Teachers' informal learning in and from practice : how educational contexts facilitate or obstruct professional learning in upper secondary schools

Abstract

Session: Uppdrag och praktik i pedagogiskt arbete

Projektidé

Läraryrket anses vara en profession där praktiska erfarenheter i yrket kontinuerligt ger nya insikter och utvecklar yrkeskunnandet. Forskningsprojektet undersöker gymnasielärares förståelse av professionellt lärandet, hur detta varierar hos lärare med olika lång yrkeserfarenhet, och hur olika syn på lärande samspelar i skolkontexten.

The purpose is to explore what teachers value as important for their professional learning in Swedish upper secondary school settings and to contrast teachers’ sense-making of learning with assumptions communicated in organized forms of collegial learning and the school organizations’ policy document.

Research questions

• What types of learning do teachers report as important for their professional learning in the teaching practice?

• What are the similarities and differences between the teachers’ perceptions of professional learning and the approaches in forms of collegial learning in the school settings?

• How can variations in views on teachers’ professional learning, within the group of teachers and between the school organizations, be explained and analyzed?

Theory

Evans (2008) distinguishes between requested and enacted professionality; the latter reflects what is observable in groups of teachers in everyday practice. Teachers’ sense-making of learning can be analyzed cognitively as different types of non-formal learning: implicit, reactive, and deliberative learning. Situated learning refers to teachers’ learning through interactions, whereas sociocultural and historical theories consider the surrounding community, processes, and structures as in school organizations and society (Lave & Wenger, 2008).

Method

The research project has a case study approach, allowing for multiple ways of collecting data: text analyses of policy documents on various levels of school governance, interviews with teachers and observations of organized structured forms of professional learning and a follow-up focus group discussion.

Expected results

The project may contribute with providing new insights into how teacher beliefs about professional learning, individual and collective initiatives, interplay with contextual factors in the school settings.

References & Bibliography

Coppieters, P. (2005). “Turning schools into learning organizations.” European Journal of Teacher Education, 28(2), 129-139 

Day, Christopher. (2012) “New Lives of Teachers”. Teacher Education Quarterley, winter 2012.

Eraut, Michel. (2014) “Non-formal learning and tacit knowledge in professional work”. Cambridge Journal of Educational Psychology, 70, 113 – 136. The British Psychological Society.

Evans, Linda. (2013) “Leadership for professional development and learning: enhancing our understanding of how teachers develop” School of Education, University of Leeds, Hillary Place, Leeds LS2 9JT, UK. (Received 2 April 2013; final version received 18 October 2013)

Evans, Linda. (2002) “What is Teacher Development?” Oxford Review of Education, Vol. 28, No. 1, 2002. Carfax Publishing. Taylor & Francis Group.

Evans, Linda. Linda Evans (2008) “Professionalism, Professionality and the Development of Education Professionals”, British Journal of Educational Studies, 56:1, 20-38, DOI: 10.1111/j.1467-8527.2007.00392.x

Evans, Linda. (2019) “Implicit and informal professional development: what it ‘looks like’, how it occurs, and why we need to research it”, Professional Development in Education. 45:1, 3-16, DOI: 10.1080/19415257.2018.1441172

Hargreaves, Andy and Michael Fullan. (2013) Professionellt kapital – att utveckla undervisning i alla skolor. Studentlitteratur AB. Lund

Kemmis, Stephen. (2021) “A Practice Theory Perspective on Learning: beyond the standard view”. Studies in Continuing Education., 43:3, 280-295, DOI:10.1080/0158037X.2021.1920384

Lave, Jean and Etienne Wenger. (2008) Situated learning. Legitimate peripheral participation. Cambridge University Press.

Reid, J-A. (2011). “A practice turn for teacher education?” Asia-Pacific Journal of Teacher Education, 39:4, 293-310.