Mobile technologies as a strategy for teaching professional development and (re)enchantment: What do veteran teachers think about it?

Abstract

The first decades of the 21st century reinforced the consolidation of technologies as a desirable and essential resource in different spheres of social life. Similarly, in the field of education, innovation and curricular practices changes have been recognized as essential if education and, in particular, schools are to be able to respond to the demands of a society that, linked to the knowledge economy, seeks the promotion of a set of skills intrinsically linked to the handling and development of new technologies. In Portugal, this expectation has posed new challenges to the pedagogical work of a teaching staff that, as it turns out, is quite aged. Therefore, it is important to find out what teachers think about continuous training’ contributions concerning technologies in the sense of equipping them to respond to contemporary demands. In this article, we mobilize data related to the perceptions, expectations, and reflections of about 70 veteran teachers (with extensive professional background) who participated in training focused on mobile technologies for educational purposes, aiming at systematizing their relationship with the pedagogical integration of technology in education. For this purpose, we address the questionnaires applied to the participants at the beginning of the training, highlighting the profile of these teachers, at the same time we identify some trends regarding their relationship with mobile technologies. In addition, we also explore the potential of training as an instrument of (re)enchantment and professional development, in accordance with teachers’ reflections which were collected by the end of the training.