Teachers' Perception of Professional Development at Secondary School Level: A Qualitative Study

Professional development is the most effective and powerful skill to increase the learners’ needs and then make them able to acquire these tools to complete their learning criteria. It works to fulfill the requirement of a teacher to meet with the effective teaching styles. This study aims to examine the secondary school teachers’ perceptions about professional development, its importance in teaching practices and why it has been declared an instrument to get the students’ learning outcomes. For this purpose, we opted semi-structured interviews for the collection of data, the total 13 participants participated in this study. The findings of the study revealed that the professional development affects teacher’s classroom practices and enhances the learning achievement of students. The findings also showed that the continuous professional development induces teachers to improve their teaching competencies to meet the need of learners as per educational demands and the relevance of teacher efficacy for his effectiveness, as related to powerful CPD experiences. Moreover, school embedded professional learning opportunities can thus answer to self-direct desires for instructional change, which afterwards provide the motivational efforts to sustain and overcome the hurdles. Further, discussion and suggestions are given.