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This paper aims to build a comprehensive picture of teacher experiences as three educational institutions undertook the process of pedagogical strategy reform through professional development thus uncovering important local data to inform policy and the change process in public and private schools in the UAE. This paper compares the outcomes, successes and challenges that impacted each project.

The three studies were ethnographic case studies using autoethnographic techniques. Data were collected using the following methods: survey, semi‐structured and unstructured interviews, evaluations, observation, document analysis, and reflective journals. The data were analysed using an inductive process of identifying themes.

The findings indicate that individual and collective learning as a result of developing learning communities contributes to a new, evolving and organic model of professional learning which encourages a focus on long‐term solutions for educational leadership in the UAE. Some of the issues that arose include the role of the project manager, the value of distributed leadership, levels of decision making, work relations and processes, and training versus education.

This paper contributes to the knowledge base on professional learning in several ways including the development of a better understanding and analysis of teacher professional learning; the development and implementation of a new model of teacher professional learning; the identification of a framework that has a potential application in other contexts; and evaluation of an interdisciplinary application of teacher professional learning.

The study aims at exploring the perspective of three English as a Foreign Language teachers after their year-long involvement in the Lesson Study project in the context of Kazakhstan in order to capture and list any perceived changes in teachers’ educational beliefs over the period of the Lesson Study intervention. The main argument of the study suggests that the school-based Lesson Study initiative is conducive to triggering changes in teachers’ educational beliefs, and thus, might lead to positive changes in school culture in Kazakhstani schools. Shaped following Hill et al., (1982) in Swales, 1990 hour-glass model of a research project (Swales, 1990), the article reflects the third concluding part of the Ph.D. thesis focusing on the implementation of the Lesson Study methodology in Kazakhstan.

The study adopts the qualitative research design and follows the narrative inquiry methodology. The three narrative interviews (Bauer, 1996) are utilized as the main method of data collection. The data were analyzed as text following a general inductive approach (Thomas, 2003), where emerging themes were identified employing data reduction and further sub-categorized through the conceptual and theoretical lenses of the study. The emerged categories reflecting the perceived shifts in teachers’ educational beliefs were dialectically linked to implications for school culture in Kazakhstani schools.

As data suggest, the respondents’ active engagement in the Lesson Study professional learning community and exercising leadership through implementing changes in their classroom practice has made a positive impact on teachers’ rethinking their teaching practice, attitudes to students and their learning, collegiality, and professional self-identification. We conclude that, if organized properly, Lesson Study has enormous potential to facilitate changes of teachers’ educational beliefs: from direct transmission beliefs toward constructivist beliefs, from restricted professionals’ beliefs toward reflective practitioner beliefs and attitudes, toward beliefs in the power of student’s voice, and collaboration. Those shifts are linked to establishing a more positive, child-friendly and rights-based school culture with teachers’ shared visions and capacity for innovation.

We acknowledge that the abundance of the reported positive changes or perceived shifts in teachers’ thinking might not be the indicators of actual changes in their beliefs. We emphasize that the study was carried in a controlled context, i.e. the three ELF teachers were constantly supported, and the teacher talk was systematically guided by a trained facilitator. Warned by Giroux et al. (1999), we are aware of the major challenge of the fundamental assumption of critical pedagogy that teachers are willing and able to undertake “the practice of analyzing their practice” (p. 27) voluntarily. Thus, the question remains open: if the facilitator’s support is eliminated, will the results point to the occurrence of the disruption and disorientation as a necessary condition for the beliefs change?

Carried out in the largely overlooked by the academic literature context of the Reform at Scale (Wilson et al., 2013) in Kazakhstan and building on the original combination of conceptual and theoretical lenses, the research contributes to the academic literature by connecting teachers’ educational beliefs, Lesson Study and school culture. The findings might be of value for the school leaders, educators, teacher trainers, and policymakers to advocate Lesson Study as a systematic approach to the whole-school improvement, as a tool to facilitate positive changes in school culture, as well as give impetus to studies employing the school culture perspective in developing Lesson Study impact evaluation tools.

This study aims to clarify the process of students' discussion in a problem-solving lesson developed autonomously by a teacher. It is expected to contribute to the accumulating and theorizing of teachers' professional development in school-based curriculum studies.

A transcript-based lesson analysis (TBLA) was conducted using quantitative and qualitative methods. The data were from a third-year junior high school social studies lesson in which whole-class discussions took place. The frequency of the appearance of keywords in the utterances was represented in the form of cumulative relative frequency graphs, and a diagram of the students' discussion process was drawn based on them.

The diagram confirmed the frequent occurrence, disappearance and transmission of keywords in the process of the lesson. The interpretation of the lesson transcript revealed that the students listened carefully to others' utterances, shared important keywords and examined the ideas critically. They were supported in identifying the connections between their interests by the teacher. The students' interactions and teacher's interventions were facilitated by the integrated curriculum design of teaching and learning.

This study verifies that students' collaborative and critical learning takes place in a lesson developed by a teacher based on the practiced curriculum. The findings of this study suggest that lesson study (LS) focusing on the words in utterances provide clues for evaluating the practiced curriculum and reveal the teacher's professional development.

The purpose of this study is to gain insight into and understand the authentic lived experience of the processes of collaborative inquiry in teamwork from the perspective of teachers.

Data comprises stimulated recall interviews and semi-structured interviews. Seventeen teachers from four different teams in four schools form the empirical basis.

The analysis reveals that a shared focus on students’ learning in teachers’ processes of collaborative inquiry results in awareness and increased knowledge of what constitutes students’ learning. Thus, teachers are potentially becoming better equipped to facilitate students’ learning by offering them a richer set of learning opportunities. Findings confirm the key role of critical reflection through bringing teachers’ assumptions about teaching and learning to the surface, available for common exploration. When exploring problems of practice and sharing ideas and suggestions for possible solutions, teacher teams operate in a collective zone of proximal development.

This analysis of teachers’ reflections on the processes of collaborative inquiry supports school leaders and facilitators of school development by revealing fundamental and often hidden characteristics of teamwork collaboration.

Findings about teachers’ professional learning through collaborative inquiry in teamwork enhance knowledge about how teachers learn in authentic settings, and unpack the capabilities of teachers to author their own pedagogical changes. This study thus challenges linear models of professional development and the idea of professional development as mainly delivery-based.

This paper reports on how a group of secondary school teachers collaborated in a school‐based professional development called Learning Study to improve accounting students' performance on the drawing up of cash budgets.

In drawing up cash budgets – the object of learning – a power point presentation incorporating systematic variation was designed to reduce the overwhelming mass of (often irrelevant) data normally presented to students in textbooks and examiners' reports as part of the solutions to cash budget problems. In total, three lessons were designed focusing on how the object of learning could be handled. In each lesson the critical aspects corresponding to the object of learning were identified and a systematic pattern of variation was applied.

It was found that student learning improved progressively over the three lessons.

There is evidence to suggest that this Learning Study has made an impact, not only on student learning but also on teacher learning, and has contributed in some way to creating a learning culture in this school.

This chapter describes a cyclical mentoring model that is designed to scaffold the use of video in a graduate literacy practicum for in-service teachers.

This chapter is organized by (1) an overview of the Literacy Practicum course and the three learning phases and activities within each phase; (2) a description of the mentoring process/procedures during each of the phases, and examples of their impact on teachers’ learning and practice; and (3) a discussion of implications for practice.

Drawing upon recent work in teacher inquiry and reflection, this model provides opportunities for teachers to take increasing ownership of their own professional growth.

The examples in this chapter are anecdotal. But they help to illustrate the processes and procedures in this model, which is described with great detail in order to be useful for pre- and in-service teachers, as well as school-based professional development programs.

The model can be effectively incorporated into both pre-service clinical settings as well as professional development with in-service teachers.

As a potential high impact tool, video analysis of teaching must not be viewed as an incidental approach; rather it must be an integral part of a learning cycle which is committed to student ownership and voice, social engagement, critical inquiry, reflection and integrative learning.

Transition can be seen as the capstone of many if not most efforts of special educators on behalf of students with disabilities. Transition programs must build upon the foundation set by general and special education teachers to promote accomplishments that will support engagement in adult life. The assumption underlying transition policy is that classroom personnel are adequately trained and supported to promote such outcomes. We investigated that assumption through research on the perceptions of 17 graduate students or recent completers of an alternative certification program serving a large urban district in the northeast. Study participants were interviewed regarding the provision of special education services at their assigned schools, the manner in which they were utilized, the degree to which they felt prepared and supported to teach students with disabilities, and recommendations for improving special education services, teacher training, and support. All participants taught special education students in secondary settings and were assigned to different schools. Several themes were identified including stress due to professional demands, concerns with collaboration and the quality of special education services, and a need for additional special education training. Implications for transition are discussed.

A growing number of countries have developed Teacher Professional Standards that describe how effective teaching is conceptualized and demonstrated. This article describes how initial teacher education and continuous professional development (CPD) is organized in Estonia, and what role professional standards have in the Estonian context. We demonstrate how the Estonian decentralized preservice teacher education and CPD system supports high quality and flexible teacher professional development throughout their careers. We will also pinpoint the biggest challenges that are currently experienced in Estonia regarding teacher education and professional development. Drawing on the international experiences, we will also discuss how Teacher Professional Standards could be further developed in Estonia to better serve as a guide for both initial teacher education and continuous professional development.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the development of mathematics teachers’ pedagogical content knowledge (PCK) over successive cycles of lesson study. Utilising the framework of mathematical knowledge for teaching (MKT) (Ball et al., 2008), this research classifies features of PCK as utilised by post-primary mathematics teachers in their planning and reflection conversations in lesson study. The development of these features of PCK is then traced over successive cycles.

In total, 12 teachers in two Irish post-primary schools participated in this research. Over the course of one academic year, these two groups of teachers completed a number of cycles of lesson study and qualitative data were generated through audio recordings of all lesson study meetings and through individual interviews with participants.

Analysis of teacher dialogue reveals distinct features of knowledge of content and students (KCS) and knowledge of content and teaching (KCT) incorporated by these teachers in their planning and reflection conversations, providing empirical evidence of MKT in lesson study. The occurrence of these features of KCS and KCT in lesson study conversations increased over successive cycles, demonstrating teacher learning.

This research contributes to the literature in expanding the theoretical underpinnings of teacher learning in lesson study. It also provides further empirical evidence of MKT (Ball et al., 2008) in teacher practice, specifically related to post-primary mathematics teachers.