforts—a call to envision and embody teaching as spiritual practice—is obscured in participants' item-by-item responses. When asked to write freely in response to the open-ended question, "What is the current content for training and supporting teachers?" respondents consistently emphasized their commitment to helping teachers see and find meaning in their work. In their open-ended writing, adult faith development was a palpable priority for religious educators.

• "I'm focusing primarily on format rather than content as we are using small group ministry this year.... I train teachers by leading them through the process. During these sessions we have focused on talents they bring to working with children as well as how/when they came to Unitarian Universalism."
   
• "I periodically take a survey of questions to evaluate how the year is going. The evaluation has the teachers rate their experiences on a scale of 1-10 and provides a place for comments about each question: 1. To what extent has this teaching experience deepened your relationship with one or more child/youth? 2. To what extent has this teaching experience deepened your relationship with one or more other adult? 3. To what extent has this teaching experience deepened your sense of belonging to this community? 4. To what extent has this teaching experience given you new knowledge or insights about your faith? That's how I judge success."
   
• "In teacher training, I talk about teaching as ministry. More important than the curriculum is modeling to our young how to be in right relationship with each other. Also, there is the importance of providing a safe space to question and explore together. We learn from each other. The teacher is learner is teacher. Learning is a lifelong process. Don't be afraid to say you don't know the answer."

The challenge or tension revealed by religious educators is between their commitment to creating and deepening teaching as a faith development experience for teachers and their commitment to covering information and materials that ensure the operation of the religious education program.

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What are the current formats used for teacher training and support?

Summary. What formats do religious educators use to engage teachers in training and support? The majority of religious educators provide written materials, including some guidelines on teaching and curriculum. Many provide communication venues including feedback forms, email, meetings upon request, and periodic newsletter or updates. Almost all respondents indicated that they provide one or more teaching training/orientation session for volunteer teachers, with many offering repeated trainings.

Participants said that they always encourage teachers to engage in or with:

• Written Materials (including handbooks, book, articles) (75%)
• Group Training Sessions (67.3%)
• Opportunities for Written Reflection (43.3%)
• Specific curricular Trainings (e.g. OWL) (42.2%)
• Workshops (28.2%)
• Teaching Team Meetings (27.9%)
• Intergenerational Programs (24.5%)
• Individual Meetings with teachers and religious educator (13.5%)
• Mentorships (11.7%)
• UU Weeklong Camps or Conferences (11.7%)
• Renaissance Modules (10.6%)
• Retreats for religious education teachers (8.8%)
• General Assembly (8.8%)
• Small Group Ministry (5.8%)
• Local community and/ or academic workshops (4.9%)

Details. In addition to assessing how often they engage teachers with specific practices or materials, religious educators commented freely and frequently. The need to balance resources of time, money, and efforts was evident. A sample of comments is offered below.

Comments about Written Materials and Opportunities for Written Reflection include:

• "I give out a handbook that has the church and classroom policies, information on multiple intelligences, information on spiritual development of children and access to stuff in my library."
   
• "Each teacher receives a complete curriculum, a syllabus and materials each week in the classroom to supplement the lesson."
   
• "I give teachers a letter from me each week with room for them to write back to me. Few use it—but it is always fresh and available."

Comments about Group Training Sessions, Individual Meetings, and Team Teaching Meetings include:

• "I do one large training at the beginning of the year and offer monthly sessions as well."
   
• "I hold these kinds of group meetings annually: Team Meetings for each group of teachers focusing on team communication, nuts and bolts, and the contents of the Teacher Manual; Teacher Rally Day focusing on philosophy and UU theology in a worship setting and team meetings; New Teacher Training for those new to teaching covering classroom management, child faith development, team building, and philosophy; Workshops on special topics such as arts in the classroom or communication with teens and OWL Training or youth advisor trainings."
   
• "I don't meet in person with individual teachers unless I need to. I did many individual trainings to accommodate volunteer work schedules. Although we don't meet in person, we have e-mail lists where I communicate on a weekly basis with all my teachers."
   
• "I'm always available to meet with individuals to develop lesson ideas. Several newer teachers rely on this individual time together."
   
• "Generally I get the teams up and moving and meet with them as needed."

Comments on Specific Curricular Trainings, Workshops, GA, and Renaissance Modules include:

• "We train OWL facilitators and youth advisors each year. There are fewer opportunities for training for teachers of young children."
   
• "We do trainings only when necessary, like with OWL. It's expensive."
   
• "Often teachers are resistant to put in any more time by the time workshops roll around. Occasionally though I have really committed teachers who get interested in these opportunities."
   
• "I have encouraged RE Committee members to attend Renaissance Modules." "Renaissance Modules are too long for most teachers."
   
• "GA is a very expensive way to support teachers, so if they want to go for their own reasons I would encourage it, but I don't push it as a training opportunity."

Comments on Intergenerational Programs and Mentorships include:

• "We do not have a lot of intergenerational events, but I encourage them—including social action projects, intergenerational worship, and fellowship events."
   
• "We do multi-generational worship services once an month and teachers are encouraged to help plan and participate in many of them."
   
• "When we have a new teacher, we pair him or her with an experienced teacher. This is not formal mentorship, however. I just make sure it happens."
   
• "As we develop master teachers in program areas they mentor new leaders each year in their area."

Comments on Small Group Ministry include:

• "I think that Small Group Ministry may be the key to keeping teachers from feeling burned out and cut off from the rest of the church because this gives them the opportunity for a spiritual component ."
   
• "It is very difficult to move people from thinking of teaching as just a volunteer job to thinking of it as an opportunity for their own faith development. I take advantage of whatever opportunities I have to use a small group ministry format with teachers, knowing that it really enhances the their own experience. There is, however, resistance on the part of over-scheduled people to spending time doing that."

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What do volunteer teachers request for support and training?

Summary. Many religious educators indicated that volunteers do not request any specific support. Analysis of this open-ended question revealed that when seeking support volunteer teachers most often ask for resources on management issues, curriculum, child development, and the connection between what they are teaching and Unitarian Universalism. Some teachers seek stories to use with children or worship materials. Many want help with specific children, including those with designated special needs. Volunteer teachers are very busy. Many religious educators indicated that teachers seem to want "less" rather than "more" from Sunday mornings, while others struggle with finding room for their own spiritual work. Categorizing and tallying the items mentioned in the open-ended question, we found the following areas most frequently mentioned:

• Management
• Curriculum
• Child development
• Connection between religious education and Unitarian Universalism
• More art & music resources
• Integrating children with special needs
• Background information on sessions
• UU Stories and/or picture books
• Spiritual aspects of teaching

Details. Comments from religious educators about what their volunteer teachers request include:

• " There are rarely specific requests. Most often teachers express lack of confidence in expressing their own sense of Unitarian Universalism. Classroom management is also a recurring issue."
   
• "They all wish they knew more. People who are not teachers during the week ask for feedback."
   
• "They want curriculum, supplies, and some developmental stages of faith."
   
• "Behavior management/classroom management—anything to do with this, except they don't want to be handed an article. They want to know how to motivate children so that every child is enjoying and getting something out of RE."
   
• "They want more self-guide resources."
   
• "Teachers ask for logistics support; how to incorporate into the program diversity or children and special needs; and workshops on curriculum enhancements—using stories, games, and music."
   
• "They would like every item for a lesson to be provided (busy people). They would like a teachers' meeting that actually took no time (busy people)."
   
• "They want to know: What can I do Sunday morning? How can I find time to do my own spiritual work?"

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What are religious educators' future visions for providing teacher training and support?

Summary. Part, but not all, of religious educators' ideal future visions is realized in their current approaches to provide teacher training and support. Overwhelmingly, religious educators expressed interest in providing more relational, group forums, that would afford teachers the opportunity to deepen their spiritual connection to teaching and to each other. The yearning to provide forums for teacher reflection which frame teaching as ministry is clear. In addition, religious educators seek ways to streamline the provision of needed pragmatic resources for teaching, including on-line or CD resources to learn about Unitarian Universalism, child development, group management, and other topics. Religious educators indicated that they would ideally offer :

• Small Group Ministry (75.8%)
• Trainings, such as OWL trainings (72.4%)
• Workshops (71.3%)
• On-line Learning Opportunities (70.5%)
• Videos for home learning (67%)
• Meetings of teachers with religious educator (65.9%)
• CDs on topics for home learning (65.9%)
• Articles and books (64.8%)
• Intergenerational programs (63.7%)

Details. When asked to reflect on their future visions for training and supporting teachers, religious educators wrote fluently and often elegantly. Religious educators hold many ideas, nested in their strong belief that teaching can be a journey of faith. Some comments on specific areas include:

Comments on Small Group Ministry include:

• "This is a great way to provide opportunities for teachers to connect at a deeper level versus a training workshop which is useful but is on a more intellectual level."
   
• "Teachers miss church services—Small Group Ministry would fill in some of the gaps."
   
• "To create a group of just teachers might just exacerbate the complaint that RE is cut off from the rest of the church."
   
• "I would like to get these going for parents and teachers to talk together."

Comments on Trainings, such as OWL trainings and Workshops include:

• "More curriculum training to develop experts on specific curriculum would be good."
   
• "If it's affordable...coming of age, teacher training, youth leadership and multiple learning styles workshops would be good."
   
• "I would love a workshop on being a UU without baggage from previous religious traditions."
   
• "Yes, I would like workshops on anything related to teacher development and social action."
   
• "I would love to get my teachers involved in district conferences. As they feel less stressed and overwhelmed with their commitments for teaching, I think they will be more open to this."
   
• "Workshops on teaching with spirituality would be good."
   
• "In an ideal world, we would have a week-long retreat each summer to explore with each other our own spirituality and sense of mission. We would create a vision for the upcoming year as well as prepare for Sunday mornings. The faculty would emerge as a cohesive group energized to minister to our children."

Comments on On-line Learning Opportunities, Videos and CDs for home learning include:

• "This is absolutely essential—one of the best ways to deliver training to some volunteers."
   
• "Absolutely, if it is quality stuff."
   
• "I would love videos if they were extremely well done."
   
• "I would love to use videos in my teacher trainings and make them available for check out."
   
• "CDs would be an excellent way for my volunteers to learn. They currently borrow the taped sermons when they are scheduled to teach and miss one."
   
• "All these things could enhance curricula and enrich teachers' experiences."
   
• "Great! How about some UU identity stuff for teachers as well as for families."
   
• "CDs and videos are okay, but on-line materials have the advantage of potentially linking teachers together—cross fertilization."

Comments on Meetings of teachers with religious educator include:

• "I would like gatherings to discuss specific topics, not just the logistics of Sunday morning."
   
• "I would love to do this if I had more hours."
   
• "This would be so nice, but logistically a nightmare. Our teaching teams are 8-24 people!"
   
• "We do this."

Comments on Articles and books include:

• "It would be great to have a published collection of UU teacher basics, which congregations could provide to new teachers.
   
• "I would especially like to offer them inspiration and empowerment."
   
• "We do this already, but more resources would be great."
   
• "Sure we would like articles. They are easy to distribute. But, will they get read without some group interaction?"

Comments on Intergenerational programs include:

• "We offer intergenerational services, but I would love to see some family life education offerings because when families learn together, it is special."
   
• "This is for the entire congregation, not just families."
   
• "We already do this and can expand this."

Overall, religious educators have future visions of at-home learning resources from which teachers can learn UU "basics" and information about children, faith, and Unitarian Universalism. Additionally, religious educators envision supporting teachers through focused discussion and sharing. Specifically, they are interested in small group ministry and its possibilities for deepening teachers' experiences. Workshops and other trainings are also pivotal parts of religious educators' ideal future visions.

The survey results demonstrate a commitment to claiming teaching as both a ministry and as a faith enriching experience. Streamlining ways of attending to the important pragmatics of teaching and adding relational forums that affirm teachers' spiritual journeys are religious educators' priorities. When asked to share "their thoughts" at the close of the survey, religious educators provided many comments including:

• "I believe teaching is one of the best ways to truly explore what our UU faith is about ...I'm trying to get teachers to say this now and am working to find ways to bring teaching before the congregation so they also know that this is a ministry we hold in high esteem."
   
• "Teachers need to see their teaching as a spiritual practice. We must provide training and support which balances the intellectual and logistical aspects of what we do with the spiritual and pastoral care component of what we do when we work with children. It is not just teaching or facilitating, it is sharing who we are and how we live as UUs."
   
• "Teaching needs to be defined as a ministry, and not a small group one, but a central ministry of the church. I am not knocking small group ministry, but am wary of piggy backing on another movement when we should be creating our own."
   
• "The more teaching can be ministry and not a chore or job or one more thing in an already busy life, the better it will be for everyone."

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Conclusion

The rich data from this survey will guide future resource development to support and sustain teaching in faith. We are grateful for the participation of religious educators in this process. Their words and wisdom provide a prophetic base for future development. Participating in the survey process was provocative to many respondents. A few survey respondents questioned the design of the survey, noting that religious education is not confined to programs but to the full life of the congregation. Many others said that the survey helped them think about teacher development in new ways.

Teaching can be a spiritual and soul-stirring practice. In lifespan faith development programs, we are all learners. Together we grow in faith. This is an essential part of our unfolding Unitarian Universalist religion. A respondent to the survey wrote: "I am convinced that good teacher preparation, training and support are essential to helping congregations to effectively educate those of all ages in the UU faith and to deepen their UU identity. Ultimately these things are essential to the growth of our movement and to the retention of our young UUs."

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