Explaining Differential Effects of Teachers’ Professional Development: The Role of Teacher Content Knowledge

• In Event: Evaluation of Teacher Professional Development

Abstract

Past research has established that in order for teacher professional development (PD) to be effective, it needs to be high quality. However, research also shows that high quality PD varies in its effectiveness. Through in-depth interviews of teachers participating in a middle school science PD intervention, we find that content knowledge plays a critical role in shaping what teachers learn and use from their PD experiences, and we explore several hypotheses about how content knowledge and teacher learning interact. We conclude that the next step toward improving teacher PD is to calibrate learning opportunities to teachers’ prior knowledge.

Authors

• Elizabeth Covay Minor, National Louis University

• Laura M. Desimone, University of Pennsylvania

• Jade Caines, University of New Hampshire