Abstract:

The findings from this study indicated that teachers in rural primary schools experience ineffectiveness in the implementation of Continuing Professional Teacher Development (CPTD) programmes within their classroom practices. The implementation of CPTD programmes is championed by the district officials who follow a top-down approach that does not recognise the needs and aspirations of the teachers in the real classroom situation. Such a cause emanates from the fact that one day workshops for implementing CPTD programmes are conducted out-of-school site instead of on-site CPTD programmes. These programmes do not improve teacher classroom practices and as such the intended improvement of learner performance is not achieved. Teachers prefer on-site CPTD programmes where they have a voice and work together with both fellow colleagues and district officials. However, from Guskey’s (2002) theory of teacher change, high quality professional development is central to the constructivist approach to CPTD which must adopt the bottom-up approach and contextualized from the view point of the teachers themselves. It is against these circumstances that Wenger’s (1998) social theory of learning postulates the idea of adult learning as involving practical experience and communities of practice. The purpose of the study was to explore the experiences of rural primary teachers in the implementation CPTD programmes under the auspices of the National Policy Framework. A qualitative research methodology was used where data was collected from 18 participants through semi-structured interviews and document analysis. Thematic data analysis was used to analyse qualitative data.

Keywords:

Experiences, Rural, Continuing Professional Teacher Development, Teachers.