Teams Interview: Teacher Teamwork, Collaboration and Characteristics

This assignment delves into the dynamics of educational teams, emphasizing teacher collaboration and team characteristics. It begins by defining educational teams, their composition, and the best practices and legal frameworks governing their operation. The assignment explores the various types of educational teams, their essential characteristics, and the stages of team development, including forming, storming, norming, performing, and transforming. It then analyzes the advantages and disadvantages of educational teams from both student and instructor perspectives, including the benefits of supportive environments and the challenges of time constraints and potential confusion. The assignment also examines student-centered teams, their purpose, and the components that contribute to effective teamwork, such as delegation, communication, and support. Furthermore, it discusses co-teaching as a specific form of collaboration, contrasting it with general collaboration in education. The assignment is based on an interview with a teacher to understand their engagement as a team member and the extent to which the teams exhibit all the characteristics of teams. References are included to support the concepts discussed.

Running Head: TEAMS INTERVIEW 0
Characteristics of Teams Interview
Student Details:

TEAMS INTERVIEW 1
While working with collaboration, educational team defines a community of
professionals making efforts and are expertise to nurture student’s social and cognitive
development. For examples, educational team foster this development in students who are not
able to hear properly or are deaf (Edwards, Newell, Rich, & Hitchcock, 2015). Based on this,
there are best practices and federal law as needed in education where the team have to work
together by making a plan; developing and implementing it for each and every program of a
student. Moreover, this team mainly includes parents of a student or other family members.
Other than this, there can also be the classroom teacher, a deaf educator, an audiologist, and a
speech pathologist (Thistle & McNaughton, 2015). There are members of an educational
team where of them is educational interpreter who provides service, a student can also be a
member if he/she is old enough. Other than this, rest team members are dependent on the
requirement of the student.
There are types of educational teams that include traditional team, collaborative team,
supportive team, parallel instruction, monitoring teacher, and differentiated split class.
Educational team demonstrates some essential characteristics such as grouping in relation to
subject or need, grade level or can be selected randomly or interdisciplinary (Visser,
Coenders, Terlouw, & Pieters , 2010). Another characteristic is goals that make the members
of the team to determine concerns and needs based on teacher observations, test scores or
other performance indicators. For instance, decline in test scores of unit noticed by one
member; other team can help them to reach the goal by creating new strategies for student
performance improvisation. Lastly, collaboration is one of the characteristics which are
benefited as opportunities. Such opportunities include observation, peer mentoring and group
planning.
Educational teams involve stages which are forming, storming, norming and
performing for development where teachers have to share accountability and responsibility
for designing and running their school. These stages help teachers to know the way of getting
started, the need of expecting from the creation process and school design, the way of
developing high-functioning teams, and lastly, required steps and tasks to be considered for
the designing and management of their team and school. Furthermore, there is one more stage
added which is transforming that helps teams to make them learn the ways of connecting and
seeing themselves being a part of growing and larger community along with other teacher-
powered schools (Harmon & Hills, 2015).

TEAMS INTERVIEW 2
In case of school settings, educational teams have both advantages and disadvantages
which can be from the perspectives of both student and instructor. Advantages include
providing supportive environment, allowing developing new teaching approaches, helps in
overcoming academic isolation, rising of sounder solutions likelihood in relation to
problematic students’ discipline, and enhances the opportunity for growth intellectually
(Herro & Quigley, 2017). Other than this, it helps student to accept more than a single
opinion and make them act cooperative with others. There are educational benefits for
students such as their increasing level of retention and understanding along with views
exposure while gaining a level of understanding knowledge.
However, disadvantages include time required for the professional development by
implementing team teaching partnership, and requirement of meetings at the time of running
program along with various spontaneous chats coming from such an attempt (Darling-
Hammond, Flook, Cook-Harvey, Barron, & Osher, 2020). Other than this, there can be
discontentment and frustration in students due to having more than one teacher among
potential for uncertainty and diversity, confusion among them while looking towards more
than one way of grading assignments or issues. Also, students are not able to try new
techniques of learning due to distinct team teaching environment.
The purpose of student-centered teams is to examine its correct use while educating
disable students or have any special needs. Teams encourage learning to allow such students
for sharing decisions, remembering the feeling to learn, and believing on their leading
capacity (McCarthy, 2015). Another purpose is using skills and strategies that can
immediately influence the work-related responsibilities and instruction; also it is more
effective. Lastly, educator has the authority where teachers decide about sharing their powers
to empower learners.
Furthermore, components that contributes in teaming effectively along with
identifying their ways and ensuring to be at the right place (DeakinCo., 2016). Teamwork is
becoming dispersed, dynamic, diverse, and digital along with facing obstacles where they can
lead success only through group collaboration. The components that can help effectively are
delegation, communication, ideas, efficiency and support for achieving the shared goal (Lin,
2012).
In education, co-teaching is where teachers are paired for practicing in a classroom for
sharing responsibilities of instructing, planning, and assessing students (Trites, 2017). The

TEAMS INTERVIEW 3
setting of co-teaching teachers considers showing equal accountability and responsibility for
the classroom. It related concepts include one teach, one drift; one teach, one observe;
parallel teaching; station teaching; team teaching and alternate teaching. These are used as
approaches for students which show appropriate behaviour (Friend M. , Cook, Hurley-
Chamberlain, & Shamberger, 2010).
However, the difference between co-teaching and collaboration shows co-teaching
providing learning opportunities and rich resources for a diverse students group and
collaboration shows cooperativeness between teachers involving their working tandem for
leading, mentoring and instructing at all instructional levels and subject areas (Kaplan, 2012).
This involves practice to nurture collaborative increasing student participation, skills,
professional growth, and improving classroom instruction for all students (Bantwini, 2013).

TEAMS INTERVIEW 4
References
Bantwini, B. (2013). Pre-service teacher’s perceptions of co-teaching between professional
development schools and university faculty. School—University Partnerships, 6(2),
63-76.
Darling-Hammond, L., Flook, L., Cook-Harvey, C., Barron, B., & Osher, D. (2020).
Implications for educational practice of the science of learning and development.
Applied Developmental Science, 24(2), 97-140.
DeakinCo. (2016, December 13). The five elements of successful teamwork. Retrieved from
DeakinCo.: https://www.deakinco.com/media-centre/news/the-five-elements-of-
successful-teamwork
Edwards, C., Newell, J., Rich, D., & Hitchcock, L. (2015). Teaching interprofessional
practice: an exploratory course assignment in social work and speech language
pathology. Journal of Teaching in Social Work, 35(5), 529-543.
Friend, M., Cook, L., Hurley-Chamberlain, D., & Shamberger, C. (2010). Co-Teaching: An
Illustration of the Complexity of Collaboration in Special Education. Journal of
Educational and Psychological Consultation, 20(1), 9-27.
Harmon, R., & Hills, R. (2015). Transforming psychiatric mental health nursing education
with team based learning. Archives of psychiatric nursing, 29(6), 413-418.
Herro, D., & Quigley, C. (2017). Exploring teachers’ perceptions of STEAM teaching
through professional development: implications for teacher educators. Professional
Development in Education, 3, 416-438.
Kaplan, M. (2012, May 10). Collaborative Team Teaching: Challenges and Rewards.
Retrieved from eduTopia: https://www.edutopia.org/blog/collaborative-team-
teaching-challenges-rewards-marisa-kaplan
Lin, M.-D. (2012). Cultivating an environment that contributes to teaching and learning in
schools: High school principals’ actions. Peabody Journal of Education, 87(2), 200-
215.
McCarthy, J. (2015, September 9). Student-Centered Learning: It Starts With the Teacher.
Retrieved from eduTopia: https://www.edutopia.org/blog/student-centered-learning-

TEAMS INTERVIEW 5
starts-with-teacher-john-mccarthy
Thistle, J., & McNaughton, D. (2015). Teaching active listening skills to pre-service speech-
language pathologists: A first step in supporting collaboration with parents of young
children who require AAC. Language, speech, and hearing services in schools, 46(1),
44-55.
Trites, N. (2017, March 9). What is Co-Teaching? An Introduction to Co-Teaching and
Inclusion. Retrieved from Cast: https://castpublishing.org/introduction-co-teaching-
inclusion/
Visser, T., Coenders, F., Terlouw, C., & Pieters , J. (2010). Essential Characteristics for a
Professional Development Program for Promoting the Implementation of a
Multidisciplinary Science Module. Journal of Science Teacher Education, 21, 623-
642.