Can anyone be a critical friend?

The answer to this question is ‘yes’. But it should be clear what we mean by ‘critical friend.’ The concept would no longer be meaningful if it could not be distinguished from helpfulness, sympathy or peer coaching. An essential characteristic of a critical friend is...

Frequently asked questions and provoking answers.

Critical friendship is an intriguing concept. The term appears in many books and articles about research and about collaborative learning. However, it has rarely been defined clearly. It is my aim to define it more precisely so that we set it apart from concepts like...

5 ways to use the Internet for teacher development

The Internet is an great tool for teacher development. If you thought the Web was just for entertainment, think again. Here are some simple ideas to get you started. TDSIG.org – Obviously, the first thing to do is sign up for this website. Our objective is to...

That’s what friends are for. Who is your critical friend?

In this month’s blog I would like to tackle the concept of critical friend. In the next NL you will find an article on this topic. What all critical friends have in common is that they are good listeners and respond to problems and questions with integrity and a...

Teacher development website, well… develops

As the proud new webmaster of TDSIG.org, I’ll be trying to provide both members and casual visitor (the “development-curious”), with a user-friendly and useful site dedicated to teacher development. To this end, I’ve introduced a few changes to...