A Study On The Learning Process Of Primary And Secondary School Teachers Based On The Perspective Of Mental Models

Teachers’ learning is an internal process of teachers’ professional development, aconstructive process through the experience of reflection, and a practice problem-orientedprocess of knowledge discovery. The idea of teachers’ learning develops and transcends thetraditional one of teachers’ education. Based on the perspective of mental models, teachers’learning in single-loop mode focuses on the cognition of the action strategies and results.However, teachers’ learning in double-loop mode stresses on the reflection of the disposablevariable, that is, teachers will change their dominant sense of value to modify the learningstrategy and to testify the learning result when they realize that their learning behavior won’tlead to the expected consequence.In the thesis, we intend to quest, from the perspective of mental models, the learningprocess of primary and secondary school teachers. We make surveys and interviews for teachersfrom three major primary and secondary schools in Lanzhou city, to known the current status,such as teachers’ cognition of learning and professional development and their reflection ofteaching, as well as schools’ construction of ecological environment of teachers’ learning. Weanalyze the process of teachers’ learning, and propose some strategies for improvement. Wecombine quantitative research methods with qualitative research methods, where qualitativeresearch aims to explore the process of teachers’ learning and quantitative research toinvestigate and analysis the influencing factors on teachers’learning.Through this study, we find that: teachers in the primary and secondary schools havelearning awareness, but they usually lack specific cognition and planning of their ownprofessional development; Their learning is usually single-loop rather than double loop; Thereare many factors that impact on their learning process, involving their own reflection, emotion,beliefs and evaluation; As far as objective conditions are concerned, overall atmosphere ofschool field as well as teachers’ interaction have impact on their learning. In primary andsecondary schools, the management and evaluation system of teachers are utilitarian. Improvingteachers’mental models can facilitate the learning of teachers.The revelation to teachers in the primary and secondary schools are: First, teachers shouldconstantly improve their abilities to learn. They should be good at double loop learning from superficial level to profound level, so that they can access to their professional developmentthrough reflective learning process. Meanwhile, teachers should have a framework that willguide their career plans; Secondly, in terms to the management level, it is important to giveautonomy of learning to teachers; Thirdly, it is necessary to rebuild the teaching managementsystem, improve school-based teaching and research system, the management system andevaluation system designed to promoting teachers’ professional development.