100 Perspectives on Progressive Philosophy & Pedagogy

In 2024, I completed my doctoral research publishing a dissertation titled, “Predicting Professional Development Learning Transfer with the Theory of Planned Behavior: A Non-Exploratory Correlational Study.” This study was inspired by years working with anti-bias educators around the world. In this blog I share how my recent research revealed that the successful transfer of professional development learning to classroom practice depends heavily on school culture, particularly individual and shared beliefs about teaching and learning. I also learned, that when a school's pedagogical approach aligns with the training content, teachers are more likely to implement new strategies, but culture alone isn't enough.

At the end of the Fall 2024 semester, I was reminded of the wonderful impact that Howard Gardner’s theory of multiple intelligences (introduced to me close to 25 years ago) continues to have on my teaching practice. It was the last day of class for the second cohort of our University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa College of Education Progressive Philosophy and Pedagogy masters students. In addition to the incredible amount of reading, writing, and dialogue they had engaged in over the course of the semester, the group was invited by my co-teacher (Dr. Chad Miller) and I to give a presentation of learning using a modality that would best communicate and illustrate their growth. In the presentation criteria we encouraged them to use a medium that would, “capture the spirit of who you are becoming as a progressive educator and philosopher.” It was a small parameter embedded into this end of semester assessment activity, a piece of criteria that ultimately yielded a very moving set of deliverables.