Professional Development: A Critical Need for a Successful Program
Most family literacy educators agree that professional development is important to a quality program. Research has identified some basic principles that family literacy professional development should be based upon. While the following list of research-based principles for family literacy professional development is not exhaustive, it does discuss the most fundamental of the principles.
Research-based Principles for Family Literacy Professional Development based on Adult Learning Theory
Family literacy educators are adult learners. But, they are not a homogenous group. Rather, they are very different from each other: they come to family literacy with different backgrounds and they work in different situations. They have a range of experiences, a range of experience in family literacy and different motivations for participating in professional development.
Brookfield (1991) discusses some basic commonalities that have implications for professional development. Among them are:
Adult learners engage in purposeful exploration of a field of knowledge or skills;
Adult learners bring to the learning a set of experiences, skills and knowledge that will influence the acquisition of new knowledge; and
Prior knowledge and experience are valuable curriculum resources for professional development.
Professional Development: A Critical Need for a Successful Program