 |
|
|
|
|
author:
|
Cathy Miles Grant
|
|
description:
|
This paper looks broadly at the field of professional development and the underlying principles that guide current approaches. The paper suggests specific issues that come with the process of supporting teachers in technology use, and concludes with a discussion of ways that current technologies offer resources to meet these challenges and provide teachers with a cluster of supports that help them continue to grow in their professional skills, understandings, and interests.
|
|
published in:
|
paper from "Technology Infusion and School Change," TERC
|
|
published:
|
05/01/1996
|
|
posted to site:
|
06/25/1998
|
The approaches discussed in this paper have been used by schools for a long time, and they hold promise for supporting teachers as they explore ways to make meaningful use of technology in schools. However, the sections above underscore how traditional models of formal and informal professional development have typically been constrained by barriers of time and place. Only recently have educators discovered ways in which technologies can be adapted to support the processes of professional development and break down these persistent barriers of time and space. With the aid of technology, schedules and even time zones can be accommodated, staff can participate from close or distant sites, materials and resources from one context and time can be shared with people in another place and time, and expertise can be made available in even remote locations. The following are some ways in which technology has served as a significant resource for professional development, transcending constraints related to time and distance.
Distance Learning: Expanding Opportunities for Courses and Workshops
Technology can play a significant role in addressing challenges of access to classes and workshops, in which time and place no longer are fixed. With the more informal structure of distance learning (also referred to as netcourses), teachers can participate from varied locations and on their own schedule. Distance learning makes use of any combination of interactive computer conferencing, video and audio tape, and conventional reading matter to allow an instructor and students to interact with one another, independent of time and place.
Teachers can enroll for credit in courses in distance learning programs at universities around the world. Most of these programs follow the traditional university course format in which the instructor lectures, asks and answers questions, assesses student progress, and provides feedback to students about assigned work. In an effort to support reflective practice in ways that traditional courses (provided either in person or through distance learning) cannot, new and informal models of distance learning have emerged, as well.
-
The major teaching formats used in face-to-face instruction have been carried over to netcourses. But are there ways of organizing instruction that are unique to netcourses? The ability to form electronic discussion groups; the future ease of generating, sharing, and publishing hypermedia documents; and the possibility of linking to current research on the net are all features netcourses can exploit better than traditional courses. It may well be, once the technology is in place, that netcourse formats will evolve away from traditional courses and become a uniquely powerful instructional medium. (Tinker, 1995, p. 21)
The advantages of distance learning over attending lengthy workshops or enrolling in regular university courses are many:
- convenience - flexibility of time and location
- immediate application -the option to attend during the school year
- professional association - the opportunity to be part of electronic discussion groups, reflecting on shared content with peers from vastly different perspectives, settings, and backgrounds
- professional growth - the possibility of enrolling in a wide range of courses
- economy - without food, transportation, or housing costs, a netcourse can be provided for one third the cost of residential institutes and half the cost of typical workshops (Tinker, 1995)
- choice - the possibility of choosing from a wide variety of options
|
PBS Mathline is a year-long professional development course dedicated to assisting middle school mathematics teachers implement the NCTM Standards. Local Public Broadcasting System (PBS) affiliates broadcast video lessons, distribute course materials over the computer network, and offer technical and organizational support to provide participants and their students with a flexible and interactive learning environment.
"The Middle School Math Project, the first of several planned Mathline services, is a year-long professional development course for middle school mathematics teachers. Each Mathline group has approximately 25 teachers-some self-selected, some chosen by their schools-and a mentor teacher. The management of each project is handled locally by the 20 participating public broadcasting stations, representing 16 states. The local stations do more than broadcast video lessons-they also distribute course materials over the computer network and offer technical and organizational support to participantsäThe videos are aired on the local PBS station at a time when teachers can tape them (at home or school) for viewing later at their own convenience, or several times to study key points in detail as they choose. The groups discuss the videos in an online discussion facilitated by a master teacher." (OTA, 1995, p. 84)
|
These courses highlight the importance of forming communities of learners. Stepping away from their day-to-day responsibilities, participating teachers explore challenging content and reflect together on teaching in a way that supports learning, engaging in a "constructive process that involves doing-solving problems, communicating, reasoning, exploring, inventing, proving-not passively absorbing and imitating" (Honey et al., 1994, p. 166). In these netcourses, the facilitator's role is not to provide all the answers, but rather to support conversation between participating teachers about their various experiences around shared content.
|
The goal of the Mathematics Learning Forums (offered by EDC and Bank Street College) is "to provide teachers across the country with on-line professional development experiences that support them in implementing aspects of the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics Standards in their classrooms" (Honey et al., 1994, p. 163). Between eight and ten K-8 teachers join eight-week telecommunications seminars to engage in reflective and instructive conversations about content, learning, teaching, and assessment issues in mathematics. Core topics for different forums have included estimation, cooperative problem solving, engaged learning, or focused observations. The Mathematics Learning Forums Project uses video in two ways: as a powerful tool for modeling teaching practices and techniques and analyzing student thinking, and as a vehicle for teachers to represent their own practice to other forum participants.
|
Using Video and Integrated Media to Improve Teaching
Live video, CD-ROMs, or videotapes of skilled practice can play a powerful role in offering demonstrations and modeling to teachers when actual observations are hard to arrange. In the Mathline project sponsored by the Public Broadcasting System (see box above), mathematics teachers use a computer network to take part in an online discussion, facilitated by a master teacher, about the mathematics teaching techniques they have observed through video presentations.
|
"At Michigan State University, Magdalene Lampert and Deborah Ball use integrated media (also referred to as hypermedia and multimedia) to help teacher education students develop new understandings of the work of teaching and learning mathematics in the elementary classroom.
They annotate videotapes and classroom artifacts of inquiry-oriented teaching where students are involved in reasoning, solving problems, and engaging in discussions about mathematical ideas." (Barron & Goldman, 1994)
|
Video and integrated media can model diagnostic processes.
|
"At Vanderbilt University, Victoria Risco uses video-based case studies in her reading courses for
preservice teachers, in order to broaden her students' understanding of children with reading difficulties. They view integrated media presentations of case studies, including multiple sources of information such as video footage of the child reading and of interviews with the parents and teacher, student products, assessment information, and references and abstracts from the literature. These are used as a context for class discussions about factors contributing to disabled readers, and as a model of the case-based approach to diagnosing and addressing reading problems." (Barron & Goldman, 1994)
|
Analyzing videotapes of one's own teaching is a time-consuming process, but it can be a powerful way to help teachers reflect on their students as learners and on themselves as teachers. In some settings, such as the Talking Math and Cheche Konnen projects described earlier in this paper, participating teachers agreed to be videotaped in their classroom (they determined the content and schedule of the taped sessions). The group then watched the tapes in seminar, and reflected on them together (Storeygard & Fox, 1995; Warren & Rosebery, 1992).
-
Typically, tapes of teaching practice are developed to present as models of what good practice should look like, but the apparent perfection of such videos often distances teachers from productive reflection. Videotapes of skilled, real-life teachers being interrupted by the intercom, buzzers, bells, and "stuff" of everyday classroom life, are definitely more accessible and identifiable. The personal connection these tapes produce generates very engaging discussions about real-life practice. (Storeygard & Fox, 1995, p. 29)
In the video Another Set of Eyes in the Science Classroom (Rosebery & Smith, in press), teachers talk about three different ways in which they have used video to help them better understand their own practice:
-
To develop a clearer view of their students' understanding. Setting up the video camera to record a small group's work from start to finish can give a teacher a chance to follow the progression of individual and group thinking (how hard they work, the depth of their thinking, whether and how they check that their answer makes sense, and so on).
To examine her or his own role in the classroom. Watching a video of their own teaching can help teachers distance themselves enough from the situation to see their own practice from a fresh perspective. For example, one teacher notes that he doesn't listen as well as he could: "Sometimes kids 'get it' early on, but I miss it and keep trying to direct conversation in that direction."
To make sense of what students are currently thinking, in order to plan for the next day's lesson. Videotapes of previous classes, combined with collegial feedback, can help teachers design units of study in their classrooms based on their students' evolving thinking.
Using technology, some K-12 schools have created professional development collaborations with universities located too far away for regular visitations.
|
"The Springfield Public Schools (SPS) District #186 in Illinois has linked one elementary school and one high school with the College of Education at Western Illinois University (WIU), 90 miles away through a real-time, two-way television linkage. The network makes it possible for teacher education candidates to observe live classroom instruction by SPS teachers and for the SPS teachers to take college courses and in-service instruction from WIU professors without leaving the school." (Barker, Helm & Taylor, 1995)
|
Electronic Communities of Learners: Expanding the Network Base
Through participation in electronic networks, educators can be supported by peers as they learn to develop their own skills and to use new resources for teaching (Newman, 1994). They can reach beyond boundaries of time and place to join electronic professional "communities of practice" through which they break the isolation of teaching and communicate about issues that are of vital importance to them: trouble-shooting, problem solving, sharing reflections, and trading materials and resources (Coladarci, 1993).
|
LabNet is a vibrant and growing electronic community for primary and secondary science and math teachers who aim to implement the new standards for math and science with inquiry-oriented, project-based learning. It provides a meeting place for teachers to support each other in experimenting with new teaching strategies, reflect on their teaching experiences, problem solve, share resources, and build collegial connections with their peers.
"The LabNet telecommunication network connects more than 1,500 participating teachers from all
50 states. Message boards (where members can initiate and carry on extended, public dialogues),
file libraries (with science materials and project database), on-line chat areas (for real-time conferencing), and a private e-mail system (which supports an Internet gateway and easy computer-computer transfer of many kinds of files) provide the structure for teacher-teacher communications. Teacher-moderators weave together strands of teacher contributions and help to link reflection on the network with action in the classroom." (Spitzer et al., 1994)
|
|
"Montana supports connections between its 15 regional training centers with a telecommunications network, the Montana Educational Technology Network (METNET). METNET uses bulletin board systems that feature curriculum guides, lesson plans, and cooperative learning projects to facilitate the sharing of teaching resources among the centers." (OTA, 1995)
|
Networks can also provide support for professional partnerships between schools and outside organizations. For example, the California Technology Project supports free K-12 telecommunications and preservice teacher links (OTA, 1995). At the University of Illinois, Jim Levin and Michael Waugh work on a number of levels to link teacher education with school practice; see boxed text below.
|
In the Teaching Teleapprenticeships models, developed at the University of Illinois, teacher education students and practicing teachers learn about teaching and learning by participating in electronic network-based activities with K-12 students, teachers and administrators, and university-based teacher educators. Teachers' resources are extended beyond the traditional face-to-face interactions, through network interactions and resource sharing.
During the years before their fieldwork in their senior year, preservice teachers are introduced to the Internet through pre-apprenticeship exercises which link K-12 classrooms to their other coursework (e.g., for a university course in biology, researching and responding to K-12 students' questions about leaf structure).
When they begin their field work, student teachers are then prepared to share their beginning knowledge of using the network with master teachers, and to introduce network-based activities in the classroom. Levin notes, "Some of our cooperating teachers mention that teleapprenticeships are kind of funny because they imply that someone is the apprentice and someone is the master. The master teachers are finding that it sometimes works both ways with their student teachers. They, of course, are the masters in how to teach, but they are often the beginners on how to use telecommunications (Levin, in Weakland, 1994).
"The university conducts a well-attended continuing education course on the use of electronic networks in education for practicing K-12 teachers, and is also working to institute a statewide K-12 network so that graduating students who go on to teach in the state can continue to have access to the Internet." (Levin, 1990; Weakland, 1994)
|
 
|
|
|
