Abstract:

The use of educational technologies and evaluative teaching methods, and thus mastering these skills, enhances teachers' agency and increases student engagement through active learning. The ability of an individual professional to exert influence that affects their working environment can be defined as professional agency. School system provides an interesting arena for the study of teachers’ professional agency, because the autonomy of the teachers is high, which means that individual teacher’s attitudes and actions impact the practices greatly. Based on this evidence, and with the aim of verifying a dynamic correlation between these three variables, our survey - conducted among a group of 329 teachers from all school levels and grades - investigates the outcome of specialized training in the field of educational accessibility. The study, through the administration of a questionnaire, aims to detect whether, thanks to the training and practices introduced, teachers have, for example, been able to promote cooperation (one of the indicators of self-efficacy and agency)at the school in which they work, using digital technologies and evaluative teaching. The results show, on one hand, a significant increase of competences in the use of innovative digital teaching methodologies (p < 0.001) and in the use of structured and semi-structured tools for assessing learning (p < 0.05) - which pertains to overt activity. On the other hand, the results indicate that this does not correspond to the development of awareness regarding certain conceptual domains (self-efficacy, level of internal assurance, persistence, motivation, dedication) that are prerequisites for teacher agency, understood as situated and systemic action within schools. The fact that the development of methodological skills does not coincide with mastering them in a transformative direction for one's professional development should inspire teacher training actions, especially in light of the spread of artificial intelligence (AI) systems that require a systematic reflection on the educational practice.

Keywords:

Competence, educational technologies, evaluation, overt activity, teacher agency.