LITERATURE REVIEW - Factors influencing Teachers’ Participation in Certification Education: A S

This chapter provides a review of the previous literature relevant to this research. Firstly the trend of education in Belize will be observed. This tends to seek the possible factors influencing teachers’ participation in TCE. The trend of education in Belize is introduced;

followed by the definition of CPD; followed by three main topics personal factors, task factors, and work environment factors. Each of these factors mentioned are conceptualized and empirically reviewed.

The Trend of Education in Belize

Belize’s education system has been evolving gradually on achieving quality and competent education to all children between the ages of five to fourteen years of age since the early 1960’s. In 1965, the Belize Teachers College (BTC) was established. Since then, according to Bennett (2008) cited from Samuels (2011) “the development of teacher education in Belize has been an undulating ride; from exhilaration, to crisis, to reform” (p.1).

Prior to 2004, primarily teachers who were already employed, who had some years of teaching experience were admitted to the teachers’ college, the only access to teacher’s certified education which was available exclusively at the Belize Teachers’ College (BTC).

In 2005, the Government of Belize, through the Teacher Education Development Services (TEDS) of the MoE, extended the training of primary level teachers to four junior colleges or Sixth Forms throughout the country: Stann Creek Ecumenical Junior College, Sacred Heart Junior College, Corozal Junior College, and St. John’s College Junior College, Education statistics at a glance (2011-12). Presently, formal CPD in form of seminars and workshops has been offered to primary school teachers every summer in the first two weeks of August, fulfilling 120 credit hours within a time span of five years at the initiation of their teaching career as a requirement to remain with a full teacher’s licence.

According to the Minister of Education in Belize, Hon. Patrick Faber, the performance level of the Belizean children is below expectation whereas there is an extreme shortage of trained and qualified teachers at all a level of the educational system. The Minister further stated that the “Rising costs and inadequate planning and management remain significant challenges. These very same issues were lamented more than twenty years ago in 1990 by a former Minister of Education” (Education Sector Strategy 2011–2016, p.3). From this statement by the Minister, the situation has not changed over a period of more than twenty years and this leads to the question of why little has been accomplished.

Every year, the MoE has been investing on high percentages of their financial budget in the development and achievement of improved results, in respect to teachers, salary, allowances, school management funding and other formal CPD rather than finding reasons why formal CPD in the case of teacher certification education is less attractive and feasible among the uncertified teachers. Therefore, this research attempts to find out the main factors influencing teachers’ decision on their participation in formal CPD in Belize.

Continuing Professional Development (CPD)

According to Kennie and Enemark (1998), "CPD is...the systematic maintenance, improvement and broadening of knowledge and the development of personal qualities necessary for the education of professional and technical duties throughout the practitioner's working life" (p. 114) whereas, it can be classified into two different modes which are formal and informal as shown below in Figure 2.1 and Figure 2.2.

Figure 2.1. Formal modes of learning. Adopted from “the growing importance of cpd,” by Kennie, T. J. M. & Enemark, S. (1998). Continuing Professional Development Journal, 1(4), 114.

Figure 2.2. Informal structured 'development' modes of learning. Adopted from “the growing importance of cpd,” by Kennie, T. J. M. & Enemark, S. (1998). Continuing Professional Development Journal, 1(4), 114.

According to Earley (2010), CPD involves all formal and informal learning that allows persons to improve themselves by practicing through a reflective action designed to improve their attributes, knowledge, and skills. Whilst keeping the improvement in the growth of knowledge and skills in subject areas of teaching so that it has a positive effect on students.

Through a study being held by OECD (2009) at various OECD countries on Creative and effective teaching learning environments shown in Figure 2.3 applied to lower secondary school teachers, it was highlighted by the study that both formal and informal CPD is essential for teachers where, study shows that Bulgaria has 50% of their teachers participating on “qualification programs” (p.58) becoming time-intensive and self-financed making the CPD more significant rather than to participate if it is less costly to free.

Figure 2.3. Reasons for not taking professional development (2007-2008). Adopted from

Hence, OECD (2009) broadly defines CPD as “activities that develop an individual’s skills, knowledge, expertise and other characteristics as a teacher.” (p.49). Within the teaching profession it is assumed that if a teacher enjoys his or her job the urge to better develop themselves will always be there.

Based on a study carried on by Desjardins (2010), findings from a large-scale survey highlighted that situational and institutional barriers are consistently found to be of crucial importance when dealing with barriers that hindrance the participation of adults in adults’

education also defined as continuing professional development (CPD). These barriers are two

of the four barriers used to assess lifelong learning which are traditionally used by Cross (1981). According to Cross (1981), situational barriers are those that arise from life’s situation for example; lack of time, pressure of work, family responsibility, etc., and institutional barriers is referred to practices and procedures that hinder in participation such as fees, inconvenient schedules or locations, inappropriate courses of study, etc. (p.98).

Likewise findings from a study held by Hustler, Olwen, and Janis (2003) on behalf of the Department for Education and Skills (DfES) by Manchester Metropolitan University (MMU) and Education Data Surveys; which took place between February and July 2002 applied to 2500 teachers in primary, secondary and special schools. Obtaining a high average of returned questionnaires and their profile closely matched that of the teaching force as a whole, highlights that workload or pressure of work was most likely to inhibit access to CPD.

Through personal experience, teachers’ workload plays an important factor that contributes to discouragement to participate in CPD. Taking school work at home, along with day to day planning schemes, and creating visual learning materials, become too intense at a certain point in the life of a teacher.

However, a study carried out by Wan and Lam (2010) highlights that over the years and in different countries, few studies have been conducted to examine factors affecting teacher’s participation in CPD activities. Likewise, another study by Lee (2002) identified a number of factors facilitating and inhibiting effective professional development in Taiwan. Among the factors inhibiting effective CPD as shown in Table 2.1 heavy workload was the most inhibiting factor affecting teachers’ CPD in school A, whilst time factor was the most inhibiting factor affecting teachers’ in school B. According to the literature, time and workload are associated factors leading to obstacles towards CPD (Day, Simmons, Stobart, Kingston & Gu, 2007).

11 professional development,” by Lee, L. (2002). (Doctoral dissertation).

Kwakman (2003) published an empirical paper describing two studies comprising the element of teacher workplace learning. The first study aimed at developing a definition of teacher workplace and exploring factors affecting their learning at their workplace. The second study aimed at answering two initial questions which were answered in form of a survey: 1) To what extent do teachers participate in professional learning activities? and 2) What factors affect this participation? Through these studies the result showed various discrepancies between the theory and practical carried out in opportunities for professional learning activities of the teachers.

These studies were conducted in the Netherlands at the brink of a large-scale educational reform whereas; major changes were going to be applied to the secondary school curriculum.

The background of the curriculum renewal is much seen as a need in a modernized society where people are ready for life-long learning and ready to learn. In the literature two theoretical perspectives are prevalent that helps to understand the different approaches of teacher learning: the cognitive psychological perspective and the professional development perspective.

Due to these two perspectives, teachers view new ways of learning by practicing new ways of teaching. If it is assumed that teachers learn the same way as students, then teachers need to construct their own knowledge and direct their learning. Both perspectives value the strength of the workplace as demonstrated by the expression that schools have to develop into places for teachers to learn (Hargreaves, 1994). Nevertheless, this falls short since schools do not offer learning opportunities as expected.

Theorists who have considered cognition as established assume that learning and knowing are integrally and inherently found in everyday life of human activity. Kwakman (2003) used three learning principles based on the idea of learning as participation in daily working activities. These principles are firstly, learning as in the process of participation;

secondly, recognition that learning is not only individual but also social in nature (Jarvis, 1997); and thirdly, that it is attached to teacher learning since it is regarded necessary for teachers to develop professionally. The conclusion of these principles is that the combination of the first two helps to define learning at the workplace whilst being conceptualized as participative at individual and collaborative level.

The second part of Kwakman’s study explored factors inhibiting teachers’ workplace learning in order to construct an empirical model for teacher learning. Since it is not clear on what factors could be inhibiting and influencing teachers’ participation in learning activities.

She began with a basic model about learning at the workplace with the sole assumption that learning is influenced by personal and by contextual factors (Clardy, 2000). In order to refined the factors she researched for theories that fit the conceptualization that teachers learn as they participate in professional learning activities. Therefore, the usage of adult learning theory and social psychological theory of work were used for the purpose of this paper. Both theories helped to detect relevant factors. Five subcategories were detected as personal factors and regarding the contextual factors, apparently it had to be split into two different categories:

task factors with five subcategories and work environment factors with three subcategories.

The first three personal factors were derived from the adult learning theory, according to Caffarella (1993) self-direct learning has been examined extensively with the intent to reveal learners characteristics of successful learners. According to Candy (1991) cited in Kwakman (2003), self-directed learning cannot be explained by a context-free personal characteristics such as self-directedness, as “people’s willingness to participate in self-directed learning activities is shaped … by their construction of the particular situation and circumstances”

(p.156). Starting from a constructivist viewpoint of knowledge and learning, Candy argues that personal perceptive and attitude of individual learners are most important to cope with, but only if they are considered to be situation-specific and contextual. Hence, Kwakman (2003) decided to select three factors that capture Candy’s main idea of personal meaning and it’s interactivity with the environment: professional learning and appraisals of personal learning activities. The first factor professional attitudes represent the significance that is connected to the new professional role that instructors ought to satisfy now-a-days along with the obligations. The second and third; appraisal of feasibility and appraisal of meaningfulness concern appraisals that are crucial in the process of meaning-making as judgements mirror how personal and situational characteristics interact (Boekaerts, 1996). The fourth and fifth factors are from the work stress theory in which it is assumed that stress and learning are mutually related, whereas, stress affect participation in learning activities (Karasek and

Theorell, 1990) the fourth and fifth factor exhaustion and loss of personal accomplishment (Schaufeli, Daamen, & van Mierlo, 1994) appeared to be most reliable in the findings and therefore, they were included in the model.

According to Kwakman (2003), from the model two different hypotheses can be deducted.

Firstly, that work stress will occur when job demands are high whereas control is low and secondly, is that learning and growth will occur in situations where both job demands and control are high although little empirical evidence exist to confirm the hypothesis, it may be concluded that job demands and job control do play a role in explaining participation in professional learning activities (Kwakman, 2001).

The second factor was broken into five task factors guided by the stress theory concerning the working conditions where it is emphasized that both job demands and job control are both multi-dimensional in nature and needs to be operationalized carefully. Firstly, pressure of work; secondly, emotional demands; thirdly, job variety; fourthly, autonomy; and fifth, participation.

Finally Kwakman (2003) used three factors to address work environment whereas different types of support was added to this model. Firstly, management support; secondly, collegial support; and thirdly, intentional learning support. After an extent review of literature, the results highlighted 13 different factors: five personal factors, five task factors and three work environment factors, which do influence teachers learning at the workplace. The research model as shown in Figure 2.4 was constructed based on the outcome of the first study whereas, personal factors, task factors and work environment factors are independent variables and participation in professional learning activity is the dependent variable.

This study adopted five variables from the study of Kwakman (2003), appraisal of meaningfulness, pressure of work, emotional demands, management support and collegial support. Also two new variables: family/work conflict and financial constraint were used after previous findings from a study by Yeh and Tun (2014) about factors influencing government primary school teachers’ participation in teacher certification in Belize.

Figure 2.4. Research model of professional learning activities. Adopted from “Factors affecting teachers’ participation in professional learning activities,” by K. Kwakman 2003, Teaching and Teacher Education, 19 (2), p. 149–170. Copyright 2003 by Elsevier.

Yeh and Tun (2014) conducted a qualitative study utilizing both the inductive and deductive approach. For the inductive approach, twelve people were interviewed: 3 experts, 3 principals, 3 certified, and 3 uncertified teachers. For the deductive approach, seven uncertified teachers were interviewed. The first approach was used to permit the research to begin with an area of study which would further allow the theory to emerge from the data (Strauss and Corbin, 1998 Cited from Thomas, 2006). The second approach utilized data analyses being selected to test whether the data were consistent with prior assumptions, theories or hypotheses developed by the researcher. Later on, the findings from the deductive approach confirmed the findings from the inductive approach.

Findings from the inductive approach revealed 4 of the 5 variables examined in Kwakman’s (2003) framework and the outcome of 5 new variables: 3 in personal factors: lack of motivation, family/work conflict and financial Constraint; 1 in task factors: school resources and 1 in work environment factors: political intervention to be negatively influencing teachers’

participation. Findings from the deductive approach confirmed the findings from the inductive approach.

Since in Kwakman’s (2003) framework there were many variables not suited for the sample being studied, the researcher opted to adopt five variables from her study and two of the new variables from the findings from Yeh and Tun’s (2014) study as mentioned. Following is a

Task Factors

complete review of the literature on the 7 variables used in the analysis and completion of this study.

Personal Factors Appraisal of Meaningfulness

Adopted from (Kwakman, 2003), she defines appraisal of meaningfulness, “as meaning is situation–specific in nature, appraisals elicit the meaning teachers attach to different professional learning activities by making judgements about different features of each professional learning activity separately” (p.156).

Therefore, based on this definition teachers tend to make judgmental decisions based on the situation they are actually involved in- at the time- that is, the extent of meaningfulness that participating in a teacher certification program will represent for them at the moment. This is in respect to the formal courses and education they will be pursuing at the institution. Will this be a plus for them when they conclude their studies and return to impart classes with a broader spectrum? If the present situation lends to the significance of their participation, bearing in mind, that the present situation in the education system in Belize for the teachers whom are not qualified is in a win or lose situation. This is because if the teachers find it meaningful to further his or her education; it will now depend on how much they appraise their profession. How much meaningfulness of furthering one’s education can make a difference for the actual teacher and their teaching profession. Many teachers countrywide are participating because of the governments’ policies enforced on them which state that, teachers need to be fully certified or involved in a certification education program in order to remain in the profession by the end of June 2014.

Teachers need to be specific and sure to be doing what they believe is best, in order to find meaning to what they are accomplishing. Teachers hold as significant the aspect of the extent to which the activities in which they participate are being appraised as meaningful to meet their expectations and satisfaction. Formal courses on teacher certification mentioned before in the literature, have an impact and portrayal of the pedagogical content towards the teachers’

learning, attitude, and satisfaction.

Also, Entwistle (1988), cited from Boekaerts (1996) made a distinction between three learning orientations, or styles, including a reproducing orientation (memorization), an achieving orientation (trying to acquire higher grades), and a meaning orientation (a search for personal understanding). As teachers tend to mature in their profession, the necessity for understanding their personal growth and finding the meaning of what they are doing as

life-long learners and practitioners is indispensable. Entwistle (1988) further added that, students with a meaning orientation are intrinsically motivated. Cited from Reynolds &

Aletraris (2007), employees who find their work meaningful will both work many hours and prefer to work many hours considered a classical sociological treatment of work (Blauner, 1964). In reality some teachers are intrinsically motivated because of the love and passion of their profession, making teaching more interesting and meaningful rather than a burden.

Appraisal of meaningfulness will cause teachers to spend more hours at work or become more interested in participating in TCE studies and to find the real meaning to their profession that has long been battered by the government and MoE on a whole. Therefore, the following hypothesis was established:

Hypothesis 1: Appraisal of meaningfulness will have a positive influence in teachers’

participation in teacher certification education.

Family/Work Conflict

Family is an integral part of our daily lives, a group of people living together functioning as a single household. As shown on Figure 2.3 based on the TALIS (2009) report, 30% of teachers from various OECD countries highlighted that family responsibilities have been a reason for them not to participate on a CPD program within their career.

A review of literature of Work-Family Conflict (WFC) and Family-Work Conflict (FWC) has depicted that both domains affect each other at a certain time. Greenhaus and Beutell (1985) cited from Carlson, Kacmar, and Williams (2000) defines WFC as “a form of interrole conflict which the role pressures from the work and family domain are mutually incompatible in some respect” (p.77). It is assumed that a teacher encounter these types of interrole conflict to a certain degree and has not been taken into consideration on understanding the female

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