Teachers’ professional development: a theoretical review

Background and purpose:?The article reviews studies that focus on the professional development of teachers after they have completed their basic teacher training. Teacher professional development is defined as teachers’ learning: how they learn to learn and how they apply their knowledge in practice to support pupils’ learning. The research question addressed in the article is: How do experienced teachers learn?

Main argument:?The review is framed by theories within the constructivist paradigm. From this perspective, knowledge is perceived as the construction of meaning and understanding within social interaction. The social surroundings are seen as decisive for how the individual learns and develops. It is argued that courses and lectures, or ‘times for telling’, and teachers’ development of a metacognitive attitude are decisive factors for teachers’ learning within a constructivist frame of reference.

Sources of evidence and method:?To attempt to answer the research question, a search was conducted of the subject of pedagogy in the ISI WEB of Science (search undertaken 9 August 2011) using the search strings ‘teacher learning’, ‘teacher development’ and ‘teacher professional development’, and covering the period from 2009 to 2011 to probe the most recent decade of research. Articles that dealt with basic education, primary and secondary school, were selected, and articles that dealt with learning using digital tools and the internet and newly trained teachers were rejected. A set of 31 articles was selected from this search. To ensure width and depth of coverage, this was supplemented by a selection of review studies and research on further education in respect of teachers’ learning. The texts were analysed by means of open and axial coding, developing main and sub-categories.

Conclusions:?The review of articles shows that both individual and organisational factors impact teachers’ learning. Teacher co-operation has importance for how they develop, and some of the teachers can lead such learning activities themselves. Moreover, a positive school culture with a good atmosphere and understanding of teachers’ learning, in addition to co-operation with external resource persons, may impact the professional development of teachers. The article concludes with the reflection that learning in school is the best arena for further development of teachers.     

Teacher professional learning as a social practice: an Australian case

Abstract

Framing professional learning as a social practice underscores the interplay between subjective meaning systems and objective conditions of the social space where learning occurs. Drawing on Pierre Bourdieu’s theory of social practice, and methodologically guided by critical realism, the paper identifies what constitutes effective teacher professional learning through mentoring. The empirical focus of the paper is an Early Childhood teacher mentoring programme in the state of Victoria, Australia. The findings show that: (a) relevant circumstances that make teacher professional learning a necessity are associated with individual aspirations and systemic requirements; (b) collegial relationships and critical deliberation constitute meaningful learning experiences; and (c) teacher learning takes place in the domains of professional dispositions, pedagogical knowledge and social capital. The implication is that in designing professional development programmes such as mentoring, it is important to take teachers’ contexts of practice into account; conceptualise learning as a socially situated practice; and recognise the value of teachers’ lived experiences as a locus of deliberation and learning.     

Understanding stories of professional formation during early childhood education and care practice placements

Narrative inquiry as a methodological approach enables us to examine how people represent their experiences and selves through storytelling (Chase, S. E. 2005. ‘Narrative Inquiry: Multiple Lenses, Approaches, Voices.’ In The Sage Handbook of Qualitative Research, edited by N. Denzin and Y. Lincoln, 651–679. London: Sage). To understand these constructions, other kinds of knowledge are required. Theories of social life, for example, help to interpret areas which narrative inquiry is good at revealing about human experiences such as the animation of temporality, sociality and place (Clandinin, J., V. Caine, A. Estefan, J. Huber, M. S. Murphy, and P. Steeves. 2015. ‘Places of Practice: Learning to Think Narratively.’ Narrative Works 5 (1). Accessed November 30, 2017. https://journals.lib.unb.ca/index.php/NW/issue/view/1799). Drawing on interviews with practice educators and final-year undergraduate early childhood education and care (ECEC) students in North-West Ireland, this paper considers how narrative inquiry and education theories work together to illuminate key learning experiences of ECEC undergraduate students during 12-week practice placements. In this paper I attempt to show how two education theories – ‘Threshold Concepts’ and ‘Communities of Practice’ – shed light on the nature of these key learning experiences. The paper suggests that narrative inquiry offers an emancipatory research approach by uncovering human and reflective elements of learning journeys made by ECEC students during their practice placements.     

Developing a virtual engineering management community

The paper reviews the lessons of planning and running an Engineering Management practitioner development programme in a partnership between BP and the University of Manchester. This distance-learning programme is for professional engineers in mid-career experienced in the engineering and support activities for delivering safe, compliant and reliable projects and operations worldwide. The programme concentrates on the why and how of leadership and judgement in managing the engineering of large and small projects and operational support. Two intensive residential weeks are combined with a virtual learning environment over one year. Assessed assignments between and after the residential weeks provide opportunities for individual reflective learning for each delegate through applying concepts and the lessons of case studies to their experience, current challenges and expected responsibilities. This successful partnership between a major global company and a university rich in research and teaching required a significant dedication of intellectual and leadership effort by all concerned. The rewards for both parties and most importantly for the engineers themselves are extensive.     

Community of Inquiry (CoI): A Framework for Social Work Distance Educators

ABSTRACT

The Community of Inquiry (CoI) framework, a research-based seminal work, provides a structure for integrating a collaborative constructivist approach in course design, implementation, and evaluation. The CoI framework suggests that by fostering three essential elements – social presence, cognitive presence, and teaching presence – a community of inquiry can be created to promote student engagement and learning. This paper will present the concepts of the CoI framework for social work educators to consider for distance education course design, implementation, and evaluation.     

Online professional development for environmental educators: strategies to foster critical thinking and social interactions

Abstract

Massive open online courses (MOOCs) offer opportunities for professional development of environmental educators globally, yet we lack understanding of participants? cognitive and social learning processes and of how instructors can enhance these processes. Based on the Community of Inquiry framework, we used a survey and coded participant discussion board and Facebook posts to examine the cognitive, social, and teaching presence in the Environmental Education: Transdisciplinary Approaches to Addressing Wicked Problems MOOC, offered by Cornell University. Rather than train educators in a specific curriculum, the goal of the MOOC is to expand educators? critical and transdisciplinary thinking about the field of environmental education and to enhance social interactions to support learning, educators, and knowledge co-creation. Results indicate that cognitive presence is higher on the discussion board whereas social presence is higher on Facebook. Over half of cognitive posts focused on exploration, a lower level of learning, whereas just less than a fifth reflected higher level integration, suggesting room for enhancing cognitive learning. Our results suggest strategies to encourage higher levels of thinking and more meaningful social interactions to foster learning, educator support, and co-creation of knowledge, thereby improving online professional development.     

Continuity of Care,Professional Community,and the Policy Context: Potential Benefits for Infant and Toddler Teachers' Professional Development

Practice or Policy: Continuity of care (COC) has many benefits for young children's development but is not the norm in infant/toddler classrooms. As a consequence, policymakers might not realize how such an approach might also benefit the professional development of infant and toddler teachers, particularly if they come to the field with little formal training. Although the supports and policies available to military child development centers may not be possible to implement at present in much of the civilian sector, this study suggests that their potential benefit for infant/toddler teachers' learning and practice may be worthy of further inquiry. Research Findings: This study shares the results of an exploratory study of the benefits of COC, professional community, and the larger policy context for staff working in a military child development center serving children aged 0 to 2. COC-related professional development also seems to enhance professional community, which along with the policy context is viewed as an essential aspect of improving teacher learning and practice in the K–12 literature.     

Agroecology Education: Action-oriented Learning and Research

Abstract

Purpose: This article examines and evaluates the potential contributions from action learning and action research with stakeholders to higher education in agriculture and food systems.

Design/Methodology/Approach: The research is based on our experiences over the past two decades of running PhD courses and an MSc degree programme in Agroecology in Norway that have attracted students from the Nordic region and other countries.

Findings: We conclude that collaborating with non-university stakeholders as an integral part of a university course or programme serves four main purposes, two directly related to learning and two that can be considered as practical implications. Firstly, it enables learning about complex topics, a learning that cannot be achieved by merely reading or listening. Secondly, the real-life flare of such activities provides the students with enthusiasm and energy to delve into theory.

Practical Implications: Thirdly, students collaborating with non-university stakeholders connect university and society. Fourthly, this process builds social relevance and civic engagement not found in conventional courses or curricula.

Originality/Value: The article presents conceptual foundations and practical implementation of a unique educational programme in agriculture and food systems.     

Learning and Innovation Competence in Agricultural and Rural Development

Abstract

Purpose: The fields of competence development and capacity development remain isolated in the scholarship of learning and innovation despite the contemporary focus on innovation systems thinking in agricultural and rural development. This article aims to address whether and how crossing the conventional boundaries of these two fields provide new directions for developing learning and innovation competence in international development.

Design/methodology/approach: Using mixed methods research, this article assesses work environments for experiential learning and innovation, and investigates effective ways of enhancing core competence in agricultural research, education, extension and entrepreneurship.

Findings: Findings suggest that while the focus on input and output indicators are relevant for technological innovation competence development, outcome indicators, such as measures of changes in cognitive, affective and psychomotor domains of learning and innovation, would better serve the purpose of developing organisational and institutional learning and innovation competence.

Practical implications: This research concludes that crossing the conventional boundaries of competence development and capacity development serves as a way to renew the role of education within the innovation systems thinking. However, such an attempt to enhance human capabilities and functionings through education should integrate theory-based, competence-based and experiential learning components as a coherent whole.

Originality/value: This article demonstrates the value of crossing the conventional boundaries of the two seemingly unrelated fields—competence development through education and capacity development through extension—to provide new directions to operationalise innovation systems thinking in agricultural education and extension.     

Professional development in person: identity and the construction of teaching within a high school science department

This is a narrative inquiry into the role of professional development in the construction of teaching practice by an exemplary urban high school science teacher. I collected data during 3 years of ethnographic participant observation in Marie Gonzalez’s classroom. Marie told stories about her experiences in ten years of professional development focused on inquiry science teaching. I use a social practice theory lens to analyze my own stories as well as Marie’s. I make the case that science teaching is best understood as mediated by socially-constructed identities rather than as the end-product of knowledge and beliefs. The cognitive paradigm for understanding teachers’ professional learning fails to consistently produce transformations of teaching practice. In order to design professional development with science teachers that is generative of new knowledge, and is self-sustaining, we must understand how to build knowledge of how to problematize identities and consciously use social practice theory.     

Interpretive validity theory: mapping a methodology for validating educational assessments

Background:?Validity theory has evolved significantly over the past 30 years in response to the increased use of assessments across scientific, social and educational settings. The overarching trajectory of this evolution reflects a shift from a purely quantitative, positivistic approach to a conception of validity reliant on the interpretation of multiple evidence sources integrated into validity arguments. Moreover, within contemporary validity, interpretation has been emphasised as a central process; however, despite this emphasis, there have been few explicit articulations of specific interpretive methodologies applicable to the practice of validation.

Purpose:?To link contemporary theoretical foundations in validity to practical methods and structures to help guide the collection and analysis of interpretive validity evidence. By building upon existing validity theory, this paper aims to provide greater clarity on the practice of validation and contribute toward the larger developing framework for the validation of educational assessments.

Source of evidence:?An interdisciplinary, integrative review of over 60 research articles and sources related to the theory and practice of educational validation and interpretive inquiry approaches. Sources include literature from the fields of educational assessment and more broadly social scientific research.

Main argument:?As assessments in education increasingly aim to measure complex constructs that are value-laden and socially dependant, validity theory must keep pace and evolve in ways that address the inherent complexities associated with contemporary educational assessment. Through this paper, I assert that a greater understanding of interpretive methodologies represents one of the most promising areas for development of validation theory and practice. Specifically, I argue that dialectic, hermeneutic and transgressive forms of inquiry can be integrated within current argument-based structures for the collection, analysis and representation of validity evidence in several useful ways.

Conclusions:?Interpretive inquiry processes, namely dialectic, hermeneutic and transgressive forms of interpretation, serve to expand validation practice to include diverse evidences for the generation of multiple-perspective validity arguments. The paper concludes with specific implications for future research and practice within the field of interpretive validity theory.     

Training for content teachers of English Language Learners: using experiential learning to improve instruction*

Abstract

Experiential learning theory places experience at the center of learning. Kolb’s four-stage cycle of experiential learning suggests that effective learners must engage fully in each stage of the cycle – feeling, reflection, thinking, and action. This research assesses the alignment of Kolb’s experiential learning cycle with the week-long Summer Institute of Assisting, Collaborating, and Training ESL Secondary Content Teachers (ACT-ESL), the first stage of a professional development model designed to train content teachers of English Language Learners (ELLs). Qualitative and quantitative data analysis from pre- and post-surveys determined positive changes in participants’ understanding of key ELL concepts, knowledge, and understanding of instructional strategies and practices. Analysis indicated that the Summer Institute had a large effect (d > 2.00 for each scale), regardless of previous training in ELL instructional strategies. Findings show that the Summer Institute incorporated the cycle of learning and tenets of Kolb’s experiential learning theory and evidenced teacher learning.     

Good CoPs and bad CoPs: facilitating reform in first-year assessment via a Community of Practice

The idea and implementation of learning communities are gaining favour in higher education institutions. In particular, there are a number of successful examples to emerge of the application of the Community of Practice (CoP) framework proposed by Wenger [(1998). Communities of practice: Learning, meaning, and identity. Cambridge, MA: Harvard Business School Press] for fostering a learning environment for academics around their teaching practice. In this paper, we describe and reflect on the efficacy of a CoP process that was implemented within our university. The purpose of this CoP was to provide a space for academics to focus on assessment practices for first-year courses and identify opportunities for professional development in this area. For a variety of reasons detailed in the paper, the efficacy of this CoP was limited, and we conclude that in the current higher education environment in Australia, success with CoP approaches to improve learning and teaching outcomes may prove limited.     

Educational professionals’ values: voices from secondary schools in England

Background:?Values continue to play an integral part in education across the globe, but the importance of teachers’ personal values is often overlooked (Klein, M.B., New teaching and teacher issues, Nova Science Publishers Inc., 2006; Aspin, D.N., and J.D. Chapman, eds, Values education and lifelong learning: Principles, policies, programmes, Springer, 2007). It has been argued that teachers need explicit opportunities to reflect on their own personal and professional values to enable them to model what they ask of their students with integrity (Palmer, P.J., The courage to teach, Jossey Bass, 1998; Atkinson, T., and G. Claxton, The intuitive practitioner, Open University Press, 2000). Professional development is still often narrowly defined within the bounds of skills and competencies. However, discussion of values could help contribute to professional development by building teacher commitment and resilience.

Objective:?The purpose of this research was to explore the intrinsic values of secondary school professionals and the publicly espoused values of the educational systems in which they work. This research is the result of a two-year funded empirical study carried out by the authors in secondary schools in England.

Research design:?Research was undertaken in five schools in a range of educational contexts. In each school, individual conversations were undertaken with six key professionals with different roles to elicit personal constructs or values. These values were discussed within schools and formed a school's ‘values footprint’. An interschool workshop completed the data collection. Data were analysed qualitatively.

Main outcomes:?Qualitative analysis suggested relationships between the professional roles of the participants and predominant values themes. There were also connections between school types and predominating values. Four key themes emerged from the individual and group conversations: importance of dialogue; recognition of the importance of self-awareness; the priority of learning for life and the influence of professional roles on an individual's values focus.

Conclusion:?This small-scale study supports the importance of dialogue and self-awareness in professional life and ongoing professional development.     

Facilitating social learning in teacher education: a case study

It is increasingly recognised that social learning by teachers can stimulate professional development. In this study, we search for the social behaviour patterns which can act as a catalyst for professional development, with an explicit focus on student teachers’ learning. Based on the ‘Dimensions of Social Learning (DSL) Framework’, including 4 dimensions and 11 indicators of social learning, the present study explores the social configuration of one network of primary teachers (n?=?12), student teachers (n?=?12) and teacher educators (n?=?2). Two research questions guide this exploration: (1) What patterns of social behaviour in teacher networks are likely to lead to professional learning? (2) What network facilitation guidelines can be discerned to assist teachers and teacher educators wishing to optimise student teachers’ professional development? Data collection consisted of video recordings, reflective notes and semi-structured interviews with network members. The findings paint a picture of how social learning in teacher networks is related to the group’s social configuration. Observation criteria and student facilitation guidelines are suggested to support professional development within teacher networks. For each dimension in the DSL Framework, one point of attention is discerned to optimise students’ learning in teacher networks.     

Trapped in our past: the price we have to pay for our cultural disability inheritance

This paper opens with an introduction to the current Scottish legislation and policy context relating to the integration of children’s services. It offers the view that integrated service policy is framed by the concept of social capital and the notion of social capital building and goes on to introduce the concepts of types of social capital as tools with which to examine professional networks and identities. The article sets policy documentation concerning the specific teacher and speech and language therapist working relation within wider Scottish policy that seeks better integrated children’s services through the roll‐out of the Integrated Community Schools (ICS) programme. Finally, the paper identifies some of the difficulties inherent in ICS transformations, and suggests that practitioners and their leaders and managers need new conceptual tools such as types of social capital with which to examine professional connections if they are to change children’s services and achieve the policy goals of social justice and inclusion.     

Adapting an Outcome-Based Education Development Process to Meet Near Real-Time Challenges to Sustainable Agricultural Production

Purpose: This paper examines the benefits of using an outcome-based education (OBE) method within agricultural extension outreach programmes for professional and farmer audiences. Design/Methodology/Approach: The method is elaborated through two practical examples, which show that focused, short-duration programmes can produce meaningful skill development and impacts at the farm level. Both examples addressed pressing problems that were evolving during the education programme, and we sought a method that would respond adaptively to local circumstances and unanticipated changes. Key aspects of the method include strategic planning to properly focus education programmes, and the integration of data-driven decision support tool development to reduce uncertainty associated with the use of high-risk pest management inputs. Findings: Professionals and farmers increased their knowledge and skills related to pesticide management, and follow-up evaluation documented high levels of adoption of risk reduction and mitigation practices by farmers. Practical Implications: We recommend OBE for several reasons: (1) it uses a group process to elicit an accurate view of the system that learners operate within, (2) it provides cohesive and active learning with the potential for continuation, and (3) it enables feedback between all stages of programme development and implementation. Originality/Value: The most novel aspect of our adaptation of the OBE approach is the integration of, and feedback between, participatory programme design and tool development throughout the process, which maximises the value of each, and their ability to deliver outcomes. The OBE method integrates science, technology and social learning, and connects these with authentic problem-solving tasks to perpetuate learning beyond the classroom to where outcomes are attained.