Professional learning and development in Denmark: From formal competence development and professional learning communities to an emergence approach

In this chapter, we focus on approaches to professional learning and development (PLD) in Denmark since the 2014 national school reform. We describe how a formal competence development approach dominated in the initial phase and how this was gradually supplemented by a top-down-oriented teacher collaboration approach within the framework of professional learning communities (PLCs). A central assumption behind this emphasis on collaboration was that collaboration would lead to increased on-the-job learning through feedback and reflection. Neither of the recent PLD approaches, however, seems to have had a significant positive impact on students’ performance. In this chapter, we analyze the examples of teacher collaboration as part of the PLD initiatives in Denmark. By including a complexity-oriented theoretical perspective, this chapter advocates an approach according to which teacher collaboration and PLD should be observed as a result of emerging processes of organization and complexity management, rather than being the result of top-down management decisions.