Professional learning

UNESCO’s Global Education Monitoring Report for 2023 focuses on technology in education. According to the report’s Profiles Enhancing Education Reviews for 211 education systems, 51% have set ICT standards for teachers ‘in a competency framework, teacher training framework, development plan or strategy’. Here is an international snapshot for 2022.

‘The result of unresolved concerns could well lead to an unwillingness to use immersive technology with students. Yet, often, the barriers are surmountable.’ Dr Susan O’Donnell and Adrian Rayner, from the VR Learning & Design Hub, look at teacher’s prior concerns and some of the solutions.

In his Teacher article Establishing Professional Learning Communities that work, Melbourne principal Dr Lars Andersson shared details of the planning and preparation phase at Richmond High School. In this follow-up, he discusses the implementation experience and the impact on practice and student outcomes.

Any kind of change can be exciting and sometimes daunting, and moving from primary to secondary school is no different. So, what are the worries and challenges for students, and what would help to make the process easier? In this episode we’re discussing the research behind Life Ed’s Guide to Thrive transition program and how student voice has informed the resources.

In our latest reader submission, Dr Lars Andersson ­– Principal of Richmond High School in Melbourne – shares how his school has worked to establish effective Professional Learning Communities (PLCs). In this first article, he explains the thinking behind introducing the PLCs, and the planning and training phase.

'Closely crafting questions, reviewing data, making changes, engaging with open-ended questions were already all part of my daily work in the classroom.’ Dr Jason DeHart discusses the importance of teacher voices in research, and reflects on his own study journey.

In the final article of a series about a 3-year Australian research project into Problem Based Learning in school-based STEM education, 2 of the teachers who are co-researchers in the project – Melissa Gatt and Frank Fabri – discuss student agency as a necessary condition for meaningful STEM learning.

How we can improve the continuity of learning from birth to 12 years? That is the question that will be explored at Research Conference 2023, held in Sydney on 3 and 4 September. In this Q&A, we speak with Conference Convener and ACER Senior Research Fellow Dr Claire Scoular, about the conference theme.

School Assembly is the podcast that explores what it takes to build a new school from the ground up. In Series 1 we’re following Principal Dr Ray Boyd and Associate Principal Rachael Lehr at Dayton Primary School in Western Australia. In Episode 9 we talk about how educational research is the foundation for everything at the school – from classroom teaching to leadership.

In the second of 3 articles about research into Problem Based Learning in schools, teachers involved in the project discuss how it has enabled them to reconsider their classroom practice and the conditions necessary for meaningful STEM learning.