How teachers’ beliefs about learning and teaching relate to their continuing professional development

Teachers’ continuing professional development (CPD) can improve teacher quality and teaching practice, yet teachers differ greatly in the extent to which they engage in CPD. In extensive research into which factors affect teachers’ participation in CPD, the effects of teachers’ beliefs have received limited attention, despite their strong influences on people’s working and learning. Teachers’ beliefs about learning and teaching in particular influence their teaching practices. Does a comparable relationship exist between these beliefs and teachers’ own learning or participation in CPD? To explore this relationship, 260 Dutch secondary school teachers completed a survey that focused on the teachers’ student-oriented and subject matter-oriented beliefs, as well as on teachers’ updating, reflective and collaborative activities. Because teachers’ characteristics reflect both belief dimensions, this study relied on cluster analysis, which revealed three distinct belief profiles. These results indicated that teachers’ beliefs about learning and teaching relate to their participation in CPD: the more a teacher’s profile is student oriented and subject matter oriented, the higher his or her participation in CPD. The results have implications for enhancing teachers’ reflections on their beliefs about learning and teaching, in conjunction with participation in CPD.     

Profiles of teacher-child interaction quality in preschool classrooms and teachers’ professional competence features

This paper investigates early childhood education (ECE) teachers’ self-reported and observed teacher-child interaction quality (TIQ) and the associated teachers’ professional competence features using a latent profile analysis (LPA) approach to identify the variations in the quality of classroom experiences in Chinese preschools. A total of 164 female preschool teachers aged 20–58 participated in this study. The analysis and discussions focus on four identified profiles of teachers: low-quality teachers (n = 9) characterised by lowest scores in both observational and self-reported TIQ; self-overestimated teachers (n = 59) with relatively low observed CLASS scores but high self-reported TIQ; self-underestimated teachers (n = 76) scoring relatively high in observed TIQ but low in self-assessed TIQ and low-level self-efficacy; and genuine high-quality teachers (n = 20) rated highest in both observational and self-reported TIQ. Findings on specific educational and psychological characteristics of the four profiles of teachers that we have identified through an LPA provide insights into teacher training in China.     

How is a professional development programme related to the development of university teachers’ self-efficacy beliefs and teaching conceptions?

This study explores how the impact of a five ECTS professional development programme for university teachers affects their self-efficacy beliefs and teaching conceptions using a mixed methods approach. For the quantitative part of the study, participants completed pre-post surveys. From these surveys, we find that the programme led to an overall significant increase in reported self-efficacy beliefs. A sub-sample of ten participants participated in the qualitative part, which consists of four phases: three reflective assignments and an interview. Individual teachers demonstrate a dominant teaching conception in each phase and in almost half of the sub-sample it developed over time, moving from a teacher-centered to a more student-centered conception. When examining the development of self-efficacy and teaching conceptions collectively, three development groups are identified. Noteworthy is that teacher development is credited to the programme as a whole and not to a specific aspect.     

Dilemmas and a paradox—secondary mathematics teachers' knowledge of their teaching in multilingual classrooms

This paper reports on the first stage of a research project that investigates the dynamics of multilingualism and the teaching and learning of mathematics in junior secondary classrooms in South Africa. The paper situates the project theoretically and methodologically and then focusses on an initial set of in-depth interviews with six teachers in three different classroom contexts. The analysis of presences and silences within and across teachers' accounts suggest that teachers in multilingual contexts confront and produce language-related dilemmas and a paradox as they manage their teaching. These, in turn, raise interesting questions for further analysis and research.     

Changes in teachers’ beliefs after a professional development project for teaching writing: two Chinese cases

A plethora of research has found that teachers’ beliefs directly influence their classroom practices and teaching outcomes. While numerous studies in second/foreign language writing have examined the effectiveness of different innovative approaches on students’ learning to write, there is a paucity of research on writing teachers’ beliefs about these approaches and how their beliefs change in the process of their professional development. Such a lacuna becomes prominent in English as a Foreign Language contexts, especially in China, where there are numerous calls for changing the nature of classroom practices from product-focused to process- and student-centred instruction. In order to fill this gap, this brief article reports on a case study regarding changes in two Chinese English teachers’ beliefs after attending a professional development project for teaching writing. A key research question guides this study: What changes, if any, did the two teachers experience in their teaching beliefs during the project? Two writing teachers were voluntarily recruited for a case study. Findings show that the professional development project for teaching writing broadened the teachers’ understanding of different writing theories, provided a clear model of how to integrate these new approaches into regular writing courses, changed their instructional focus and shifted their perception of teachers’ roles in teaching practice.     

The contribution of non-formal learning in higher education to student teachers’ professional competence

This article reports a mixed methods study on the contribution of various aspects of pre-service student teachers’ learning in initial teacher education (ITE) to their professional competence in a Five-year Bachelor of Education Programme in Hong Kong. Special attention is given to how student teachers’ non-formal learning in higher education contributes to their professional competence, an under-researched area in teacher education. A total of 282 student teachers participated in the quantitative survey, 18 of whom were interviewed. Although  Undergraduate Learning Experience: Formal Learning and Non-formal Learning was not the most highly rated factor, multiple regression indicated that it was the only ITE professional learning factor that significantly predicted all dimensions of professional competence. This supports the hypothesis that non-formal learning as a part of learning in higher education makes a significant contribution to student teachers’ professional competence. The qualitative findings showed that non-formal learning provided opportunities for service learning, co-curricular activities, and student exchange programmes with different objects of engagement. Student teachers constructed pedagogical content knowledge, general pedagogical knowledge, and knowledge of context through hands-on experiences, professional dialogue with practitioners, and observations of others’ practice. Such knowledge contributed to their competence in classroom teaching and to work in schools. Implications for ITE are discussed.     

The effect of student teaching experience and teacher beliefs on pre-service teachers’ self-efficacy and intention to use technology in teaching

The student teaching experience has been considered important in establishing pre-service teachers’ beliefs and attitudes towards their teaching. However, few studies have investigated the effect of student teaching experiences as an educational intervention for increasing technology integration – especially pre-service teachers’ pedagogical beliefs as an internal barrier to technology integration. Thus, this study examined how technology-centred student teaching experiences differently affect pre-service teachers with different teaching beliefs with regard to self-efficacy and intention to use technology. Participants were 55 pre-service teachers in a student teaching practicum. The findings revealed that technology-centred student teaching experiences increased pre-service teachers’ self-efficacy regardless of their teacher beliefs. Additionally, pre-service teachers with traditional teacher beliefs had a low level of intention at the outset but significantly increased their intention after experiencing technology-centred student teaching; however, those with constructivist teacher beliefs showed no meaningful differences in their intention levels. Implications for teacher education and the limitations of this study are discussed.     

How do professional learning communities aid and hamper professional learning of beginning teachers related to differentiated instruction?

Research has shown that adequate support from the school environment is necessary to help beginning teachers in applying differentiated instruction (DI), but how schools can aid in this process remains unclear. This qualitative study explores how professional learning communities (PLCs), an indicator of a supportive school environment, can enhance beginning teachers’ professional learning in DI. Furthermore, it examines how structural and cultural school conditions foster the development of PLCs in the schools’ organization. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with school leaders, special needs coordinators, and beginning teachers in primary schools. A comparative analysis was carried out in three schools with high (case A), medium (case B), and low (case C) levels of beginning teachers’ professional learning in DI, as assessed by changes in practice (i.e. teachers’ flexibility in adapting their classroom behaviour). The comparative analysis indicated that the three cases could be situated at different stages of PLC development. Case A had reached the mature stage, whereas case B was in the evolving stage and case C was still in the beginning stage of PLC development. Also, the analysis indicated that structural and cultural school conditions in the three cases were related to the different stages of PLC development. Finally, the results revealed that in the three cases, leadership of both the principal and special needs coordinator played a key role in the development of the structural and cultural school conditions.     

The impact of direct experience on preservice teachers’ self-efficacy for teaching in inclusive classrooms

With current inclusion trends, teacher educators are challenged to redesign their programmes to prepare preservice teachers to educate a wide range of students in whole-class settings. This quantitative study examined the impact of an inclusion course and a field experience on preservice teachers' self-efficacy for teaching in inclusive classrooms. Based on data collected from 141 participants, the results indicated that both the inclusion course and the field experience produced significant gains in self-efficacy. Participants with prior experience with people with exceptional needs had significantly higher levels of self-efficacy than those without prior experience; however, both groups experienced significant gains after the course and the field experience. Also, the results showed that, during the field experience, as preservice teachers spent more time with direct, individual instruction with students with exceptional needs, and less time with observation and whole-class instruction, their self-efficacy was more likely to increase. Findings were discussed, and implications for practice and future research were suggested.     

The teaching efficacy beliefs of pre‐service teachers in the USA and Turkey

The purpose of this study was to compare pre‐service elementary teachers' sense of mathematics teaching efficacy beliefs in a Turkish university and in a major American university located in the Midwest. The data for this study were collected by means of the Mathematics Teaching Efficacy Beliefs Instrument. In the Turkish sample there were 141 pre‐service elementary teachers, and in the American sample there were 104 pre‐service elementary teachers. Results from the study indicate that pre‐service teachers in Turkey tend to have a stronger belief that teaching can influence student learning when compared with pre‐service teachers in the United States. However, a similar difference was not observed for personal mathematics teaching efficacy.     

How does writing for publication help professional development of teachers? A case study in China

Publications by teachers reporting results or case studies of school-based teacher inquiry activities benchmark their professional development by indicating they have a ‘stance of inquiry’. Such papers also disseminate valuable knowledge to the education community for sharing. Essay or case writing has always been a part of school-based teacher learning in China. The small-scale qualitative study reported here examines the impact of producing publications on the professional development of teachers within the context of educational reform. Findings show that producing publications contributes to teacher development in three ways. First, an expanded knowledge base gives the teachers new understandings of student-based learning. Second, teachers obtain insight into their practices by making their tacit knowledge explicit. Third, teachers have a sense of achievement by theorising personal experience. Publications serve as ‘boundary objects’ which can potentially help teachers achieve and develop their professionalism by disseminating individual knowledge into the public knowledge domain with transformative learning. Such developments, however, normally tend to focus on expanding local pedagogical practice. More emphasis on the notion of ‘teachers as researchers’ through critical reflection may help teachers perform as transformative intellectuals whilst searching for ways to retain teachers’ voices in their written publications.     

Should professional development include analyzing and coaching ways of speaking during inquiry-based science instruction in elementary classrooms?

In this commentary, I first consider what Oliveira defines inquiry-based science instruction to be. Next I discuss what the discourse practices are that he is advocating. Then I examine what he presents as evidence of changes in two teachers’ discourse practices due to a summer institute and how their pragmatic awareness seems to have been enhanced through institute activities. Finally I ponder whether, when, how, and why professional development should include a focus on ways of speaking during inquiry-based science instruction.     

Beliefs as filters for comparing inclusive classroom situations. Connecting teachers’ beliefs about teaching diverse learners to their noticing of inclusive classroom characteristics in videoclips

Insight in the way teachers' beliefs filter their interpretation of inclusive classrooms is vital to support teachers’ competences to teach diverse learners. This study explores how three types of teacher beliefs about teaching diverse learners (i.e., professional beliefs about diversity, beliefs about differentiating the curriculum, and growth mindset) are associated with their noticing of two key aspects of effective inclusive classrooms (i.e. positive teacher-student interactions (PTSI) and differentiated instruction (DI)). Data was collected in a sample of secondary education teachers (N = 462) in Flemish schools (N = 23). Teacher beliefs were measured by survey scales, while teachers’ noticing of PTSI and DI was assessed by a standardised video-based comparative judgement instrument. Survey and video data were combined in a multivariate multilevel framework. Findings indicate that teachers’ professional beliefs about diversity and beliefs about differentiating the curriculum serve as filters for noticing PTSI and DI in videoclips. For teachers’ growth mindset no significant relationship was found. These associations did not change when taking into account teachers’ sex, age, educational background or experience. Furthermore, a small part of the differences in teachers’ noticing DI is explained by the school level, suggesting that teachers within a school can share a vision. Results are discussed in the light of teacher thinking for inclusive classrooms and implications for teacher professional development.     

How do preservice teachers perceive ‘environment’ and its relevance to their area of teaching?

The environment is not only an ecological entity distinct from people but a cultural, social, and political construct. Understanding how learners conceptualize ‘environment’ may contribute to more effective environmental education (EE). This study investigated, in a paired pre–post design, 215 students’ understandings of ‘environment’ and perceptions of its relevance to their teaching area, at the onset and toward the end of their studies in teacher-education colleges in Israel. While student teachers, regardless of their major, acknowledged the importance of EE to their future function as teachers, they do not demonstrate an adequate understanding of the concept environment: humans are not viewed as part of the environment nor is the environment understood as a complex web of interactions among people, man-made systems and natural ecosystems. The fact that toward the end of studies, student teachers’ understandings of environment remained essentially basic indicates the necessity to reorient teacher-education programs toward EE. The various ways in which students perceived the relevance of environment to their teaching area are the starting points for this change.     

How can only 18 black teachers working in Liverpool represent a diverse teaching workforce? A critical narrative

This paper follows on from the authors’ previous research into minimal Black teacher representation in Liverpool schools [Boyle, B., and M. Charles. 2010. “Tightening the Shackles: The Continued Invisibility of Liverpool's British African Caribbean Teachers.” Journal of Black Studies 42 (3): 427–435]. It is based on a re-examination of their findings of Liverpool's Black teachers’ historic institutionalised invisibility [Swann Report. 1985. Education for All. Report of the Committee of the Enquiry into the Education of Children from Ethnic Minority Groups. London: Her Majesty's Stationery Office.] and an interrogation of the situation as revealed by the 2015 data. The article uses as its evidence base, questionnaire responses and data from a sample of interviews with the current 18 Black teachers. Despite the voices of Black teachers being marginalised and even less likely to be heard, it is vital that the pedagogies of Black teachers contribute to a ‘dismantling of binaries and hierarchies that privilege Eurocentric paradigms of teaching’ [Escayg, K. 2010. “Diverse Classrooms, Diverse Teachers: Representing Cultural Diversity in the Teaching Profession and Implications for Pre-Service Admissions.” Canadian Journal for new Scholars in Education 3 (2): 1–8, 4].     

‘Soviet’ in teachers’ memories and professional beliefs in Kazakhstan: points for reflection for reformers,international consultants and practitioners

This paper is a part of a three-year study, ‘Internationalisation and reform of secondary schooling in Kazakhstan’, jointly conducted by an international team of UK- and Kazakhstan-based researchers in 2012–2014. The study was conceived as a mechanism to support education reform in the country. This was achieved through reconstructing the education policy narrative of the last two decades and understanding the effects of the newly established Nazarbayev Intellectual Schools and the Centres of Excellence in-service professional development programme on the larger system. While the focus of the study was on Kazakhstan’s educational present, the references to the previous system of education, which was often referred to as Soviet, traditional, but also successful, fundamental and the best in the world, were numerous. These continuous references to the past prompted the authors of this paper to address the questions: What memories and practices of Soviet education are still dominant in the field of education in Kazakhstan? How do these beliefs continue to shape educational debate in the country? In support of its argument, the paper draws on the literature on Soviet schooling and contemporary education reform, interview data with national and international teachers in Kazakhstan, and field observations. The resultant narrative, which brings together the analysis of educational change and changes in teachers’ beliefs, may appeal to many involved in the construction of the contemporary reform agenda.     

How do teachers evaluate their parent communication competence? Latent profiles and relationships to workplace behaviors

Parent-teacher communication competence, frequency of exchange on parent-related issues with colleagues and time spent working with parents were measured with questionnaires in a sample of 677 German mathematics teachers. A latent class analysis revealed four groups of teachers: 24% showed high, 36% showed medium and 16% showed lower levels of communication competence with balanced profiles. A fourth profile (24%) showed a strong focus on pragmatic problem solving in communication with parents. The profiles differed in the extent of their exchange with colleagues on parent-related issues. No relationships were found regarding the time spent talking to parents.     

Our teachers want to be the best: on the necessity of intra‐professional reflection about moral ideals of teaching

Teaching is a significant social good and therefore teachers as well as the state have to take responsibility for guarding the moral quality of the teaching practice. Based on this premise, the article describes and defends the view that these parties have their own particular role by means of literature review and theoretical and practical arguments.

The role of the state is necessarily limited to defining minimal moral rules and obligations, because in liberal Western democracies morality is codified in law to a minimal degree. The state also has practical reasons for such a confined position, among which are the complexities of professional practice and its implied tacit knowledge.

Teachers have to take responsibility for constructing the full width of professional morality, but particularly for defining its optimal or aspirational dimension. This dimension comprises the virtues deemed important for teachers as well as their professional ideals. Whereas the literature on professional ethics of teachers is relatively silent about professional ideals, several arguments are provided for the importance of ideals for teachers.

The final part of the article defends the claim that teachers have to articulate their professional ideals through intra‐professional dialogue. Again, theoretical and practical arguments are provided, for instance that such a debate provokes teachers to think about the best aims and means of their profession and that it contributes to the sense and meaning of their work. The article ends with some practical implications of the theoretical exposé.     

How should the higher education workforce adapt to advancements in technology for teaching and learning?

In a time of change, higher education is in the position of having to adapt to external conditions created by widespread adoption of popular technologies such as social media, social networking services and mobile devices. For faculty members, there must be opportunities for concrete experiences capable of generating a personal conviction that a given technology is worth using and an understanding of the contexts in which it is best used. The paper examines approaches to educational professional development at The Open University, including recent initiatives related to faculty development in relation to mobile learning. The paper reflects on what can be learnt from these experiences and proposes a lifelong learning perspective which can help the higher education workforce to adapt. Faculty members have to commit to lifelong learning, remembering that ‘professional role model’ to students is one of the main roles of the teacher.     

Teachers’ practices and beliefs about teaching writing: a comprehensive survey of grades 1 to 3 teachers

Reading and Writing - A random sample of 782 grades 1 through 3 Chinese language arts teachers in Taiwan were surveyed about how they taught writing and their beliefs about writing. The underlying...