Teachers’ trajectories of technology integration during participation in an online professional development program

Abstract Technology-related professional development (PD) is a crucial strategy to prepare and encourage teachers to integrate technology into their teaching in a high-quality way. During teachers’ participation in technology-related PD, change processes occur from a current to a desired status of technology-enhanced teaching (TET). A higher probability of disruption of TET can be assumed during these change processes. However, previous research on PD is mainly based on cross-sectional data that does not provide insight into such change processes (especially during PD participation). In this study, we examined teachers’ trajectories closely during their participation in a 3-month technology-related online PD (OPD). We conducted a concurrent explanatory mixed-methods approach to analyze longitudinal data from the first four weeks of the OPD, focusing on 23 teachers who completed weekly reflection diaries. Findings from a multilevel framework revealed that most of the variances in the development of teachers’ technology integration (i.e., frequency and quality) and motivation to use technology for teaching (i.e., self-efficacy and utility value) was due to contextual factors. Using linear mixed-effects models, we found a statistically significant decrease in teachers’ quality of TET over time. Analyses of reflections on TET of extreme cases allowed us to identify possible relevant contextual characteristics related to smoother TET: 1) the use of one generic technology across lessons and 2) the use of ready-to-use domain-specific technology. Implications for practice are discussed, such as attention to unintended side effects of teachers’ TET during instructional phases of technology-related OPD.