Continuing professional development is a process of lifelong learning which enables teachers to expand their knowledge, share their best practices, and enhance their skills to fulfill their potential.
Continuing professional development is one of the major elements that allow educational institutions to improve and maintain high performance. First, I believe that the ingredient that makes a difference in students’ learning is the quality of teaching. Teachers need knowledge, awareness and support due to the major transformation in the educational system from the behaviorism approach to the constructivism approach. Second, educational systems need a clear provision for the whole staff development to improve student achievement. Some teachers have their own personal initiative for developing themselves but not everyone. Awareness of the new methodologies needs to be a school culture.
Continuing professional development can be training within workplace, word based projects, conference study sessions with colleagues, team discussions, reflections, or learning a new technique. Depending on the form and content of the development program many things can be produced such as case studies, protocols, discussion documents, guidance material, reports, presentations, questionnaires, action plans, course assignments, or learning contracts. The material that demonstrates the reflection, evaluation of learning and practice after the program can be profiles drawn from learning portfolio, feedback or personal development plans.
