Teachers’ Informal Learning Based On Elementary And Middle School

Teachers development is the fundamental factor for improving educational quality. And it is affected by various factors. High-quality teachers’development needs some endogenous power to inspire and maintain. Studies have shown that informal learning is one of the most important ways to promote teachers’self-development from elementary and middle schools, which can be organized, decided and encouraged by teachers themselves. However, scholars and elementary and middle teachers pay close attention to the top-town formal learning which is organized and arranged by Educational Administration Department, while the informal learning has been less concerned in theory and practice. In this paper, the author considers that teachers are highly full persons with the unity of social value and self value. Teacher "development does not only mean teacher’s professional development but also include inspiring teacher’s potential of life and achieving their value of life at the extreme. Teachers’development can be achieved by integrating the exterior professional standard with the intrinsic needs of self-development. The teacher development of ego integrity is the internal impetus of teachers’development. Therefore, this study adopts the perspective from teachers’ development of ego integrity, and focuses on the most important implementation of teacher development of ego integrity, aiming at conducting the research of informal learning thoroughly and systematically. The paper has two logic starting points, the current situation of informal learning of international and domestic academics, and the current situation of practice of domestic in-service teachers from elementary and middle schools. On one hand, this study tries to explore some unsolved problems about teachers’informal learning in theory, based on reviewing relevant domestic and foreign literatures. On the other hand, this study attempts to discover some deficiencies of teachers’informal learning by investigating the current situation of domestic in-service teachers from elementary and middle schools. This study employs historical research method, literature research method and survey research method to discuss the ontology of teachers" informal learning, to construct the theories of teachers’informal learning, to analyze influence factors of teachers’informal learning, to propose practical model of teachers’informal learning, to discuss the effectiveness of self evaluation system from teachers’informal learning and to demonstrate conditions-guarantee from teachers’ informal learning. This study tries to construct the theoretical system of teachers’ informal learning from elementary and middle schools and the practical model of teachers’informal learning in China.This dissertation consists of eight parts as followed:Part one presents the introduction. Firstly, the questionnaires and interview are employed to survey teachers from elementary and middle schools, revealing these activities of teachers’informal learning are closely related to their daily life and the influences upon teachers’development. Based on the documents about teachers’ informal learning at home and abroad, the study has found out that there are still a number of unsolved problems both in theory and in practice in this field. The author tried to analyze the causes of these problems, suggesting that teachers are highly full persons with the unity of social value and self value. Teacher development does not only mean teacher’s professional development but also include inspiring teacher’s potential of life and achieving their value of life at the extreme. Teachers’development calls for ego integrity. The practice of teachers’development ideal about ego integrity is the same as teachers’informal learning.Part two mainly explores the overall current situation of teachers’informal learning from elementary and middle-school teachers. This section further reveals the current situation of teachers’informal learning in real educational settings from four perspectives, including the conception and consciousness of teachers’informal learning, methods, some specific ways of teachers’informal learning, the significance and value of teachers’informal learning and the culture and environment of teachers’informal learning. Based on these perspectives, the author makes a full investigation to address13schools teachers from elementary and middle schools. These teachers come from different places covering Sichuan, Yunnan, Guizhou, Chongqing and Tibet Autonomous Region. Nearly one thousand teachers have been investigated by questionnaires and depth interview. The research has revealed that informal learning from elementary and middle-school teachers presents various problems, such as their consciousness of informal learning is not clear and their self-development concept is confused, their independent development is discrete and their professionalism is indifferent, their rationalism trend and learning methods are simple and their deficiency theories of informal learning and their low efficiency of applying research findings to practice. These factors above have a significant impact on teachers’ development of elementary and middle schools in some degree.Part three mainly discusses about the ontology of teachers’ informal learning. Based on the related literature review and analysis from teachers’ informal learning, the author has made a full investigation about the current situation of teachers’ informal learning from elementary and middle school discussed the fundamental questions of teachers’ informal learning. On the basis of the development ideal of teachers’ ego integrity, the author proposes the ontology questions about teachers’ informal learning, which includes the essence, the main types, the basic structure and the essential features of teachers’ informal learning.Part four constructs the theories of teachers’ informal learning from elementary and middle-school teachers. On the basis of the previous surveys and discussion, this section will make attempts to construct the development ideal of teachers’ ego integrity from these perspectives, such as the socio-cultural theory, the self-directed learning theory, the transformative learning theory and the knowledge management theory. The author points out the core ideas of these theories, namely, the socio-cultural theory creates the supporting system of culture and ecosystem for teachers’ informal learning, the self-directed learning theory contributes to the ego integrity of teachers’ goals, the transformative learning theory reveals the mechanism of teachers’ intrinsic transformative learning, and the knowledge management theory contributes to promote the knowledge self-organization system.Part five mainly focuses on the investigation of the influence factors of teachers’ informal learning. The author particularly discusses these influence factors of teachers’ informal learning, such as the institutional factors, the cultural factors and the individuals’ factors. The author suggests that the institutional factors primarily focus on the division of labor, the impersonal orientation, the hierarchy of authority, the rules system, the career orientation and so on. The cultural factors manifest as the examination culture emphasizing students’scores model in school, learning cultures emphasizing teachers’training model and teacher’s moral and culture emphasizing assessment standard. The individuals’factors mainly reflect in teachers’identity as a "learner", teachers’self-value and teachers’self existence.Part six mainly explores the practical model of teachers’informal learning. The author comprehensively summarizes the integration of research mode, including the integration of the inside field research and the outside field research, the integration of students and curriculum research, and the integration of the grassroots issues and the standard issues. The author further proposes that the trinity reading model, the trinity learning model and the practical community model. The trinity reading model can be made up of the self-reading model, the feelings reading model and the reading model out of class. The trinity learning model includes the transformation from teaching courses to learning courses, the transformation from attending lectures to observation classroom, and the transformation from the teachers discussing courses to the teachers discussing with students about courses together. The practical community model contains teachers’identity community, teachers’emotional community, teachers’ practical community and teachers’cultural community. The author preliminarily constructs a set of practical model of informal learning covering teachers’research model, reading model, learning model and practical model.Part seven explores the self-evaluation of effectiveness about teachers’informal learning. From the prospective of teachers’development of ego integrity, the author constructs the self-evaluation systems of effectiveness about teachers’informal learning on the basis of the fundamental theories, the objects, the contents, the methodology and the motivation of teachers’ informal learning.Part eight focuses on the condition guarantee of teachers’informal learning. In this part, the author mainly discusses the coordination of hierarchical power and professional power, the integration of formal organizations and informal organizations, the coordination of institution and cultural, the mutual promotion of professional faith, ideal and consciousness. Condition guarantee can be better provided by means of teachers’ professional power, informal organization, institution, culture and teacher’ individuals.