Continuing Professional Development for Filipino Educators: A Systematic Literature Review on PLCs, Reflective Practice, and In-Service Training Models

Abstract

Continuous professional development (CPD) under Philippine law and teaching professionalism standards remains underexplored in the literature. The present study synthesizes existing research on CPD for Filipino teachers, its relation to professional communities and learning-enhancement practices, and teachers’ professional development. The PRISMA procedure was used to accurately extract data from a small Scopus dataset. In summary, the study analyzed 177 sources in two stages. 61 empirical studies published or soon to be published were selected for the analysis. Four main themes have been highlighted: (a) While in-service training is fundamentally episodic, lecture-based, and weakly evaluated, needs-based, experiential, and technology-driven training courses are beginning to surface; (b) Professional learning communities, Learning Action Cells, and lesson study are collaborative models that foster collegial and pedagogical progress factor, but performance is hampered by workload issues, leadership dilemmas, and Filipino culture, especially in terms of pakikisama and hiya; (c) while reflective practice can be enriched by means of mentoring during practicum, feedback, and action research, it is never organized or maintained; and (d) the pre-service-in-service continuum lacks coherence and research capacity.