Development support groups’ contribution towards professional development of teachers through a training needs analysis

Training needs analysis assists in identifying the kind of training that an individual employee needs and ensures that the training addresses any existing problems. The South African Department of Basic Education has made different provision for professional development of Foundation Phase teachers. One of them is the support that should be provided by the development support group (DSG) as part of the integrated quality management system (IQMS). The aim of the study reported on here was to explore the role of the DSGs in identifying professional development needs of teachers and the provision of relevant support. An observation-based qualitative study was undertaken to investigate how the DSGs identified professional development needs of teachers with the purpose of offering appropriate support. Five DSGs from 5 schools were purposefully selected to provide rich information about the issue under study. A case study approach was used to gain an in-depth understanding of the process. The findings reveal that needs analysis was not effectively executed since most DSGs combined different IQMS processes on the same day rather than allowing time between the evaluation and the review. I recommend that the role of the DSGs be reviewed and strengthened, and their activities be properly monitored to produce the envisaged teacher development.