Another aspect consistently associated with the uptake of technology in schools is
the provision of teacher professional development and training (Bennett and Lockyer
1999; Bennison and Goos 2010; Fitzallen 2005; Lawless and Pellegrino 2007).
Previous studies have highlighted how effective professional development activities
are intensive (Darling-Hammond 1998) and sustained over time (Guskey 2003). For
professional development in the use of technology, researchers suggest that
programs move beyond simply enhancing teachers’ technical skills (Watson 2001;
Fitzallen 2005) to influence teachers’ beliefs about what constitutes effective
teaching (Goos and Bennison 2007) and to demonstrate how technology can
transform traditional classroom roles (Windschitl and Sahl 2002; Thomas and
Chinnappan 2008). However, the process of scaling up professional development
programs to sustainable, on-going experiences which operate effectively across a
number of schools can be a challenging task for education systems (Goos et al.
2007). The reality for most teachers is that professional development activities are short-term and sporadic, so the focus tends to be on learning to operate the basic
functions of the technology rather than considering how it might be used to improve
teaching and leaning (Fitzallen 2005).
One possible solution to some of these professional learning issues might lie in
the design of the technological tools themselves. The authors have been studying
how teachers use online mathematics learning systems which, we believe, may have
the potential to support teachers who wish to make greater use of technology in
mathematics lessons without the need for intensive (and often expensive)
professional development. Such systems typically incorporate several of the
following student learning activities: