At a Glance

This study employed a cluster randomized trial to examine the difference in teacher and student effects in two modalities of professional learning, online and face-to-face. Researchers concluded that both conditions produced results and the differences between modalities were negligible.

The Study

Fishman, B., Konstantopoulous, S., Kubitskey, B., Vath, R., Park, G., Johnson, H., & Edelson, D. (2013, July). Comparing the impact of online and face-to-face professional development in the context of curriculum implementation. Journal of Teacher Education, 64(5), 426-438.

What This Means For Practitioners

As a result of this study, practitioners have more evidence that professional learning through both online and face-to-face modalities produces similar effects for teacher learning necessary for early-stage adoption of a defined curriculum program and for student effects.

Given the tremendous demand for professional learning related to implementation of new curriculum, especially as districts and states develop and implement new curricula and curricula frameworks aligned with new student standards, districts and states may increase access and cost-effectiveness of professional learning by employing professional learning through both an online and face-to-face modality.

This is especially true if the professional learning is constant over time and will be repeated multiple times so as to recoup the initial cost of design and deployment of effective online learning.

The study, however, does not provide evidence that professional learning for all purposes or all types of teachers is equally effective through both modalities. In fact, professional learning frequently sets goals such as increased collaboration for sharing expertise and increasing consistency in instruction and student learning.

This study looked only at individual learning with no expectation for teacher collaboration to generate shared understanding and expertise.

The introduction of the online modality in a two-day, face-to-face orientation session raises questions about the effectiveness of online professional development alone with no face-to-face component. This study examines teachers who all have responsibility to teach the adopted curriculum.

This finding opens doors for using both face-to-face and online professional development to achieve outcomes related to curriculum adoption and potentially for other purposes. It also suggests that designers of professional development may tap the particular benefits of both online and face-to-face professional development for accomplishing outcomes related to each approach.