TEACHER PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT: PROMOTER OF INNOVATIVE PEDAGOGICAL PRACTICES WITH THE USE OF TECHNOLOGIES IN BASIC EDUCATION

Nowadays, the integration of Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) in pedagogical practices is a reality that has the potential to transform the Teaching and Learning Process. There are several national and international projects targeting the integration of the ICT in Education. In the 2014-15 school year, the EduLab Program emerged, involving 10 Portuguese school groupings. The EduLab is a technologically equipped classroom for the promotion of innovation in education. Within the EduLab Program, the AGIRE project has emerged with the aim of describing and understanding the needs of teaching and assessment practices, in a school grouping in the centre of Portugal, towards its innovation. The project intended also to promote the teachers professional development (TPD) by the implementation of a 25 hours-workshop.

During the second year of the EduLab project, opinions of the EduLab teachers about their training needs were identified and, thus, arises this research. The goal is to develop, implement and evaluate an accredited Training Course (TC) to answer to the identified needs and enhance the TPD, in order to improve and to innovate their pedagogical practices.

To answer the research question “How to promote teacher’s professional development, in a TC context, towards innovative pedagogical practices and integrating technological resources provided by the EduLab?” the following objectives were defined:
(1) to identify the teachers' perceptions about their teaching practices with ICT;
(2) to plan a 25 hours TC that meets the teachers’ needs;
(3) to implement and monitor the TC; and
(4) to assess the impact of the TC in the TPD and the pedagogical practices.

The recently initiated study falls under a design of case study and uses various techniques of data collection (observation, survey and documentary collection). The participants are teachers of several disciplines of the 2nd and 3rd cycle of basic education (10-15 years-old students).

The study comprises three phases:
(1) development of the TC and the data collection instruments;
(2) implementation of the TC where teachers will develop educational strategies integrating ICT to implement in real contexts; and
(3) impact evaluation of the TC on professional development and teachers’ pedagogical practices.

From the data gathered so far, through a survey about the teachers’ opinions on the introduction of the ICT in pedagogical practices using the Technology Integration Matrix (TIM), it was possible to verify that majority of the teachers identified themselves at the level of “adoption” of the ICT integration in “constructive”, “authentic” and “goal directed” environments, and at the “entry” and “adaptation” levels in the “active” and “collaborative” environments, respectively. When questioned about the desired position in the near future, teachers intend to identify themselves at the level of "infusion" in all significant learning environments, except for the "authentic" environment, where the "transformation" level stands out. At the end of the TC, the teachers shall repeat this exercise to identify eventual progress in the integration of ICT in their pedagogical practices.

It is expected that this research will contribute positively to the integration of ICT in teaching, to the professional growth of teachers, and the development of pedagogical and digital skills, thus fostering the change of practices.