Information and computer technology (ICT) is expanding rapidly. Whether in the form of virtual assistants like Alexa (Dousay and Hall 2018), generative artificial intelligence (AI) like ChatGPT (Jeon and Lee 2023) or social robots (LeTendre and Gray 2023), teachers must now contend with multiple new technologies.  While educational technology corporations promote the advantages of these technologies as improving student achievement, the actual impact on teachers is unclear.  In some cases, teachers may find themselves spending less time on instruction and more time on dealing with failing technology (Serholt, Pareto et al. 2020).  We know that inclusion of ICT in teacher education has important effects on teachers’ use of ICT (Davis, Preston et al. 2009, Davis and Loveless 2011).  Teacher characteristics also play a critical role in the use of ICT (Gil-Flores, Rodríguez-Santero et al. 2017). However, little research has been conducted on how ICT is related to teacher collaboration or teachers ability to enact leadership in schools via professional learning. Collaboration is crucial to the teaching profession and is linked with teacher’s ability to enact leadership (Woo, LeTendre et al. 2022).  Professional cooperation has been identified as a central element in major reviews of teacher leadership. (York-Barr and Duke 2004, Wenner and Campbell 2017, Nguyen, Harris et al. 2018). Does training or professional development in ICT promote teacher collaboration?  

To address this lack of research, we undertook a study to examine how the inclusion of the use of ICT for teaching in teacher education and participation in professional development (PD) for ICT skills for teaching are related to teacher collaboration and cooperation.  Using the Teaching and Learning International Survey (TALIS) 2018, we looked at two composite measures of collaboration and cooperation. In TALIS 2018, teacher collaboration was measured with a scale that includes: “teaching jointly as a team in the same class; observing other teachers’ classes and providing feedback; engaging in joint activities across different classes and age groups (e.g. projects); taking part in collaborative professional learning.” On the other hand, teacher cooperation was measured with a scale that includes: ““exchanging teaching materials with colleagues; engaging in discussions about the learning development of specific students; working with other teachers in this school to ensure common standards in evaluations for assessing student progress; and attending team conferences.” 

Our fixed-effects estimation showed that both the inclusion of the use of ICT for teaching in formal teacher training and participation in PD for developing ICT skills were significantly and positively associated with teacher collaboration and coordination across a broad range of societies including many European countries (e.g., Austria, Finland, Italy), even after controlling for other variables. In addition, we found that both the inclusion of ICT in formal teacher training and participation in PD were positively associated with professional collaboration in almost all societies only with a few exceptions.

Together, our findings suggest that systematic training or access to ongoing PD in ICT appears to be a promising area to improve teacher’s ability to collaborate and cooperate, and thus enhance teacher’s leadership capacities.  It is likely that teachers who have access to high quality training and PD are more likely to be aware of the positive aspects of new technologies and better able to navigate their pitfalls.  We argue that the inclusion of the use of ICT for teaching in teacher education and participation in PD regarding ICT skills for teaching will become even more salient in the future as the explosion of ICT continues.

Data and Sample Our data source was the 2018 TALIS administered by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD). Beginning in 2008, TALIS has been collecting various information on teachers in mainstream schools in 24 OECD member countries, as well as other partner countries, every five years to assist countries in developing teacher-level policies aimed at promoting high-quality teaching and learning (OECD, 2019). The 2018 TALIS is the most recent survey conducted for this study. The target population includes teachers and school leaders in lower secondary education (OECD, 2019). The intended sample size is 200 schools per country, with 20 teachers and one school leader participating (OECD, 2019). For the 2018 TALIS, 47 economies participated. We excluded regional participants, such as Alberta (Canada), Buenos Aires (Argentina), and Shanghai (China), while including England (UK). Measures Dependent variables. Our dependent variables were (1) teacher collaboration and (2) teacher cooperation. Due to space limitations, a detailed description of the items measuring teacher collaboration and teacher cooperation is provided in Appendix Table 2. For both variables, TALIS generated a composite score with a mean of 10 and a standard deviation of 2. Independent variables. Our independent variables of interest were (1) the inclusion of the use of ICT for teaching in teacher education and (2) participation in PD for ICT skills for teaching. The inclusion of the use of ICT for teaching in teacher education was measured by a dichotomous variable indicating whether the use of ICT for teaching was included in teachers’ formal training. Participation in PD for ICT skills for teaching was also measured by a dichotomous variable indicating whether ICT skills for teaching was included in teachers’ PD activities during the last 12 months. Controls. We controlled for gender, age, educational levels, teaching as the first choice as a career, and full-time employment status when estimating the models predicting teacher collaboration and teacher cooperation. Analytic Strategies We performed descriptive analyses to examine cross-national differences in the inclusion of the use of ICT for teaching in teacher education and participation in PD for ICT skills for teaching. We also estimated the fixed-effect model to examine whether the inclusion of the use of ICT for teaching in teacher education and participation in PD for ICT skills for teaching were related to teacher collaboration and cooperation, controlling for other variables.

Our analysis shows that, on average, about 60% of lower secondary school teachers in 41 nations indicated that that ICT was included in their formal training (see Figure 1) or that they participated in ICT-related PD during the past 12 months (see Figure 2). There was considerable cross-national variation with many European countries (e.g. Austria, Czech Republic, Belgium and Denmark) falling in the low end of the distribution. For example, only 37.8% of teachers in Sweden indicated that the use of ICT for teaching was included in their formal training, but the corresponding percentage in Viet Nam was 96.3%. Only 39.4% of teachers in England indicated that they participated in PD for developing ICT skills for teaching during the past 12 months, whereas the corresponding percentage in Viet Nam was 92.8%. Our fixed-effects estimation showed that the inclusion of the use of ICT for teaching in formal teacher training was significantly and positively associated with teacher collaboration and coordination in many societies, even after controlling for other variables. We found that participation in PD for ICT skills for teaching was positively associated with professional collaboration in all 41 societies. Similarly, we found a positive relationship between the inclusion of the use of ICT for teaching in formal education and teacher cooperation in 28 out of 41 societies. Given the positive relationships between the inclusion of the use of ICT for teaching in formal education and teacher collaboration in 29 out of 41 societies, countries with low levels of ICT intergration in teacher education and PD should carefully consider the impact this may have on teacher’s collaboration and coordination. Improved access to high quality training in ICT may play a role in promoting the conditions for more active teacher leadership via increased professional collaboration.

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