The second part of year two [IE 933] looks at working with others and is organised around the planning and implementation of CPD in your school. As a background to these session you may be interested in the following readings, wherever possible these are hyper linked. Some of the work will draw on articles I used in my review of learning platforms and ICT CPD for Becta:

Hammond, M. (2010) What the literature says about continuing professional development and the use of learning platforms in schools and in Initial Teacher Education, Becta, Coventry [link here]

The critique of top down implementation:

A recurring theme of many of the articles is the critique of top down policy. Sustainable change is seen as a complex, long term undertaking in which practitioners need to identify their own goals even if they need support in doing so. A key point of reference is Michael Fullan whose various editions of Fullan, M. (2007) The Meaning of Educational Change, New York: Teachers College Press are constantly cited. You can incidentally download one of Fullan's presentations at http://www.michaelfullan.ca/resource_assets/Keynote2006.pdf (though these are only the bullet points) and can access various interviews with him on You tube eg http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1vxU7O75zkA. But Fullan is not of course the last word on educational change.

Key figures on educational change in the UK are Day, Leithwood, Harris, Sammons. Here is a report they co-wrote for the DfES as once was.

Leithwood, K., Day, C., Sammons, P., Harris, A. and Hopkins, D. (2006) Successful School Leadership: What It Is and How It Influences Pupil Learning, Research Report No 800, Nottingham: University of Nottingham. [access here]

In similar vein Harris has written several well received reviews of leadership, this one considers the findings emerging from cases of schools in challenging circumstances:

Harris, A. (2002) Effective leadership in schools facing challenging circumstances, School Leadership and Management, 22, 1, 15- 26.

http://0-www.tandfonline.com.pugwash.lib.warwick.ac.uk/doi/abs/10.1080/13632430220143024a

Some other articles in which change is discussed include:

Osborn, M. (2006). ‘Changing the context of teachers’ work and professional development: A European perspective’, International Journal of Educational Research 45, 11, 242–253. [access ot the library link here]

Villegas-Reimer, E. (2003). Teacher Professional Development: An International Review of the Literature. Paris: IIEP UNESCO. This is now looking a little old and the international perspective may not interest you so much, but it does give a good run through of issues and does confirm the picture that top down implementation does not work very well. It is long so don't print it all off! [You can access this here ]

A very pertinent point of reference for us is the critique of so called NOF training in UK at the start of the past Labour Government:

Conlon, T. (2004)A Failure of Delivery: the United Kingdom's New Opportunities Fund programme of teacher training in information and communications technology, Journal of In-Service Education, 30, 1, 115-1.

http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/13674580400200229 or click here

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