China recently launched a large-scale reform of educational practices encompassing curricular content and pedagogical approaches. In this chapter, we outline some of the issues and types of changes that we think will be required of school and university-based educators in responding to this reform. The research project described in this chapter is part of a three-country collaborative project (Australia, Canada, and China) which explores the processes and products of teacher researchers operating in networks of professional learning communities. In this chapter, we will only be describing our work in the Chinese context.
Many scholars argue that the most effective approach for promoting deep and sustained teacher development to achieve desired educational outcomes is to create “professional learning communities” (PLCs) involving educators at all levels of the educational continuum (Borko, 2004; Fullan, 2001; York-Barr & Duke, 2004). Issues of organizational change are crucial for all educational jurisdictions as they engage in system-wide reform, but especially so for China as it attempts to implement radical, countrywide curricular and pedagogical reforms (Liu, 2006; Zhu & Kang, 2002). The international scope and design of this project will enable us to look at the ‘mobility‘ of pedagogical practices and understandings across different teaching communities and contexts (Eraut, 2004; Nespor, 1994).
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Erickson, G., Kang, C., Mitchell, I., Ryan, J. (2008). Role of Teacher Research Communities and Cross-Culture Collaboration in the Context of Curriculum Reform in China. In: Samaras, A.P., Freese, A.R., Kosnik, C., Beck, C. (eds) Learning Communities In Practice. Explorations of Educational Purpose, vol 4. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4020-8788-2_13
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