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Building the capacity of sessional law teachers to meet the changing

demands of legal education

Natalie Skead, University of Western Australia. Mark Israel, University of Western Australia.

Mary Heath, Flinders University.Kate Galloway, Bond University.

Anne Hewitt, University of Adelaide. Alex Steel, University of New South Wales.

Support for this project has been provided by the Australian Government Office for Learning and Teaching. The views in this project do not necessarily reflect the views of the Australian Government Office for Learning and Teaching.

CHANGING CONTEXT OF LEGAL EDUCATION

Widening participation, increasing access

Increasingly diverse cohort of students

Law student wellbeing at risk

Threshold Learning Outcomes for Law

NOT TO MENTION…

Changing nature of legal practice

Increasing proportion of graduates unlikely to end up as legal practitioners

Declining numbers of students entering law schools

Changing regulation and accreditation

SESSIONAL LAW TEACHERS SHARE THESE CHALLENGES

Precariously employed &

little professional development

butUndertake half of all university

teaching in Australia (Percy

et al, 2008)

SMART CASUAL: PROMOTING EXCELLENCE IN SESSIONAL TEACHING IN LAW

What• Provide professional development training for sessional staff in Law

Who• Natalie Skead and Mark Israel (UWA), Anne Hewitt (Adelaide), Mary

Heath (Flinders), Kate Galloway (Bond), Alex Steel (UNSW)• Funded by Office for Learning and Teaching Seed Grant ($49k) and

Innovation and Development Grant ($225k)

How• Identify professional development requirements• Design, trial and evaluate resources• Distribute the resources to Australian law schools

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I use the methods that the course coordinator asks me to use. I’m not being paid to dream up teaching techniques. I’m being paid to teach a class and to convey the necessary material to the students. If the course coordinator wants me to do this in a specific way, he/she will tell me to do that.So, what would it take...?

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CURRENT PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT PRACTICES?

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We are different They are differentIt is different

WHY DISCIPLINE-SPECIFIC?

Professional development resources for

sessional legal educators

Addressing identified national

need

Discipline-specific

Peer-to-peer model

Available freely online

Just-in-time

WHAT AREAS?

9Facilitate critical thinking of students

Facilitate/manage student participation (in class)

Provide quality feedback to students

Facilitate deeper understanding for students

Assess student learning

Knowledge of practical teaching techniques

Design a tutorial/seminar/workshop

Knowledge of teaching and learning theory

Reflect upon my teaching

Facilitate/manage student participation (online)

Facilitate critical thinking of students

Facilitate/manage student participation (in class)

Provide quality feedback to students

Facilitate deeper understanding for students

Assess student learning

Knowledge of practical teaching techniques

Design a tutorial/seminar/workshop

Knowledge of teaching and learning theory

Reflect upon my teaching

Facilitate/manage student participation (online)

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1. Survey of Sessional Staff

2. Investigation involving Assoc

Deans3. Literature

Review

4. Develop modules 5. Expert review 5. Revise

modules

7. Trial modules 8. Evaluation 9. Refine modules

10. Distribution 11. Dissemination 12. Work with partners

SMART CASUAL 1, 2014Engagemen

t

Problem solvingFeedback

FOCUS GROUPS‘It was really pleasing to open the modules and think ‘oh, someone is really concerned about me and what I’m doing’. Normally you get things that are vague and generic and just about ‘teaching’ not teaching law. Which is very, very different.’

‘Every module was extremely important. When I first started tutoring three years ago I literally got a textbook handed to me and a topic guide and they said ‘off you go’. I had never done any teaching before and had no idea what I was doing.’

‘… this is something I could pick up again in two or three years’ time and look over and still get something out of..

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SMART CASUAL 2, 2015-2016

SIX NEW MODULES

Wellbeing-in-Law

Indigenous Peoples and

the Law

Communication & Collaboration

Critical Legal Thinking

Reading Law

Legal Ethics & Professional

Responsibility

TLOs

Existing research

Smart Casual 1 findings

Diversity Gender International-isation

Digital literacies

PLUS FOUR INTEGRATED THEMES

longstanding + emergent needs identified by legal education stakeholders; in TLOs

DIVERSITY

Law slow to embrace student diversity (Burns, 2014) yet…

Quality in higher education is synonymous with a broad interpretation of social inclusion in higher education in that both are concerned with equitable access, participatory engagement and empowered success.

Gidley et al, 2010: 142

GENDER

ALRC 1994 recommendations still not achieved

The failure is that we still do not take sufficient account of the ways that women’s experience is different from that of men whether as practitioners or as people forced to use the law …

Kennedy, 2005

INTERNATIONALISATION

Australia has the most internationalised higher education system in the world, (OECD 2009) without evidence of an internationalised approach to teaching

Sawir, 2011

DIGITAL LITERACY

Competency in using the technologies relevant to legal practice, but also the technologies relevant to law teaching to better prepare law students now for the practice of law tomorrow.

Thomson, 2009

WELLBEING IN LAW

Support for this resource has been provided by the Australian Government Office for Learning and Teaching. The views in this resource do not necessarily reflect the views of the Australian Government Office for Learning and Teaching.

CONCERNING FACTSOver 35 per cent of Australian law students report experiencing symptoms of high or very high levels of psychological distress (Kelk et al 2009)

While this was a self-selected sample, this proportion is significantly high.

On entering law school, our students enjoy levels of wellbeing equal to, if not higher than, the general population.

From the first semester of their law studies, students report beginning to experience symptoms of psychological distress at alarmingly high rates.

Levels of psychological distress may vary in relation to particular groups of law students and/or when dealing with particular aspects of the curriculum.

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BUT WHY?

What are the

possible causes?

Innately pessimistic and

adversarial nature of law

Heavy student workload

Grading and ranking system

Teaching methods

commonly adopted in

teaching law

Competitive nature of law

and law students

Inadequate feedback

Finding a professional

identity

Feelings of lack of social

connectedness, competence

and autonomy

High cost of a legal education

21Of these possible causes, are there any you might affect through your teaching?

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Expectations

Click on a topic

Respect

Inclusion

Engagement Support

Feedback

Collaboration

Delight

Sensitivity

EXPLORE FURTHER

RESPECT #1The most important principle of successful teaching is to have a deep respect for students (Otto Eckstein quoted in Gullette 1984: 48)

A respectful learning environment:makes each student feel valued as an individual member of the group

begins with a respectful mindset

requires an awareness of the diversity of the group and an understanding of what respect might mean to each member of the group

necessitates respectful online and face-to-face behaviour

is fertile ground for:

• exploring, sharing and challenging ideas• solving problems• critical reflection

without fear of embarrassment, humiliation or judgment.

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TOOLKIT: RESPECT #1

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• Work with students to identify what respect means for the group and how it will be demonstrated

Encourage students to develop a respectful mindset and behave respectfully

• Encouraging students to speak• Modelling respect when responding to questions, answers, ideas and observations• Acknowledging and empathising with different perspectives and feelings – even if this may

not traditionally be seen as a consideration in law or legal practice • Demonstrating critical self-reflection (eg ‘with hindsight perhaps my comment wasn’t

correct/appropriate/wise’)• Using respectful and considered language when discussing contentious cases, issues,

conduct or topics that students may find upsetting or confronting • Promoting autonomy through non-controlling language (eg ‘there are several ways you

could present this, the choice is yours’)

Articulate the rules in positive rather than negative terms by

Here John discusses how he creates standards for mutual respect in his classes [1.10]

How might you nurture a respectful and safe learning environment?

COMMUNICATION AND

COLLABORATION

Support for this resource has been provided by the Australian Government Office for Learning and Teaching. The views in this resource do not necessarily reflect the views of the Australian Government Office for Learning and Teaching.

COMMUNICATION AND COLLABORATION ‘BLOCKS’What do you think about the following statements? (adapted from Arkoudis 2014)

Students before they enter their course of study, and teaching these skills should not be part of higher education curricula.

is an international student issue.

Law does not require communication and collaboration skills development incorporated within the curriculum, as they are not an important part of teaching and

do not have the time or the necessary skills to assess effective communication and collaboration.

Why might a colleague disagree with your view/s?

How might you respond to that colleague?

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should develop their communication and collaboration skills

Law teachers

learning in law.

The development of communication and collaboration skills

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Click on a topic

Feedback

Active listeningClarifying

expectations

Using language specialists

Persuading

Negotiating

Collaboration and

TeamworkWorking

with diversity

Explaining and

advisingWritten

communication

Interviewing clients

Digital technologies

EXPLORE FURTHER

WORKING WITH DIVERSITYA culturally competent lawyer can anticipate the areas where difference is most likely to arise,

and, equally importantly, the direction in which the differences are most likely to proceed. Knowing that, the lawyer can anticipate provisionally the places where her model's world view might not be the same as that of her culturally different client, remaining open to possible misunderstanding and the possibility of conversation about the differences, if appropriate. (Tremblay 2002-03: 385-6)

Law schools have an obligation to embrace, celebrate and accommodate diversity by:

building gender-inclusive learning environments that promote gender equality

equipping law graduates to take their place in a multicultural society

teaching and planning learning that both caters for students’ diverse needs and celebrates the variety of student experiences and perspectives

recognising and responding both to the strengths a diversity of students bring to law and the challenges they will experience

fostering wellbeing among law students, by facilitating social connectedness among students.

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… and about awareness of gendered roles in tutorials [1:30]

Fiona talks about recognising and responding to diversity [1:29]…

Wellbeing moduleIndigenous Peoples and

the Law module

TOOLKIT: WORKING WITH DIVERSITYHow might you nurture students’ communication and collaboration skills to help:

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• Identify and constructively challenge stereotypical characterisation when encountered, for example in external sources, student communication and collaborative behaviour, or dealings with colleagues

• Use gender-neutral languagePromote gender equality

• Accommodate and learn to engage with variation in linguistic competence, language use and accent by offering opportunities to practice oral communication, in a safe environment

• Adopt strategies to assist students with communication-related disabilities• Allocate groups for that reflect and take advantage of the student

cohort’s diversity

Create learning environments that identify, accommodate

and celebrate the diversity of students

• Incorporate issues of race, gender, class, sexual orientation, religion and disability in the examples, names and characters used to illustrate legal principles

• Facilitate an understanding of how to respond to client diversity, for example asking students what would help them understand a lawyer’s advice if they were not fluent in English (use of ‘plain English’, avoiding colloquialisms).

Embed a range of diverse experiences, needs, values and perspectives within the teaching and practice of law

including active listening

teamwork

https://smartlawteacher.org

@smartcasuallaw