The most significant learning stories: TIMSS assessment items as a prompt for professional learning

Abstract

Education policymakers in Serbia recognized that schools and teachers should include the results of International Large-scale Assessments (ILSAs) in further plans for improving the quality of teaching (Official Gazette of the Republic of Serbia, 14/2018). According to Đerić et al. (2020) and Mullis et al. (2020), in TIMSS 2019, teachers from Serbia identified Improving Students’ Critical Thinking or Problem-Solving Skills (MATH: 54%; SCI: 56%) as one of the greatest needs for further professional development (PD). Thus, it is crucial to design effective PD programs to help teachers connect the TIMSS framework and data with their practice. Moreover, PD programs need to be constructed within a Universal Design for Learning (UDL) framework to promote inclusive pedagogy (Sanger, 2020; Schreffler et al., 2019). With this in mind, we developed a PD program entitled TIMSS 2019 for Teachers: Quest for Quality Questions (TIMSSQs).