Professional learning communities in South African schools and teacher education programmes

This book draws together research on professional learning communities in schools and teacher education in diverse contexts in South Africa. Each chapter captures the rich and complex nature of professional learning communities, the challenges in developing and maintaining them, and the extent to which the promote successful learning for teachers and changes in teaching practices. The book shows that professional learning communities can promote continuous learning in response to local school and classroom realities and work against 'quick-fix', fragmented workshops for teachers, where learning tends to dissipate. This book should be of interest to teachers, school-leaders, teacher-educators, policy-makers and researchers. It represents the first set of research studies in what is a new and growing field in South Africa.