James Calleja

Teachers choose to take up professional development courses for different reasons. This paper reports on the motivations of a small group of Maltese secondary school teachers of mathematics in joining a continuing professional development (CPD) programme aiming to support them in Learning to Teach Mathematics through Inquiry (LTMI). During mathematical inquiry, students assume a central active role – wrestling with ideas, asking questions, exploring and explaining meanings – supported by the teacher as a facilitator. This paper also explores teachers’ understandings and their reported experiences of programme effectiveness. A qualitative design using thematic analysis was used to investigate views, experiences and accounts of LTMI features that teachers believed to be effective for their professional learning. The data reported here was taken from a focus group held with teachers at the end of the CPD programme, and three interviews held with the same teachers before, during and after their participation in CPD. Findings reveal intrinsic factors motivating teacher participation, namely: (1) teachers’ will to develop knowledge about teaching; (2) their beliefs about the benefits of inquiry; and (3) their need to change classroom practice. The key aspects that teachers voiced as effective throughout their CPD experience were learning by being part of a community, active learning and immersion in practice-based understandings.

This study explores teachers’ perceptions of the leadership role of assistant heads in primary schools in Malta. It draws on teachers’ voice to shed light on the intentional role that assistant heads have in supporting staff and cultivating co-learning relationships. Carried out during a period of ongoing reform in Malta, this research adopts a qualitative design within a constructivist epistemology. A web-based survey taken up by 130 teachers was then followed by three one-to-one in-depth interviews. Data analysis included manual coding following a thematic analysis approach. Findings suggest that teachers recognise the assistant head: (1) as an instructional leader providing educational and emotional support and (2) as a critical friend that engages in dialogue, listens and cares. We conclude that the contemporary assistant head may act as catalyst to support and inspire teachers towards self and school improvement by undertaking deliberate steps that include intentional self-development, leading visibly, reverent listening, purposeful dialogue, care for the wellbeing of those who experience their leadership, and supporting a collaborative work culture.

Throughout their career, several teachers seek to improve their professional practice through various means. Lesson study, a collaborative approach to teacher professional development, involves educators working together over an extended period of time to improve teaching and learning. The cyclical process involves identifying a learning goal, preparing a lesson plan, implementing the lesson, reflecting on student learning and revising the lesson plan. This article illustrates the process of a lesson study which was implemented in a local state primary school. This lesson study, conducted as part of the Master of Arts in Educational Leadership and Management course at the University of Malta, focused on teaching mathematics through the concrete-pictorial-abstract (CPA) approach.

Lesson study or Jugyokenkyu is based on a Japanese model of teacher professional development (PD). This PD model fosters reflective practice and can help teachers to become more effective practitioners. It involves a collaborative process of planning, teaching, observation, evaluation and reflection. This lesson study, which involved two lesson trials, aimed to improve teaching and learning the Maltese language, targeting two classes of Year 3 students, aged 8 years. Each lesson was 70 minutes long and involved students in speaking, listening, reading and writing tasks. The focus was to improve their vocabulary and facilitate comprehension. The tasks supported reading comprehension by enabling students to learn new vocabulary through a multi-faceted approach. Discussions in pairs presented ample opportunities for collaborative learning and to use the vocabulary in context. Furthermore, posing higher order questions stimulated student thinking and promoted critical thinking skills, encouraging students to use more complex vocabulary. The results show that lesson study was beneficial for teachers to plan a well-structured lesson through ongoing collaboration and group reflection. The knowledgeable other was instrumental in lesson design, and in fostering teachers' professional growth.

This article zooms in on a lesson study process which sees a group of mathematics teachers designing a research lesson to address the students’ prevalent reliance on rote memorisation which is overshadowing the importance of conceptual understanding. Breaking away from the traditional approach of posing a textbook question, the team chose to present a Year 10 high-ability class with an open-ended investigation, allowing free exploration of a hexagonal visual aid. To ensure a structured and guided learning process, the lesson was designed on the 5E Inquiry-Based Instructional model (Bybee & Landes, 1990), a framework that was introduced to students as well. Through this self-directed learning opportunity, students took on roles as active agents fuelling a collaborative inquiry and using their existing knowledge as a scaffold for constructing new knowledge independently. The observations of this research lesson proved to be an enriching experience for everyone involved as the shared feedback revealed various successful aspects of the lesson. This experience motivated the lesson study team to intensify their efforts towards integrating lessons promoting students’ conceptual understanding. Concurrently, the observations also shed light on the challenges of teaching for conceptual understanding, urging the lesson study team to reflect on their practices for ongoing improvement.

This report explores the lesson study process undertaken to improve Year 4 students' mathematics problem-solving skills in a Maltese primary state school. It specifically focuses on their ability to identify and apply the correct operations in mathematics problems. A team of educators, including three Year 4 teachers, the assistant head in charge of the year group, the mathematics head of department and members of the Faculty of Education at the University of Malta, collaboratively designed and refined the lesson through two trial implementations. The first lesson trial revealed specific challenges, leading to targeted adjustments. Following changes to the lesson plan, observations during the second lesson trial indicated significant improvements in student engagement and understanding. These findings were shared with the wider school community, leading to the decision by the Senior Leadership Team (SLT) to adopt lesson study as a whole-school approach. The process demonstrated the effectiveness of collaborative planning, on-going reflective practice and continuous improvement in enhancing both teaching practices and student outcomes.

This study explores the process of leading a lesson study, a collaborative teaching approach that involves choosing a team of teachers and a research focus, planning a research lesson, delivering it, followed by a debriefing session aimed to create new knowledge. Originating in Japan, lesson study has gained popularity because of its reported effectiveness to promote reflective teaching and continuous improvement. In leading the lesson study reported in this paper, which focused on facilitating connections with students through group work and discussion, the team included three teachers and a knowledgeable other. Guided by Vygotsky’s concept of the Zone of Proximal Development, the lesson study team aimed to build on students' existing knowledge with carefully planned tasks and questions. This lesson study left a profound impact on both educator development and student learning, highlighting the benefits of lesson study as an approach to collaborative teaching. This experience enhanced Physics teachers’ opportunities to explore inquiry-based teaching strategies by researching, sharing, and implementing their ideas. Meanwhile, the Year 11 students with whom the lesson was taught, were introduced to the topic in an interactive manner, and this fostered active engagement and curiosity.