Teaching and Teacher Education 23 (2007) 985–997 Teachers’ perspectives on innovations: Implications for educational design $ Karen D. Ko¨nings à , Saskia Brand-Gruwel, Jeroen J.G. van Merrie¨nboer Educational Technology Expertise Center, Open University of the Netherlands, PO Box 2960, 6401 DL Heerlen, The Netherlands Received 5 September 2005; received in revised form 8 June 2006; accepted 12 June 2006 Abstract Educational designers often develop a ‘powerful learning environment’ that is subsequently implemented by teachers. Due to a lack of cooperation with teachers they may receive limited feedback on the quality of their design and the way it is implemented. This study focuses on teachers’ perceptions of a Dutch innovative learning environment called the ‘‘Second Phase’’, as well as their desires and their dis/satisfaction with this environment. The results show that teachers are reserved about student autonomy and productive learning. Perceptions and desires are related to their individual approaches to teaching. The findings provide useful feedback for designers and a starting point to intensify their cooperation with teachers. r 2006 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. Keywords: Educational innovation; Secondary education; Teacher conception; Teacher perception; Cooperation between designers and teachers During the last decade, many initiatives to modernise education and to optimise student learning have been taken place in Dutch schools. Principles of cognitive psychology and construc- tivism are the basis for such innovations, which should eventually lead to ‘‘powerful learning environments’’. Such learning environments are aimed to reach the main goals of modern education: acquisition of high-quality knowledge, problem- solving skills, self-directed learning skills, and transferability of knowledge and skills. In the literature, several characteristics of a design of a powerful learning environment are described, like active knowledge construction, gradual transfer of responsibility, and complex and realistic learning tasks (see Ko¨ nings, Brand-Gruwel, & vanMerrie¨nboer, 2005, for an overview). It is a general risk of large-scale innovations that educational designers develop a design or blueprint for a powerful learning environment that teachers subsequently do not or cannot fully implement in their teaching. This seems to have happened also in the innovation of Dutch secondary education (Veugelers, de Jong, & Schellings, 2004). A nation- wide innovation in the higher grades of Dutch secondary education started in 1998, aiming to develop a powerful learning environment that should predominantly promote students’ acquisi- tion of self-directed learning skills. Teachers play a crucial role in the interpretation of an innovative ARTICLE IN PRESS www.elsevier.com/locate/tate 0742-051X/$ - see front matter r 2006 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. doi:10.1016/j.tate.2006.06.004 $ This research was supported by the Netherlands Organisation for Scientific Research (NWO) under project number 411-01-052. à Corresponding author. E-mail address: karen.konings@ou.nl (K.D. Ko¨nings).