Teacher Professional Development through Blogging: Some Preliminary Findings

Abstract

The emerging trend of the use of innovative technologies to support teachers' teaching and learning is indicative of the increasing dominance of technology in educational environments. One aspect of the use of technology is the developing online technologies where teachers are in an online interactive platform to share knowledge on their teaching practice. Blog is one of the online interactive platforms, commonly used by teachers to interact with their peers which not only makes them cognizant of the usefulness of technology but also helps them to learn how to integrate the technology to support teaching. Utilizing the theory of community of practice and through observing blog activities of teachers, this paper attempts to present some preliminary findings to show that teachers' sharing of their practices within the communities facilitates collaboration and sharing of knowledge that benefits both the teachers and their students. It is based on a study involving 7 Iranian EFL teachers who shared their experiences and knowledge within the community through blogging for one semester. The initial findings suggest that blogging has a positive effect on teacher learning within a community of practice.

On the Effect of Online Peer Knowledge Sharing on Iranian EFL Teachers' Professional Development

“…Through such interactions and discussion, EFL teachers can benefit from their colleagues' knowledge and experience and try to improve their teaching. Teachers' sharing of their practices through blogging promotes collaboration and sharing of knowledge that benefits both the teachers and their students (Zandi, Thang, & Krish, 2014).…”

“…The phrase 'community of practice' was invented by Lave and Wenger in 1991. In fact, (CoP) is a model developed in line with social constructivism's point of view on sharing experiences within a community (Zandi et al 2014). Saeedan, et al (2015) explored effect of weblogging on Iranian English teacher professional development.…”

“…Similarly, Zandi et al (2014) explored the effects of blogging on teacher professional development. It was manifested that teachers' sharing of their practices within the communities improves collaboration and sharing of knowledge which benefits both the teachers and their students.…”

Efl Oral Skills Behavior When Implementing Blended Learning in a Content-Subject Teachers’1 Professional Development Course

“…In this sense, PD should be an ongoing process so that educators are up to date (Zandi et al, 2014). It seems clear that the world is constantly changing and this becomes a challenge for teachers' job.…”

“…However, occasions for teachers to practice and interact in EFL with peers are rather poor (Taillefer & Munoz-Luna, 2013). Even though education and technology are working hand in hand in new teaching tendencies, teachers lack the knowledge and skills regarding the use of technological resources (Zandi et al, 2014). A needs analysis aimed at identifying researchable problems from a community visit was conducted at Einstein school 4 .…”