Developing a culture of collaboration and learning among natural science teachers as a continuous professional development approach in a province in South Africa

This article discusses the views of natural science teachers on their culture of collaboration and learning as a continuous professional development approach. It included the support received from their school leadership. The data were collected in a large province in South Africa by means of interviews and a questionnaire. Findings indicate contradictory results between interviews and questionnaires. The interviews reveal that many of the teachers did not collaborate with their colleagues while in the questionnaires they claim that they did. Also evident is that though some teachers do collaborate, the culture of learning is not formalised and not frequent. Further, there were shortfalls regarding the support provided by the school leadership. Thus, the author argues that collaboration has the potential to provide teachers with opportunities for professional growth within a school environment, thereby ultimately increasing their confidence in their teaching abilities.