MoTeL workshops
MoTeL workshops
MoTeL workshops were held monthly in the first year of the project, dedicated to the discussion of our research results. In this semester we planned to open up these workshops to the wider (national) professional audience, inviting external experts, in order to enhance the professional discourse and knowledge-sharing of our research topic. Due to COVID-19 lockdown, however, we had to postpone these workshops, but we hope we can re-start them in the autumn 2020.
A study by Márta Héreginé Nagy, Sándor Lénárd, László Horváth and Nóra Rapos has recently been published in the Q1 journal School Leadership & Management. In their article titled The organisational context of middle management role behaviour in Hungarian schools, the authors focused on how teachers in different positions conceptualised organisational learning. They found that middle managers are more prominent in smaller schools than in larger ones, as they are more likely to use their strategic role in a more cohesive community. The results suggest that the middle management function should be better utilised in larger organisations.
July MoTeL workshop
The last workshop in this academic year of the MoTeL research that was launched this past October was held on 2 July 2019. Studies reviewing the international and national literature regarding the individual/personal and organisational factors that determine teacher professional development and learning as well as the understanding of its effectiveness have been prepared for this occasion. In the first part of this 4-hour workshop, the main points of these studies were presented. This was followed by a fruitful discussion of the proposals in the study of the individual/personal level regarding the definition of the concept of ‘professional development and learning’ and effectiveness as well as the theoretical framework (to be supplemented by the organisational and system levels), which has to a great extent oriented our work for the future. We plan to develop the theoretical framework of the empirical research to be carried out next year by the end of summer, which will be presented and discussed at the first, September workshop of the new academic year.
MoTeL workshops in May
Two workshops were organised in May 2019 within the framework of the MoTeL research project. On 21 May we discussed the synopses of planned reviews of international and Hungarian research literature about teacher continuous professional development focusing on the level of the individual and of the system, as part of pillar 2. A summary of the results of the coding of empirical research on CPD, prepared by doctoral students, was also presented here. A week later, we first had a debate of the synopsis of a review focusing on the level of organisation, followed by a discussion of the secondary analysis of existing databases prepared in previous Hungarian studies (the 2013-2014 panel teacher survey of the Institute of Educational Research and Development and a teacher research commissioned by the Educational Authority carried out in 2013-15). We also discussed plans to introduce the research project to the wider national professional audience in a symposium at the Autumn 2019 National Conference of Educational Science.
April MoTeL workshop
At the third MoTeL workshop, which was held on 30 April 2019, we discussed the draft versions of two papers prepared in the MoTeL research project. The studies titled “Professionalization of the teaching profession and some other professions and their models of continuous professional development” and “Analysis of the system environment of CPD in Hungary”, written within the framework of pillar 1 and 3, respectively, were first presented by the pillar leaders. Following their short presentations, participants provided valuable input for the finalization of these studies. At the workshop, a closely related project of the ELTE Institute of Research on Adult Education and Knowledge Management was also introduced and we plan to continue discussions with participating researchers that we believe would be fruitful for both projects. Due to lack of time, we had to postpone the discussion of the synopsis of studies to be written in pillar 2 to an extra MoTeL workshop to be held in May.
March MoTeL workshop
The third MoTeL workshop was held on 19 March 2019. In the first part of the meeting, the pillar leaders presented their work and initial results so far, including the questions and dilemmas that have arised during their work. Reviewing the concept of continuous professional development and related concepts (e.g. understanding of profession, learning environment, effectiveness) has proved to be a challenge for each pillar and one significant expected output of our research project would be the clarification of key concepts and a concept map of CPD and effectiveness. In the second part of the workshop we have discussed the synopsis of secondary analyses of existing databases of former Hungarian research projects, to be produced in pillar 4.
February workshop
At the February workshop of the MoTeL project in 2019 we discussed the synopsis of the study to be prepared in Task 1 “Main fields of study of profession and related research of CPD. Exploration of the general knowledge base of CPD in some other professions related to the teacher profession”, with project participants and colleagues in the Institute of Education. This study aims to provide relevant and useful input for our research investigating the continuous professional development of teachers through exploring the legal, medical and higher education instructor professions.
The second half of the workshop was dedicated to discussing the next steps in our analysis of international and Hungarian literature that will provide a basis for developing the theoretical framework of our research.
January workshop- Launching the MoTeL research project
Our first workshop in the MoTeL project was held on 28 January 2019. In addition to presenting the launch of the project and the initial work done so far, the workshop provided an opportunity for knowledge sharing with our colleagues in the Institute of Education. Professor András Németh, Imre Garai and András Zoltán Szabó talked about the results of their recently conducted research project, exploring the historical development and different development models of the teacher profession. Their presentations were followed by a fruitful professional discussion among participants of topics relevant also to the MoTeL project. Following that, Judit Saád, EDITE project manager presented three recently completed theses that were written within the framework of The Learning Teacher research programme of the EDITE international doctoral programme.