Effect of professional development on teaching behaviors and efficacy in Qatari educational reforms

Abstract

Qatar is undergoing major educational reform that is shifting its educational policy toward an instructional orientation grounded in constructivism and student-centered instruction. Differences in cultural conceptions of knowledge acquisition and the purpose of education are examined to highlight challenges to Qatar’s reform implementation efforts. Self-efficacy theory is reviewed to provide a theoretical framework for our examination of the adequacy of professional development to impact teacher efficacy for implementing reform-based teaching practices. Teaching behaviors in line with the reform and teacher efficacy were quantitatively measured before and after professional development for treatment and control groups. Regression methods were used to examine the impact of professional development on the relationship between teaching behaviors and teacher efficacy. Results indicate a significant interaction effect; for teachers who received the training, the relationship between behaviors and teacher efficacy was negative, while for teachers in the control group this relationship was positive. Implications of the findings for teacher efficacy and professional development are discussed.

Keywords:

• professional development
• self-efficacy
• teaching behaviors
• teaching efficacy
• policy transfer

Notes

An earlier version of the paper was presented at the 2012 meeting of the Northeastern Educational Research Association (NERA) in Rocky Hill, Connecticut. When the research was conducted Whitney Alicia Zimmerman was a graduate student in the Department of Educational Psychology, Counseling, and Special Education.