Effectiveness of ICT-Based Professional Development Programs in Enhancing Teaching Skills

The research prerequisite investigates the usefulness of Information and Communication Technology (ICT)-based professional development (PD) program to develop teaching expertise in various education settings. Under the mixed-methods research design, 150 educators were interviewed and surveyed using structured and semi-structured questions. Statistically significant positive changes in the instructional strategies, digital literacy, assessment, classroom management, student engagement were observed after the engagement in the ICT-PD programs. ANOVA alternated with paired samples t-tests showed significant change between educational levels and a high degree of correlation between ICT use and pedagogical development. A qualitative analysis entailing thematic coding of interview transcripts exposed 4 key themes that are; program design, contextual relevance, institutional support, and teacher motivation. Nevertheless, along with good results, the study revealed such still remaining issues as insufficient access to internet sources, absence of online infrastructure, and urban-rural teacher gap. These results support the disruptive promise of ICT in the field of teacher training, but only when implemented in context and supported by policy on a policy level to realize longer-term effects and equity. The conclusion drawn in the research is that variousiated PD models, long-term follow-ups and institutional investment in ICT infrastructure are all important to address clean gaps of teacher capacity and academic quality.