Despite the recognized importance of productive struggle (PS) in fostering conceptual understanding in mathematics, a persistent gap exists between its theoretical endorsement and classroom implementation. In Ethiopia, teacher centered instruction dominates, leading to low proficiency. Teachers often view struggle as harmful and revert to directive practices, such as telling and over-scaffolding that remove cognitive demand from students. Traditional Professional Development (PD) fails to bridge this gap by attempting to change beliefs before changing practice. This study designed and evaluated a contextually relevant PD intervention using Guskey’s model of teacher change, which deals belief change follow, rather than precede, observable improvements in student outcomes. Employing a qualitative Design Based Research (DBR) methodology, the study involved two early-careers Grade 3 mathematics teachers and 30 students in Bahir Dar. The intervention included a baseline followed by two iterative cycles. The PD equipped teachers with the strategies to support PS. Data from classroom audio and video recordings, student artifacts, and semi-structured interviews were collected and then analyzed thematically. Findings showed a substantial change in teachers’ practices. In the baseline, teachers acted as struggle removers through procedural questioning and immediate intervention. By Cycle 2, they transitioned to struggle facilitators, effective questioning, purposeful wait time, encouraging persistence, and acknowledging the normalcy of mistakes. Consequently, student engagement evolved from passive reception to multimodal representation, while perseverance increased dramatically, evidenced by self-correction of their thinking and multiple attempts. Crucially, the study validated Guskey’s sequence; only after observing tangible student engagement and perseverance did teachers’ beliefs shift from viewing struggle as instructional failure to viewing it as a necessary catalyst for learning. The study concludes that experiential, video reflection based PD grounded in Guskey’s model can effectively transform mathematics instruction by shifting the focus from preventing struggle to facilitating it