Classroom teachers’ professional development needs as lifelong learning: Which topics and by methods?

DOI

10.2991/978-94-6463-380-1_18How to use a DOI?

Keywords

Classroom teacher; professional development needs; type of professional development

Abstract

The aim of this study is to identify the topics that classroom teachers in Turkey need in their professional development as lifelong education and which types of methods are useful. Although similar studies have been conducted for this purpose, this study also aims to reveal the relationship between the degree of need of the subjects and the perception of which method would be useful. Thus, information will be provided to those who prepare professional development curriculum about which topics should be given by which method. The research is in survey model. The data of the study were obtained from the Progress in International Reading Literacy Study (PIRLS) 2021 study. The analysis of the study was conducted with teachers from Turkey who participated in the study and answered “yes” to the question “during your < post-secondary > education, what was your major or main area(s) of study?”. Within the scope of PIRLS 2021, teachers were asked “how would you prioritize your need for future professional development?” to determine their needs in seven subject areas as “high”, “medium” and “low”. In the same questionnaire, teachers were asked “how helpful is each type of professional development?” to determine which method is helpful as “helpful”, “somewhat helpful” and “not helpful”. Frequency, percentage and Goodman-Kruskal Gamma test were used to analyze the data. According to the results of the analysis, “integrating technology into reading instruction” is the subject that teachers need the most. The method that is seen as the most useful by the teachers is “access to a mentor”. When the relationship between the most needed topic and the most useful method was examined, it was determined that “access to a mentor (e.g., literacy coach)” and “teacher professional learning communities” practices produced a significant relationship with all subject areas. The highest relationship was found between “access to a mentor (e.g., literacy coach)” and “addressing differentiation of instruction for students” needs and interests”. Accordingly, it is recommended that those who design a professional development program for classroom teachers should prepare a program on “access to a mentor (e.g., literacy coach)” method and “addressing differentiation of instruction for students” needs and interests”.

Copyright

© 2024 The Author(s)

Open Access

Open Access This chapter is licensed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/), which permits any noncommercial use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license and indicate if changes were made.

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TY  - CONF
AU  - Gökhan Ilgaz
PY  - 2024
DA  - 2024/02/29
TI  - Classroom teachers’ professional development needs as lifelong learning: Which topics and by methods?
BT  - Proceedings of the International Conference on Lifelong Education and Leadership for All (ICLEL 2023)
PB  - Atlantis Press
SP  - 183
EP  - 191
SN  - 2667-128X
UR  - https://doi.org/10.2991/978-94-6463-380-1_18
DO  - 10.2991/978-94-6463-380-1_18
ID  - Ilgaz2024
ER  -