Professionals make decisions, problem-solve through experience, skill and cognition, while providing a unique community service. For the government-employed professional teacher, professional associations, standards, identity and their employer contribute to professional development (PD). Meanwhile, continuous PD, or professional lifelong…

Claims about teachers' potential to influence change tend to overlook that educational outcomes arise from complex, situated practices of many actors including teachers. This article introduces a tool for Teachers' Reflection on their Agency for Change (TRAC) for empirical analysis of teaching as a collective activity designed to 'track' the…

This article discusses how mathematics didactics can be inspired by and further developed through responsive pedagogy, understood as feedback directed at self-regulation and self-efficacy, in mathematics teaching. The authors explain the rationale behind an intervention model for improving mathematics teachers' feedback practices. The model is a…

The purpose of this paper is to describe the school-based contextual constraints perceived by beginning elementary teachers as they attempted to enact their visions of effective mathematics teaching and the components of a mathematics-specific, university-based induction program designed to support elementary teachers in their teaching of…

The Collaborative Teacher Inquiry Project was a professional development initiative that sought to improve the teaching and learning of Grade 9 Applied mathematics by encouraging teachers to work collaboratively. The project brought together Grade 9 Applied mathematics teachers from 11 schools across four neighboring public school boards in the…

The Summer Curriculum Writing Institute (SCWI) supports graduates of a university-based teacher education program during the induction years and beyond with the aim of impacting teacher quality. The purpose of this article is to describe the development, goals, research, and lessons learned during SCWI from 2005-12. The week focuses around the…

Novice teachers need to develop their professional judgment. Teaching is performed in the face of imperfect, complex but above all continuously emergent situations. These matters have not received adequate attention in theories relating to professional judgment and professionality in teaching or in the contemporary discourse of education policy.…

This paper is a narrative of two dimensions of professional learning: a personal one following the development of the author's own understanding of professional learning and its impact on practice explored through her research into support staff in schools. It draws on three research projects which examined the role and work of teaching assistants…

Te Kotahitanga is a research and professional development project that aims to support teachers to raise the achievement of New Zealand's indigenous Maori students in public/mainstream classrooms. An Effective Teaching Profile, developed from the voices of Maori students, their families, principals and some of their teachers, provides direction…

Many teachers use their own work as the basis for research and this can be a complex and confronting task. It demands merging the roles of teacher, researcher and research participant. These roles may not speak with one voice. Some voices are faint, mere echoes; other voices convey a more confident sense of the different roles. This paper draws on…

A collaborative school innovation project is explored as a pivot for the professional development of the teachers involved. The Second Chance School (SCS) of Acharnes in Greece constitutes such a collaborative innovative project, regarding the underlying theory of multiliteracies, its decentralised character, respect for student individuality, and…

This paper is an account of the early career narrative of a young Emirati teacher, Amal, against the backdrop of the radical reformation of state schooling underway in the United Arab Emirates. Amal's decision to become a teacher was influenced by negative school experiences in her own childhood, thus fuelling her desire to "have a hand in…

Drama for Schools (DFS) is an arts integration professional development program rooted in critical pedagogy and constructivism that emphasizes partnerships between school districts and a major research university. As a part of the research initiative embedded in this professional development program, DFS began an Arts integration Research Teacher…

Given the crucial issues of disproportionality and the growing diversity of our K-12 student population it is imperative that today's classroom teachers be prepared to critically examine, reflect on and respond to practices for learners with diverse needs and from diverse backgrounds. While effective teachers are the key to meeting the needs of…

Positive claims are made for the adoption of practices that permit greater levels of involvement in teacher appraisals. The assumption is that when teachers are more involved in observing and evaluating their teaching, corresponding increases in empowerment and autonomy occur as a direct result. This paper challenges this claim by arguing that…