George Bernard Shaw’s quote, “He who can, does; he who cannot, teaches”, is

ignorant of the complexity and high demands of the daily work of teachers and presents a

simplistic view on the teaching profession. However, when The Professional Standards

Council’s (2018) definition of a profession is applied to teaching, it is evident that teachers

are considered to be professionals in their field. The Professional Standards Council (2018)

defines a profession as:

‘A profession is a disciplined group of individuals who adhere to ethical

standards. This group positions itself as possessing special knowledge and skills

in a widely recognised body of learning derived from research, education and

training at a high level. A profession is also prepared to apply this knowledge and

exercise these skills in the interests of others.’

When the definition of a profession is broken down into its various components, it is

apparent that based on the four teaching and learning concepts the complex daily work of

teachers classifies teaching as a profession. This essay will explain what each of the four

teaching and learn concepts are as well as discuss how they each fit into the definition of a

professional according to The Professional Standards Council and form an interrelationship

with each other. In order to demonstrate this further the interconnected relationship

between curriculum, pedagogy and assessment will be demonstrated through the effective

design process of Project Based Learning (PBL) experience.

In order to be effective educators and maintain high standards of teaching, teachers

require necessary knowledge, skills and practices known as ‘Teacher Professionalism’

(OECD, 2016). Recently teacher professionalism and their ethical standard has been a focus

of the Australian government in order to improve teaching standards and increase

educational outcomes for students. This has led to the development of the Australian

Professional Standards for Teachers (APST), a national document outlining what constitutes

teacher quality (Australian Institute for Teaching and School Leadership [AITSL], 2017). The

implementation of this document has had a large effect on initial teacher training and entry

requirements, ongoing teacher professional development as well as the ethical standards

teachers are required to maintain throughout their daily work. The Australian Professional

Standards for Teachers define the work performed by teachers by identifying seven teacher

standards, which are categorised into three over-arching teaching domains: professional

knowledge, professional practice and professional engagement (AITSL, 2017). Universities

are required to prepare preservice teachers to meet the graduate level of the Professional

Standards for teachers and all teachers must become proficiently accredited early within

their career, thereby demonstrating that Australian teachers are expected to possess a high

level of skill and competence. Furthermore, teachers must maintain their proficient level of

accreditation by continually updating their professional knowledge by completing 100 hours

of professional development every five years. Additional career stages include Highly

Accomplished and Lead teachers. The structuring of the Australian Professional Standards

for Teachers into career stages and the ongoing professional learning requirements

demonstrate that teaching is a complex profession in which teachers are expected to

continue to develop and improve with experience. This shows that the teaching profession

adheres to the first part of the Professional Standards Council’s definition of a profession as

a disciplined group of individuals who adhere to ethical standards.

Additionally in order to demonstrate compatibility with the definition of a

professional, the teaching profession must demonstrate specialist knowledge and show that
research is continually conducted in the area. Understanding teaching pedagogy is key to

addressing this part of the Professional Standards Council’s (2018) definition of a

professional. Pedagogy is the art and science of teaching (Gore, 2007). Co-creator of the

Quality Teaching Model (QTM), J. Gore (2007), argued that to improve teaching pedagogy,

teachers need a detailed concept on what is considered good practice and that these

practices need to be framed in a way to support teachers and not used to judge

performance. This lead to the development of the QTM by the NSW Department of

Education and Training in the early 21st Century. The QTM outlines what an effective lesson

or unit of work should contain and gives a method of measuring that lesson or unit of work

and providing a model for teaching pedagogy that can be applied to all stages of learning

(Department of education and Training [DET], 2003a). The QTM is a framework consisting of

three focus areas intellectual quality, quality learning environment and significance.

Intellectual quality refers to how well the lesson or unit of work engages students in higher

order thinking and communication of what they have learnt. Quality learning environment is

a measure of how productive the work environment, in regards to relationships between

teachers and students. Significance is a measure of the importance and meaning of the work

presented, this allow students to draw connections and ground their work (DET, 2003a).

These three focus areas are further broken down into 6 sub-categories to describe an

overall teaching pedagogy that teachers can use to direct and improve their teaching

(Department of education and Training [DET], 2003b). By using these different pedagogies in

the teaching profession and with continued research into the discipline of education and

teaching it is shown that the teaching profession does possess ‘specialist knowledge’ as

required by the Professional standards council’s definition of a professional.

 Curriculum is an integral part of a teacher’s professional life and how they select

what to information is required to be delivered to the benefit of students. Curriculum, as

used in the teaching discipline, can be described as, ‘the study of any and all educational

phenomena’ (Egan, 1987). From this definition it can be seen that curriculum aims to outline

what a student is required to be taught throughout their schooling, otherwise know as

outcomes. Curriculum is integrated into the professional life of teachers as it is a key aspect

of the Australian Professional Standards where all levels of accreditation need to have a

level of understanding of the curriculum, from the use of curriculum in assessment and

reporting to a comprehensive knowledge of the curriculum (AITSL, 2017). The use of

curriculum in education allows teachers to apply their knowledge of how to teach to specific

subject knowledge, in order to pass subject knowledge along to students. This application of

knowledge and ability to pass it on to the benefit and interest of others is integral to the

professionalism of teachers.

Over the last ten years, the Australian government has invested heavily into

developing a national curriculum, an essential aspect of teachers’ professionalism. This shift

was the result of the position adopted by ministers after the 2008 Melbourne Declaration

on Educational Goals for Young Australians (Australian Curriculum, Assessment and

Reporting Authority [ACARA], 2016). As a result of the conference, the Australian

Curriculum, Assessment and Reporting Authority (ACARA) was established to design a

national curriculum from Foundation to Year 12, develop a national assessment program

that aligns with the national curriculum and to collect and report on data collected from the
assessments (Australian Curriculum, Assessment and Reporting Authority [ACARA], 2013).

By making a shift to a national curriculum the teaching profession is better able to apply

specific subject knowledge to the benefit of students using appropriate pedagogies.

Curriculum and assessment are connected through the teaching and learning cycle.

This connection enhances the professionalism of teachers by allowing a more thorough

exchange of knowledge for the benefit of students. The teaching and learning cycle is used

by teachers to determine what students already know, what areas of knowledge or skills are

lacking and what work needs to be planned in order to meet the curriculum outcomes for

the unit of work as well as to reflect on the effectiveness of teaching and learning programs

(NSW Education Standards Authority [NESA], 2017). This allows teachers to ensure that

curriculum outcomes are being met by students. The key elements of the learning and

teaching cycle are; assessment, planning, programing, implementation and evaluation

(NESA, 2017). In order to plan effective units of work and reliable assessments tasks,

teachers use different resources and guides, these should include QTM as well as other

educational tools such as Bloom’s taxonomy. Using Curriculum and assessment in the

teaching and learning cycle and different professional resources to construct quality

educational programs and assessments, enables teachers to develop students’ knowledge,

skills and understanding. This is a key component of the Professional Standards Councils

definition of what makes a professional.

The National Assessment Program Literacy and Numeracy (NAPLAN) is a key

assessment tool used in Australia to assess students in years 3, 5, 7 and 9 in reading, writing,
language conventions (spelling, grammar and punctuation) and numeracy. This formative

assessment has been conducted annually since 2008 (National Assessment Program, 2016a).

The aim of the NAPLAN test is to give a snapshot of the overall national ability in literacy and

numeracy, as well as an individual assessment of each student’s abilities. The NAPLAN test

aligns with the Australian curriculum (National Assessment Program, 2016b). This is an

excellent example of how a curriculum and assessment are used together to direct teachers

in what a student is expected to know at different stages of their schooling.

Problem Based Learning (PBL) is a form of constructivist teaching pedagogy that is

student centred and combines the problem solving process with an inquiry approach to

teaching (El Sayary, Forawi, & Mansour, 2015). PBL is also described by Savery (2006) as ‘an

instructional (and curricular) learner-centred approach that empowers learners to conduct

research, integrate theory and practice, and apply knowledge and skills to develop a viable

solution to a defined problem.’ PBL has become more popular as an alternate pedagogical

model to the standard expository pedagogy model in schooling around the world as the

approach to learning is suitable to different disciplines (Perrenet, Bouhuijs, & Smits, 2000).

This change in pedagogy is used to increase student engagement, and to provide a

framework to teach and assess soft skills needed for the ever-changing workplace while

maintaining academic excellence (Hendry et al., 2017). The benefit of PBL is that it allows

teachers to provide grounding for the content outlined in the curriculum (Hendry et al.,

2017). This is achieved by creating problems that are related to current issues in the world

or local stage. An example of this is presented by Adam (2017) where a PBL project in

business studies is centred around the taxi ride-sharing service UBER. By having a relevant
problem for students to apply their knowledge of key curriculum outcomes it tends to

engage students with the problem.

The PBL pedagogy relies on the use of curriculum and assessment to deliver a well-

rounded teaching approach for students. One example of this interrelationship between

Pedagogy, curriculum and assessment is in Parramatta Marist High School’s PBL flipped

classrooms, used in stage 6 courses (Hendry et al., 2017). This model uses a two week cycle

to deliver a module of work, where students are first introduced to the module by having

content delivered online, known as pre-learning. During this stage, a diagnostic assessment

is used to ensure students have understood the content. Then students are given 100

minutes of class time to clarify and apply the content before a problem is presented to the

students. A further 200 minutes is then devoted to understanding and solving the problem.

During this 300 minute block, teachers are continually conducting formative assessments on

the students. The students then undertake summative assessment tasks on the project and

curriculum outcomes for the unit of work (Hendry et al., 2017). For this model to be

effective, both curriculum and assessment are used together. Curriculum is used to

determine what outcomes are being targeted in that unit of work and assessment to

determine that the outcomes are being met by the students as well as to enable teachers to

reflect on the effectiveness of the teaching and learning program so that professional

practice can be continually improved.

Teachers are professionals as many aspects of their job fulfil the Professional

standards council’s definition of what a professional is. As outlined throughout this essay,
Teaching requires four defining attributes: The first is professionalism through the use and

application of the Australian Professional Standards for Teachers (APST). The second is

pedagogy through the use of the NSW Quality Teaching model. Third is curriculum through

the Australian National curriculum and finally assessment such as the NAPLAN test. This

shows that George Bernard Shaw’s quote, “He who can, does; he who cannot, teaches” is a

misrepresentation of teachers which devalues and underestimates the complexity of the

teaching profession.
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