**Abstract**

This chapter is about teacher professional development in Tanzania. The authors have examined the current status of teacher professional development in Tanzania, focusing on predominant perspectives on the concept and provision modalities. In addition, the authors have identified challenges facing teacher professional development in Tanzania, most of which seem to be systemic. The challenges include lack of explicit policy and guidelines for teacher professional development, limited knowledge on teacher professional development among teacher professional development stakeholders, predominance of traditional approach to teacher professional development, and ineffective organization of teacher professional development activities. It is, thus, concluded that a number of opportunities are available for effective teacher professional development in Tanzania. These include strengthening the available institutions responsible for teacher professional development, making use of different teacher professional development providers available in the country to promote professional development activities for teachers through a harmonized scheme and capitalizing on the use of different communication networks and the national optic fiber to promote self-directed teacher professional development.

**Keywords:** teacher, professional development, challenges, opportunities, Tanzania

## **1. Introduction**

There are different ways to define teacher professional development. According to [1], teacher professional development could be conceived as an essential mechanism for enhancing teachers' knowledge and instructional practices through carefully designed programs. In the same light, [2] views teacher professional development as a process through which teachers learn, learn how to learn, and transform their knowledge, competences, and skills into practice, with a view of enhancing students' achievement of learning outcomes. Other scholars, such as [3], perceive professional development for teachers as a key vehicle through which teaching is improved, hence improving student achievement. In the context of this chapter, teacher professional development entails all learning experiences which are geared towards developing teachers' knowledge, skills, competences, and other attributes in order to enable them cope with educational reforms and facilitate achievement of learning outcomes during teaching and learning.

It is generally accepted among teacher educators, scholars, and researchers that teacher professional development is an important component for the success of

any reforms intended for an education system. All countries around the globe have forms of teacher professional development. The reason for having such initiative is that teachers face challenges resulting from changes taking place in education systems. The changes range from subject matter knowledge and pedagogical approaches to the use of technology in teaching and learning. Thus, teachers need to be developed continuously in order to keep them updated on both national and international trends in education.

Like any other countries, Tanzania has, for many years, strived to conduct inservice teacher professional development in order to have the teachers aligned to the emerging changes in school curricula and advances in science and technology, especially the use of information and communication technology in teaching and learning.

In this chapter, the authors analyze teacher professional development in Tanzania, focusing on the currents status, challenges, and available opportunities.

## **2. Teacher professional development in Tanzania**

In Tanzania, teachers are trained either in teacher education colleges or higher education institutions. Teacher education colleges train teachers at the levels of certificate and diploma, while higher education institutions, including universities and university colleges, train teachers at Bachelor's degree level and beyond. Teachers from both paths are employed to work in schools and colleges where continuing professional development is required for enhancing their knowledge, skills, and competences. The following subsection highlights the status of teacher professional development in Tanzania.

#### **2.1 Status of teacher professional development in Tanzania**

A quick scan of the status of teacher professional development in Tanzania reveals two perspectives: First, the idea of teacher professional development seems to be understood mainly in terms of aligning teachers with changes in school curricula. Teachers are subjected to teacher professional development programmes only when changes have been made in the school curricula. This implies that, at other times, teachers do not have opportunities for teacher professional development. Experience from authors of this text—who also worked as school teachers in Tanzania for some years—shows that, in some places, teachers have not attended any teacher professional development programmes for a good number of years. This is mainly due to lack of opportunities and motivation as one of the primary school teachers in Morogoro, Tanzania, had this to state:

*"….I was employed 6 years ago to work in this school. Since then, I have never attended any professional development programme. My college mates, who work in other schools, told me that they face the same challenge…."*

Regarding motivation for professional development, another teacher, from a secondary school in Iringa, Tanzania, stated that:

*"… There is no motivation for taking part in professional development programmes. I do not find any difference between those who get the opportunities to attend teacher professional development programmes and those who do not. For example, attending teacher professional development programmes is not a requirement for promotion. Why should I bother?"*

#### *Teacher Professional Development in Tanzania: Challenges and Opportunities DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.90564*

Quotations from the two teachers imply that teachers are neither professionally bound nor motivated to attend teacher professional development programmes. Something worth noting is that even the self-directed form of professional development is not only patchily practiced in schools but also uncoordinated.

Aligning teachers with changes in school curricula is a commendable thing. However, it is not supposed to be a one-shot event—conducted only when changes have been introduced in the school curricula. In the intrinsic nature of professional development, the process ought to be continuous because teachers need to be developed not only in subject matter and pedagogical knowledge but also managerial skills and thinking skills which are crucial for effective teaching and learning.

The second perspective regarding the status of teacher professional development in Tanzania is that most of the teacher professional development programmes implemented in the country are donor funded. Some examples are as cited by [3], which include the Quality Education Improvement Programme in Tanzania (EQUIP-T), funded by DFID; Literacy and Numeracy Support Programme (LANES), funded by Global Partnership in Education (GPE); and School Based In-Service Training (SBIT), funded by UNICEF, to mention a few. This seems to be a challenge, considering that when the projects phase out, the sustainability of teacher professional development programmes is adversely affected. Moreover, some of the organizations do not necessarily provide professional development programmes which are reflective of the teachers' contexts.

In addition to the two perspectives on the status of teacher professional development in Tanzania, there is something worth mentioning. It is about the presence of many organizations—internally or externally oriented—which offer programmes intended for teacher professional development in Tanzania. According to [4], there were more than 100 organizations by October, 2019, providing teacher professional development in Tanzania. Nevertheless, a snapshot of the professional development programmes offered by these different organizations reveals the following features: First, the coverage of areas involved in the programmes is uneven. Most of the programmes are implemented in urban areas, leaving the rural areas unreached. Some of the regions mostly covered by the professional development programmes include Dar es Salaam, Kilimanjaro, Arusha, Dodoma, Mwanza, Kagera, and Mbeya. It is also worth noting that even within the areas reached by the programmes, the coverage is uneven, hence fragmenting teachers into groups of those frequently benefitting from teacher professional development programmes and those who do not. Secondly, there is a duplication of efforts and resources among providers of teacher professional development programmes. It seems that the different organizations do not collaborate even when they work within the same area. For example, if one of the organizations develops teacher professional development materials which could be shared, there would seem to be no need for the other organization to invest resources on the same. Instead, other organizations could use the available resources for other activities, including scaling up the programmes to other areas. However, in the current practice, each organization works on its own *modus operandi*. Lastly, it is evident that the provision of teacher professional development programmes in Tanzania is uncoordinated. Although, by establishment, the Tanzania Institute of Education is charged with the responsibility to coordinate in-service training for teachers, it seems that guidelines are missing to have this mission achieved. Therefore, it could be deduced that, despite the good efforts by different organizations to promote teacher professional development in Tanzania, there is a need to harmonize the programmes for better results.

The following subsection highlights some of the main challenges facing teacher professional development in Tanzania.

### **2.2 Challenges facing teacher professional development in Tanzania**

As pointed out earlier, teachers are the cornerstone of any educational reforms [5], and thus, they need to engage in continuous and meaningful professional development. Unfortunately, many Tanzanian teachers hardly engage in adequate and ongoing professional development activities [6–9]. The in-service teacher professional development sector has been facing numerous challenges that have acted as barriers to teacher learning. Most of these challenges are systemic, though varying in terms of geographical location, subjects, and education levels. The subsequent subsections present the major challenges of teacher professional development in Tanzania.

#### *2.2.1 Limited knowledge on teacher professional development*

While most Tanzanian teachers and school leaders have indicated increasing demand for professional development [10–13], they lack knowledge of what professional development for teachers really entails. Teachers do not have a proper understanding regarding the concept, scope, and features of teacher professional development. Furthermore, they do not have an understanding of how best they can participate in professional development as beneficiaries of training packages and as managers of learning programmes. Researchers [14, 15] in Egypt and Zambia, respectively, realized that lack of proper information about professional development affected teachers' participation in learning. Studies conducted in Tanzania have revealed that teachers' understanding of professional development is narrowed to the so-called traditional in-service trainings, such as seminars and workshops [6, 16, 17]. In this sense, teachers are not aware of a variety of professional development opportunities available within their working environment. A wide range of professional development opportunities include peer classroom observation, coaching, discussions, networking, as well as classroom-based action research.

Moreover, school management finds it difficult to support professional development for teachers learning if they are not conversant with the nature of professional development programmes, benefits, and implementation modalities.

Thus, due to limited knowledge of professional development, teachers assume that they are mere recipients of professional development programmes. This is different from places, such as Singapore, New Zealand, and Finland, where teachers are in charge of their professional development.

#### *2.2.2 Predominance of traditional approach to teacher professional development*

The traditional approach to professional development has withstood the test of time, since it has served the purpose of training in-service teachers worldwide. Teacher professional development programmes such as workshops, seminars, conferences, and upgrading teachers' qualifications are the most popular forms of professional development in Tanzania. However, the government has admitted that the overreliance on traditional approach has prevented many teachers from engaging in adequate professional development. To date, the ad hoc in-service teacher training with little focus on teacher professional learning needs has not offered enough support to teachers with their daily classroom practices [18–20]. In practice, most professional development training programmes in Tanzania tend to use a top-down style of which rarely focuses on specific needs of teachers. The professional development courses generally occur separately from the realities of school or classroom challenges, and many trainers do not follow up to see how well the teachers are implementing the acquired skills or competencies.

#### *Teacher Professional Development in Tanzania: Challenges and Opportunities DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.90564*

Although seminars have been popular professional development programmes in Tanzania, like in many African countries [21–23], they are not adequately provided to teachers [10, 12, 24]. Ref. [25] commented that usually training programmes are offered to a small section of teachers. If there are no effective means and resources to cascade learned information, the training programmes could likely benefit only a particular group of teachers.
