Professional Development in the School Institute “Discovery Experimentation” – Framework and First Results

Abstract

ABSTRACTThis article introduces a Design- and Effect Framework for Professional Development (PD), the research design for a validating intervention study, and first findings from this study. The PD aimed at introducing teachers to a method of inquiry-based experimentation (Discovery Experimentation); During 1.5 academic years teachers attended workshops, were visited in their lessons and coached. Teachers were monitored regarding the development of their beliefs towards inquiry-based experimentation, their respective professional content knowledge (PCK), and their teaching practice. Results suggest that the PD can contribute to improving teachers’ beliefs towards inquiry-based experimentation. Developments in PCK appear to be quite low but might be affected by the small realized sample at the time of reporting.Background: Professional development (PD) in science education is understood to be influenced by personal dispositions as well as by the quality of formal learning opportunities for teachers. Some beneficial promotors of PD can be identified: duration of a PD programme, active learning of participants, content focus, coherence, collective participation. Respecting these promotors in PD programmes is expected to favourably influence teachers’ professional knowledge, their beliefs about teaching, their teaching practices, and – in extension – student achievement. All these aspects (development of professional competence, promotors of PD, relevant goal variables of PD) can be merged into a coherent framework that can inform empirical studies as well as the design of PD. Purpose of this study is to check the validity of one of the promotors by contrasting variant settings regarding “active learning” in two formats of PD. In one of these, participants are encouraged to intensively collaborate and coach each other (PD institute) while teachers’ progress in the other format (personal PD) is left to their own disposal with the coaching function falling exclusively to the professional developers. Sample/Setting: Forty-six teachers from eight secondary schools in Baden-Wuerttemberg (Germany) participated in the PD programme (PD institute: n = 22, personal PD: n = 24). The programme lasted for three consecutive semesters (1.5 academic years). Teachers were introduced to a novel approach to teaching through inquiry: “Discovery Experimentation” as a form of opened experimentation (semester 1). All the teachers were observed twice in their teaching (semesters 1 and 2) which formed the core of subsequent coaching sessions either in the teacher group (PD institute) or individually with professional developers (personal PD). The third semester served as a fade-out phase to still have professional developers available but without intensified personal engagement. Design Methods: This is a quasi-experimental study. Quantitative data were surveyed from teachers – over four points of measurement – on their pedagogical content knowledge (PCK) and their beliefs about teaching with opened experimentation. Paper-and-pencil-tests and -questionnaires prove to survey reliably (PCK: α = .853, beliefs: average α = .738). Most teachers were video-taped twice (semesters 1 and 2); this is the focus of a separate video study on teaching practices whose results are pending. Data survey has not yet been completed – thus, the reported data are provisional allowing, nonetheless, to identify general trends. Results: Trends in teachers’ developing beliefs about teaching with opened forms of experimentation suggest that the PD can contribute to advancing these. Regarding the experimental conditions, the PD institute appears more promising when it comes to improving an understanding of the significance of opened experimentation, and to decrease inhibitors to implementing opened experimentation. We suggest that this is due to increased discourse amongst teachers in the PD institute. PCK develops positively for the duration of the programme but without remarkable effect. Conclusions/Implications for classroom practice and future research: Professional developers should actively encourage teachers to collaborate and discuss content and implications from a PD programme. Left to their own impetus, teachers can easily miss (if not avoid) the development potentials of a formal learning opportunity. This might, ultimately, render any attempts at PD fruitless.