Conference Agenda

Educational change often fails due to its complexity: differing, even contradictory factors, agents, goals, norms or beliefs are involved. Too often practitioners, researchers and educators try to reduce or even ignore tensions, paradoxes and uncertainties and search for clear procedures and the one and only solution in achieving the foreseen change. Outcomes are not always unambiguously good or bad in terms of individual teachers’ practice or students’ learning outcomes. This session considers how to address this complexity not so much by minimizing it but by leaning into it for the purposes of professional growth, informed by data or evidence. The first paper asks, how can novice teachers be supported to make sense of the complexity of teaching and move forward in their thinking and practice? The second paper investigates how educational professionals respond to tensions, and how these responses are shaped by organizational conditions. The third paper considers cross-national professional development opportunities where what is deemed good, bad, appropriate or realistic - might vary significantly from context to context, especially if teachers are situated in different school systems and subject to different pedagogical and social norms. The discussant will present overall insights in an interactive discussion with the audience.

Objectives and problem of practice

In recent years, Austrian education was faced with far-reaching reforms that, i.a., aimed at quality professional education by establishing scientificity and research as constitutive elements of teacher training study programs.

Theoretical framework

A favorable attitude towards research and an inquiry habit of mind (Brown & Malin, 2017) have been described as important antecedents of evidence use in education. However, findings on influencing attitudinal factors and the effects of inquiry learning in teacher training (Wessels et al., 2019) raise the question, to what extent this can be accomplished.

Research question

The two studies presented aimed at exploring

(1) how useful Austrian trainee teachers find research and for what,

(2) to what extent their intention to use research can be predicted by the perceived value and their research-related learning opportunities (RLO, e.g. Rueß et al., 2016).

Methods

In Study 1 (Haberfellner, 2016), 295 students at two teacher training institutions were surveyed about their perception of the utility value of research evidence (e.g., for their thesis or classroom teaching) and their inquiry habit of mind. Study 2 was carried out in 2021 at two institutions, where 125 students were surveyed about the same topics, but also about RLO. Data was analysed via structural equation modelling (Muthén & Muthén, 2017).

Results

In both studies, students showed rather a research-averse than a research-oriented stance. Moreover, results from Study 1 indicate, that the perceived value of evidence for classroom teaching has a positive effect on the general intention to use research, even though research appears to be mainly perceived as useful for thesis writing. Student teachers’ research-related mindset could be further differentiated in Study 2, according to which the research-oriented stance could be predicted by the perceived usefulness of educational research, but also by the extent of RLO during their studies. The results give cause for optimism as they indicate that an engagement with and in research during initial teacher education can contribute to developing some sense of commitment to use research for one’s own teaching practice. But the available utility-value short interventions for initial teacher training (Rochnia & Gräsel, 2022) are of limited effect, which is why more “tailor-made” (= data-wise) intervention studies in teacher education are needed.

Educational importance for theory, practice and/or policy

The results will be discussed against current developments in Austrian teacher education still faced with the challenge that aspirations and ideas of academization come up against structures and traditions that are sometimes at odds with each other. This dilemma is currently exacerbated by the acute shortage of teachers at Austrian schools and the early entry of teaching students into the profession.

Connection to the conference theme

The presented research is based on the theoretical assumption, that a research-orientation is consistent with the professional stance that being a teacher requires lifelong learning (Groß Ophoff & Cramer, 2022), and that evidence can be an resource for enhanced school effectiveness and improvement. Therefore, initial training of teachers is the first, and thus crucial, stage of quality professional education.

Objectives and problem of practice

Tensions that come with educational change greatly influence the success or failure of improvement plans and professional development. For example teachers experience tensions between the different and sometimes inconsistent tasks they have to carry out. The way professionals handle these paradoxes supports or hinders the development of quality professional education (e.g., Lewis & Smith, 2014). This study aims to gain insight into the ways professionals respond to tensions that come with educational change and how these responses are influenced by organizational conditions.

Research question

How do teachers respond to paradoxes that come with educational change? Which organizational conditions hinder or promote strategic reactions to paradoxes?

Theoretical framework

Tensions in complex educational change processes can be seen as an expression of underlying organizational paradoxes (Smith & Lewis, 2011). A paradox is described as ‘contradictory yet interrelated elements that exist simultaneously and persist over time’ (Smith & Lewis, 2011, p. 386). To foster change processes, educational professionals need to navigate these tensions without choosing either one of the apparently opposed elements of the paradox (e.g., Lewis & Smith, 2014). In reality, this is difficult to accomplish. Therefore attempts to relieve the tensions (at least temporally) by choosing one side of the paradox and hence stagnation of change processes is common practice (e.g., Lewis & Smith, 2014). Organizational conditions can influence the way professionals respond to these tensions (Miron-Spektor et al. 2017, Smith & Tracey, 2016) which in turn influences the sustainability of change initiatives. Because of the complexity of this relationship, it is necessary to use data and multiple perspectives to gain insight. It is our goal to develop and validate a questionnaire that helps professionals to gain insight in this relationship and to support decisions to alter organizational conditions in an evidence-informed way.

Methods

Questionnaire development based on a) literature research on the relationship between handling paradoxical tensions and organizational conditions, and b) semi-structured interviews (professionals working in a complex educational change project of a Dutch institution of higher education). The questionnaire will then be validated (in several Dutch institutions of higher education).

Results

Data collection took place in June 2023, validation of the instrument is planned in October 2023. All results will be available at the ICSEI 2024 conference.

Educational importance for theory, practice and/or policy

This study will help to clarify the relationship between approaching paradoxical tensions and organizational conditions that influence them. It will support teachers and leaders to make evidence-informed decisions on altering organizational conditions to foster educational change processes aimed at improving teaching and learning and can be helpful to quantitatively evaluate the effectiveness of policy decisions on this subject.

Connection to the conference theme

This paper fits the focus of the conference on exploring approaches to enhance professional education. Developing (an instrument to gain) insight in the conditions that influence the way professionals handle the inevitable tensions of change processes, will have an impact on school effectiveness and improvement, hence on the quality of teaching and learning.

Objectives and problem of practice

Cross-national professional learning opportunities are increasingly available to teachers. Some of these opportunities relate to calls for more “intercultural” or “global” education (OECD, 2018) and involve interaction among students as well as teachers (e.g., e-Twinning’s, Global Cities). But what happens if teachers and students are situated in very different social or pedagogical contexts and are not necessarily “playing the same game”? How can data be interpreted to evaluate the outcomes of such professional development experiences?

Theoretical framework

This paper reports on a three-month study involving seven teachers situated in Bolivia, India, Mexico, and the United States. The teachers piloted a new history curriculum with teenage students (n=104) via an established online intercultural learning program and platform. While the primary goal was to develop student-centered approaches to history education that could enhance critical historical awareness or consciousness (Clark & Peck, 2019), the experience also represented a professional learning opportunity, with the teachers periodically convening to debrief and reflect. Students engaged in a series of activities inviting them to explore how and why the past is remembered both publicly and privately in their communities. They posted their work online, reading and commenting on one another’s work. Teachers integrated this curriculum into their regular practice.

Methods

The findings are based on analysis of informal teacher focus groups (n=4), student work and comments posted on the platform, student post-survey responses (n=71), and semi-structured student focus groups (n=7) and interviews (n=14).

Results

• Teachers and students described the overall experience as highly stimulating and beneficial. Students appreciated the opportunity to hear directly from peers whose perspectives they would not ordinarily encounter; share their own stories and perspectives with an authentic audience; and explore their identities and values. Students gained at least some substantive historical and/or cultural knowledge.

• However, important cross-site differences emerged. US-based students showed greater critical historical awareness, with some developing insights into how their history education and liberal-leaning context influenced their opinions about the past and monuments. Students from Bolivia, India, and Mexico tended to exhibit a more naïve stance towards the nature of historical knowledge, even while exhibiting stronger pride and engagement with local history and greater excitement at sharing their stories, both locally and online; sometimes they responded thoughtfully to the prompts in ways not anticipated by the curriculum designers.

• These differences reflected important pedagogical and epistemological differences in the teachers’ approaches, which in turn reflected different school structures and societal and pedagogical norms.

Educational importance

This paper raises important practical, ethical, and theoretical puzzles in terms of interpreting data and assessing learning outcomes in cross-national professional learning opportunities. How should ambiguities and differences be negotiated? How can teachers be supported to get the most out of this kind of professional learning in ways that allow for their different contexts and approaches to history education?

Connection to the conference theme

This paper aligns with the conference’s focus on enhancing professional education—and is particularly apt given the conference’s international outlook and emerging trends in professional development.