Investigating the Effectiveness of a Dynamic Integrated Approach to Teacher Professional Development

Panayiotis Antoniou,Leonidas Kyriakides,Bert Creemers

doi:10.26529/cepsj.439

Abstract

This paper argues that research on teacher professional development could be integrated with validated theoretical models of educational effectiveness research (EER). A dynamic integratedapproach (DIA) to teacher professional development is proposed. The methods and results of a study comparing the impact of the DIA and the Holistic - Reflective Approach (HA) to teacher professional development are presented. Teaching skills and teacher perceptions of teaching of 130 teachers and the achievement of their students (n=2356) were measured at the beginning and at the end of the intervention. Teachers found to be at a certain developmental stage were randomly allocated evenly into two groups. The first group employed the DIA andthe second the HA. Teachers employing the DIA managed to improve their teaching skills more than teachers employing the HA. Teacher perceptions and attitudes towards teaching have not been modified due to their participation in the interventions. On the other hand, the use of DIA also had a significant impact on student achievement. Implications of findings for the use of EER for improvement purposes are drawn and suggestions for research and practice in teacher professional development are provided.

Highlights

This research is in line with the current approaches of merging the findings of Educational Effectiveness Research (EER) with initiatives to improve education and teacher effectiveness
The present paper argues that research on teacher professional development should draw from validated theoretical models of EER in order to develop teacher professional development programmes that will have an impact on improving teacher knowledge and skills but will raise educational standards
When the Rasch model was applied to the data of the baseline measure it was found that all of the teaching skills included in the dynamic model were well targeted against the persons’ measures, since Rasch person estimates range from -3.06 to 3.12 logits and the estimates of the difficulties of teaching skills ranged from -2.93 to 3.16 logits

Summary

Introduction

This research is in line with the current approaches of merging the findings of Educational Effectiveness Research (EER) with initiatives to improve education and teacher effectiveness. Many researchers (e.g., Creemers & Reezigt, 1997; Reynolds, Hopkins & Stoll, 1993) have identified that an important constraint of the existing approaches of modelling educational effectiveness is the fact that the whole process does not contribute significantly to the improvement of teaching practice. Taking this into consideration, this study aims to contribute to further development of the framework related to the use of the dynamic model of EER (Kyriakides & Creemers, 2008) for improvement purposes. EER addresses questions as to what works in education and why, and refers to specific factors concerned with quality of teaching associated with student achievement

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Conclusion