Designing Technology to Support Online Faculty Development Through Teaching Observation, Peer Feedback, and Collaborative Reflection: A Brief Literature Review

This paper presents a brief literature review on technologies and web-based tools for faculty development. It investigates what resources are available to higher education (HE) teachers to support online professional development (OPD) activities based on feedback, collegial discussion, collaborative reflection or teaching observation. From recent studies we note that collective reflection is effective when technologies are acted and used as a medium for collaborative professional learning, appropriately choosing and aligning technology with education purposes and teachers’ developmental needs, acknowledging the interrelations among technology, content and pedagogy. The paper provides a better understanding of the limits and potential of different technologies and how programmes of online faculty development can be designed to promote dialogical collaborative thinking.