International Portal of Teacher Education
The online resource of academic content on teacher training and teacher education
Section archive - Professional Development
Page 3/37
367 items
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The authors investigated the design and implementation of the Climate Academy, a professional development project intended to help teachers learn about climate change and support the development and implementation of climate change topics in participating teachers’ curricula. This article indicates that a focus on the science of climate change and modeling of theoretically driven pedagogical activities can help teachers improve their climate science knowledge as well as their understanding of how to teach climate science concepts by aligning content and practices with students’ local environment. Furthermore, the authors found that all teachers appreciated the opportunity to learn important content from climate experts and experience hands-on modeling during the summer institute.
Published: 2016
Updated: Nov. 11, 2018
22
The purpose of this study was to explore whether the use of virtual learning community (VLC) associated with an online teachers' professional development program enable Biology teachers to share knowledge with their peers. The findings reveal that teachers that joined the this community intensely shared knowledge both on Biological contents and didactic experiences. They seldom used the VLC-Bio for social purposes.
The authors also found that the effective participation in the collective construction of knowledge on how to teach Biology topics occurred mainly through interaction of teachers with their peers.
Published: 2014
Updated: Oct. 18, 2018
23
This study describes the visions of nine teachers over the course of seven years. The results highlight how the teachers articulated clear visions for their students that focused on helping them become motivated, successful, lifelong learners, and these teachers designed their instruction and classroom environments to support their visions. The authors found, however, these teachers encountered far more obstacles to enacting their visions than they did affordances for working toward them.
Published: 2017
Updated: Oct. 14, 2018
24
The purpose of this study was to examine whether teachers’ motivation to diagnosing, attitude toward diagnosing, the self-efficacy, their knowledge, and reflection on experience in diagnosing would predict their diagnostic competence. The authors also examined whether teachers with professional experience were more competent diagnosticians than students in the second phase of German teacher education who in turn were expected to be more competent than students in the first phase. The findings demonstrate that teachers’ motivation to diagnose and teachers’ knowledge of diagnosing are substantial predictors of teachers’ diagnostic competence.
Published: 2016
Updated: Oct. 10, 2018
25
The purpose of this study is to examine teacher-perceived capacity to meet their students’ additional support needs. This study also aims to identify perceived sources of help or hindrance in meeting students’ additional support needs, as these sources may be relevant when focusing on the improvement of teacher potential. The findings reveal that the participants perceive themselves to be fairly capable of meeting students’ additional support needs. The participants’ own competencies are perceived as being helpful in addressing all dimensions of students’ additional support needs. The teachers discern four sources of help or hindrance to which teachers attribute their success: teacher him/herself, student characteristics, school/working conditions and teachers’ self-efficacy beliefs.
Published: 2016
Updated: Sep. 04, 2018
26
This study aims to explore pre-service teachers’ understandings of scientific modeling during a multi-day, technology-integrated professional development workshop. The authors conclude that such integration holds potential not only for teachers, who must implement such tools in the classroom. The authors also argue that teacher educators can use such technology to elicit and build upon pre- and in-service teachers’ preexisting knowledge and strengths.
Published: 2016
Updated: Jul. 19, 2018
27
This article addresses a growing need to attend to the way teacher professional development (TPD) is enacted in today’s schools. The authors argue that that the physical presence of students is the missing variable in the majority of TPD efforts. In this article, they present a framework for administrators, teacher leaders, and teachers to either evaluate or initiate TPD in relation to levels of physical student presence.
Published: 2017
Updated: Jul. 08, 2018
28
This study examined how teacher professional development could be conceived and conducted to support take up of digital game-based learning in the context of a 3-week social studies unit on governance and citizenship. The findings indicate that preparing teachers to appropriate curricula innovations involves deeply personal transformations that intersect with the core of their professional identity. The teachers, who play the game, face dilemmas and conflicts in making professional and personal decisions. This study suggests that teacher professional development through reflective, reflexive guided appropriation is vital.
Published: 2015
Updated: Jun. 13, 2018
29
This article aimed to examine the factors that influenced the decision for three researchers to make the move from primary teaching to higher education. The authors identified three common, key themes leading to the participants’ career change: exploration and reinvention, key figures and lifelong learners. The results suggest that the participants felt a sufficient degree of competence to pursue a career as a teacher educator within higher education and so made the decision to apply for a position.
Published: 2016
Updated: May. 22, 2018
30
The purpose of this study aimed to gain an understanding of teachers' expertise.
It also aimed to determine the extent to which improvisation was a facet of advanced professional practice. The findings reveal that teacher’s expertise is best expressed as continually evolving practice. The participants argued that advanced practitioners use their expertise to adapt and to interact with their pupils in order to create the conditions in which learning can, and does, take place. The findings also showed that teacher expertise is seen as fundamentally improvisatory through being socially constructed and that this has a positive impact on the quality of teaching. The author found that the primary concern of the teachers was to develop relationships with pupils in order to maximise interaction in the classroom.
Published: 2017
Updated: May. 22, 2018