Digital storytelling in teacher professional development

Abstract

This paper explores, through a pilot study, the potentials and pitfalls of using digital storytelling-inspired approaches combined with investigative sketching processes in teacher professional development (TPD) and in-service teacher training, focusing on an individual sense of agency and collegial collaboration. Seen in a broader perspective of societal developments, TPD is increasingly imperative, as teachers have to navigate through extended inclusion of students with special needs, digital literacy, and multicultural classrooms; and as more teachers are entering the profession through alternative pathways, without having the initial teacher education, TPD is increasingly seen as a process of lifelong learning (OECD, 2009 & 2014). The research in this article originates from a small segment of a large longitudinal research project on online teacher professional development (oTPD) for science teachers in Danish elementary schools. Data in this pilot study derive from a two-day workshop, conducted with two science teachers, aiming to 1) facilitate an investigative process for the participants where they, through video productions and personal digital storytelling, could explore, identify challenges and develop their teaching practice, and 2) use the productions as empirical data in the larger research project. Adaptations of digital storytelling developed by www.storycenter.org were applied in the workshop in combination with investigative sketching processes. The analysis in this research documents progress in the teachers’ sense of agency and action competence, as well as progress in the teachers’ motivation for continuous collegial professional collaboration. Though the experience was of increased sense of agency (also when revisited after one year), the question remains whether the teachers actually had the capability to act in their teaching practice and organisation. The structures of school contexts in general may be such that even though the teachers have identified possible actions and how they would like things to be, few changes are actually obtainable without actionable management support. The pilot study in this article involves a very limited number of teachers; nevertheless, the analysis points out interesting potentials which motivate a follow-up study in these approaches in TPD and in-service teacher training.