Patterns in professional growth of science teachers involved in a team-based PD project

The outcomes experienced by four science teachers from a local science team are used to illustrate and discuss change sequences connected to their professional growth. The teachers participated in a year-long school-based experimental project, which involved collecting data about students’ thinking and learning and subsequent discussion of this material. Repeated interviews were analyzed using an adapted version of the interconnected model of teachers’ professional growth.
The results show various ways of experimenting with new approaches to be important for three of the teachers while a novice teacher mainly refer to getting ideas from colleagues’ practice. Collegial interactions is mentioned by all teachers, but it cannot based on this study be seen as a growth factor in it-self, it is collegial interactions about experimenting in classrooms and/or about shared artifacts from practice the participants refer to. Conclusion is that there are professional growth patterns, especially a pattern involving experimenting, which have a forward-pointing potential to be used to inform school based PD. The results implicate that the same PD project can frame experimenting into practice in various tempi and with differentiated facilitation aligned to the individual teacher’s current needs and that external support of science resource teachers can be an integrated part of school based PD.