I find writing an editorial a reflective experience, particularly, as I am now one of the longest serving members of the journal’s editorial board. During my time on the board, I have witnessed many changes, notably in terms of the nomenclature in the field, that has encompassed in-service training, continuing professional development, professional development and now professional learning, with more to follow I am sure. I highlight these changes, as in my view, they have been positive changes. They have not been part of what I would term an initiative bandwagon, where those who develop and run professional learning activities and systems create a superficial label that individuals and organisations hook on to until, the next fad comes along.
I also reflect how the journal has changed from its origins as the British Journal of In-Service Education, to the Journal of In-Service Education to Professional Development in Education. The changes in the title were deliberate as they have been in response to the changing nature and growing importance of professional learning within the education and other sectors, where the term training, was and is being replaced with terminology that is more in keeping with the developing professional approach and outlook to post-compulsory learning.
Thus, the journal has been and is continuing on an odyssey that began in the United Kingdom but now is now seen as a global publication recognised by the Social Sciences Citation Index. International recognition that is well deserved, as I know how much work the managing editors, associate editors, international advisory board members, article reviewers and the publishing team put into creating high-quality, insightful and relevant issues.
This final issue of Volume 44, is no exception and can truly be described as a global odyssey with England, Republic of Ireland, Scotland, Norway, New Zealand, Israel, the United States, Iran, Australia and The Netherlands represented. The breadth and diversity do not stop at the nations and continents represented within this issue – it continues with the issues addressed as well as the methodologies adopted to analyse, examine and discuss the subject matter under consideration.
The odyssey begins in England with David Overton’s work – Findings and implications of the relationship of pre-service educators, their university tutor and in-service teachers regarding professional development in science in the primary school system. The article explores what can be deemed the complex practitioner relationship between pre-service teacher (placement student), school-based mentor (practising teacher) and teacher educator (university tutor) within the English initial teacher education (ITE) system that has seen a significant shift towards schools running significant elements of ITE. This is achieved through examining the professional development needs of the three types of practitioner using a grounded theory approach within the context of teaching and learning activity linked to the learning experiences of primary school children during sessions at a local Children’s University (CU) centre.
The article is significant as firstly it investigates and highlights the pedagogical aspects that show this type of inter-working between these three types of practitioner is both singularly and mutually beneficial from a professional learning perspective. Secondly, the policy implications of how university tutors and school mentors work together and the potential impacts this can have negatively and positively on university–school relationships and partnerships in relation to ITE. Thirdly, such working interaction can lead to positive reactions from the students that are involved in this dynamic process of professional working and learning.
The article by Fiona King, Orla Ní Bhroin and Anita Prunty, Professional learning and the individual education plan process: implications for teacher educators, uses a mixed methods approach underpinned by a professional development conceptual framework constructed around the following five elements – teacher’s motivation and expectations for engaging with professional development; professional development experience; learning outcomes; degree and quality of change in practice and systemic factors. It is a welcome addition to the conceptual professional learning literature this journal has called for in recent years.
The article deals with inclusion, special educational needs (SEN) with the key focus being the individual education plan (IEP) process by examining an award bearing professional development programme within a Republic of Ireland context. The conceptual model allows the authors to highlight collaborative practices that need to be developed and addressed as well as teacher educators creating cultures of professional learning that have a teacher leadership and capacity building focus.
The Celtic influence continues with Lorele Mackie’s piece entitled Understandings of mentoring within initial teacher education school placement contexts: a Scottish perspective. The article deals with the complexity of mentoring within a teacher education context, utilising a constructivist qualitative case study approach framed within the current Scottish education policy discourse. It introduces the reader to a Scottish perspective on the international body of literature on the mentoring of student teachers. Significantly, the author addresses the issue from the viewpoints of both the mentors and mentees.
The research findings concentrate on the importance of the multidimensional personal and professional aspects of mentoring. Friendship and building up personal trust over time between the mentors and mentees were identified as being key personal elements in a positive relationship. Whilst at a professional level, it was recognised by participants that the mentees learning and being able to self-evaluate within the mentoring process were key to their development and progression. As for the mentors, they have more than one role that encompasses being a trainer, educator and assessor. To this end, Mackie calls for developing and expanding mentor education, which at present is targeted at those involved in post-ITE induction programmes. This may well help improve the quality and consistency of mentoring for student teachers as well as having policy implications as it runs counter to some current policy initiatives.
Marit Ulvik, Ingrid Helleve and Kari Smith examine What and how student teachers learn during their practicum as a foundation for further professional development. The context of this article is three different Norwegian teacher education programmes preparing secondary school student teachers. The article’s aim is to understand how school practice interacts with university coursework to enhance professional competencies through examining how student teacher work placements contribute to the integration of practical skills and theoretical knowledge. The authors utilised a qualitative focus group approach based on the themes of the placement context; the differences between learning on campus and in the field of practice; and the outcome of field experiences. What is interesting to note about this study is that it is part of a larger project that is examining the education and learning of students in professions outwith teaching such as medicine, music and aqua medicine. Thus, this can be regarded as a collaborative and comparative project that can have multiple professional development and learning implications.
The findings raise key issues as the experiences of the placements varied considerably at times based on attitudes, facilities, mentors and possibilities to learn from experiences. The student teachers highlighted the importance of having solid theoretical foundations so they could develop their practice systematically whilst they were in the field. Additionally, and to no one’s surprise they realised how demanding and time consuming the teaching profession is. The authors argue the placements must be regarded as more than training and not left to chance. As with the previous article, the authors highlight the important and pivotal role mentors play and put forward the proposal that there should be formalised mentor education. The authors conclude that a framework should be introduced that binds university coursework with the placement experience and learning.
The article by Glenda Anthony, Roberta Hunter and Jodie Hunter entitled Challenging teachers’ perceptions of student capability through personal development: a telling case is set in New Zealand. This study is unique in that it concentrates on one teacher participant within the policy-driven whole-school mathematics-based professional development initiative – Developing Mathematical Inquiry Communities (DMIC) aimed at helping to reverse the persistent underachievement of Mãori, Pasifika and other groups of diverse students. The authors made teachers’ decisions about contradictions the conceptual object of their work based on semi-structured qualitative interviews with their participant teacher.
The authors make a telling point when discussing the outcome of their study when they state ‘For teachers, enacting reform is not a matter of wholesale adoption of advocated practices but rather a matter of figuring out whether, when and how to incorporate new ideas into an on-going system of practice.’ The teacher participant faced many conflicts based on contradictions and dilemmas they encountered during the period of the study. Notably, in relation to questioning their practice and their students’ engagement with the subject matter. The authors conclude there are policy and professional learning implications in relation to ensuring teachers have the pedagogical expertise and knowledge allied underpinned by the need for on-going self-reflection to deliver such policy initiatives.
Orit Avidov-Ungar’s article, Professional development communities: the perceptions of Israeli teacher-leaders and program coordinators. The focus of this naturalistic study using semi-structured interviews and focus groups undertaken within the interpretive paradigm is based on the international and internal Israeli discourses of professional development communities (PDCs) led by and for teachers. It explores PDCs as a source for on-going teaching support of teachers; for teacher collaboration and reflection; and platforms for developing leadership skills among teachers. The context being the Israeli Ministry of Education’s pilot Hashkafa (viewpoint) programme that aims not only to improve wholescale professional development for the Israeli teaching force but also to identify teacher-leaders who can teach their peers in a school environment.
Key findings from this study are that teacher-leaders identified the following, four types of support that enable them to facilitate their leadership of PDCs – support of the school’s senior leadership team, logistical support, the support of their teaching community colleagues and support from external personnel such as official school inspectors and subject centre supervisors. However, a number of these were also identified as barriers along with the participants’ heavy workloads. These findings notably, the negative or positive roles school principals play and the level of staff resistance to engaging with such initiatives add to the growing international discourse in relation to the role teacher-leaders play in the professional development and learning of their colleagues, of which this journal has been leading the way over the past decade.
Surviving the first year; new academics flourishing in a multidisciplinary community of practice with peer mentoring by Barbara Kensington-Miller picks up on the themes of communities of practice and mentoring that have been developed in the preceding articles. However, the context is the world of higher education and not the compulsory education sector which adds a further dynamic to the debates initiated in this issue. Kensington-Miller highlights that induction programmes in universities are short and cover the basic fundamentals from a teaching perspective with a deluge of information for the new academics. In essence, this leaves them unsure what is expected of them in their new role. This is a study of ten new academics involved in a unique multidisciplinary community of practice with peer mentoring named Catalyst with the express aim of creating safe meeting spaces for new academics to have deep and meaningful interactions in relation to the academic paths they are embarking on within a New Zealand university.
The study is driven by the powerful personal narratives of the participants obtained through one-to-one interviews, focus groups and the author’s reflective observational journal notes made after each of the meetings. These allowed the author to identify that through Catalyst, the new academics had a greater sense of belonging, created a knowledge building community and continuity was developed through peer mentoring. These factors enabled this diverse group of individuals to understand their agency and grow in confidence and self-belief, which can only be beneficial to the institution and students they teach. As Kensington-Miller notes, such an approach is both economical and sustainable, which is a further factor that it should be continued and adopted by other institutions.
The article Understanding teacher resistance to instructional coaching by Jennifer Jacobs, Alison Boardman, Ashley Potvin and Chao Wang is a study of a diverse group of middle school teachers based in the USA who were assigned an instructional coach as part of a policy-driven professional development initiative to support their required use of Collaborative Strategic Reading (CSR), which is a multi-component reading comprehension approach. The key aim of the study was to better understand teachers’ responsiveness to coaching, particularly those who appeared to be less responsive to working with approach to support the implementation of this new initiative.
The study was carried out over a two-year period based on the evidence gathered from demographic and project data; the meetings and conversations the coaches had with the participating teachers; feedback the coaches gave the teachers; and observation of classroom practice carried out by a trained rater and CSR expert. The study found that receptive teachers were not only more likely to become CSR certified than non-receptive teachers they would also have more meetings with coaches and be more willing to be observed. Whilst the non-receptive teachers, the majority of whom had ten or more years of experience, fell into three distinct categories. Firstly, the resistant to coaching time teachers who did not communicate or meet with their coaches on a regular basis and were reluctant to allow coaches into their classrooms. Secondly, the resistant to CSR teachers who either perceived the CSR model negatively or were not committed to using it in their classrooms. Thirdly, the resistant to integrating feedback teachers who did not actively take up their coaches’ feedback for improving their practice.
Those of us who have been involved in professional development and learning recognise these types of teachers and their characteristics. Their actions raised interesting issues for the author that lead to questions such as to how you get them to buy into such initiatives without making it a mandatory action? Is coaching the only method to achieve the acceptance and implementation of such initiatives or should a variety of alternative professional learning activities be offered to dissipate such resistance? Is the use of coaches the most financially viable method of professional learning and development when seeking to effectively and efficiently implement such policy-driven initiatives?
Parvin Safari’s article, A critical reflection on (re)construction of my identity as an English language learner and English teacher, is a significant addition to the critical self-reflection narrative discourse in the professional learning and development academic literature. It is based on the first-shaped and later-shaped professional identity of the author through her passage as an English student, on to becoming a student teacher in a teacher education university, then her teaching career and to the present as an English teacher, an instructor and an educator in high schools and universities from a unique Iranian educational and societal context.
The narrative journey the author plots for the reader based on various forms of reflective writings, is honest, illuminating and open. Additionally, Safari is brave in the manner in which she articulates her reflections and observations that question her assumptions, learning experiences and pedagogical practices. It brings to the fore the author’s struggles as to her identity both professional and personal as well as various relationships both as a student and as a professional which then impact on her professional learning and development.
As Safari concludes ‘…providing an open space for teachers to narrate their stories helps researchers, educators and education policy makers to be informed about the process of learning to teach, the struggles they are faced throughout this journey, the images that teachers have of themselves, and the impact of this on their pedagogical acts.’
Florencia Gomez Zaccarelli, Ann-Kathrin Schindler, Hilda Borko and Jonathan Osborne’s study, Learning from professional development: a case study of the challenges of enacting productive science discourse in the classroom, highlights how current research emphasises that discourse should become a more prominent feature of learning in classrooms supported and underpinned by professional development initiatives. In order to address this issue within the context of science teaching, this is another study that derives from policy initiatives and focusses on the practice of one teacher. It is in the form of a qualitative descriptive case study examining how the teacher supports elementary school student engagement with science discourse before and after participating in a practice and video-based teacher professional development programme. The researchers utilised video observations of the teacher’s classroom practice, interviews and a survey. The analysis took the form of a using the Science Discourse Instrument (SDI). This instrument measures six classroom discourse practices from the perspectives of teacher and learner. The three teacher practices are based around Ask, Press and Link and the three student practices are based around Explain/Claim, Co-construct and Critique. I highlight this instrument as it is another example in this issue of how methodological concepts and research instruments are taking the analysis, discussion and theorisation of professional learning and development to a much higher academic plain.
The authors found the post professional development classroom practices of the teacher changed in a number of ways. Notably, in terms of developing new activities which increased the student dialogue time in lessons and reducing the number of her teacher actions to facilitate dialogue. The teacher had clearly reflected on her practice which enabled her to feel confident enough to step back and give the learners the space to develop their independent learning through the utilisation of the activities and tools the teacher had been introduced to on the programme. Significantly, the extended length of the programme (compared to other much shorter programmes the teacher had attended) aligned to the time it allowed the teacher to reflect, were significant factors highlighted by the participant as the significant impact it had on changing her practice. These are valuable lessons that should be heeded by those constructing and running professional development and learning programmes.
Changing course: the paradox of the career change student-teacher by Meera Varadharajan, John Buchanan and Sandy Schuck, is a study that examines career change student teachers experiences and views regarding their teacher education programmes in Australia. The authors highlight that the number of career changers enrolling on Australian teacher education programmes is steadily rising with more than one in three Australian secondary teachers having worked in another sector prior to becoming a teacher. These individuals bring with them different work experiences and qualities that can only be beneficial to the profession and the learning of the young people they teach. Thus, the authors felt it was important and pertinent to elicit their views of the programmes they enrolled on and the support they received.
The study adopted an interpretive methodological inquiry approach with the principal method of data collection being an online survey. The survey was both quantitative and qualitative in nature with a number of open-ended questions that informed a significant element of this article. The study identified a number of paradoxes and tensions amongst this cohort of research participants. Firstly, coming to terms with being expert-novices in comparison to fellow students who have just left school and also compared to some of their teaching colleagues. Secondly, being unable to find the flexibility and support to meet the external competing demands of family life and on-going financial commitments whilst studying, dealing with the significant workload that comes with being a teacher and in many cases earning less money as a teacher than in their previous profession. Thirdly, in a number of cases they had held significant managerial positions and were more qualified than their university lecturers, future teacher colleagues and school principals they would be serving. Fourthly, they would in many cases be older than the teachers supervising them. Finally, battling with the need to create a balance based on the acknowledgement of previous experience, working independently but still being assisted in developing as a teacher.
These paradoxes and tensions lead the authors to conclude that universities must become more cognisant of them in terms of ensuring their teacher education programmes can be adapted and are flexible to meet the needs of this valuable group of potential teachers. For example, creating on-line bridging courses to bring these career changes up-to-speed with developing their academic literacy and skills in such areas as assignments as well as being offered the choice of learning either face-to-face or online. This study raises a number of issues in relation as to how teacher education programmes need to address the requirements of career changers that are a challenge that universities need to deal with.
Albert Zeggelaar, Marjan Vermeulen and Wim Jochems’ study, Exploring what works in professional development: an assessment of a prototype intervention and its accompanying design principles, highlights the growing complexity and changes to vocational education and training (VET) in The Netherlands that has increased the pressures on teachers to develop their knowledge and skills. The authors raise the issue as to whether policy-initiated and imposed professional development is the most effective method of developing VET teachers.
To try and answer this, the authors evaluated the design requirements (DR) in a mandatory professional development programme delivered in a VET Institute to identify which were the most effective. The study utilised a DR for Effective Professional Development framework the authors had constructed through theoretical conceptualisation of the extant literature that utilised quantitative and qualitative research instruments.
The framework helped the authors identify that the effectiveness of the programme was limited. Notably, there was a lack of learning amongst the participants because they did not perceive to have ownership of the programme which the authors stated ‘…limits internalisation and attitudinal and intellectual development.’ Additionally, it was concluded that greater attention ‘…should be given to the self-guided cognitive learning ability of teachers as it seems to limit effectiveness because of the mandatory character of the programme.’ Food for thought for policy makers and those charged with developing such programmes. Significantly, the authors reflected on the robustness of the framework and identified that it had gaps and strengths, notably, in relation to construct validity. This allows others to utilise, adapt and improve the framework the authors have constructed and highlights the importance of publishing such work in this journal.
This brings me to draw this editorial to a close through two challenges to our readership and the wider academic community. Firstly, there is clear evidence of conceptualisation and theorisation in this issue and we as an editorial board encourage more of this in the field of professional learning and development. Secondly, social media can play a positive role in developing the academic debate in our field and we encourage you to do so through our twitter handle @PDiEjournal by discussing the articles featured in this issue.