Innovative work activity of science teachers

Periodical
European Journal of Contemporary Education
Volume
10
Year
2021
Issue number
1
Page range
187-201
Relates to study/studies
TIMSS 2015

Innovative work activity of science teachers

The pathway from new ideas generating to sharing

Abstract

The study addresses the phenomenon of science teachers’ innovative work activities referring to Rogers’ Diffusion theory of innovation (RDI) based on four countries (Sweden, Norway, Lithuania, Italy) TIMSS 2015 data set. The countries were chosen according to different criteria: 1–years of teaching; 2 – gender; 3 – hours spent for professional development. According to RDI, the innovation process consists of five stages: Knowledge, Persuasion, Decision, Implementation, and Confirmation. Different innovative work activities occur at different stages of innovation process: to generate, to champion, to apply, to promote, and to share new ideas. The aim of the article is to reveal the internal structure of innovative work activity of science teachers, highlighting the associations of innovative work activities on each other. TIMSS 2015 the instrument for science teachers allowed carrying out empirical analysis of science teachers’ innovative work activities. All variables of our interest in innovative work activities of science teachers were directly observable. Taking this into account a path analysis was used. According to the findings of the path analysis all innovative work activities of science teachers directly and positively influence each other. We argue that new idea generation activity of science teachers directly and indirectly influences new ideas sharing activity. The direct effect of new idea generating activity on new idea sharing activity is stronger than the indirect effect