Self-Directed Learning: An Effective Way for Teachers’ Professional Development

The traditional model of teacher professional development ignores the individual uniqueness of teachers and requires teachers to develop in the form of external instruction. While self-directed learning, which is characterized by autonomy, flexibility, universality, and development, can give full play to teachers’ initiative in process of their professional development. This paper starts from the status quo of teachers ‘professional development, summarizing the main characteristics of teachers’ self-directed professional development, pointing out the necessity and feasibility of teachers’ self-directed learning, summarizing the main factors affecting the self-directed learning of teachers. In order to effectively improve teachers’ self-directed learning ability, teachers must “want to learn, know how to learn, enjoy learning, and persist in learning” while external support must be “harmonious, diverse, timely, and efficient.”