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Personal development planning ininitial teacher training: a case studyfrom post‐compulsory educationRon Thompson a , Linda Hallwood b , Christine Clements b & HelenRivron ba School of Education and Professional Development , Universityof Huddersfield , Huddersfield, UKb HE Directorate, Teacher Education , Wakefield College,Wakefield, UKPublished online: 19 Aug 2009.

To cite this article: Ron Thompson , Linda Hallwood , Christine Clements & Helen Rivron(2009) Personal development planning in initial teacher training: a case study frompost‐compulsory education, Research in Post-Compulsory Education, 14:3, 269-285, DOI:10.1080/13596740903139339

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Research in Post-Compulsory EducationVol. 14, No. 3, September 2009, 269–285

ISSN 1359-6748 print/ISSN 1747-5112 online© 2009 Further Education Research AssociationDOI: 10.1080/13596740903139339http://www.informaworld.com

Personal development planning in initial teacher training: a case study from post-compulsory education

Ron Thompsona*, Linda Hallwoodb, Christine Clementsb and Helen Rivronb

aSchool of Education and Professional Development, University of Huddersfield, Huddersfield, UK; bHE Directorate, Teacher Education, Wakefield College, Wakefield, UKTaylor and FrancisRPCE_A_414106.sgm(Received 21 May 2008; final version received 11 October 2008)10.1080/13596740903139339Research in Post-Compulsory Education1359-6748 (print)/1747-5112 (online)Original Article2009Further Education Research Association143000000September [email protected]

This paper provides a case study of personal development planning (PDP) withinan initial teacher training course for the post-compulsory sector, delivered througha large consortium in the north of England. The paper reviews conceptual andempirical studies of PDP in higher education and reports on the practice andperceptions of students and tutors in the light of these studies. The paper finds thatPDP is often a negative experience and that difficulty and frustration areassociated with the requirement to re-contextualise, for the purposes of externalaudit, practices occurring organically but less visibly elsewhere in the course. Theimportance of issues relating to resources, assessment and ownership of PDPprocesses is highlighted, but the paper concludes that conceptual and ideologicaldifficulties imply that requirements for ‘individual learning plans’ and ‘personaldevelopment records’ for trainee teachers may be inescapably problematic.

Keywords: personal development planning; initial teacher training

Introduction

Initial teacher training (ITT) for the post-compulsory sector in England is currentlyundergoing significant change, initiated by the government’s reform agenda for learn-ing and skills (Lucas 2007; Nasta 2007; Thompson and Robinson 2008) – an agendasuccinctly expressed by its stated intention to ‘put teaching and learning at the heartof what we do’ (DfES 2002, 15). This process of change aims at the‘professionalisation’ of the teaching workforce, an aim which, in practice, has beenassociated with a steady increase in central control of a hitherto neglected area ofteacher education (Lucas 2004; Simmons and Thompson 2007). The evolution of anational framework for the training of new and existing teachers in further educationand the wider learning and skills sector comprises a number of key elements. The mostimportant of these have been: national occupational standards (the ‘FENTO stan-dards’) for teaching and supporting learning (FENTO 1999; LLUK 2007), againstwhich teaching qualifications were required to be ‘endorsed’; the introduction in 2001of a statutory requirement for teaching qualifications; the Ofsted survey inspection offurther education teacher training (Ofsted 2003); the reforms proposed in Equippingour teachers for the future (DfES 2004); and the Further Education White Paper of2006 (DfES 2006). As part of the new ‘curriculum offer’ embedded in the reforms,

*Corresponding author. Email: [email protected]

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270 R. Thompson et al.

training providers are required to initiate a personal development process whichenables students to identify and address learning needs on entry, during training and– by means of a new, mandatory requirement for continuing professional development(CPD) – throughout a teacher’s career path. The various publications cited above useterms such as ‘individual learning plan’ and ‘professional development record’ torefer to the documentation associated with different stages of the development process(DfES 2004, 8–9). These plans and records are intended to take account of the greatdiversity in experience and academic attainment to be encountered in new entrants toteaching in the post-compulsory sector, so that prior learning can be recognised andfuture learning experiences shaped, helping new teachers to ‘achieve their full poten-tial’ (Ofsted 2003, 4). A key part of the analysis of learning needs is the assessmentof a student’s attainment in literacy and numeracy, a consequence of the increasingattention being paid by the UK government to the role of these skills in post-16 teach-ing and learning, and specifically to the lack of a national entry requirement for ITTin the sector in relation to mathematics and English.

At the same time, there has been a more general impetus towards personal devel-opment planning (PDP) in higher education (Clegg 2004; Clegg and Bradley 2006a,2006b). PDP is now a standard requirement in UK higher education, defined as:

a structured and supported process undertaken by an individual to reflect upon their ownlearning, performance and/or achievement and to plan for their personal, educational andcareer development. The primary objective … is to improve the capacity of individualsto understand what and how they are learning, and to review, plan and take responsibilityfor their own learning … (QAA et al. 2001, 2)

This requirement for increased learner autonomy contains the usual tension betweeninstrumental and transformative views of higher education:

A critical element of learner autonomy is the ability to reflect constructively on one’sown experience of learning, to record the results of that reflection, to use these both toplan one’s own future actions and to present oneself to others (including potentialemployers, tutors and collaborators). (McNair 1997, 24; emphasis added)

University sector providers of ITT for post-compulsory education are therefore facedwith a dual imperative for the introduction of personal development planning.However, this type of process is inherently problematic, partly because of conceptualweaknesses in the idea of reflection (Ecclestone 1996; Bleakley 1999; Tomlinson1999a, 1999b; Clegg 2004) but also because of a failure to recognise the ‘diverseclass, gendered, racialized … locations’ of reflective practitioners (Clegg 2004, 292).As Clegg (2004, 288) notes, ‘what is striking from the literature is the difficultiesinvolved in the types of reflection PDP requires … These difficulties are not merelymatters of pedagogical technique, but reflect the profoundly ideological nature of thetask itself’. Often introduced as an ‘add-on’ to an existing professional or academicprogramme, individual planning and recording processes can be perceived as imposedon learners and tutors, and as responding to external agendas rather than the needs ofthose required to use them. In Foucauldian terms, they may be seen as mechanisms ofdisciplinary power, serving to reproduce the status quo instead of their stated aims inthe opposite direction. It can therefore be anticipated that academics and studentswithin a university introducing or extending such a process will encounter difficultiesproduced by the conflicting pressures of individual need, resource availability and

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Research in Post-Compulsory Education 271

external priorities. This paper, based on practitioner research into the perceptions ofstudents and tutors, discusses the implementation of PDP in one large provider of ITTfor the post-compulsory sector.

Personal development planning in post-compulsory education

There is a growing literature on PDP in higher education, including policy statementsand recommendations (for example, DfEE 1997; QAA et al. 2001; Brennan and Shah2003; HEA 2005); academic research (Bullock and Jamieson 1998; Clegg 2004;Jackson and Ward 2004; East 2005; Clegg and Bradley 2006a, 2006b; Quinton andSmallbone 2008); and a wider literature on reflective learning dating back many years.As noted by Clegg and Bradley (2006b), PDP is not a new idea; however, much of themore recent work locates the introduction of PDPs in higher education withindiscourses of employability, national economic competitiveness and the individuali-sation of social risk based on constructions of the ‘lifelong learner’. In England, thesediscourses are increasingly used by the Government to justify unprecedented levels ofcontrol and intervention in all areas of education. This means that the introductionof PDP in higher education is often highly problematic, and can lead to a perceptionof imposed change without additional resources. As East (2005, 166) reports ‘staff atti-tudes invariably range from enthusiasm through ambivalence to outright hostility.Negative attitudes are likely to increase if staff involvement in this process is seen asimposing an additional burden’. This may lead, he argues, to universities taking a lineof least resistance and instituting a system of PDP which is merely ‘symbolic’ and doesnot play a significant role in student learning. However, where PDP initiatives coincidewith, and build on, teacher beliefs, constructive and meaningful change is more likely(Clegg and Bradley 2006a, 72).

A more fundamental difficulty with PDPs is that they are difficult to conceptualisein a coherent way across higher education. Clegg (2004, 292) argues that PDP is a‘chaotic concept … involving different practices, contexts, types of students, culturalexperiences etc.’, while East (2005, 165) notes the lack of consensus as to which skillsare likely to improve the learning performance and employability of students.However, even if consensus could be achieved, identifying the practices engaged inby students which could potentially form part of PDP activity, and translating partic-ular instances of these practices into a student’s own portfolio unavoidably mustchange the character of such practices and the way in which they are perceived bystudents and tutors.

The process whereby they are identified and described as separate practices changes theirdiscursive location even if the particular pedagogic activity remains located in the samemodule. To describe a process … explicitly as PDP … subtly changes its location frombeing an integral part of learning within the context of specific disciplinary ways ofknowing, to one in which meta-discourses of learning-to-learn or employability apply.(Clegg 2004, 290)

The difficulty of conceptualising PDP arises in part from the wide variety of contextsencountered in higher education. Clegg and Bradley (2006a) analyse different catego-ries of PDP approach using a typology deriving from Bernstein’s (2000) concepts of‘introjection’, in which course models arise largely from internal disciplinary andacademic influences, and ‘projection’, where powerful external influences help toshape the curriculum. Of particular interest for this paper is the ‘professional’ ideal

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type (Clegg and Bradley 2006a, 65), characterised by teacher training and healthcourses. Clearly, in the current political climate such types are projective, with oftenoverwhelmingly powerful outside forces driving change, but also singular, with rela-tively impermeable boundaries between professions and a strong sense of identitywithin each one. In such courses, where reflection is often strongly institutionalised,a reflective approach to learning may be expected to succeed. Clegg and Bradley(2006a, 67) suggest that:

… the strong, singular self-definitional boundary of PDP activities anchored firmly inprofessional identities, sustained in the external world, and anchored in a body of theo-retical literature on reflection means that this model is likely to be extremely robust.

However, we argue in this paper that, in the case of ITT for the post-compulsorysector, external influences are now so strong that, rather than PDP activities beingsustained in the external world, they are in fact constrained and disrupted byconflicting imperatives from outside, undermining Clegg and Bradley’s suggestion ofrobustness. In such circumstances, their observation that ‘in some areas skills aredeeply embedded in core academic practices, and to tear them from context for qualityaudit purposes would be counterproductive’ (Clegg and Bradley 2006a, 73), is highlypertinent.

Elsewhere in education, the notion of PDP is embedded within developments suchas individual learning plans (ILP) in further education and work-based learning;Bullock and Jamieson (1998) trace the origins of PDP in schools and colleges toNational Records of Achievement, the Technical and Vocational Education Initiativeand the Youth Training Scheme. PDP is also strongly associated in many people’sminds with NVQs and the commodification of education (Clegg and Bradley 2006b,475). Often, these developments relate to low-status provision such as adult literacyand numeracy, vocational preparation courses or welfare to work initiatives and thereflection involved is rudimentary compared with the intentions of PDP in highereducation.

The general frame within which these developments have taken place is indicatedby Bernstein’s discussion of the emergence in further education since the 1980s of ageneric mode of pedagogic discourse, characterised by terms such as key skills, think-ing skills and ‘learning to learn’. Young (2008, 155–6) links this generic mode withBernstein’s concept of trainability, or ‘the ability, in coping with the new requirementsof work and life, to adapt to and profit from continuous pedagogic opportunities’.Although nowadays trainability is often presented as something unequivocallypositive, Bernstein argued that, when it is institutionalised as a primary pedagogicalobjective, trainability may reproduce:

imaginary concepts of work and life which abstract such experiences from the powerrelations of their lived conditions and negate the possibilities of understanding andcriticism. (Bernstein 2000, 59)

For trainee teachers working in post-compulsory education, PDP in the context oftheir own training cannot be seen simply as a neutral engagement with the course athand, but will be refracted through the lens of their experience as teachers in a sectorincreasingly penetrated by this generic mode.

Empirical studies of PDP in the UK are still relatively uncommon. Bullock andJamieson (1998) report positively on an initiative in Wiltshire aimed at 15–17-year-

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olds in schools and colleges, although the benefits of this system do not appear to betransferable to the higher education context. Clegg (2004) and Quinton and Smallbone(2008) remark on the limitations of the EPPI-Centre systematic review (Gough et al.2003) in terms of the nature and scope of the studies included. Because of these limi-tations, they question the relevance to UK higher education practice of the review’sconclusion that PDP has positive effects on student learning and attainment. Otherwork, such as East (2005), Clegg and Bradley (2006b) and Quinton and Smallbone(2008), concentrates mainly on the practices and perceptions of academics andstresses a number of structural and cultural issues that are reflected in this paper. Thereis also a suggestion (Brennan and Shah 2003) of a cultural divide between pre-1992and post-1992 universities, with the latter being more likely to make PDP a compul-sory activity and to link it with assessment. Work on students’ perceptions, forexample Fry et al. (2002), illustrates the potential benefits but also the difficultiesencountered by students in engaging with the sort of reflection required by PDP, andin some cases their dislike of the experience, even when recognising its value. Again,these themes recur in the present study.

Background to the case study

The provision discussed in this paper is located in a large consortium for teachereducation in the post-compulsory sector that covers an extensive geographical area inthe north and midlands of England. It is led by a post-1992 university, working inpartnership with around 30 colleges of further education (Bridge, Fisher, and Webb2003). At any one time, there are approximately 2000 students following ITT coursesleading to the Certificate in Education (Cert Ed) or PGCE, including both in-serviceand pre-service routes. The present study is concerned with in-service students,reflecting the dominant system of initial training in the sector. Programme delivery issupported by regular ‘network’ meetings at the university for college-based tutors andtraining events for tutors new to the programme. One potential weakness in thissystem is that, because of college commitments, not all tutors from a particular collegecan attend the network meetings and therefore many tutors rely on their colleagues todisseminate information from the university. This can be problematic in times ofsignificant curricular change.

Since 1993, the course had operated a system for promoting reflective learning,based around a document known as the Record of Learning and Achievement (RoLA)and designed to support the diagnosis of initial needs, action planning and reflection.Throughout the decade of its operation, the RoLA was a troublesome beast: at its mosteffective when embraced wholeheartedly by student and tutor, often facilitating agenuinely transformative learning experience; and least effective when regarded as‘paperwork’ and ‘full of jargon’. More recently, the RoLA began to be used as avehicle for the various mechanisms of central control that were gaining ground in theyears following 1997. Checklists for ‘key transferable skills’ were introduced, meet-ing requirements for the integration of employment-related competence in highereducation. Once the reform agenda for learning and skills was underway, sections ofthe RoLA that had formerly been concerned with the development of generalacademic literacy were appropriated to serve the ‘minimum core’ of language, literacyand numeracy (FENTO 2003). However, monitoring progress towards achieving theFENTO standards was never explicitly incorporated in the RoLA. This was for avariety of reasons, related to the occupational rather than developmental nature of the

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standards and the emphasis of the endorsement process on coverage of the standardsthrough course content as opposed to assessment (Lucas 2004, 101–5).

In spite of this gradual evolution, course designers at the university regarded morefar-reaching changes as essential in order to provide evidence for external bodies, suchas Ofsted and QAA, that requirements for individualised development planning wereindeed being met for all students. In 2004 – immediately prior to an Ofsted inspection– it was decided to restructure the RoLA and rename it the Individual Learning Plan(ILP). The term ILP was chosen, in preference to PDP, because it was felt thatstudents familiar with ILP processes in the learning and skills sector would regard itas more relevant to their work as teachers. The ILP placed greater emphasis than theRoLA on partnership between tutor, student and mentor in development planning,with a requirement for regular reviews of progress through individual tutorials anddiscussions between student and mentor. In addition, it included initial assessment ofliteracy and numeracy skills, and monitored development in these areas. It alsoattempted to respond to the sector-wide criticisms made by Ofsted (2003) and theproposals in Equipping our teachers for the future by encouraging trainees to broadenand deepen their experience through reflection and target-setting in relation to theirexperience of the post-compulsory sector, practical teaching skills and professionalknowledge. A significant element of continuity was that the ILP, like the RoLA,existed alongside the modular course structure; it was therefore easy to view it as anadditional burden on students (or tutors) rather than as an integral part of the course.A further element of continuity was provided by the decision to continue with animplicit, rather than explicit, approach to the FENTO standards. Students wereexpected to have regard to these standards in setting targets for practical teaching, butnot to offer evidence of their achievement on a standard-by-standard basis; this wouldin any case have been impractical due to the nature of the standards themselves.

The reception of the ILP in its first year of operation (2004–05) was mixed, to saythe least. Initially, reaction was largely negative, although towards the end of the year,as tutors and students became more familiar with the process, attitudes tended toimprove. Nevertheless, both internal evaluation and external inspection identified aneed for change and improvement across the whole process. Although it was possibleto introduce some changes for 2005–06, it was clear that systematic research wasneeded to identify where change was needed and what form that change should take.To this end, a research project was established, supported by the Learning and SkillsCouncil and largely undertaken by practitioners from within the network of partnercolleges delivering the programme. The overall aim of the research was to assess theeffectiveness of the ILP system across the programme and to make recommendationsfor its improvement. The present paper attempts to go beyond these practical issuesby re-interpreting project data in the light of other studies of PDP in higher education,with the aim of providing a case-study of PDP in the specific context of ITT for thepost-compulsory sector.

Methodology

A sample of five partner colleges was used, selected to represent a range of character-istics and providing spatial and contextual triangulation: college WB had a highproportion of students (i.e. trainee teachers) from a work-based training environment;college S had only a small number of students and college L a large number; collegeME was identified as having a relatively high percentage of students from minority

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ethnic backgrounds and college GD took students from a large geographical area. Thesample chosen ensured that a range of contexts was represented: for example, studentswho were vocational teachers as well as those teaching academic subjects; studentsemployed by the organisation delivering the training and students employed else-where. Because of the complexity of the issues to be investigated it was decided to usea range of methods, each one appropriate to a particular facet of the research but alsoproviding some degree of methodological triangulation. These methods includeddocumentary analysis based on course materials and ILPs completed by students, aswell as the use of questionnaires, semi-structured interviews with tutors, focus groupswith students and tutor diaries. In total, 121 students (56 in year one of the course and65 in year two), and nine tutors took part in a questionnaire survey. Five focus groupswere held (one at each college) and interviews were conducted with 11 tutors.

The use of focus groups with students enabled more students to be contacted andmore qualitative data to be obtained than in-depth interviews, given the time available.There is a risk that more vocal participants may dominate focus groups; however, theresearchers endeavoured to reflect the full range of views expressed and appreciatedthe honesty and openness shown by students. The possibility of moderator influencewas taken into account in conducting the focus groups and the questions were struc-tured accordingly and followed up with additional questions to encourage participantsto develop points further. The wide range of views expressed demonstrates that themoderators did not unduly influence the responses. Focus group participants wererecruited by direct contact with tutors in the sample of partner colleges. Most focusgroups were small, with fewer than six participants, although one group (GD)consisted of a whole Year Two class (12 students in all). Other groups may have beenself-selecting, with those having strong (negative) opinions on the ILP being morelikely to volunteer. Conversely, students with support needs may have been less likelyto participate. Overall, 26 students, from a range of subject areas and with teachingexperience ranging from one to 15 years took part in the focus groups. Although it wasnot constructed to be statistically representative of students and tutors on the courseas a whole, we suggest that this sample will reflect with some robustness issues relat-ing to the ILP at that time.

A total of 11 tutors were interviewed; the teacher education experience of thesetutors varied between two and 12 years. Only three tutors had worked in teachereducation for less than three years. In addition to the interviews, tutors were asked tomaintain a reflective diary on their experience of using ILPs with students. Thesediaries allowed greater insight into day-by-day processes and the developing perspec-tive of tutors, although at the cost of considerable effort and commitment on the partof those keeping them. Six diaries were returned: three from college L, two fromcollege GD and one from college S. Documentary analysis of completed ILPs wasalso undertaken. In all, 39 ILPs were examined (19 first-year and 20 second-year) andinformation was logged on the nature of the entries made. The documentary analysistook place in March so that both first and second year students could be expected tohave made substantial progress with their ILP.

The analysis of data was completed by hand and involved close cooperationbetween three of the researchers, who cross-checked their interpretations. The fourthresearcher then re-analysed the data and again cross-checked interpretations with theother researchers. The findings presented here derive from common themes andsignificant differences were identified through this process; quotations are used in thetext to illustrate points emerging from our analysis, either as examples of common

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themes or as exceptions to overall conclusions. Data have been anonymised for ethicalreasons.

Findings

Although the case study had been constructed to include a range of partner colleges,the consistency of findings across these colleges was striking. No significant differ-ence between colleges was observed in the broad nature of the responses, either fromstudents or from tutors; there was also no significant difference observed between CertEd and PGCE students, except in one instance relating to literacy skills. However,although overall attitudes were similar, there were differences between Year One andYear Two students. These are described, where appropriate, in the following sections.

Tutors’ perceptions of the ILP process

All tutors from colleges L, S and WB had received information on the ILP processdirectly from the university, while at college GD one tutor who had attended universitymeetings was expected to disseminate the information to their colleagues. Training onthe ILP was also provided at university events for new tutors. One tutor, who hadattended two such events in the last year, was very positive both regarding the valueof the training and the effectiveness of the ILP. Other tutor responses to the ILP variedfrom ‘mixed reaction’ (tutor in college L), to ‘Oh dear, more paperwork’ (tutor in collegeS) to ‘a sinking feeling’ (tutor in college WB), reflecting East’s (2005) findings discussedearlier. Common themes were concerns over lack of time and excessive paperwork.‘A bunch of forms’ and ‘a bundle of paperwork’ were recurring negative descriptionsof the ILP. More favourable reactions related to the importance of recording and docu-menting tutorials, which were seen as a high priority. Later in the year, some valuablework was seen in ILPs, but tutors were sceptical about how common this was:

A well completed ILP really makes you think, ‘Oh yes!’ It shows a picture of thatlearner’s development. I think they are few and far between. (Tutor interview, college L)

A number of tutors were familiar with PDP from experience of working on franchisedhigher education courses, and reported also having ‘mixed reactions’ in those cases;many tutors had experienced ILPs in the context of further education courses. Thetransferability of either model to initial teacher training was regarded as questionable.It is interesting that, although several tutors used their previous experience of ILP andPDP in order to contextualise and make sense of this new experience, in a similar wayto the contextualisation in terms of local histories reported by Clegg and Bradley(2006b, 473), only one referred to the RoLA as an immediate local reference point.

In general the responses from tutors tended to support the assertion made by Cleggand Bradley (2006a, 67), that in professional ideal type courses reflection is culturallyembedded and thus likely to be supported by tutors. However, a small number oftutors interviewed were critical of the concept of reflective practice, regarding it asinappropriate to what they saw as their role in developing critical practitioners:

… it was something that was very helpful in teacher training 20 years ago – there wereacademic studies done in reflective practice. Where you reflect on experience, I don’t thinkthat offers a great deal … They’d be better off reading than reflecting. I’d value more

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greatly the acquisition of knowledge and broader thinking skills rather than reflection.It’s a different angle, a different philosophy. (Tutor interview, college WB)

This may suggest that cultural and disciplinary differences in the reception of PDP bystaff can run within course types as well as between them; it also provides anotherperspective on the observation by Clegg and Bradley (2006b, 475) that reluctance tocomply with the emphasis given to reflection in the PDP process can be consistentwith pedagogical sophistication rather than implying the opposite.

Introducing the ILP to students

All colleges introduced students to the ILP at induction and staff at all colleges saidthat they tried to ‘sell’ the ILP positively. A tutor at college S went on to say that shetried to inform students that it was for their benefit and made it part of tutorial plan-ning. College ME stressed the importance of considering the ILP on an individualbasis, in addition to a group introduction to the documentation. College WB informedstudents that it was a requirement of the course. One tutor said he tried to inform them‘in a low key manner’, as he felt that making it a requirement was off-putting forstudents. The more positive methods of introduction stressed the role of the ILP inmonitoring or guiding progress and reflection.

The response of students was largely instrumental, seeing the ILP as simply arequirement, as ‘something to be done to complete the course’. Some were familiarwith ILPs in different contexts, such as employment-related training or courses in liter-acy and numeracy. One student related her own reaction to the ILP to her experiencesof using ILPs with her own learners:

You write up what you think they want to read. Yes, you make it up, yes. That soundsright, that’s what they’ll want to read, tick box. Like with one of my students, a key skillsstudent. She asked ‘What are my goals?’ ‘Well I don’t know, what are your goals?’ Thenwe have to come up with some random goals because we have to tick the box. (Focusgroup, college S)

The terminology used was frequently mentioned as a problem and referred to as‘jargon’; although the language was in fact common currency in teaching, it may havebeen that students were not yet comfortable with it. One tutor was concerned thatinduction to the ILP took place in September but that a formal review of each student’sILP was not required until January – in this tutor’s experience ‘nothing else was addedto the ILP until January’. This suggests that the ILP was only seen as relevant in rela-tion to review dates and could help to explain the relatively small number of first-yearstudents adding information on initial assessment to the ILP (see below).

In general, tutors attempted to introduce the ILP positively but felt that they werehampered by an unhelpful format and a lack of information from the university. Wherea tutor had undertaken staff development at the university or within their collegeregarding the ILP process, the response of both tutor and students was significantlymore positive.

Use of the ILP process by students and tutors

There was considerable variation in when and how often students used the ILP.Focus group responses indicated that its main use was in tutorials and for teaching

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observations so the pattern of use reflected the timing of these events. One collegemade a closer connection between every module and the ILP documentation so thetiming of reviews and tutorials was related to the delivery of modules. Only one groupreferred to using the ILP to inform meetings with mentors and again the timing andnumber of such meetings was varied.

No one in the focus groups reported using the ILP regularly although two studentsin one focus group said they routinely wrote reflections in a personal diary. Theyreferred to these reflections later when writing their assignments and also occasionallywhen completing sections of the ILP. Significantly, second-year students commentedthat they used the ILP more frequently than in the first year as it was ‘more compul-sory’ and, more importantly, it had to be handed in as part of an assignment. Onegroup of second years said that assessment was their main driver for completing theILP and they questioned the reasons for, and the philosophy behind, the process.These findings reflected varying interpretations of the role of the ILP (is it for negoti-ating and planning learning; for storing feedback and recording progress; for personalreflection; for assessment?).

The information from focus groups was more positive than that received earlierfrom the student questionnaires, which had indicated that 40% of the studentssurveyed only updated their ILP under some external influence, such as impendingreview dates or when prompted by their tutor (see Table 1). Second-year students weremore self-directed but responded in very different ways to using the ILP. There wasalso a wide range of views within the questionnaires on the most useful aspects of theILP (see Table 1), although this is reasonable in that different students may beexpected to have different needs and priorities. Of greater concern is that 30% ofstudents reported that the ILP was not useful in their development.

Overall, it is clear that most students were not using the ILP systematically to planand direct their own learning. Only one focus group (college GD) found it useful interms of planning but the same group was very reliant on advice and support fromtheir tutor as to how and when it should be completed. The majority of tutorsconsidered that the ILP should be learner-driven but found that they had to tellstudents to complete forms and make suggestions as to how it should be completed,contrary to what they saw as its ‘real’ purpose. It was regarded by the majority ofstudents and tutors as an additional requirement without the benefit of being assessed,a monitoring and recording tool and a chore to complete. One student summed up theattitudes of many in expressing what she disliked about the ILP:

Table 1. Student questionnaire responses concerning frequency of completion and usefulnessof the ILP (n = 121).

Frequency of completion % I have found the ILP most useful in %

Weekly 2 Developing literacy skills 142–3 week intervals 16 Developing numeracy skills 16When I remember 28 Developing study skills 22Only when prompted by tutor 21 Setting targets for development in other areas 18Before ILP review dates 19 Not useful at all 30Rarely 13 Total 100%Other 1Total 100%

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Not knowing what you’ve got to do. You haven’t had clear information and theredoesn’t seem to be a clear context. Is anyone going to look at it? You work through itand you’ve got to do it and that’s fine but … is anyone actually interested in it? (Focusgroup, college S)

Seemingly minor points had, for several first-year students, become bigger issues intheir quest to ‘do things the right way’; in wresting learning processes from their orig-inal context in the quest for transparency (Strathern 2000), the ILP appeared to createuncertainty and frustration in many students. As one said:

But we do so much reflection anyway. Everything we do is reflection. It’s another bit ofpaper that duplicates what we’re doing. There are more important things to do thanreflect and duplicate what we’re already doing. (Focus group, college L)

This requirement for the explicit performance or rehearsal of practices already embed-ded in their natural position elsewhere in the course seems to be responsible for muchof the negative reaction displayed by the students. A significant minority referred toissues of privacy in reflection, either from a desire to reflect at a deeper, more personallevel or as a barrier to using the ILP. Issues of privacy are also reported by Fry et al.(2002, 104), with tensions between the benefits of disclosure (e.g. guidance fromtutors) and a reluctance to expose difficulties.

All tutors interviewed regarded documenting tutorials as being of paramountimportance. Discussing students’ needs and setting targets had a high priority and aneed for documentation was accepted, although this may largely have been a pragmaticcompromise with performativity:

I think that it’s very important to have tutorials and it’s very important to considerprogress and where you’re going and there has to be some paperwork with it. It’s just aquestion of limiting it to the essentials. (Tutor interview, college GD)

There was no real consensus about the effectiveness of the ILP in achieving this. Onetutor found it provided a useful ‘at a glance’ summary of progress but this was aminority view. Most others felt it was difficult for students to complete and too much‘driven by the boxes’; boxes which, in turn, were driven by the requirement forexplicit performance of practices in anticipation of external audit.

One explanation for the lack of clarity and need for guidance felt by many students(and some tutors) is that the evidence from student focus groups and staff interviewsdemonstrated very little understanding of the background or context of ILPs, particu-larly in relation to the ongoing reforms to teacher education in post-compulsoryeducation. In the absence of a clear context, students constructed their own, oftennegative, explanations for the requirement to complete ILPs, according to their partic-ular professional and academic backgrounds. Similar questions were raised by thetutor diaries, with comments relating to uncertainty about the purpose and philosophyof the ILP, and its role in assessment. Table 2 summarises many of the tutorcomments, suggestions and questions to be found in the diaries.

The ILP in relation to initial assessment of literacy and numeracy skills

One of the strongest external drivers for the specific form and content of the ILP wasthe emphasis placed by the ITT reform agenda on the literacy and numeracy skills ofstudent teachers. This was in part an attempt to compensate for the difficulties

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encountered by school-leavers and adults in accessing further education, by makingteachers better equipped to support learners in these skills. However, it was also aresponse to uneven development in the literacy and numeracy skills of teachers them-selves, in a sector for which specific entry requirements relate mainly to specialistknowledge rather than general education. Due to government vacillation over theintroduction of an external ‘skills test’, ITT providers were left to devise their ownmeans of assessing and developing literacy and numeracy. Initial assessment andmonitoring of these skills therefore became a prominent component of the ILP.

Most students (79% of questionnaire returns) reported being interviewed beforethe course commenced and 42% had been assessed at interview for literacy, numeracyor study skills. In general, colleges that assessed at interview focused on literacy andnumeracy with only a few assessing study skills at this point. A variety of assessmentmethods were used, such as qualification checks, college screening, a piece of writingand commercially-produced assessment instruments. College WB did not formallyassess students in these skills, but in other centres students who had not been assessedat interview, or whose needs were likely to have changed, were assessed during induc-tion. Most students felt that initial assessment had helped them understand the areasthey needed to develop and this was particularly high in college L and college ME.College S had a high proportion of students who felt that the assessment had notprovided anything new as they were already aware of any needs they had.

Course induction took place at all colleges in the study. In the questionnaires,settling in on the course was identified by 36% as the most beneficial element ofinduction, with introduction to the ILP (16%) the next, followed by assessment of

Table 2. Comments, suggestions and questions from tutor diaries.

Comments from the diaries

Students need a lot of guidance, but is there a danger of spoon feeding?

Quality of some ILPs is high and shows the distance travelled.

Dedicated ring binder is a huge improvement.Confusion of language used – is it ILP or PDP?Too much paperwork especially in induction.Many students have experienced ILPs as tutors

but often with limited success so come with negative feelings.

ILPs used in most tutorial sessions.Linking ILP documents to modules can be

confusing.Can see at a glance how teaching is

developing (or not).Some students use a personal diary.Some students put in far too much

information – impossible to read it all (do we need to read it all?).

Students impatient to get on with the course and fail to see the purpose of ILPs.

Suggestions from the diariesStart ILP process as early as possible.Build ILP sessions into course schedule.Need to allow more time in induction to cover

ILP.Need exemplars.Guidance for tutors is essential.

Need to teach how to reflect.Organise small group sessions to discuss ILPs

(peer support).Students need to own the process.Encourage students to see ILPs as a regular

check on their development.Need to stress importance of ILP as part of

assessment process.

Questions from the diariesWhat is the philosophy of the process?Can you fail an ILP? Need criteria to state what

is expected.

Process driven? Form driven? Mechanistic?How do we ‘sell’ ILPs to students?

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literacy and numeracy needs (12% each), although one focus group was very negativeabout the emphasis on literacy, stating that they felt insulted by the implication thatthey might have difficulty with literacy when they were doing a PGCE. Only 6%thought that induction had not been useful.

An important function of the ILP was to record issues that may affect learning andto encourage action planning. It would therefore seem obvious that feedback frominitial assessment of literacy and numeracy would have been recorded in the ILP. Inpractice, however, this did not always happen and recording varied from college tocollege and year to year, suggesting a strong dependence on the ways in which indi-vidual tutors managed their student groups. In one college 58% of students in year onesaid that initial assessment information was added to their ILP while this was the casefor 88% of those in year two. However, where students had been identified as needingto develop literacy, numeracy or study skills, only 45% had taken up support. Forthose who had not, time constraints, other commitments and lack of release from workwere the main reasons cited.

A significant problem in interpreting the data relating to literacy and numeracy isthat these areas were, at the time of the study, weakly conceptualised both in thecolleges involved and more generally in teacher education for the post-compulsorysector. Uncertainties over the proposed external tests have already been mentioned. Inaddition, the academic level to be achieved was unclear, broadly though confusinglyinterpreted as a minimum of level 2 in the UK national qualifications framework interms of personal skills and level 3 when contextualised within a teacher’s subjectarea. In addition, the minimum core (FENTO 2003) demands pedagogical knowledgein addition to personal skills, as well as the explicit subject knowledge of numeracyor literacy necessary to identify and articulate misconceptions. Establishing individualstarting points and aims was therefore far from simple, a problem compounded by thelack of initial assessment instruments designed for the context of ITT in the sector. Itis clear that further work is needed to elucidate the role of PDP in this area.

Conclusion

Perhaps the most striking feature of this case study is that, in spite of its intentions,students were not using the ILP to plan and direct their own learning. As a mediumfor developing learner autonomy, it appears to have been largely unsuccessful. Tosome extent, this may be expected from a part-time course in which students havemany conflicting demands and multiple tensions in their personal and professionalidentities. Typically, in-service trainee teachers in the post-compulsory sector arecontinually making role transitions: for example, between student and teacher orbetween subject specialist and educator. For many, this would be their first experienceof higher education. It is not surprising, therefore, that students may have been reluc-tant to engage seriously in personal development planning, particularly when exposedto the mixed feelings of tutors about what was ‘really’ important in the course.

These underlying problems were perhaps exacerbated by the design of the ILPsystem, in terms of its rapid introduction and uncertain articulation with course aimsand structure. The findings presented here support several of the recommendationsprovided in practitioner guides (see, for example, Bloy et al. 2005; HEA 2005). Theimportance of embedding PDP in central curriculum processes, of gaining the supportof staff and of placing PDP in the context of the central concerns of a discipline areclearly illustrated, although more easily recommended than implemented. There is

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also support for the findings of other practitioner studies, in terms of student and staffattitudes and the importance of adequate resources (Fry et al. 2002; East 2005; Cleggand Bradley 2006b; Quinton and Smallbone 2008). Strategic learning was clearlytaking place, with students responding instrumentally to the emphasis placed on theILP by course assessment strategies and the requirements of individual tutors.Perfunctory engagement with the process, for example, the retrospective completionof tasks, is suggested by some student responses and there is evidence of a linkbetween staff and student attitudes: ‘You work through it and you’ve got to do it andthat’s fine but …is anyone actually interested in it?’

A specific issue requiring further elucidation is the considerable range of views onthe initial assessment of literacy and numeracy, and the rather patchy uptake ofsupport in these areas. This could help to resolve apparent contradictions between theviews expressed on the value of initial assessment by many students and the relativelylow rate of participation in support, as well as the opposition by some to what theysaw as a patronising or insulting element of the ILP.

It could be argued that a more effective local implementation of the ILP wouldsolve many of the problems uncovered in the research. This may well be true, andthere is certainly evidence from course evaluations that subsequent changes to the ILPprocess have had a positive impact. However, although the nature of local implemen-tation is certainly important, wider issues of surveillance and discipline in a performa-tive culture are involved. The association of the ILP with compliance models, and theresentment arising from this, is quite evident from several tutor responses, whilststudent perceptions often seemed coloured by negative views of the ILPs they hadencountered in working with their own learners. One of the clearest conclusions fromthe focus groups was the extent to which the term ‘ILP’ was disliked in the context ofa university course.

Although in some ways the strong projective forces operating in teacher educationfor the post-compulsory sector may have the potential to sustain PDP by relating it toan external professional world (Clegg and Bradley 2006a, 67), this paper indicates thatthe opposite tendency is also possible. When PDP is embedded in a culture of perfor-mativity and bureaucratic control, attempts to reconcile the conflicting demands ofdifferent ‘stakeholders’ may explain the difficulties of course designers in followingapparently straightforward recommendations on good practice. Thus, the problemsevident in the case study may be seen as more than the consequences of local decisionmaking – arguably they are strongly related to the system of ‘policy technologies’associated with the modernisation projects of recent UK governments (Ball 2008).

This raises an interesting question about how PDP should come to terms with therecent reforms to teacher education – specifically, in relation to the new professionalstandards and to the mandatory requirement for CPD (Orr 2008). Should PDPprocesses seek to embed the new standards, and develop continuities with the CPDframework being developed by the Institute for Learning (IfL), or will such accommo-dations strengthen perceptions of surveillance and compliance? The researchpresented here indicates that too close an adherence to bureaucratic occupational stan-dards could be counter-productive. On the other hand, early signs are that the IfLframework for reflecting on CPD (IfL 2009) will have a much more professional,developmental focus than the standards and that relating PDP in ITT to this frame-work could be beneficial. Nevertheless, tensions inherent in a mandatory CPDrequirement are already emerging, with a fixation on measurement and recordinghaving the potential to detract from professional development (Orr 2008, 104–6).

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A wider question, of whether PDP could be made to work more effectively ifdetached from a bureaucratic framework of standards and targets, is difficult to answerfrom this case study, in which local and sectoral issues have had such a profoundimpact. However, the point must be made that PDP, as currently conceived in UKhigher education, is closely linked to performativity, to discourses of employabilityand to a generic mode of pedagogic discourse. As Clegg (2004, 288–90) points out,this makes PDP an inherently ideological process which would be difficult to insulatefrom political forces.

This research has shown that the requirements for individual learning plans andpersonal development records embedded in documents such as Equipping our teach-ers for the future can be problematic as well as challenging for students. As discussedabove, some of the difficulties may be attributed to local decisions on the part ofcourse designers. However, the broader context of a performative, bureaucraticculture in post-compulsory education is, arguably, a significant negative influence. Ofcourse, from within the world-view of modernisation, it might be argued that the verydifficulties described in this paper are evidence of the need for reform – that studentsand providers need to be challenged to go beyond their existing practice in order tobroaden and deepen training, and that this can only benefit the sector. From this pointof view, PDP is helping to fulfil the requirement of central government for a ‘stepchange’ in the quality of initial teacher training. However, this paper indicates that aprocess which simultaneously engages trainee teachers in the exploration of theirdevelopment needs and at the same time is a performance of this exploration for aculture of performativity and compliance is likely to be problematic and challengingfor both students and tutors.

Notes on contributorsRon Thompson has worked in further and higher education and has a range of research interestsrelated to post-compulsory education.

Linda Hallwood has over 20 years experience teaching in post-compulsory education, includingmanaging teacher education programmes.

Christine Clements has extensive experience in post-compulsory education and teachereducation, with a particular interest in skills for life.

Helen Rivron is an advanced practitioner for equality and diversity and has teaching interestsin skills for life and teacher education.

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