The continuing professional development of secondary school teachers : insights into self-sought learning

Abstract

With the introduction of the sectorial agreement, signed between the Government and the Malta Union of Teachers in 2017 (see Ministry of Education, 2017) teachers have been incentivised to accelerate their salary scale progression following engagement in self-sought professional learning. This mixed methods research is intended to explore the importance attributed by secondary school teachers to professional learning and self-sought learning. Moreover, this study explores the ways in which teachers seek to develop professionally. Following the process of data collection of 166 questionnaires and 14 teacher interviews, quantitative and qualitative data were analysed using SPSS and MAXQDA respectively. Results show that teachers perceive professional learning as an important tool to develop further in their career and to help their students improve. However, participants still perceive professional learning as an addition to their workload, while job-embedded opportunities are not recognised as such. This thesis also sheds light on teachers’ views on collaborative learning, their learning preferences, and their past experiences. While teachers report that professional learning activities should aim to be fun, engaging, and related to their classroom practices and professional needs, they appear to lack experiences in more innovative approaches to professional learning such as participating in a network of teachers or conducting observation visits. With regards to learning voluntarily, while the majority of teachers are intrinsically motivated to pursue self-sought professional learning, they still mention the need to provide teachers with other incentives, namely monetary help. The main barriers the participants face when they wish to pursue further learning beyond school hours are those of “family responsibilities”, “lack of time”, and “money”. Moreover, a lack of appreciation from the authorities and society appears to be another demotivating factor for teachers. Finally, the implications and recommendations offered at the end of this thesis, highlight the importance of improving professional learning opportunities and experiences for teachers, that include approaches to cultivate more job-embedded professional learning opportunities, improve collaborative practices, and reduce the barriers faced by teachers so they can more readily participate in self-sought courses.