Abstract:

Teachers' professional development, carried out in a collaborative manner, enhances their metacognitive skills, increases their sense of belonging to the professional community, and provides clear directions for guiding and regulating their classroom practice.

In the present study we aim to provide a processual picture, treated from the perspective of teachers' social interactions, of the reflexive action of collecting a set of relevant, valid and reliable information about the relevance and value of their teaching approaches.

The collaborative self-reflection of teachers within the educational team helps them to identify the successes of a teaching event, the shortcomings encountered during the lesson, the concrete actions taken by the teacher and the principles applied by the teacher. Reflection on the actual action generates the optimal context for collective analysis of the teachers' teaching activity, with a view to improving the instructional-educational act, having as a preamble examples of good practice, obtained in a cooperative and creative manner from other teachers.

Within the research approach, we were interested in establishing to what extent the in-depth knowledge of affinities and relationships within the collective of teachers, leads to boost the practice of analysis of teaching activity, through collaborative self-reflection.

In order to obtain results relevant to our research interest, we applied the sociometric method, based on the sociometric test, to a group of 30 participants, teachers working at the primary, middle and high school levels in the same school. The sociometric test, consisting of three items, measured the preferential and sociometric status of the participants, so that we were able to distinguish the preferential areas of the participants in relation to the collective analysis approach to teaching activity. A relevant conclusion was that optimal social interactions, established between teachers with common goals, enhance opportunities for reflection, by interassisting in lessons and carrying out joint teaching activities.

The survey revealed the proactive attitude of the teachers participating in the study, as they are aware of the importance of collaborative interventions, from the perspective of reflection, to achieve a desirable analysis of personal and collective teaching activity, which will serve to improve the instructional-educational process as a whole.

Keywords:

Analysis of teachers' teaching activity from a collective perspective, collaborative self-reflection, social interactions, teachers' professional development.