Abstract:
This research aimed to analyze, from the point of view of its effects, the programs and activities of professional development of primary school teachers. This is a study with a qualitative approach, and it was developed through a questionnaire administered to teachers, exploring the perceptions of primary school teachers in the districts of Matola and Marracuene, from the identification a) of the professional development actions in that they participated; b) their training needs; c) the motivations for their involvement in such programs and d) their perceptions about the effects of those programs with regard to their attitudes and practices in the classroom. In order to complement and substantiate the information of respondents, interviews were conducted with trainers and education managers. Due to the need to limit the field of study, the districts of Matola and Marracuene, in the province of Maputo, were chosen because of their experience with the CRESCER program (School Reinforcement Courses: Systematic, Continuous, Experimental and Reflective ). The study made it possible to verify that the professional development programs in which the interviewed teachers participated did not take into account their training path, not even their training needs. The selection of teachers to participate in the aforementioned programs was based on the realization of students' performance problems and not necessarily of the teachers. With regard to the contributions of the programs in which the teachers participated, the changes they perceive refer to the teacher's roles in the classroom, namely, the organization and management of teaching, the pedagogical interaction; the ability to pay more attention to their practices in the past, that is, to reflect on their pedagogical action, leading this to the search for new experiences and new ways of looking at teaching; the adoption of collaborative strategies with colleagues, including the search for information from discipline delegates or class coordinators, to overcome specific problems
