Case study. Teacher development: addressing the difficulties of schools and teachers

Case study. Teacher development: addressing the difficulties of schools and teachers

Objectives

• To analyse possible difficulties that may appear in the reality of educational centres due to the lack of on-going training and collaborative work.
• To reflect on the general and individual difficulties detected and to relate them to lines of action for the professional teacher development.
• To learn to choose the most adequate paths to professional development for the difficulties and specific needs in the schools and in the teaching staff.
• To design a proposal with lines of action that respond to the training and professional development needed at the level of the centre and the teacher of the case.
• To assess the importance of on-going teacher training for the development of quality education.

Description and instructions for the activity

In order to carry out this activity you will have to answer to a case that you will find below. This is an individual activity in which you must take into account the content addressed in units 4 and 5 of the course to propose the most appropriate professional development options to respond to the difficulties that are presented in the scenario.

In order to complete this activity, you will have to take into account the contents of units 4 and 5 on teacher professional development and on-going teacher training. Read carefully the case that you will find at the end of this statement and follow the following indications:

• Present an introduction indicating the importance of on-going training and professional development activities for teachers in order to improve schools and teachers.
• Identify and point out the difficulties, problems and needs presented by the school on a general level and by the teacher on an individual level.
• Identify and describe two lines of action (of on-going training/professional development activities for teachers) that you would recommend on a school level where the whole school staff is involved.
• Identify and describe two lines of action (of on-going training/teacher professional development activities) that you would recommend to the teacher at an individual level.
• Provide a final reflection in which you indicate to what extent the proposed actions will benefit the school, the teacher and, ultimately, student learning.

Case

Antonio is a primary education teacher in a 5th grade class at a public school in Andalusia, and this is his first year at the school (his third as a teacher). The school has two lines in Primary Education and Early Childhood Education. The ratio is between 23 and 25 students per classroom. Of the 25 students that Antonio has in his class, five of them are diagnosed with specific educational support needs and six are non-Spanish speaking immigrants with less than three years of residence and schooling in the Spanish educational system.

With regard to resources, the school does not have any permanent hearing and language specialist teachers or special education teachers, as these rotate through different schools in the area and visit Antonio's students one day every two weeks.

With regard to the families, Antonio considers that most of his students belong to dysfunctional families with little support at home for their daily work. In addition, he has identified high levels of absenteeism among his students over the past quarter.

The professional relationship between Antonio and the rest of his colleagues is non-existent. When he arrived at the school, he was told that he had total freedom to do what he considered appropriate in his classes, since each teacher works as they wish in their subjects. Antonio confesses that he arrives home every day exhausted and listless. He has never felt more lonely than in this school. He is a very extroverted teacher who is passionate about his work and about technology, but he finds no support from his colleagues.

Antonio prepares his classes daily, and although he is passionate about technology, he does not know how to apply it to the classroom. In other words, he projects materials on the digital blackboard, but he is not sure that this is all he can do to motivate his students using digital resources.

The students, on the other hand, are unmotivated, and he is unable to connect (physically or emotionally) with families to work together and improve this situation. Antonio searches the internet for information and tries to join other schools' Facebook groups to find colleagues to help him with his problems, but so far he has not been successful.

With regard to students who require individual attention or adjustments in the curriculum, Antonio confesses that he is not prepared to deal with some of them. He prints out a card for them every day so that they can learn numbers and simple words. He doesn't know what else he can do because "the curriculum is very complex for these students and they can't get there", the teacher argues.

As for the school's Education Project, it incorporates a teacher training plan. Antonio has found out that, although the training plan is dated this academic year, the content is the same as ten years ago. The plan outlines the mechanism used in the school to develop annual training programmes to meet the needs of the entire faculty. However, as Antonio has verified, this training plan is not being followed at present, apparently due to a series of organisational and economic setbacks.

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