Archive

• Class Size — August 27, 2010
• Mixed-Ability Grouping — August 20, 2010
• Performance-Based Assessments— August 13, 2010
• Teacher Preparation for Urban Schools — August 6, 2010
• Teacher Induction Programs — July 30, 2010
• Phonics Instruction — July 23, 2010
• Single-Sex Education — July 16, 2010
• Teacher Candidates' Field Experiences — July 9, 2010
• Kindergarten Entry Age — July 2, 2010
• Equitable Distribution of Teachers — June 25, 2010
• Drug Abuse Prevention Programs — June 18, 2010
• Data Use by Teachers— June 11, 2010
• School Start Time — June 4, 2010
• Balance Balls and Student Attention — May 28, 2010
• Student Mentoring — May 21, 2010
• Alternative Schools — May 14, 2010
• Low-Performing Schools — May 7, 2010
• Extended Learning Time — April 30, 2010
• 21st Century Skills — April 23, 2010
• Dropout Prevention Legislation — April 16, 2010
• High-School Grade Configuration — April 9, 2010
• Middle-Grades Configuration — April 2, 2010
• Music and Infant Development — March 26, 2010
• Homework and Student Achievement — March 19, 2010
• Foreign Language Technology — March 12, 2010
• Standardized Testing — March 5, 2010
• Charter Schools — February 26, 2010
• PD for Principals — February 19, 2010

The Reference Desk, using available evidence and research, provides quick-turnaround responses to questions submitted by education stakeholders around the Northeast and Islands Region. Every Friday, REL-NEI highlights one or two questions submitted to its Reference Desk.

Online Professional Development for Teachers

The Reference Desk receives many questions about the role of technology in education. This week, the Digest examines online professional development for teachers and, next week, online learning for students.

Question

What does the research say about Online Professional Development (OPD) for teachers?

Research Synopsis

Reference Desk researchers found a number of resources regarding Online Professional Development for teachers. One resource suggests that, “School districts must provide ongoing and effective professional development to help their staff learn to use educational technology in their classrooms. OPD, when carefully tailored to meet local needs, and when well integrated with other ongoing technology and professional development plans and initiatives, provides a powerful way for busy educators to meet this challenge successfully.” (Treacy, 2003; see below)

Publicly Available Resources

1. Successful Online Professional Development. Treacy, B., Klieman, G., and Peterson, K.; Learning & Leading with Technology, Vol. 30, No.1.; September 2002; pp. 42–47.
   

   “The success of your OPD program depends on fulfilling the following elements:

   • Assess local professional development needs and develop an OPD plan based on these needs.
   • Connect OPD with other ongoing face-to-face professional development activities.
   • Carefully select and train OPD specialist team members.
   • Build a strong local team.
   • Develop incentives.
   • Publicize the OPD program and involved local stakeholders.
   • Provide readily available and reliable access to technology and support.
   • Foster a rich, interactive online learning community.
   • Integrate online workshops with face-to-face meetings.”
2. Teacher Professional Development, Technology, and Communities of Practice: Are We Putting the Cart Before the Horse? Schlager, M., and Fusco, J.; The Information Society, Issue 19; 2003; pp. 203–220.
   

   From the abstract, “Over the past decade, education reform and teacher training projects have spent a great deal of effort to create and support sustainable, scalable online communities of education professionals. For the most part, those communities have been created in isolation from the existing local professional communities within which the teachers practice. We argue that focusing on online technology solely as a mechanism to deliver training and/or create online networks places the cart before the horse by ignoring the Internet’s even greater potential to help support and strengthen local communities of practice within which teachers work.”

3. Online Professional Development — concern about the standards of distance education. Richardson, J.; School Administrator; October 2001.
   

   From page 1, “Online staff development offers enormous opportunities to customize learning around individual teacher needs and to make learning convenient for teachers. Learning can be ’just in time,’ when teachers need it most. Online training can allow teachers to learn basic skills with confidentiality or it can open doors to allow teachers to network with colleagues across their school districts or the country… [However] online learning also has the potential to accelerate the worst parts of staff development—the fragmentation and the isolation—without any monitoring of the rigor of the work that teachers are doing.”

The Reference Desk also found these organizations and resources to be helpful in learning more about OPD for teachers:

1. EdTech Leaders Online (ETLO)
   

   “EdTech Leaders Online (ETLO) is a capacity-building online program for K–12 school districts, state departments of education, regional service centers, teacher training institutions, and other educational organizations to enable them to provide effective online learning programs for teachers, administrators and students.”

2. iNACOL (International Association for K–12 Online Learning)
   This nonprofit organization facilitates collaboration, advocacy, and research to enhance quality K–12 online teaching and learning.
3. The e-Learning for Educators Initiative
   “The e-Learning for Educators Initiative is a federally funded program seeking to establish an effective and sustainable model of online professional development that will help address statewide teacher quality needs and have an impact on student achievement in eight partner states.”
4. Leading Gen Y Teachers: Emerging Strategies for School Leaders. Behrstock, E., and Clifford, M.; TQ Research and Policy Brief; National Comprehensive Center for Teacher Quality; February 2009; 17 pages.
   

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