8 Types of Professional Development Districts Can Offer Educators
Professional development for educators offers opportunities to engage in classes, seminars, conferences, and other educational formats to hone skills and knowledge, allowing teachers to be more effective in the classroom. Many formats are available, and school districts need to understand what types of teacher professional development offerings make the most sense for their staff members.
Here, we’ll explore several examples of different types of professional development for educators, the pros and cons of different PD options, and how school districts can gauge whether their PD offerings are conducive to better teacher and student outcomes.
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Teacher Professional Development Examples
Rather than thinking of PD as a box that needs to be checked, school districts should harness the valuable opportunity to utilize professional development to create lasting, positive systemic change throughout the district.
Teachers, just like students, have varied learning styles, and offering different types of professional development can help teachers get the most out of their PD time. Let’s explore eight types of professional development for teachers, as well as examples you may want to consider offering in your district.
1: Online Professional Development
Online professional development allows teachers to hone their craft at their convenience. This type of professional development can include professional development webinars for teachers. This can include interactive modules, virtual lectures, and online courses.
EVERFI has dozens of professional development webinars for teachers free for you to watch on demand and live.
| Pros | Cons |
| Online learning allows teachers to learn on a flexible schedule. | Less hands-on experience could mean that it’s harder to implement newly learned skills. |
| Diverse learning options (like videos, text, and interactive modules) cater to different learning styles. | Distractions and other priorities may make it harder for teachers to focus on the material. |
“The strategies are priceless, the presenters were dynamic, and I’ve just had a wonderful time. [EVERFI has] reignited my passion to get this school year started, so thank you!” – Christina R. – Elementary Inclusion Teacher, Nevada
2: Gamified Learning
Incorporating games like Kahoot! or bingo into PD can make longer learning sessions more enjoyable and engaging. Creating group challenges or quizzes and offering incentives can increase focus and help lock in new concepts.
| Pros | Cons |
| Games increase engagement by capturing attention and encouraging participation. | Superficial learning can occur when learners become more invested in winning the game than learning the content. |
| Immediate, in-the-moment feedback allows facilitators to identify and correct misunderstandings quickly. | An overemphasis on competition may discourage less competitive participants. |
3: Classroom Observation
Have a teacher who is crushing it in the classroom management department? Asking a few first-year teachers to observe them reigning in one of their toughest classes can teach more lessons than any hour-long lecture on positive reinforcement. This isn’t just a great option for the observers — it also gives the teacher being observed the chance to get feedback from a new perspective.
| Pros | Cons |
| Observation promotes a collaborative culture throughout the school and district. | Observation can be time-consuming. |
| It offers new perspectives to both the teacher being observed and the teacher who is observing. | Variability in teaching styles can render observation insights ineffective. |
4: Workshops
These interactive sessions allow teachers to work as teams, fostering practical skills they can implement in their classrooms immediately. It’s a good idea for district administrators to create workshops based on targeted teacher needs. If you have the capacity for several workshops, you may want to allow teachers to choose the workshops they feel will most benefit their classrooms. It’s a good idea to watch for upcoming educator conferences and events to find opportunities that could be a good fit for your teachers.
| Pros | Cons |
| Focused learning opportunities allow teachers to deepen their understanding of a specific area. | A one-size-fits-all approach may only meet the needs of some participants. |
| Teachers can immediately implement new strategies learned during these workshops. | Too much information too fast can overwhelm some teachers. |
“It is relevant. It is on point. It’s fun and refreshing – [EVERFI] made every minute count!” – Lisa M. – Middle School Life Skills Teacher, California
5: Leadership Development
Teachers interested in moving into leadership may benefit from professional development programs that allow them to develop various leadership skills, including communication, collaboration, goal setting, problem-solving, decision-making, team building, and more. Districts can offer open leadership development to teachers or make this PD opportunity an invitation-only opportunity.
| Pros | Cons |
| An enhanced leadership skill set can help teachers grow in conflict resolution, collaboration, and more. | Anxiety about reactions from other teachers may stop some participants from taking steps toward implementing leadership principles. |
| An increased number of leaders in the building can positively affect school culture. | Some teachers may feel overwhelmed by stepping into leadership while also running their classrooms full-time. |
6: Peer Mentoring
The benefits of peer mentoring are myriad — teachers get to learn from one another, administrators get to see potential leaders in action, and mentees get to learn from seasoned classroom veterans who are utilizing the strategies they recommend.
| Pros | Cons |
| Personalized support means that teachers get guidance tailored to their individual needs. | Schools with less seasoned teachers may struggle to find influential observers. |
| Support from peers can boost a teacher’s confidence. | A lack of engagement from either side can result in ineffective mentorship. |
7: Degree Programs
Many teachers earn master’s or doctorate degrees as a natural part of meeting their continuing education requirements. This form of professional development allows teachers to become experts in their field who can use their knowledge to advance in their careers, potentially moving into educational leadership.
| Pros | Cons |
| Enhanced knowledge of teaching methodologies and subject matter can increase effectiveness. | The financial costs of graduate programs can be a barrier for some. |
| These teachers have a heightened ability to mentor less experienced teachers. | Extensive time commitment can make it hard to balance work and school responsibilities. |
8: Individual Research
Some teachers find that conducting individual research works well as a professional development opportunity that fulfills degree program requirements. Teachers who perform their own research can also help others with their professional development requirements by offering workshops or peer mentoring that utilize their findings to benefit classrooms throughout the district.
| Pros | Cons |
| Individual research enhances understanding of educational practices and student learning. | Individual research takes a lot of time and energy. Focusing on research may take away from focusing on students. |
| Teachers can present their research findings to their peers or the district to inform best practices. | Additional responsibility of research may increase the potential for teacher burnout. |
The Best Way to Implement PD in Your District
Focusing on different PD opportunities for your teachers is crucial, but figuring out which formats you’d like to offer can be challenging — and how to get started. If you feel that your current district resources for professional development could use a refresh, it may be time to consider revamping your PD program.
Consider these steps as a roadmap to implementing or updating your district’s PD program:
- Determine the needs of your district. Student test scores, teacher surveys, and parent and administrator feedback can all help inform the needs of your teachers.
- Set goals. Create specific, measurable, achievable, realistic, and timely (SMART) goals that you’ll work to address while implementing your new professional development offerings.
- Consider the audience and plan the content. For example, a PD program focusing on a small subset of teachers will likely be offered in a different format than a large-scale classroom management webinar.
- Offer choice. If you don’t have a pre-selected group of teachers for your program, provide teachers with PD options so they can choose based on their needs and interests.
- Collect feedback. Following the PD session, ask teachers to provide feedback. If possible, observe teachers using the skills they learned during their PD session in the classroom.
- Analyze and refine. After you see the impact of your new program at the school, you’ll be able to see what’s working well and what areas of your PD program have room for improvement.
What Does a Successful Professional Development Program Look Like?
After you’ve implemented new professional development options in your district, it’s important to keep an eye on whether your initiatives are working.
Some ways to learn whether your PD is working include:
- Use data to track metrics targeted by PD. This doesn’t necessarily mean test scores (although that certainly can work). Reductions in negative classroom behaviors, for example, can also be a metric that’s positively affected by certain professional development initiatives.
- Talk to your teachers. Select a few teachers to talk about their experience with new PD initiatives and invite their honest feedback to help you understand how they’ve been able to utilize new skills in their classrooms.
- Talk with principals, assistant principals, grade team leads, and department heads to discuss the changes they’ve seen in their teachers due to new professional development initiatives.
Maryland’s Prince George’s County Public Schools partnered with EVERFI to create a multi-faceted training plan. After assessing the staffing and scheduling challenges, EVERFI and PGCPS designed a flexible training and communication approach. Comprised of two structured PD sessions and eleven informal virtual sessions, over 100 teachers were trained and confident in their ability to strengthen student financial literacy. EVERFI continues to meet with district leaders to share teacher feedback, assess usage and learning gains data, identify areas of growth, and share opportunities for community engagement as well as college scholarships.
“We’re thrilled with the amount of professional development that we’ve had. And EVERFI was a big part of that…[we] were able to get [teachers] comfortable with the content & with what they were doing. Support and encouragement for the teachers was a really big part of [our success].” – Susan B. – PGCPS administrator
How EVERFI Can Help
At EVERFI, our team is here to provide districts with free life skills resources and support, like free professional development opportunities that will help your educators teach critical life skills. Reach out to us today to learn how EVERFI can assist your district with free professional development, resources, and support.
“To say I have been pleased with the EVERFI team is an understatement. We are appreciative of the standards-based curriculum modules, the ease of teachers being able to assign the lessons to their students, and the aspect of them being self-graded. I look forward to continuing to work with Andee and the EVERFI [Team] in the future.” – Michele P. – District Administrator, California