Session Information
01 SES 03 C, National Perspectives from Latin America and Europe
Paper Session
Contribution
Teacher´s professional development is an essential process to contribute to the improvement of student learning (Gordon, 2006). However, teacher education is based on solitary, individual training strategies, rather than models that enhance collaborative work (Vaillant & Marcelo, 2018). The collaborative dimension of the teaching activity is often not reflected in the leadership of most schools. Building spaces that promote collaborative learning and connect communities and cultures is a real challenge for today educational systems.
The main purpose of this study is to examine how principals support professional learning communities in Europe and Latin America from a comparative perspective. At present professional learning communities have become a key idea in the educational field. Principal´s leadership plays a significant role in the ability of a school to become a professional learning community that enhances student learning. This study explore what kind of principal creates a professional learning community in his/her school in Europe and in Latin America and contribute to integrate different cultures.
Research questions:
- What is the principals’ role to establish and develop teachers’ professional learning communities in ten European and ten Latin American countries participating in PISA 2018?
- What kind of leadership do principals exercise to connect different cultures and promote student-centered pedagogical practices?
- What differences emerge from the comparison between countries and regions?
- What factors contribute to explaining such differences?
Objectives:
This study is guided by two main objectives. The first one is to generate knowledge about the principals’ role to create and foster teachers’ professional learning communities. The second one looks forward to understanding the relationship between school principals’ leadership and the connection of diverse cultures in the European and Latin American countries participating in PISA 2018.
Theoretical framework:
The theoretical framework of this research is based on the accumulation of the so-called "professional learning communities." “community of practice”, “learning community” or “professional learning community” are terms that focus on the communitarian dimension of teaching activity. As Leclerc (2012) has pointed out, these terms are is based on the idea that the mutual commitment of the participants of a school constitutes a fundamental factor for the development of shared learning.
In “professional learning communities”, group meetings are held periodically - virtual or face-to-face- so as to strengthen work teams, contribute to teacher professionalization and foster the creation of a professional culture with common values and priorities (Gairín, 2018). In particular, in the educational field, “profesional learning communities” aspire to build communities with a high degree of teaching professionalism and high expectations regarding student learning.
Additionally, the study is also supported by the literature on school leadership, which has grown significantly in recent years (OECD, 2013; UNESCO-IIPE-IWGE, 2012; Weinstein, Muñoz & Hernández, 2014). In the past, school leadership was synonymous with the management teams of schools. In the last decade, the conceptualization has varied and it emphasizes that leadership involves the generation of a common culture of expectations, in which all school actors are responsible for their contribution to the collective results related to student learning (Leithwood & Louis, 2011).
Method
This is a multiple case study of a comparative and quantitative nature. The main source of data is PISA 2018 in which 79 countries participated, including multiple European and several Latin American countries. As in all its editions, PISA 2018 focused on the evaluation of 15-year-old students' learning in different areas (through standardized tests) and also collected social and pedagogical data through several self-administered questionnaires (principals, teachers, students and parents). The research will compare the information of Latin America as a whole, Europe as a whole, the 10 participating Latinamerican countries and 10 selected European countries. Among the available forms, the analysis will privilege the questionnaire applied to school principals. In particular, the analysis will exploit data from these questionnaires on the school system, the learning environment, the development of a school culture in continuous improvement, the promotion of teaching practices based on recent educational research and the promotion of professional development activities.
Expected Outcomes
In Latin American and European countries there are school principals with a clear conviction that their role is to promote the professional development of teachers, build professional learning communities and exercise their leadership in such a way that the school contributes to socio-cultural inclusion of students and the implementation of pedagogical practices that take the student as a center. It is expected to find both similarities and differences between Europe and Latin America, as well as among the countries of the two regions. The similarities are probably associated with the school format that has historically prevailed in schools and the scarce tradition of collaborative work in the professional teaching culture. The differences should be linked to the specificities of each of the educational systems under study. Finally, school principals’ discourse must be confirmed through studies of effective practices in the referred dimensions.
References
Beltman S. (2020). Understanding and Examining Teacher Resilience from Multiple Perspectives. En C. F. Mansfield (Ed.), Cultivating Teacher Resilience (pp. 11-26). Springer. British Council Argentina & Fundación Varkey (2020). Investigación y Análisis acerca del cierre de las escuelas en América 2020. British Council Argentina; Fundación Varkey. Cuenca, R., & Pont, B. (2016). El liderazgo escolar: inversión clave para la mejora educativa. Fundación Santillana. Dufour, R. (2011). Work together: But only if you want to. Phi Delta Kappan, 92(5), 57-61. https://doi.org/10.1177/003172171109200513 Harris, A. (2020). Leading school and system improvement: Why context matters. European Journal of Education, 55(2), 143-145. https://doi.org/10.1111/ejed.12393 Harris, A., & Jones, M. (2020). COVID 19 – school leadership in disruptive times. School Leadership & Management, 40(4), 243-247. https://doi.org/10.1080/13632434.2020.1811479 Leithwood, K., & Seashore-Louis, K. (2012). Linking Leadership to Student Learning. Jossey-Bass. OEI. (2017). Miradas sobre la Educación en Iberoamérica. Organización de Estados Iberoamericanos para la Educación, la Ciencia y la Cultura (OEI). OREALC-Unesco (2014). El liderazgo escolar en América Latina y el Caribe. Un estado del arte en base a ocho sistemas escolares de la región. OREALC-Unesco. https://unesdoc.unesco.org/ark:/48223/pf0000232799?posInSet=1&queryId=13f1fd96-5d24-4f23-b7cc-848bb869361b Vaillant, D. (2017). Directivos y comunidades de aprendizaje docente: un campo en construcción. En J. Weinstein & G. Muñoz (Eds.), Mejoramiento y liderazgo en la escuela: once miradas (pp. 263-294). CEDLE; Universidad Diego Portales. Vaillant, D. (2019a). Experiencias innovadoras en el desarrollo profesional de directivos. CAF. Vaillant, D. (2019b). Directivos y comunidades de aprendizaje docente: un campo en construcción. Revista Electronica de Educacao, 13(1), 87-106. https://doi.org/10.14244/198271993073 Vaillant, D., & Rodríguez Zidán, E. (2016). Prácticas de liderazgo para el aprendizaje en América Latina: un análisis a partir de PISA 2012. Ensaio: Avaliação e Políticas Públicas em Educação, 24(91), 253-274. https://doi.org/10.1590/S0104-40362016000200001 Weinstein J., Muñoz G., & Flessa, J. (2019). Liderazgo directivo para la calidad de la 2educación: aprendizajes desde un campo de investigación emergente. Revista Calidad de la educación, (51), 10-14. http://dx.doi.org/10.31619/caledu.n51.793 Weinstein, J., Hernández, M., Cuéllar, C., & Fless, J. (2015). Liderazgo escolar en América Latina y el Caribe. Experiencias innovadoras de formación de directivos escolares en la región. OREALC-Unesco.
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