Page 139 - The SpeakTeach method - Esther de Vrind

with the achievement of both the goals of the innovation and their own other goals. These findings are unique because the implementation of innovations often conflicts with teachers’ other goals and therefore often fails (Kennedy, 2016; Janssen et al, 2013). This study shows that the principles of modularity and self-evaluation in SpeakTeach made it possible to achieve both types of goals, those related to the innovation and teachers' other goals, at the same time. This was confirmed by the finding that nearly all of the teachers had firm intentions to continue to use the method in the future and reported after a year that they were indeed still using parts of it.
All of the participants reported that they had succeeded in expanding their teaching repertoire, except for one who did not implement one of the three procedures. The results demonstrate that the adaptive professional development trajectory allowed teachers to choose their own learning route in the context of the innovation. Teachers appeared to develop repertoire in different ways. First of all, some teachers, in the model of Bransford et al. (2005), stayed close to the dimension of routines, and built stepwise on routines from their regular teaching practice, inserting the procedures progressively. We called them builders. However, most teachers immediately took big steps. A number of them then took big steps back. We classified this group of teachers as the innovators with big steps back. These teachers were not always very satisfied with the realization of all their goals and seemed to be experimenting a lot to find an application that suited them. This did not mean that they were dissatisfied; over all they were very satisfied with the new teaching approach. We also distinguished a third classification: innovators who refined. Like the other group of innovators, they immediately experimented with the maximal design of the procedures. However, in contrast with the innovators who took big steps back after early experimentation, they consolidated and refined the application of the procedures. These teachers were generally satisfied with the achievement of their goals and the new teaching approach. In conclusion, three different routes were identified which were all successful in implementing the innovative teaching approach and in achieving the teachers’ goals. We therefore conclude that teachers differ in how they expand their repertoires and that the professional development trajectory in this study was adaptive enough to do justice to these differences, allowing teachers to follow their own learning routes. This means that the model of Bransford et al. (2005) was not only used as a framework for determining whether or not teachers were
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