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Obviously, the above external factors have brought teachers in China to the point of having to change, whether they want to or not. However, there remain the questions of whether the teachers are ready for these changes and how changes and developments can happen. Change and development in education are considered as a process, in which school improvement and management is one of the perspectives from which to look at the issue of change (Fullan, 1993; Hargreaves & Fullan, 1992). Another perspective is to consider changes in teachers' mental models, beliefs, and perceptions regarding students' minds and learning (Guskey & Huberman, 1995).
Though a number of studies report positive changes in teachers' perception and behaviour (Huberman & Miles, 1984; Mevarech, 1995; Huberman, 1995; Guskey, 2002), other studies on the effects of staff development programmes indicate that teachers' perceptions are rather stable and changes to teachers' perceptions brought by staff development programmes are not significant (Guskey, 1989; Mevarech & Netz, 1991). Shulman (2000) even pointed out that people's deeply held, private, intuitive theories were difficult to change as conceptual change was engaged in a process that was deeply emotional as well as cognitive.
Therefore, with regard to the situation in China, where the teachers have no other choice, but to cope with the changes and developments, what is important in this study is to understand the process of change and to understand the pain, or joys, the teachers are experiencing, so that teacher preparation and teacher development projects can contribute to such change. With these basic principles in mind, rather than working out a framework of teachers' knowledge or beliefs, this study started with what the current teachers know about their work, and then commissioned whether training or a staff development programme would make any difference, how such programmes might be handled and what factors affect the changes. This study consequently narrowed its focus to teachers' knowledge and behaviour and became a study of whether the changes of such knowledge and beliefs could bring about change and development in teachers' behaviour, and what affects such changes might have. As later chapters will show, the research indicates that any change in knowledge, beliefs and behaviour is a complicated issue which must take into account both the teachers' mental world and the contexts in which they work. Change cannot happen in a vacuum, it takes place in an ecological system in which cognitive aspects and social aspects are intertwined. Change and development in different contexts should be differently handled because of differences in politics and systems. In the unique system of China, these differences obviously play a crucial role in the change and development of teachers'. In this research, fieldwork has focused on such aspects, and analysis of them will occur in the chapters which follow.