Team Teaching - It's More than Taking Turns

Presented by Bob Pike and Becky Plath (father, daughter team - Bob is a training "legend" and has 35 years experience; Becky has 10 years exp).

This team was good at marketing and took a few opportunities to solicit audience participation which the rewarded with a different one of their books each time - allowed them to advertise the books (they must be wealthy!). Apparently Becky just wrote here first book: "101 movie clips that teach and train". Sounds interesting - I would have taken a peek at the conference bookstore but it was sold out. The 60-sec activities books were sold out also - but I ordered one of those from amazon today since we seem to have enough interest in the EO.

The instructors started by introducing each other. This was interesting - I don't think that we are used to doing this. Typically people introduce themselves in our courses, right? Advantages:
- you can brag about each other and establish credibility - most people don't like to brag about themselves :)
-establish a team mentality and the relationship
-highlight mutual admiration for each other (I suppose you have to fake it if you don't admire your team member!)
-they made a point to share something from the person's past (establish credibility) but also share something recent (show that they are with the times)

FIVE DEADLY SINS OF TEAM TEACHING:
1. Going over time on your piece!
2. Disagreeing in public
3. Violating standards and norms. (for example, answering your cellphone in the middle of the class)
4. Failing to remember who is up front.
5. Leaving the room!
6. Cookie cutter transitions between speakers ("are there any questions?")
7.Wind out of sails (one-upping each other's stories, etc)

The best training would be with subject matter experts (SME) but we need to use the right processes to help you deliver the material. There is a continuum between facilitator and speaker - and effective trainer should be in the middle of this continuum.

What are the benefits of team teaching? (Kleem's favorite 3 in italics)
-changing face/voice
-whatever you miss they cover
-reduced stress
-learn from each other
-support each other
-better flow
-reduces burnout
-keep it fresh
-increases flexibility
-makes handling emergencies easier
-neither of us is as smart as both of us
-reduced difficult participants
-increases one-on-one time with participants

There are many roles for team teachers when they are on or off the stage: supporter, guide, observer, participant, coach, runner, AV support, preparer, scribe, encourager, instructor. Keep in mind that if you are not team teaching, you have to do all these yourself!

Top techniques for making it really work:
-Both in room.
-one in front, one on the side
-stick to agreed time limits
-demonstrate respect toward one another
-appropriately hitchhike (smooth transitions)
-guide on the side. pre-arrange a signal for entering the conversation
-proper preparation and practice prevents poor performance
-being one anothers cheerleader
-it's not you or me, it's we.

I guess it is bad to interrupt your teammate when they are up there, even if they forgot to make an important point. The better way to deal with this is for the "sidelined" teammate to give a signal to the presenter. This way the presenter can "invite" the other to enter the conversation/discussion and it will flow better and show a united front. The signal can be pre-arranged if necessary.

After this session, I reflected that the DMPK course is an ineffective team-teaching course and almost everything is wrong! Instructors don't stay through the whole course, and most sit in the back and do other work. Transitions are horrible and it is really just people taking turns talking. (However, maybe this may be expected since it is a lecture-based course and the instructors are reluctant to change since they haven't seen the power of how much better it could be with changes). TTT is more along the lines of these guidelines and has better transitions and RR is supportive during the others' presentations. But it may be too much one way with RR being the driver and it's still not truly a fully effective team (perhaps it depends on the specific instructor). I suppose every "team-taught" class could use improvement.

Hope you are getting some usefulness out of these blog posts. I think the first day was much more interesting than the rest so far.
Note that I have skipped summaries for some of the sessions and will come back and update on those ones later.