Published Paper Details:

Our changing goals for learning, coupled with shifts in curriculum emphasis and a deeper understanding of teacher learning and student thinking, have led to new findings about the impact of teacher professional development and how best to sharpen teachers' skills and knowledge. What matters most is what teachers learn. Professional development should improve teachers' knowledge of the subject matter that they are teaching, and it should enhance their understanding of student thinking in that subject matter. Aligning substantive training with the curriculum and teachers' actual work experiences also is vital. The time teachers spend in professional development makes a difference as well, but only when the activities focus on high-quality subjectmatter content. Extended opportunities to better understand student learning, curriculum materials and instruction, and subject-matter content can boost the performance of both teachers and students. There are five components of Professional development viz Knowledge, Competencies in Teaching, Commitment and Accountability of teacher educators, Leadership & Personal Effectiveness, Self-upgrading & Extended Reading. Present study focuses the influence of some background variable on Professional development and its variables.