A Chinese Teacher's Perspective on Professional Development in Literacy Education.

This paper presents the teaching and learning experiences of a Chinese literacy teacher in narrative form. The participant's story is presented in his own voice, as constructed from interview transcripts. Challenges and struggles faced by the participant include limited professional autonomy in a hierarchal school system, awareness of conflict between educational theory and classroom practices, and lack of social and institutional support for teachers' professional development initiatives. This narrative is situated in China, but the challenges faced by the participant (Hao-Ying) are similar to my own experiences (as a teacher in Pakistan and Canada) and may strike a chord with other literacy teachers. "The question that I would ask is how can a teacher improve him or herself, without positive reinforcement and encouragement from school authorities? " The question above was posed by my research participant, an international graduate student from China, Hao-Ying1 who, through learning and teaching experience in literacy education, was committed to developing himself as a professional. This paper presents his experiential narrative in story form, as constructed from interview data using the method of narrative inquiry (Clandinin & Connelly, 2000). Hao-Ying's question raises an important point about the effectiveness of professional development initiatives for literacy teachers in his home country of China. Narratives are formed in three-dimensional space; they occur in a particular time, historical, political, and cultural context, and geographic place (Clandinin & Connelly, 2000). Hao-Ying's story is situated in contemporary China, a communist republic with an autocratic educational system. As a literacy teacher and teacher educator in Pakistan, a so-called democratic republic recovering from colonial aftershocks, with a British-model educational system, I was surprised by similarities between my own experiences (Syed, 1999) and the experiences of Hao-Ying. I suspect that Western readers will also find resonance between their experiences and the challenges faced by Hao-Ying in his efforts to become a professional literacy teacher. It is my hope, while reading this paper, teachers and educators will, likewise, reflect on the efficacy of professional development initiatives in their own professional institutions. Before presenting my participant's perspective, it is necessary to define what professional development means in the current context of literacy education literature. What is 'Professional' Development? Continuous, global, professional development initiatives are essential if literacy teachers are to effectively respond to the complex and rapidly changing demands of today's students (Darling-Hammond, 1993a). I use the term "professional" development because I understand teaching to be a professional enterprise. Professional teachers draw upon specialized knowledge to perform their duties (Brandt, 1993). In the performance of their duties, they hold themselves accountable to the highest possible standard-addressing their students' and their own evolving learning and teaching needs. To address these learning needs, teachers must be committed to inquiry, an ongoing, lifelong learning journey (Hargreaves & Fullan, 1992). This journey may take an inquiring teacher along untrammeled and unpredictable paths. Brandt (1993) described the present-day drive for professionalism as originating in the mid-1980s, when policy makers identified the teacher as the critical factor in students' learning and stated that "the quality of students depends on the quality of instruction, and the quality of instruction depends on their teachers" (p. 234). Knowles (1980) envisioned education as "a lifelong process of continuing inquiry . The most important skill of all for both children and adults is learning how to learn; the skills of self-directed inquiry" (p. 41). Not only must professional teachers be lifelong inquirers if they are to meet their own and their students' learning needs, they must also be exemplars of active inquiry to their students. Like Knowles (1980), I define professional literacy teachers as those who participate in self-directed literacy learning and teaching inquiries, which lead to improvements in their practice. While I am arguing that teachers must establish their own professional inquiry agendas, I am not advocating that teachers (or any other learners) learn best when they learn alone. Rather, based on my own understanding of learning as a social enterprise, and drawing from the literature on professional development, I would anticipate that where schools foster a democratic, professional culture, teachers have the potential to grow beyond the expectations they might have set for themselves as individuals. Barth (1990) emphasized that "the professional growth of teachers is closely related to relationships within schools, between teacher and principal, between teacher and teacher" (p. 51). In the current, global context, teaching and learning are complex processes. Darling-Hammond (1993b) noted: There is a little room in today's society for those who can not manage complexity, find and use resources, and continuously learn new technologies, approaches, and occupations. In contrast to low skilled work on assembly lines, which was designed from above and implemented by means of routine procedures from below, tomorrow's work sites will require employees to frame problems, design their own tasks, plan, construct, evaluate outcomes, and cooperate in finding novel solutions to problems. Increasing social complexity also demands citizens who can understand and evaluate multidimensional problems and alternatives and who can manage even more demanding social systems (pp. 753-761). To rise to the challenges of modern social complexity, professional literacy teachers must be able to analyze their practices, recognize problems, and self-direct their professional development to address identified shortcomings. It is important for teachers to engage with their own professional development by situating themselves as active participants in its design and implementation. Too frequently, however, professional development initiatives are coordinated by national or provincial ministries of education, or, in third world countries, international development agencies such as the United Nations Education Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO; Matsuura, 2002). In the complex and multi-layered world described by Darling-Hammond (1993b), it is difficult to imagine that successful professional development could emerge from programs dispensed to teachers who were not consulted in externally devised agendas. Listening for Teachers' Voices My purpose in this study is to examine the experiential narrative of one Chinese literacy teacher, to assess the challenges and successes he has experienced on his way to becoming a 'professional' literacy teacher. At the time of data collection, my participant was enrolled in graduate studies in education at a Western Canadian university, and planned to return to a teaching career in China upon graduation. He hoped to gain knowledge and new perspective into literacy teaching theory and methodology from Western educational theorists. It is my hope that his story will reciprocally provide insight about systematic factors that can encourage and support literacy teachers' quest for professional development. I have narrowed the focus of my research to professional development in reading education in the early years of schooling. I appreciate that the interrelationships among reading, writing, drawing, and spoken language in children's literacy development (Pearson & Stephens, 1994) may make it difficult to separate reading, from other aspects of literacy. However, given my focus on professional development, I felt it necessary to limit the scope of my discussion. I am specifically interested in my participant's perceptions of his own professional development needs, with respect to both societal expectations and his own assessments of students' present and future literacy needs. I am also interested in learning about what enhances or interferes with teachers' professional inquiries in literacy education. The complexity of these questions requires that they may be approached through in-depth study of individual learning and teaching narratives. This paper presents one narrative, from a literacy teacher from China and I hope that it will prompt readers to reflect on their own experiences of professional development in literacy education.