Research into Practice: Using Case Studies in Professional Development

Professional development of teachers involves working with individuals, understanding their needs, experiences, hopes, and goals, sharing, exchanging, and exploring practices, trialing new ways of doing things, and critically reflecting on models, factors, and practices that influence what happens in different education environments. In this chapter, we explore how the SITES-M2 case studies are being used to support professional development – to act as a catalyst to advance and change educational practices. We describe the roles that case studies in general have played in education, before documenting how the SITES-M2 case studies are being used to inform educational practices in Hong Kong and elsewhere. The model underpinning this use of the studies is not one of “farming,” that is, of trying to replicate innovations as good practices in different regions, countries, schools, and classrooms. Rather, it is one that encompasses observation, interpretation, and analysis. It also involves, where appropriate, adapting, with reference to a model of evolving development and change, ideas taken from the case studies so that they suit different environments. We also consider, in this chapter, how the SITES-M2 studies can be used to stimulate change in thinking about innovation and the role that technology can play in different contexts. We describe how this use has played out so far during workshops held in different countries for teachers and educational administrators and during professional development courses for teachers.