Journal Article

·2016 OPEN ACCESS

Professional Development of Elementary School Teachers through Online Peer Collaboration: A Case Study

İbrahim H. Acar , Süleyman Yıldız YTU

Turkish Online Journal of Qualitative Inquiry

Abstract

The\npurpose of the current case study is to explore the influence of online peer\ncollaboration among Turkish elementary school teachers in order to gain an\nunderstanding of the contributions from online peer collaboration to teachers’\nprofessional development. For the purpose this study, online peer collaboration\nis defined as online support provided by teachers to one another through a\nweb-based professional development platform called “Learner-Teachers”. This\ncase study involves eight volunteer elementary school teachers who have been\ninvolved in “Learner-Teachers” online peer collaboration professional\ndevelopment process. Qualitative data collection consisted of semi-structured\ninterview and utilizing teachers’ online entries on the web-based exchange platform.\nOpen coding method and entry analyses were done as data analyses. Four main\nthemes emerged from the current study: 1) Satisfaction with peer collaboration\n2) Usefulness of online peer collaboration 3) Improvement of classroom teaching\nmethods and techniques 4) Improvement of classroom management skills. Overall,\nteachers who participated the online peer collaboration appeared to benefit\nfrom this collaboration in their personal and professional development. The\nimportance of peer collaboration via online tools are discussed.

Keywords

Professional development Mathematics education Pedagogy Psychology Humanities Medical education Medicine Art

Subject Areas

Education and Technology Integration ·Education ·Social Sciences
Education Practices and Challenges ·Philosophy ·Social Sciences
Child Development and Digital Technology ·Education ·Social Sciences

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