Continuous professional development is lauded by academics, championed by school teachers and praised by school leaders, yet, in actuality, it fails to be effectively deployed on a regular basis.

According to new research from the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), teachers in England spend half as many days on professional development activities as their international colleagues in other parts of the world.

On the whole, respondents to the poll agreed that the biggest barrier to professional development is workload. Teachers are already struggling to fit in lesson planning, marking work and carrying out other responsibilities, meaning they tend to work late and on weekends.

There simply isn't enough time in the day to allocate to professional development, especially if it is to be done in a useful way. It has to result in progress; otherwise, going through the motions, as is often the case, is of no real benefit to stakeholders.

On average, teachers in England were found to work a lot more hours than teachers in other countries, averaging 46 hours a week (although some would argue that they put in a lot more than this). Spare a thought for teachers in Japan, who average 54 hours.

Interestingly, the Teaching and Learning International Survey showed that teachers in England nevertheless have high levels of access to professional development at no cost to themselves – 92 per cent had engaged in some sort of professional development in the last 12 months.

It also showed that teachers in England want more training on teaching school children with special needs (22 per cent) and information and communications technology skills (19 per cent).

"Around half of teachers believed appraisal and feedback added no value to their teaching pedagogy or self-efficacy and merely served to satisfy administrative requirements," Christine Blower, general secretary of the National Union of Teachers, commented last month.

"Amongst head teachers in England, the survey makes it very clear that they feel the main barriers to their effectiveness are government regulation and policy (79 per cent), inadequate budgets and resources (78 per cent) and high workload and level of responsibilities (68 per cent).  "

The authors of the report said that one useful way of boosting teaching practice in England would be to overhaul the way schools deliver appraisals and enhance the quality of feedback that is given to teachers.

Professional development therefore needs to be more focused and ultimately more meaningful, teachers highlighted. The result is transformative, respondents explained, because it boosts job satisfaction and feelings of self-efficacy.

"Many schools feel under pressure to make performance management systems improve the appearance of the school for accountability purposes rather than making it about growing the teachers and helping the children succeed," David Weston, chief executive of the Teacher Development Trust, said last month.

"In some schools there's an element of ticking boxes and jumping through hoops to satisfy Ofsted rather than helping children in the classroom or helping teachers develop as professionals and this can have an effect on how they view appraisals."