Mobile Professional Development for STEM Teachers Using AI

این پژوهش با هدف بررسی رابطه مولفه‌های خودکارآمدی و اعتمادسازمانی مدرسه با توسعه حرفه‌ای معلمان دوره ابتدائی با نقش میانجی ادراک رهبری انجام شد. روش پژوهش، توصیفی از نوع همبستگی که با استفاده از تکنیک مدلسازی معادلات ساختاری و با نرم افزار Spss و Amosتجزیه و تحلیل گردید. جامعه آماری شامل تمام معلمان رسمی دوره ابتدایی شهرستان ارومیه 1400 نفر بودندکه با استفاده از روش نمونه‌گیری خوشه‌ای چندمرحله ای با بهر‌گیری از فرمول کوکران تعداد 302 نفر به عنوان نمونه انتخاب گردید. ابزارهای سنجش شامل پرسشنامه‌های استاندارد اعتماد سازمانی Popen (2003)، خودکارآمدی معلم Tschannen-Moran & Woolfolk (2001) پرسشنامه رفتار رهبری ادراک شده(1987) Schriesheim ، پرسشنامه توسعه حرفه‌ای Behdani (2016) بود که روایی و پایایی آن‌ها تایید شد و برای روایی و پایایی آن از تحلیل عاملی تاییدی و آلفای کرونباخ استفاده شد. نتایج نشان داد که خودکارآمدی معلم، اعتماد و ادراک رهبری با توسعه حرفه‌ای معلم ارتباط مثبت و معناداری دارد، اما خودکارآمدی اثرمستقیم و معنی‌داری بر توسعه حرفه‌ای ندارد. اثر غیرمستقیم اعتماد و خودکارآمدی بر توسعه حرفه‌ی از طریق ادراک رهبری مثبت و معنی‌دار می باشد و ادراک رهبری نیز نقش واسطه‌ای را در ارتباط اعتماد و خودکارآمدی با توسعه حرفه‌ای ایفا می کند. در واقع، معلمان به عنوان مجریان برنامه درسی می‌توانند کمبودها و کاستی‌های برنامه های درسی تدوین شده را رفع نمایند و یا این که حتی اگر برنامه‌ای به بهترین حالت تدوین شده باشد اگر معلم اثربخشی و کارایی لازم را نداشته باشد، آن برنامه‌های مطلوب درسی را پوچ یا بی‌اثر نماید.

Aim/Purpose: The study aims to explore the dimensions of identities in relation to an online community of practice (CoP) and how the dimensions of identities influence the way teachers behave on their online CoP. Background: One of the emerging approaches for teachers’ professional development is through a form of community of practice, through which teachers learn through collaboration and active learning. In line with the progression in technology, online communities of practice have been widely accepted as one of the possible approaches for teacher professional development that can enhance the opportunity for collaboration. Even though online CoPs provide a better platform for collaboration and sharing best practices among teachers, some issues lead to a failure of any online CoPs. Day, Sammons, Stobart, Kington, & Gu (2007) stress the importance of understanding the aspects of identities and their impact on how teachers perform and commit to any activities and that an understanding of teachers’ identities is central to any analysis of teachers’ effectiveness, work, and lives. Previous research, however, studied the aspects of identities in the perspectives of the development of their identities as teachers in the context of their daily interaction with significant others in face-to-face mode. However, there has been very little research that has focused on teachers’ identities in relation to their participation in online communities. The extent to which their identities influenced the way they interact, engage, and contribute to their online CoP is still debatable, although it was profoundly stated that identities play a great role in shaping teachers’ behavior in their offline CoPs. Taking this into account, this study aims to identify the dimensions of identities in an online CoP setting and how these identities influence their capacity to involve themselves in online sharing through communities of practice (CoPs). Methodology: This research employed a case study approach which involved 16 teachers from six high performing secondary schools. The selection of the participants was made through purposive sampling. Data was generated through in-depth one-to-one interviews. Data analysis was conducted using thematic analysis through which the emerging themes were carefully identified. Contribution: The study has successfully identified the dimensions of identities in relation to teachers’ participation in an online CoP, which adds to the current body of literature. The result of the study also illustrates how these dimensions of identities interrelated to each other that led to the teachers’ level of participation in an online CoP. Having an in-depth understanding about identities also would provide a better understanding of why the members reacted the way they did and, and how the dimension of identities plays a role in this. Findings: The result of the analysis indicates four main dimensions of identities, i.e., personal identities, professional identities, learner identities and member of the community’s identities. These dimensions were found to influence each other. Overall, there are seven factors seen as ‘immediate’ causes leading to the final outcome (participation in online CoPs), i.e., beliefs in the benefits of informal sharing activities, perceived importance of online sharing activities, perceived role in community, willingness to initiate discussions, willingness to respond, acceptance towards others’ comments, and beliefs in the benefits of online communities. Personal identities affected not only their jobs as teachers but also influenced their commitment towards their participation in the online CoPs in this project. Their prior knowledge and experience influenced teachers’ perceived competency in using online sharing applications. Their prior experience also impacted the way they perceived the benefits of online activities (teachers’ identities as learners) and their attitudes towards them. The findings indicate that different individuals had different sharing preferences, and the differences were partly driven by how they conceived of professional development as well as how they perceived themselves professionally. Recommendations for Practitioners: This study also indicates that to ensure the success of any online professional development for teachers, it is essential to take into consideration the aspect of endorsement by senior management, e.g., principals or coordinators from a district or state level. It is also critical for stakeholders to understand the working culture of teachers and their conception of professional development to ensure any new policies is in line with teachers’ identities. Recommendation for Researchers: The analysis in this study was developed by exploring the reasons behind the teacher’s behaviors. In the future, it will be more meaningful for new researchers to consider the dimensions of identities when they develop any online CoP. Future Research: This study was conducted using a qualitative approach. The emerging dimensions of identities can be used by future researchers as a basis to do quantitative research that covers a larger sample size, through which a generalization can be made. A causal network that was developed in this study can be tested using inferential statistics.

В условиях социально-культурных и педагогических трансформаций высших образовательных организаций важным компонентом их модернизации становится реформирование системы профессионального развития педагогов, перед которой процессы глобализации и цифровизации выдвинули новые требования. Все это вызывает необходимость формирования у преподавателей вузов готовности к постоянному повышению своей профессиональной квалификации и непрерывному профессиональному развитию в контексте единого образовательного пространства. Следовательно, компаративные исследования проблем профессионального развития преподавателей вузов в России и за рубежом являются принципиально актуальными и своевременными. Данные исследования являются ответом на требования современного демократического общества к профессионально-личностным качествам педагогов и векторам их профессиональной деятельности в новых условиях. Готовность к профессиональному развитию у педагогов неразрывно связана с их стремлением к повышению профессионального мастерства и с достижением успеха в работе. Формирование данной готовности, так же как и процесс профессионального развития, в целом должны носить индивидуализированный и одновременно добровольный характер. Для этого необходимы определенные условия, в том числе реальная заинтересованность руководства вуза в профессиональном развитии каждого педагога, наличие различного рода ресурсов и развитая инфраструктура для организации данного процесса, разработанные и апробированные модели индивидуализации профессионального развития педагогов вуза. Бенчмаркинг как технология проведения сравнительно-педагогического исследования моделей профессионального развития педагогов показал свою эффективность в выявлении успешных практик в данной области и позволил выявить три основные модели в организации процесса повышения профессионального мастерства и развития в вузе. Представленные в статье зарубежные модели организации профессионального развития преподавателей вузов могут быть использованы в российских вузах при условии их адаптации к российским реалиям и образовательным традициям. In the context of socio-cultural and pedagogical transformations of higher educational organizations, the reform of the system of teachers’ professional development becomes an important component of their modernization, before which the processes of globalization and digitalization have put forward some new requirements. All this causes the need for university teachers to be ready to constantly improve their professional qualifications and be ready for continuous professional development in the context of a single educational space. Therefore, comparative studies of the problems of professional development of university teachers in Russia and abroad are fundamentally relevant and timely. These studies are a response to the requirements of modern democratic society for teachers’ professional and personal qualities and the vectors of their professional activity in new conditions. Teachers’ readiness for professional development is inextricably linked with their desire to increase their professional skill and achieve success in their activities. The formation of this readiness, as well as the process of professional development as a whole, should be individualized and, at the same time, voluntary. To do this, it is necessary to have certain conditions, including the real interest of the university leadership in the professional development of each teacher, the availability of various kinds of resources, and a developed infrastructure for organizing this process, as well as developed and tested models of individualization of the process of teachers’ professional development. Benchmarking as a technology for conducting a comparative pedagogical study of the models of teachers’ professional development has shown its effectiveness in identifying successful practices in this field and made it possible to identify three main models in organizing the process of increasing professional excellence and development at the university. Foreign models of the organization of professional development of university teachers, presented in the article, can be used in Russian universities, provided that they are adapted to the Russian realities and educational traditions.

The Transforming Assessment Mindsets (TAM) project aims both to research and support teacher training in the real-world context of professional development (PD) in early English language education using a blended Massive Open Online Course (bMOOC). The use of technology in teachers’ PD is recognised as being effective and meaningful and bMOOCs have the potential to widen participation and disseminate innovation. Additionally, bMOOCs associated with online or virtual communities of practice (vCoPs) have been shown to reduce professional isolation, foster engagement and result in higher rates of course completion. The bMOOC Classroom-based assessment in primary English education has been developed with a learning environment design that follows adult learning theories, combining cognitivist and social learning with socio-constructivism and is directed to Portuguese Primary English Teachers. This paper presents the results of the first iteration cycle analysing the pre-bMOOC survey and post-bMOOC survey replies with a focus on the content and structure of the bMOOC. These show general satisfaction with the course but also point out some dimensions that should be enhanced in further iterations, as the navigation and orientation through the different online spaces of the online environment. One major additional finding is that participants reported using regularly Gen AI-supported tools for fine tuning their writings, finding further information and summarising responses

in cross-cultural communication teaching process, professional development of Chinese foreign language teachers seems especially important. This paper first presents basic connotation of professional development of foreign language teachers, then carefully analyzes current situation and various problems of professional development of Chinese foreign language teachers and finally proposes some effective approaches to promote professional development of foreign language teachers in combination of actual situations of Chinese foreign language teachers in cross-cultural communication teaching so as to make foreign language teachers really own, coordinate and share precious professional development experience.

Stage 1: Survival During Stage 1, which may last throughout the first full year of teaching, the teacher's main concern is whether she can survive. This preoccupation with survival may be expressed in questions the teacher asks: "Can I get through the day in one piece? Without losing a child? Can I make it until the end of the week? Until the next vacation? Can I really do this kind of work day after day? Will I be accepted by my colleagues?" Such questions are well expressed in Ryan's enlightening collection of accounts of first-year teaching experiences (3).

This study examines the crucial role of professional development (PD) for STEM educators in enhancing teaching effectiveness through continuous learning. Utilizing a comprehensive review methodology, the study explores various dimensions of PD, including its types, best practices, challenges, and future directions. Key findings indicate that effective PD is characterized by its duration, content focus, collaborative nature, and emphasis on reflective practice. High-quality PD, integrating emerging technologies such as virtual reality and online platforms, significantly enhances educators' skills and teaching strategies. However, challenges such as funding constraints, time limitations, logistical issues, and resistance to change persist. Addressing these challenges requires a multifaceted approach involving adequate funding, tailored content, and continuous support. Future trends suggest a shift towards personalized learning, interdisciplinary approaches, and a focus on equity and diversity, with technology playing a pivotal role in PD delivery. The study concludes that continuous, innovative PD programs are essential for meeting the evolving needs of STEM educators and improving student learning outcomes. Recommendations include adopting personalized and interdisciplinary PD models, integrating advanced technologies, and fostering collaborative learning communities to ensure the sustainability and scalability of PD initiatives. Keywords: Professional Development, STEM Educators, Teaching Effectiveness, Continuous Learning, Emerging Technologies, Collaborative Learning.

Virtual communities of practice (VCoP) have been advocated for some time as a promising means of taking professional development to teachers in widely distributed locations. However, geography, and indeed education literature as a whole, contains very few examples where this has been achieved. This paper reports on two VCoP professional development modules for New Zealand geography and social studies teachers. The first module focused on perspectives in geography and the second on values in social studies. The paper describes the design of the modules and tells the story of each module in practice as two “tales” or narratives. The second tale tells a much happier story than the first, and the reasons for this are explored. The paper concludes by discussing what can be learned about implementing successful professional development for geography teachers through VCoPs as indicated by the results reported through the two tales.

As global education reform continues to advance and the knowledge economy is booming, building a learning society has become an irresistible trend of social development. In this context, improving the professional development and literacy of college teachers will inevitably become a critical link and a significant force to promote the sustainable development of higher education, and it is an essential topic of higher education research in all countries in the world. This paper uses the approach of comparative research to study the historical evolution, connotation, and organization of teachers' professional development in Chinese and British universities. It found that the professional development of teachers in Chinese and British universities is macroscopically aimed at promoting the high-quality development of education and serving students and society. On the micro level, China pays attention to the integrity of the development of teachers in colleges and builds an education and training system from top to bottom, while in the UK, the government, professional organizations, and universities establish professional development institutions for teachers, which are independent and cooperative with each other; the financial support for teachers’ professional development in the UK is flexible and diverse, while in China, the government allocates funds directly; the UK actively carries out international academic exchanges and cooperation for teachers' professional development, formulating rules and sharing experiences, while China pays more attention to domestic exchanges and cooperation for teachers' professional development, with less participation in international contacts.

Teacher professional learning and development are critical to educational improvement efforts and teacher professional growth. Such learning and development can be facilitated in a range of ways, including more traditional ‘workshop style’ training programmes as well as coaching, mentoring, advisory support, teacher inquiry, and other activities that can contribute to teacher learning and change. Despite the extensive time, financial, and human resources invested in teacher professional learning and development in Aotearoa New Zealand every year, it is over 15 years since research on teacher development in this country was brought together in a published review. This paper presents a scoping review of n = 178 primary studies published in English in 2010–2023 that focus on teacher professional development in the Aotearoa New Zealand schooling sector. Looking across this body of literature, we provide a quantitative overview of characteristics of the literature base and identify shifts, trends, strengths, gaps, imbalances, and directions for future research. This paper offers a timely summary and synthesis of recent research on teacher professional development in Aotearoa New Zealand and also offers challenges and recommendations for researchers working in this area.

The use of makerspaces in education has exploded around the world over the past decade (Halverson & Sheridan, 2014); however, their employment in professional development for teachers has only recently emerged within the literature. Previous studies have found that makerspaces have the potential to radically transform how professional development is delivered to teachers by fostering nurturing opportunities to collaboratively engage in professional learning (see Girvan et al., 2016; Kjällander et al., 2017; Panganelli et al., 2017). Despite its emergence in the literature, the study of makerspaces in teacher professional development is limited to those studies inspired by STEAM education (science, technology, engineering, arts, and math). Consequently, little knowledge exists about their use in professional development for second language teachers. While presenting data gathered from reflective feedback questionnaires of teacher participants taking part in makerspace workshops, this paper contributes to the conversation in the literature by exploring the utility and application of makerspaces as professional development for second language teaching. The goal of the study was to explore in what ways this type of experiential professional development might enhance professional learning and reflective practice and contribute to professional growth and development among early career second language teachers. Findings strongly indicate that makerspace professional development sessions offer second language teachers a positive and supportive space in which to reflect and expand on their professional knowledge of best practices in second language teaching by directly engaging with learning activities meant to support students in their acquisition of the target language.

This research aims to investigate the relationship between mathematics teachers' knowledge of STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics) education and their teaching practice in schools during a STEM professional development program. The study involved 34 Indonesian mathematics vocational high school teachers enrolled in the STEM professional development program. Tests and reports on STEM teaching practices served as data sources for this study. Our finding shows a positive correlation between mathematics teachers' STEM knowledge and how they facilitate STEM project-based learning for their students. We discuss two different points of view to interpret this result. Furthermore, we suggest the need for further research to develop sustainable efforts in strengthening the STEM education interdisciplinary approach for the professional development of mathematics teachers.

This study examined the relationships between research culture, organizational learning, and the professional development of teachers at Dologon National High School. This study aimed to resolve the following questions: 1) Determine the level of professional development of the secondary teachers in terms of trainings and seminars, self-efficacy, and advanced degree; 2) Determine the level of research culture of the secondary teachers in terms of infrastructure, capability, funding, collaboration, and interest; and 3) Ascertain the level of organizational learning of the secondary teachers in terms of managerial commitment and empowerment, experimentation, and professional development opportunities. 4) evaluate the relationship between overall professional development and organizational learning and research culture of secondary teachers; and 5) identify the variable, singly or in combination, that best predicts overall professional development of secondary teachers. During the 2022–23 school year, the investigation was conducted with 70 secondary teachers. The instrument measured teachers' perceptions of organizational learning, research culture, and professional development based on their responses to a Likert scale.The findings revealed that teachers' perceptions of professional development and the organizational learning they received from their institutions were both extremely high. However, in terms of research culture, teachers were uncertain as to whether they had the skills and motivation to conduct action research studies at the classroom level. In addition, there was no correlation between professional development and the independent variable research culture. Despite this, a significant relationship existed between organizational learning and professional development. Lastly, professional development is predicted by five sub-variables of organizational learning: managerial commitment and empowerment, experimentation, risk-taking, openness and interaction with the external environment, and knowledge transfer and integration. This research concludes that organizational learning is necessary for the sustained professional development of teachers. According to this definition, "perceived organizational learning" refers to "an employee's perception that the organization values his or her contributions and cares about his or her welfare."

This article aims to explore the impact of social changes on the professional development of biology teachers. The purpose of the study is the analysis of modern challenges in the field of education and the development of a model of professional growth of a biology teacher. The following methods are employed in the study: analysis and synthesis of literature on the research topic to determine the current state of the investigated problem, systematic analysis, and synthesis of obtained information to identify the main models of professional development for biology teachers. The regulatory framework ensuring conditions for the professional development of teachers has been analyzed. Modern economic and technological changes, socio-cultural and political transformations, dynamics of interethnic and cultural relations in Ukraine, high population mobility, and migration processes affect the education system and the professional development of teachers. In the scientific discourse, among effective models of professional development for teachers, scholars distinguish: concepts of teaching and development of teachers' professional abilities based on knowledge (knowledge for practice, knowledge in practice, personal knowledge); models of professional development for educators (training model, award-bearing model, deficit model, cascading model, standards-based model, coaching/mentoring model, community of practice model, action research model, transformational model); competency, cognitive, human-centered models; models of applied science, craftsmanship, reflective, apprentice-expert model, rationalist model, case studies model, cascading. The author proposes an original model of professional development, which involves six stages: analysis of contemporary challenges, professional training based on teachers' needs, creation of an individual development plan, integration of innovative technologies into professional activities, self-evaluation, and the establishment and support of professional communities. The main research results indicate the need to reconsider traditional approaches to teaching biology and emphasize the use of modern technologies in the professional development of teachers for successful implementation of changes in the educational environment.

Teacher professional education development is actually another type of development that crosses over into a category of teacher training development that encompasses two other types of teacher training—one of which is formal and the other is informal teacher training. The other approach to teacher professional development is quite different from the professional development of professional education. The focus of the professional development of teachers is a dynamic process of development in which teachers take the initiative, actively, and consciously pursue the direction of professional development of teachers. Therefore, how to observe and study the direction of teachers’ professional development from the perspective of teachers is an urgent problem that needs to be studied and solved. The professional development of teachers should be combined with their own social and teaching lives. In addition, information technology should be integrated into teachers’ daily teaching life, so that it can be used as a tool to support teachers’ professional development. Information technology has gradually become a tool and a means that teachers cannot do without in their teaching lives, so it is important to study and think about it from various aspects, such as the teaching process and teachers’ growth experiences, and to continuously study teachers’ professional development. Therefore, it is necessary to study how information technology can be used well by teachers and used by teachers to become a useful tool in teachers’ educational and teaching work from various aspects. This paper first argues that the main goal of teachers’ professional development is to gradually grow into expert teachers, while the main content of teachers’ professional development is to understand practical knowledge, and the specific tool used by teachers in teaching is the application of social software support that can support teachers’ professional development (Romanowski and Alkhateeb, 2022). This paper envisages that information technology can be integrated into the entire teaching environment and the teaching process of teachers, as a tool and a means to make the content of teachers’ teaching more concise and clear. Through the use of information technology and other tools, teachers can gradually identify what they need to improve and add to their teaching process, lay the foundation for their future development, and pave the way to become better teachers with a clearer plan for their future development.