Support and guidance on planning, facilitating and evaluating professional learning

Introduction and Background

This facilitation guide is for those that plan, facilitate and evaluate the professional learning of colleagues. For example, those who have a formal or informal remit for leading staff development in their setting. It can also support those seeking professional development in leading professional learning.

This facilitation guide will cover topics such as:

• the principles and practices of the national model of professional learning

• transformative learning theory and fostering a productive learning culture

• accessibility and inclusivity

• effective facilitation tools

This is a new resource and it will develop over time to include the latest theory and strategies.

If you have any questions or feedback on this guide, please contact us.

How to use this guide

This guide is a mixture of theoretical explanation and practical tools. It has three overarching sections:

• planning professional learning

• facilitating professional learning

• evaluating professional learning

We encourage you to read these sections in order at least once. This will help you to understand the full professional learning cycle. There is also the executive summary. This summarises the important messages from each section.

You may also wish to use each section as an independent reference based on your needs. For example, section two is a collection of resources that you may with to return to.