The effects of distant professional development model on second grade teachers’ instruction and students’ quality of procedural papers

The purpose of the study was to examine the feasibility and effectiveness of a distant-professional development model that supported the implementation of genre-based strategy instruction for procedural writing on second grade teachers’ fidelity of implementation and students’ writing quality. Participants were 84 s graders and four teachers who were randomly assigned to condition. Teachers completed an online workshop module prior to instruction, a survey on their instruction and confidence to teach writing, received coaching feedback during implementation, and were interviewed at pretest and posttest. Students wrote in response to two procedural topics at pretest and posttest, at maintenance, completed transfer tasks in science and in persuasion, were interviewed at posttest, completed a confidence scale, and standardized measures. Results showed that treatment teachers positively evaluated the PD and its components, taught with high fidelity, and positively commented on the instructional approach. Treatment students wrote papers of better quality at posttest and maintenance tasks, while there were no statistically significant differences at the transfer tasks, on students’ confidence, and on standardized measures. Implications for professional development, practice, and research are further discussed.