Building Your FallProfessional Learning

Community

How will we learn together to teach for shining eyes?

Learning goalsDeepen passion for being rigorously reflective and collaboratively curious about student work and data

Build strategies and tools to deepen your own collaborative reflection and learning this fall

Collaboratively agree upon definitions of “proficient”

Plan specific “observables” that prove the effectiveness of your new curriculum this fall

Plan discussions for regularly reflecting on your data

Waterfall LearningFocused Leadership Solutions

Celebrating Each Other

Choose a partner you’ve never worked with (or don’t know very well.

Interview him or her for 3 minutes each.

Report out: your partners’Name

Level taught and number of years in education

One professional or personal accomplishment of which he or she is proud to share

The story of Christian

The story of Christian

Mission

To work with others to create and invent a place where it is inevitable that all children will have Christian’s moment every

day.

What does OURProfessional Learning Community

look like?

What are the best ways to be collaboratively curious?

What systems can we build for ourselves that ensure collaborative, weekly reflection and action based on

student work?

What agreements and norms do we need to allow us to be accountable to each other and to be rigorous in this

process?

• What do we want our students to know?

• How will we teach it?

• How will we know if they learned it?

• What will we do if they didn’t?

This, and nothing else.

What It Looks and Sounds Like

Take a few minutes to read “A Big Picture Look at Professional Learning Communities”

What matched your picture of a PLC?

What challenged your picture of a PLC?

Share your perceptions with a neighbor. Be ready to share.

Bad PLC/Good PLC

First Video:

http://www.teachertube.com/viewVideo.php?title=Example_of_a_Bad_PLC_Meeting&video_id=46926

What agreements are missing?

Second Video:

http://www.teachertube.com/viewVideo.php?video_id=46928

What agreements are in place?

The Learners’ Path: The Five Questions

Are you producing desired results?

Will you address it?

Will you try an alternative strategy?

Will you re-evaluate your action repertoire?

Will you engage in renewal and correction?

It’s all about “who’s in the data box?”

Examine an example of a data sheet from your own colleagues.

The essential assumption: “Lots of people may have already tried to get these kids out of the box.”

The next question: “How do we put our heads together to get these kids out of the box?”

(In other words: How can be be intentional about creating Christian’s moment, next week?)

PracticeThis boy is in your room.

The lesson: Create mental images to show, not tell emotions.

Noah is trying to describe a time when he was playing outside and he didn’t want to come in.

Noah has been stuck “in the box” for years.

Watch: “What’s That Word?” Password 212

http://watchlearning.weebly.com/watch-plcs.html

What do you see happening? Write silently and then turn to your neighbor. What would you plan next for him?

This Fall…TODAY: Work with a teammate or by yourself. Answer each question with

as much detail as possible. Be prepared to share your answers with the whole group:

WHAT IS PROFICIENT? Are their simple thing they must recall AND complex things they must do? Is there some kind of mix of both that indicates PROFICIENCY?

SIMPLE INDICATOR OF SUCCESS: After teaching with your new curriculum, what indicators during the first week would show you students are learning the topic?

SIMPLE REPORTING: What type of measurement would allow you (and teammates) to say to each other “During my first week of teaching this topic, _____ out of _____ could answer/construct/remember/etc. _______ with proficiency.”

FORMATIVE LISTENING/LOOKING: Is there a way to measure this WITHOUT a paper and pencil test? Is there a TASK they could perform during REGULAR INSTRUCTION? What would be the key WORDS or ACTIONS you would look for that would indicate PROFICIENT? Do your teammates AGREE? Will they use the exact same WORDS and ACTIONS?

Sharing our Fall PLC Focus

Share your answers to the questions.

Describe lingering questions or things you are wondering about.

Peter Senge

“Personal change and organizational change are two sides of the same coin. And the fantasy that we often carry around that somehow my organization will change without me changing is crazy!”

The Learners Path: Practices for Recovering KnowersPegasus Communications; p.xii