What Makes a Good Teacher Workshop? Reflections from CASE 2025
What makes a good teacher workshop isn’t flashy slides or catchy acronyms—it’s practical, relevant learning that teachers can immediately apply in their classrooms. This hit home for me again this past weekend when I was facilitating and participating in teacher workshops at the 2025 California Association of Science Educations (CASE) conference. The energy was palpable during well designed and run teacher workshops.
Similar to conference sessions, when instructional coaches, professional development coordinators, or school leaders design or select the right workshop the buzz in the room can be palpable and lead to that impact instructional quality and teacher confidence we are aiming for.
So whether you're organizing a back-to-school training, planning a mid-year PD day, or looking for sustained support, thinking about the elements of effective workshops is key…and we can take some ideas from those great conference sessions that rejuvenate and inspire us. Let’s explore what to look for and how in-school teacher training can meet those expectations.
What Makes a Good Teacher Workshop? Practical Criteria to Guide Your Planning
The best workshops leave teachers saying, “That was worth my time.” Here's what I experienced at CASE that helped to make that happen.
1. Clear, Teacher-Centered Objectives
The “good” workshops started with a clear purpose that was shared upfront. Teachers should know:
- What they’ll learn
- Why it matters
- How it connects to their content or students
Effective sessions past weekend included learning goals that were actionable—not vague concepts, but real instructional moves teachers could try this coming week. The inclusion of humor as these learning objectives were shared was great too…as although it can feel a bit “kid like” to talk about learning objectives the same reason they work for our students is why they work for us adults too 😀
Examples:
- “Teachers will analyze student graphing misconceptions and adapt a lesson to address them.”
- “We will experience strategies to encourage students to identify relevant evidence in a dataset and plan how to integrate it into their lesson plans.”
- “Teachers will create at least one learning experience where students are using AI to engage in a specific content area.”
2. Active Participation Over Passive Listening
Just like our students…professional development works best when teachers are involved—not just sitting through slides. That means:
- Hands-on activities with tangible materials to work with
- Think-pair-shares and group analysis
- Opportunities to apply strategies during the session
This past weekend we explored with 3D printed urchins (to consider morphological phylogenetic trees before comparing it to genetically-based trees), wrote bumper sticker takeaways on flipcharts, moved sand through steam tables while collecting data on different river ecological engineering options, explored the Writing Feedback Tool in MagicSchools with sample student artifacts, and much more!
In teacher professional development workshops focused on data literacy, we often have teachers:
- Create their own data visualizations and/or critique sample student graphs (see the “How Can We Help Students Make Better Graphs? Through Iteration & Collaboration” Science Scope Jul/Aug 2025 article for more ideas on how to do this with students)
- Explore ways to help students identify and breakdown patterns in data by actively annotating graphs from our curriculum (see “Draw on Your Graphs” Digital Resource for annotation ideas by graph type)
- Practice using real-world data to adjust instruction to open the experience up for more students exploration (see the “How Can We Help Students Explore Data in Their Sensemaking?” Science Scope Jan/Feb 2025 article to use the “Muck About” strategy for introducing new datasets and/or data tools)
3. Relevant to Teachers’ Context and Curriculum
To state the obvious…workshops are most impactful when aligned with what teachers are already doing and what they are looking to adjust. That adjustment can be related to things like 1) making their work easier, 2) helping students overcome a common struggle, 3) unpacking questions they have, etc. But the bottom line is that while generic PD may inspire teachers temporarily it rarely, if ever, sticks. I’m not sure how many times I have sat in a workshop or webinar and nodded my head in agreement during the session to never implement anything from it.
Dr. Shernice Lazare gave the closing keynote address at the CASE conference this year and she shared a great quote “Tell me and I forget. Teach me and I may remember. Involve me and I learn” (Confucian philosopher named Xun Kuang).
Instead, choose workshops that:
- Use grade-band-appropriate examples
- Connect to current pacing guides or units
- Address challenges teachers actually face
At Dataspire, our in-school training is co-designed with schools so content fits their needs—whether it’s focused on middle school science labs, high school civics projects, or elementary graphing.
4. Supports Implementation Before (and After) the Session Ends
A good teacher workshop doesn’t end when the session ends or the facilitator leaves. Strong PD:
- Provides resources teachers can use immediately
- Includes built-in reflection or follow-up tasks
- Offers pathways for continued learning (like coaching or collaboration)
It was wonderful to see so many sessions this weekend include time to pause, reflect, and plan how to take information shared into our work going forward. The sessions that sparked the most participation in this step were ones that had prompts grounded in identifying a tangible next step. I think one of my favorite quotes was a presenter saying “ok I want you to pull out your phones and put in a calendar reminder 1, 3, 6 weeks from now–whatever timeframe you think is realistic–for when you are going to act on what we discussed here today” :)
For in-school workshops, we recommend adding optional follow-up PLC discussions, coaching sessions, or shared resource repositories to help reinforce and sustain impact.
5. Promotes Equity and Student Engagement
High-quality PD helps teachers support all students—not just those already thriving. That includes:
- Differentiated strategies for multilingual learners and students with IEPs…because as a presenter this past weekend shared creating an onramp for traditionally marginalized students actually creates an onramp for all of our students
- Examples of culturally responsive teaching
- Tools that engage students in inquiry, collaboration, and critical thinking
Workshops focused on data-supported instruction naturally promote equity by teaching students how to make sense of the world around them—and giving them the skills to participate in data-rich conversations. And yes we know we are biased about being pro-data…but what can we say, it is true ;)
How In-School Training Brings It All Together
What sets in-school teacher training apart from conference sessions is its adaptability and responsiveness to in-school needs of teachers and students. Rather than relying on a packaged presentation where you do not know who will walk through the door for the session. In-school sessions can be designed around your school’s goals, challenges, and instructional frameworks.
At Dataspire, personalizing our in-school teacher training allows us to:
- Lead sessions that feel directly connected to teachers’ classrooms
- Model effective workshop practices in real time
- Build momentum across a full staff or within small teams
From 1-hour introductions to multi-session PD series, in-school training makes PD feel supportive, not overwhelming.
