 Can virtual replace in-person coaching? Experimental evidence on teacher professional development and student learningJacobus Cilliers, Brahm Fleisch, Janeli Kotze, Nompumelelo Mohohlwane, Stephen Taylor and Tsegofatso Thulare Journal of Development Economics, 2022, vol. 155, issue C Abstract: Virtual communication holds the promise of enabling low-cost professional development at scale, but the benefits of in-person interaction might be difficult to replicate. We report on an experiment in South Africa comparing on-site with virtual coaching of public primary school teachers. After three years, on-site coaching improved students’ English oral language and reading proficiency (0.31 and 0.13 SD, respectively). Virtual coaching had a smaller impact on English oral language proficiency (0.12 SD), no impact on English reading proficiency, and an unintended negative effect on home language literacy. The top-performing students consistently benefited most. Classroom observations show that on-site coaching improved teaching practices, while virtual coaching led to larger crowding-out of home language teaching time. Implementation and survey data suggest technology itself was not a barrier to implementation, but rather that in-person contact enabled more accountability and support. Keywords: Education; South Africa; Development; Coaching; Training; Student learning (search for similar items in EconPapers) Downloads: (external link) Related works: Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:deveco:v:155:y:2022:i:c:s0304387821001668 DOI: 10.1016/j.jdeveco.2021.102815 Access Statistics for this article Journal of Development Economics is currently edited by M. R. Rosenzweig More articles in Journal of Development Economics from Elsevier |
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