The purpose of this paper is to present and discuss the methodological design and the preliminary findings of a research project aiming to conceptualize and systematize the major contributions of an innovative program of teachers´ continuing professional development ­— the Project 10x10 by FCG.

The Commission of European Communities (CEC, 2007) states that the teaching profession should be highly qualified, should be based on a formative process marked by processes of lifelong learning, and should be a profession characterized by mobility and process-based work in partnership. Moreover, there is a growing recognition of the need to promote research practices as an instrument of CPD, as a methodological axis structuring the formative processes, as well as the need to build training programmes based on practical and dynamic partnerships that would bring together different types of actors and institutions (CEC, 2007). Although Richter et al. (2011) define professional development as an “uptake of formal and informal learning opportunities that deepen and extend teachers’ professional competence, including knowledge, beliefs, motivation and self-regulatory skills” (p. 116), the formal learning opportunities tend to become central given the regulatory dimensions of the profession.

Facing the rising need to engage in CPD, Sachs (2009) studied and conceptualized the diversity of programes develloping a complex approach to teachers’ CPD as she identifies two co-existing kinds of guiding goals: professional development as a means to improve pupils’/students’ learning and professional development as a means to develop strong and autonomous teacher professionalism. The author identifies 4 models of teachers’ CPD programs: retooling, remodelling, revitalizing and reimagining. Sachs’ (2009) work both allows us to capture the diversity of the offer of formal CPD programmes and makes clear how informal dimensions of CPD are neglected or undervalued.  

Taking into account the different approaches to CPD, this paper focuses on our research about an innovative teachers’ training program developed by Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian (“10x10”). The innovative character of this program relies on its ability to work in-between spaces of art and education, of school subjects and artistic fields, of schools and museums, of teachers and students, of teaching and learning.  This is so since “10x10” is grounded on cooperative work developed by teachers and artists and implemented by both in the classroom context. Although taking place between the museum and the school, and making use of artistic devices and rationalities, this is not an arts education program; rather it promotes teachers’ critical distance towards the classroom. By being grounded on cooperative and creative team-work, the program aims the emergence of unforeseen pedagogical devices – named as micro-pedagogies in the guidelines of the project “10x10” – derived from artistic strategies of work.

Although we consider that this is only a starting point, subject to the natural dynamic of the research and so on under construction, we present several general questions that will guide the first stage of research:

. From an epistemological perspective, what are the main achievements that emerge from the confrontation between artistic knowledge and pedagogical knowledge?

. At the level of the teaching and learning practices developed by teachers and artists, what type of regularities, similarities and disruptions is it possible to identify?

. What type of relationships can be established between the teachers' pedagogical practices and the artistic practices? Is it possible to map these differences?

. Can these practices be created/developed regardless the scientific domain where they are used?

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