Sunday, July 7, 2019

Principles for Effective Professional Learning


Are you working with your school’s leadership team to improve instruction?  Have you targeted an area where you would like to see growth during the upcoming school year?  Maybe your school’s goal is to include more STEM instruction, to incorporate social-emotional learning, or to implement a writer’s workshop approach.  Once you’ve determine an instructional goal, how do you make it happen?

Research on professional development suggests of few key characteristics of teachers’ learning that I think will ring true for you. 

Discussion-based learning: Teachers’ learning, like their students, is contextual and social.  Professional learning that includes collaboration and social construction of knowledge promotes teacher learning and also models interactive learning structures that teachers can take to their own classrooms. Text talks, protocols for professional discussion, and co-constructed anchor charts help teachers generate and hang on to important ideas.

Personalization: Peery (2004) argued, “Teachers must invest in their own growth by posing their own questions…This personalization is the essence of development.” But how do you personalize teacher learning when a focus has already been selected?  I’ve found that it is helpful to generate a list of essential questions about the topic (beforehand or as you launch a new initiative). Then let each teacher pick from among these the one s/he is most interested in investigating. You can also personalize by offering several articles for learning about the topic and letting teachers choose which to read, by giving opportunities for teachers to journal about their own learning, and by including time for teachers to design lessons that put principles into practice in their own classrooms.  Professional growth is possible when training is responsive to teachers’ personal needs.

Conceptual Understanding linked to Practical Application:  To be effective, teachers’ professional learning needs to maintain a link between conceptual and practical tools. When principles are presented, teachers need the opportunity to plan how to put them into practice.  This works best when professional learning experiences happen right in the school.

Time: short, stand-and-deliver inservice workshops can introduce or build awareness of new content, but real change requires extended opportunities for professional development.  Research suggests that longer duration produces sustained results. It’s hard to make the things listed above happen without investing considerable time. Having the time to think, read, write, and talk together supports Implementation.
As you ponder and plan for the upcoming school year, be sure to think about how the principles of professional learning, listed above, will be part of your plan for purposeful change.

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Peery, A.B. (2004). Deep change: Professional Development from the Inside Out. Lanham, MD:
Scarecrow Education.
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Teachers’ professional learning is something I’m passionate about!  One form of professional learning that includes the above attributes is Lesson Study.  You can read more about it in my upcoming book, Collaborative Lesson Study, available here for pre-order (20% discount code is TCP2019).  Please indulge me in celebrating this book.  I’m so excited to share what I’ve learned!

This week, you might want to take a look at:

3 Ways to More “Aha” Moments in Coaching: 



I’ve tried this and it works!  Combining character traits and vocabulary instruction:



How mentors help first-year teachers:

The ABC’s of feedback:



That’s it for this week.  Happy Coaching!

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