Teacher Professional Engagement and Constructivist-Compatible Computer Use

This report describes a number of aspects of the professional engagement of American teachers. It also examines relationships between professional engagement and teaching practice, including instruction involving computer use. We defined professional engagement as a teacher taking effort to affect the teaching that occurs in classrooms other than his or her own. We measured professional engagement by (1) the frequency that a teacher had informal substantive communications with other teachers at their school, (2) the frequency and breadth of professional interactions with teachers at other schools, and (3) the breadth of involvement in specific peer leadership activities– mentoring, workshop and conference presentations, and teaching courses and writing in publications for educators. Using these measures of professional interactions and activities, we divided teachers into four groups from the mostto the least-professionally engaged using the following categories: Teacher Leaders (2%), Teacher Professionals (10%), Interactive Teachers (29%), and Private Practice Teachers (58%). We tested the hypothesis that teachers who regularly participate in professional interactions and activities beyond their classroom teach in different ways than teachers who have minimal contact with their peers or profession. In particular, we examined whether the professional engagement of teachers correlated with a specific philosophy, with types of instructional practices linked to philosophies, and with frequency and type of computer use. We also showed how professionally engaged teachers distribute by subject area, school and community characteristics (e.g., student SES and ethnicity), and in their own educational and teaching background. We found that the more extensively involved teachers were in professional activities, the more likely they were to (1) have teaching philosophies compatible with constructivist learning theory, (2) teach in ways consistent with a constructivist philosophy, and (3) use computers more and in exemplary ways. We found that professionally engaged teachers were somewhat more experienced than others and had made more investments in their own education but that they taught a representative group of students–they were not less likely present in schools serving disadvantaged students nor were they more likely to be assigned to classes of higher ability students. Finally, we found that although professionally engaged teachers who taught in more privileged situations did use computers more than professionally engaged teachers in high-poverty schools, those differences were largely explained by differential access to technology–at school, at students' homes, and at teachers' homes. Given sufficient access to computers, professionally active teachers will use them in exemplary ways, and given their greater involvement in leadership activities and informal collaborations with peers, teacher leaders are in a position, with sufficient authority and time, to help other teachers move towards being more accomplished users of computer technology. Teacher Professional Engagement Teachers' Personal Definition of Their Role Teachers vary in how they conceptualize their role—their duties and responsibilities as teachers. Some teachers view their work as taking place solely within their classrooms in what is essentially a private, individual practice. They are content to let educational decisions about curriculum, policies or standards be made by outside experts, and they accept that different teachers choose to teach in ways that they themselves believe are ineffective or wrong. Instead, they focus on trying to be the best teacher they can be with the students in their own classroom. Others view their responsibilities as extending beyond classroom teaching to include participation in the larger community of educators and administrators. They see their role as trying to help other teachers be more successful and to influence how teaching occurs in other places. Although few teachers see teaching exclusively in one way or the other, it may be useful to think of this contrast as a continuum from private to professional practice. How teachers define their role will determine how they spend their limited time both in and beyond the classroom.