Principles of Effective Professional Development
for
Mathematics and Science Education: A Synthesis of Standards
by Susan Loucks-Horsley, Katherine Stiles and Peter Hewson
A Framework for Designing & Identifying
Professional Development Programs
Principles of Effective Professional Development
Designing Professional Development: A District
Profile
School reformers are paying considerable attention to
the role that effective professional development can play in improving the
teaching of mathematics and science. Significant contributions on this question
are represented in national and state efforts to develop standards to guide
reform. Some national efforts, such as those by the National Council of Teachers
of Mathematics and the National Research Council, come from those who are
interested in improving particular subject matter, as well as teaching and
assessment. Other groups, such as the National Staff Development Council,
focus on professional development itself. The Professional Development Project
of the National Institute for Science Education set out to explore whether
the science, mathematics, and professional development communities share a
common understanding of what effective professional learning experiences look
like, and how teacher development should be nurtured. We examined a variety
of standards and related materials
(NOTE: The materials reviewed for this brief are listed
here).
A Common Vision
In fact, a great deal of consensus was noted. Despite addressing the question
from separate perspectives and disciplines, the different materials we reviewed
largely reflect a common vision of effective professional development. According
to that shared vision, the best professional development experiences for science
and mathematics educators include the following seven principles:
1. They are driven by a clear, well-defined image of effective classroom learning
and teaching. This image includes:
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2. They provide teachers with opportunities to develop knowledge and skills
and broaden their teaching approaches, so they can create better learning opportunities
for students. This process includes:
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3. They use instructional methods to promote learning for adults which mirror
the methods to be used with students. Good learning opportunities for teachers:
-
Build on the teachers’ current science and mathematics
knowledge, skills, and attitudes. Teaching teachers means having a good
sense of where they are starting from, by clarifying their initial conceptions
about science and mathematics, so that enrichment activities will be appropriate
for them.
-
Allow teachers to construct their own knowledge through
immersion in the scientific and mathematical processes. Teachers, like their
students, best learn science and mathematics by doing science and mathematics,
by investigating for themselves and building their own understanding, as
opposed to being required to memorize knowledge that is "already known."
-
Provide teachers with opportunities to work in collaborative
teams, to engage in discourse about science, mathematics, teaching, and
learning, and to observe the modeling of relevant, effective teaching strategies.
Many teachers find themselves unable to teach in the ways that students
learn best because they themselves have not experienced that type of learning.
Teachers need experience with strategies such as scientific inquiry, mathematical
discourse, and learning cooperatively if they are going to be able to use
those strategies with their students.
-
Give science and mathematics teachers adequate and ongoing
opportunities to develop, practice, and reflect upon new knowledge and strategies.
Deep learning takes time, and takes place over time.
-
Plan and design for structured, continuous opportunities
for follow-up. Professional development should provide science and mathematics
teachers with a structure, and ongoing support, for reflecting on their
learning, getting feedback on the changes they make, and continually analyzing
and applying what they learn.
-
Unify the set of learning experiences through a comprehensive
plan. Professional development is often experienced as a patchwork of fragmented,
one-time learning opportunities, with limited potential to truly impact
teaching and learning. Effective programs unite those experiences through
a set of goals, strategies, and support over time.
Teachers, like students, best learn science
and mathematics by doing
science and mathematics, by investigating for themselves and building
their own understanding, as opposed to being required to memorize
what is "already known."
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4. They build or strengthen the learning community of science and mathematics
teachers. In an effective learning community:
- Collegiality and collaborative professional exchanges are valued and promoted.
Too often, teaching is a lonely and insulated profession. Teachers need to
support each other and enrich each other’s work. The school or department
should, in turn, support that collaboration: for example, by encouraging science
and mathematics teachers to work together, to observe and coach each other,
to inquire together into questions of common
interest, and to share what they learn from workshops, conferences, and other
professional development opportunities they have attended elsewhere.
- Teachers are encouraged to take risks, and are provided opportunities for
experimentation. They need to know that no one expects them to have all the
answers just because they’re certified as science and/or mathematics
teachers, and that trying multiple times before experiencing success is a
part of learning. They need to feel they are supported in stretching their
limits.
- Professional development is viewed as a lifelong process that is part of
the school norms and culture. Schools should support the idea that everyone
is always engaged in learning, not just students, and that asking good questions
is at least as important as knowing the answers.
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5. They prepare and support teachers to serve in leadership roles if they are
inclined to do so. As teachers master the skills of their profession, they need
to be encouraged to step beyond their classrooms and play roles in the development
of the whole school and beyond. Leadership support includes:
- Planning and implementing professional development opportunities for themselves
and others. Teachers should be key players in shaping that process, not just
the targets of professional development activities.
- Acting as agents of change. Everyone within a school should be thinking
about, and working for, reform. The school’s culture should reflect an
expectation that teachers will take on that broader mission. Teachers should
have opportunities to learn the knowledge and skills they will need to be
change agents, so they can work confidently and competently with others in
all settings.
- Promoting a shared vision of science and mathematics education. Mathematics
and science teachers must continually ask: What is the function of this experience
in the broader context of a child’s education? Is there a common understanding
about the value of the experience by the child, parents, and other teachers
and community members? How can I best promote a common understanding of the
purpose of science and mathematics education?
- Supporting other teachers. Schools, districts and other organizations can
create formal roles for teachers as mentors, coaches, lead teachers, study
group facilitators, and resource teachers, and can prepare and encourage teachers
to assume those roles by providing materials, staff development time, and
other resources. These organizations also can encourage teachers to support
each other in less formal ways, by engendering an atmosphere of cooperation
and providing time for them to work together.
Teachers need to know that no one expects
them to have all the answers just because
they’re certified as science and/or mathematics teachers,
and that trying multiple times before experiencing success is a part of learning.
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6. They consciously provide links to other parts of the educational system,
by:
- Integrating professional development activities into other initiatives of
the school or district. If, for example, a school adopts a new set of science
materials, the school needs to decide what professional development experiences,
supplemental materials, and other support teachers will need in order to make
them work.
- Aligning activities with curriculum frameworks, academic standards, and
assessment. Professional development can help teachers understand and apply
the standards and initiatives that come to them from other levels of the education
system. Teachers can thereby make the most of the opportunities the new standards
provide.
Establishing active support within the school, district, and community. Professional
development, like teaching itself, cannot take place within a vacuum.
- Administrators, parents, and community members need to be aware of professional
development activities for teachers, and to be provided with clear channels
for providing input and assistance to teachers whenever possible and appropriate.
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7. They include continuous assessment. Professional development programs must
constantly be reviewed in order to:
- Determine participant satisfaction and engagement, and to make short-term
adjustments. In the same way that continuous formative assessment is imperative
in science and mathematics classrooms, monitoring teacher experiences in professional
development provides opportunities to constantly improve the impact of these
activities.
- Evaluate the longer-term impact on teacher effectiveness, student learning,
leadership,
and the school community. Too many resources are invested in professional
development to ignore its impact over time. Identifying the full range of
outcomes intended for professional development, and then exploring the extent
to which these are
achieved, can contribute to the knowledge base on professional development
and
improve its design and implementation.
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Policy Recommendations
To support this vision of effective professional development, policy makers
should consider the following issues:
- Using these principles to determine which professional development efforts
should be supported and funded. For example, the principles can be used as
criteria for Eisenhower-funded initiatives, school-based or district-based
improvement projects, or plans for implementing technology. Plans that extend
over time and go beyond workshops and institutes could be given priority.
Just as continuous formative assessment is imperative in science
and mathematics classrooms, monitoring teacher experiences in
professional development provides opportunities to constantly
improve them.
- Improving preservice education programs for science and mathematics teachers,
to model the principles of effective teaching and learning. Coursework at
colleges and universities, especially content courses in science and mathematics,
could model the kind of teaching that teachers are expected to pursue with
their students. Preservice programs for administrators also could change,
to help participants learn to build and sustain cultures of learning for the
adults in schools as well as the students.
- Revamping recertification of teachers. Recertification could depend less
on the amount of "seat-time" teachers log in courses and inservice
programs. Instead, science and mathematics teachers could be encouraged to
pursue more meaningful learning opportunities, such as periodically taking
time away from teaching to perform scientific research. Teachers also could
receive credit for such activities as peer coaching, participation in support
groups, and engagement in professional networks.
- Creating time for professional development. Teachers need regular, scheduled
blocks of time for working and learning together. It could be considered legitimate
for teachers to spend time away from students and performing these activities.
This can be aided by attention to scheduling, staff assignments, and time
allocations.
- Requiring people and work units responsible for curriculum or content issues
to work closely with those who are responsible for professional development.
These two areas of responsibility, which today are often funded and considered
separately, must be seen as inexorably linked.
Building an infrastructure that supports ongoing learning. This could include
the creation of additional roles for teachers as providers of mutual support,
developers of curriculum and professional standards, and developers of licensing
procedures. Teachers also could be active participants in major projects,
such as developing and scoring assessments and portfolios. These new roles
for teachers could be created at the school level as well as statewide and
nationally.
- Modeling effective learning environments. Those who make and oversee policy
have special opportunities to inform people on issues, stimulate change, and
monitor the impact of changes made. These public figures could emulate effective
teaching and learning strategies by actively engaging people in learning over
time, providing the public with different kinds of support for that learning
process, and by seeking to capture the deepening and broadening impact of
their work. They can, in effect, "walk their talk."
- Requiring a strong evaluation component in professional development efforts,
including examination of both short-term and long-term impact. Are educators
satisfied with their professional development experiences? Are they acquiring
new knowledge and skills, and changing their practice based on those experiences?
Are their organizations, by virtue of more collaborative cultures, better
able to meet new challenges, and to implement and sustain changes? Are students
learning mathematics and science better as a result?
Effective professional development means building a culture
of ongoing learning for the adults in a school as well as the students.
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Standards and Related
Resources Reviewed for this Synthesis
Standards
National Council of Teachers of Mathematics. (1991). Professional standards
for teaching mathematics. Reston, VA: Author.
National Council of Teachers of Mathematics. (1992). Curriculum and evaluation
standards for school mathematics. (5th ed.). Reston, VA: Author.
National Research Council. (1995). National science education standards.
Washington, DC: National Academy Press.
National Staff Development Council. (1995). Standards for staff development–study
guide: Elementary school edition. Oxford, OH: Author.
National Staff Development Council. (1995). Standards for staff development–study
guide: High school edition. Oxford, OH: Author.
National Staff Development Council. (1995).Standards for staff development–study
guide: Middle level edition. Oxford, OH: Author.
Related Resources
Corcoran, T. B. (1995, June). Helping teachers teach well: Transforming professional
development (Policy Brief No. RB-16). New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers, the State
University of New Jersey, Consortium for Policy Research in Education.
Loucks-Horsley, S., Brooks, J. G., Carlson, M. O., Kuerbis, P. J., Marsh, D.
D., & Padilla, M. J. (1990). Developing and supporting teachers for science
education in the middle years. Andover, MA: National Center for Improving
Science Education.
Loucks-Horsley, S., Carlson, M. O., Brink, L. H., Horwitz, P., Marsh, D. D.,
Pratt, H., Roy, K. R., & Worth, K. (1989). Developing and supporting
teachers for elementary school science education. Andover, MA: The National
Center for Improving Science Education.
Loucks-Horsley, S., Harding, C. K., Arbuckle, M. A., Murray, L. B., Dubea, C.,
& Williams, M. K. (1987). Continuing to learn: A guidebook for teacher
development. Andover, MA: The Regional Laboratory for Educational Improvement
of the Northeast and Islands.
Loucks-Horsley, S., Kapitan, R., Carlson, M. O., Kuerbis, P. J., Clark, R. C.,
Melle, G. M., Sachse, T. P., & Walton, E. (1990). Elementary school science
for the ’90s. Andover, MA: The NETWORK, Inc.
National Center for Improving Science Education. (1993). Profiling teacher
development programs: An approach to formative evaluation. Andover, MA:
The NETWORK, Inc.
National Center for Improving Science Education. (1991). The high stakes
of high school science. Washington, DC: Author.
U.S. Department of Education. (1995). Building bridges: The mission and principles
of professional development. Washington, DC: Author.
Susan Loucks-Horsley is co-director of the Professional Development Project
of the National Institute for Science Education, and a senior associate with
WestEd.
Katherine Stiles is an associate with WestEd whose previous work
as a teacher and school founder includes experience writing and implementing
elementary level science curriculum.
Peter Hewson is a professor of science education at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
His research focuses on the learning and teaching of science and the education
of preservice and inservice teachers.
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NISE Brief Staff
Directors Denice Denton
Andrew Porter
Project Manager Paula White
Editor Leon Lynn
Editorial Consultant Deborah Stewart
Graphic Designer Rhonda Dix
This Brief was supported by a cooperative agreement between the National Science
Foundation and the University of Wisconsin-Madison
(Cooperative Agreement No. RED-9452971). At UW-Madison, the National Institute
for Science Education is housed in the Wisconsin
Center for Education Research and is a collaborative effort of the College of
Agricultural and Life Sciences, the School of Education, the College of
Engineering, and the College of Letters and Science. The collaborative effort
also is joined by the National Center for Improving Science
Education in Washington, DC. Any opinions, findings or conclusions herein are
those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views
of the supporting agencies.
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Vol. 1, No. 1 May 1996
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A Framework for Designing & Identifying Professional
Development Programs
Principles of Effective Professional Development
Designing Professional Development: A District
Profile
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