Teacher collaboration in curriculum design teams: effects, mechanisms, and conditions

TLDR

Collaborative design positively affects professional development and curriculum change implementation by fostering teacher competencies, practice, and ownership. The study explores empirical evidence on processes in teacher co‑design and their contributions to professional development and curriculum change. Evidence from 14 PhD studies was analyzed to assess impacts on teacher learning and curriculum change by examining effects, mechanisms, and conditions. The studies found that curriculum design teams improve teachers’ pedagogical content knowledge, design knowledge and skills, and stakeholder appreciation, and that collaborative design tied to curriculum specifically enhances teacher knowledge, practice, and the implementation of curriculum change.

Abstract

Collaborative design positively affects both professional development and the implementation of curriculum change, because teachers develop competencies and practice and develop ownership of the change. The current study was aimed to explore what empirical evidence is available about processes that take place when teachers co-design and how these contribute to professional development and curriculum change. Evidence from 14 PhD studies was collected to study their impact on teacher learning and curriculum change, by analysing effects, mechanisms, and conditions. Results showed that effects of curriculum design teams, in terms of learning outcomes for teachers in areas such as (pedagogical) content knowledge and design knowledge and skills, became manifest in the outcomes of the curriculum design process, and in the appreciation by the stakeholders. We concluded that professional development, through collaborative design in teams, which is specific and linked to the curriculum, influences teachers' knowledge and practice and impacts implementation of curriculum change.