Understanding primary teachers’ professional learning and practice: an activity theory lens

ABSTRACT

In this study, the author reports on the professional learning of three primary teachers who engaged in three cycles of collaborative action research over a three-year period from 2013 to 2016. Case study was chosen as a methodology to gain insight into the context of the teachers’ work as they interacted with others and adopted multiple tools. Data collection and analysis were on-going over a three-year period, using several sources, including classroom observations, interviews, portraits and teacher-created multimedia artefacts. Cultural-Historical Activity Theory (CHAT) and its activity system unit of analysis (subject, object, tools, norms, community and division of labour) was used by the author to describe changes in the professional learning of the three teachers, the contradictions or tensions they addressed, and how they transformed the aspects of their professional knowledge and classroom practice.

KEYWORDS:

• Activity theory
• professional development
• science education
• teachers

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Goodnough Karen

Dr. Goodnough Karen has been a faculty member at Memorial University of Newfoundland (MUN) since December 2003. Before this, she was a faculty member at the University of New Brunswick and at the University of Rochester, New York. She is actively engaged in research that focuses on collaborative action research, inclusive pedagogy in teacher education, school-university partnerships, science teaching and learning, and teacher professional learning in STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics) education. She is a former high school science teacher and spent several years working in the area of gifted education. She was the recipient of the President’s Award for Outstanding Research 2016 (MUN).