A learning community creates and maintains an environment that promotes and value learning. It fosters collaboration, a commitment to the growth and development of individual members, students, staff, principals and parents. The teacher does not only face the responsibility of her students but of each other. They are responsible for learning new skills so that there can be an improvement in their students learning. The community focuses on curriculum strategies and improvement in instruction. The teacher finds new strategies and takes on a number of leadership responsibilities. The professional learning community is for student improvement and learning opportunity. It is formed for teachers to improve their teaching through collaborative …show more content…
They saw a list of challenges the traditional schools went through such as: achievement scores were consistently low or falling, students were unhappy and/or unmotivated, parents were ignored, community members were disengaged, and school staff did not believe they could affect student learning. They assisted them in undertaking a school reform. They had no intention on introducing them to a professional learning community but the actions guided them to a professional learning community philosophy. The areas they were failing in improved drastically. They were organizational structures, focus of improvement work, personal and social dynamics, contextual influences, and leadership and saw significant improvements in these …show more content…
Communication was very weak. There was a big disconnection in the goal, purpose and intent. There was tension and challenges in the traditional school model. The staff embraced a set of value, customs and beliefs that conflicts with the school they are working in. Professional communities need an orientation that values openness to new ideas and practices and mutual accountability for learning (Talbert, 2010) during collaboration the team tried to solve complex problems it can be difficult for the learning community to hold control of the conversation. (3) Arriving at solutions and organization takes a lot of time and effort. Grossman, Wineberg, and Woolworth (2001) states it takes time to sort through subject matter, approaches to teaching, gender, race, and ideas of privacy. There need to be commitment and continuous engagement. (4) There is the challenge of student learning and faculty development. It is important for the learning community to form a platform for student learning and faculty development. The team needs to gather up what they know about learning and practice the best approaches to student teaching (5) the challenge of institutional change. In order for a learning community to succeed, there need to be institutional changes to enhance educational reform. It requires structural change, reworking roles and relationships, and generally employ
I had the pleasure of being able to shadow Superintendent Shirley Hall of the Maplewood School District. Ms. Hall took the reins of the district over in 2012 from a very popular superintendent who was credited with making great strides within the district. Although Ms. Hall had very large shoes to fill, she seems to be doing it with grace and enthusiasm. She credits the previous superintendent with making systemic changes and establishing the overall forward momentum of the district, but recognizes that she cannot rest on past success. Her goal is to take the district to the next level of educational excellence by focusing her and her administrative team's efforts on the P.E.L.P. coherence model from Harvard University. This model focuses the leadership's attention on the interdependence of the various aspects of their school district and how they reinforce one another to support the implementation of an improvement strategy. One of Ms. Hall's mantras was change, but not just for change sake, deep change for sustained improvement. Therefore, although Ms. Hall's predecessor was able to put the district on the right path, Ms. Hall has taken the baton and run with it; establishing her own style and path to excellence.
That broader conception of school allowed those schools to better support the students and address social issues that prevent students from accessing their full potential. This conceptual shift can only be spurred by a clear vision of “good education”—which then caused an improvement in their community’s education
This proposal is designed to address the need for professional development of which can be utilized in assisting teachers within our institution mature and grow educationally for the purposes of becoming better instructors for the purposes of education our students academically and assisting them to succeed within their academic goals and objectives. The proposed plan of action of which can ultimately assist bot our facu...
According to Ravitch, what Klein and Rhee failed to recognize is that teachers improve with experience and that children do not lead static life’s. Children experience ups and downs that effect their abilities on any giving day. As teachers, we know many different things can affect a student’s academic abilities. Klein and Rhee felt that the best way to improve schools is to fire “bad” teachers and principals. However, what we are finding is that it impossible to improve schools with constant firing and hiring on new teachers, management, or using different curricula each
Laura Jimenez’s article “The Next Frontier of Education Reform” was a well thought out article about the possibility for a new program called LEAP or LEarning Together to Advance Our Practice to help improve the failing system of improving our public school educators. Jimenez uses accurate data to show the reasons behind the need to reform educator professional development and shows different examples of how this could be accomplished. She largely looks at the DC public school system’s IMPACT and the newly created LEAP projects.
1. Introduction McTeague Frank Norris Novel First published in 1899, this Realism novel comments on the terrible nature of people in general and the city of San Francisco. Protagonists: McTeague Antagonists: Trina, Marcus, the money, Plot Summary: McTeague, a large brute of a dentist in San Francisco, spends his days living a quiet life alone in his “Dental Parlors.” Until his “pal” Marcus Schueler brings in his dear cousin, Trina Sieppe, to have the dentist fix her broken teeth. After spending some time with Trina, McTeague falls in love with her, and Marcus happily gives her up despite his plans to marry her himself.
Traditionally, teacher development typically occurs through trial and error in the isolated confinements of each teacher’s classroom with some periodic whole-group professional development (Goddard & Goddard, 2007). Within the past few decades, many schools and districts, including ours, have considered and experimented with Professional Learning Communities (PLC) as an alternative framework in guiding a more efficient development program for their teachers. PLCs are focused on enhancing student learning through developing teacher practices. The concept of PLC relies on using structured collaborative sessions amongst teachers within the school to build internal capacity. Through PLCs, teachers critically reflect on current practices, brainstorm solutions, and obtain help and advice from others in a supportive growth-oriented environment over an extended period of time (Vescio, Ross, & Adams, 2008; Nelson, 2009; Scher & O'Reilly, 2009; Bolam, McMahon, Stoll, Thomas, & Wallace, 2005). The theory of change guiding PLCs holds that by providing teachers with targeted support from within the school community, as oppose to hiring additional outside experts, professional developments can become for efficient. Implementation of effective PLCs requires intentional effort, school-wide and possibly district-wide restructuring of teacher schedules, and additional resources. For schools considering implementing PLCs, it is important to understand the logic of action and the benefits of PLCs as it relates to teacher improvement and increased student achievement.
Daniel, K. (1995). The Learning and Teaching Environment. Available: http://tecfa.unige.ch/tecfa/research/CMC/andrea95/node4.html. Last accessed 29 OCT 2011.
Research shows that the learning environment encompasses more than just the classroom that learning and teaching takes place. Many factors contribute to a learning environment, including the students, teachers, parents, school staff, policy makers, specialists, support staff, community members and the different learning spaces and resources available. This reflective journal will discuss some ways that teachers can set up the learning environment to maximise teaching and learning and some potential advantages and difficulties for me as a new teacher.
The work of professional learning communities (PLCs) can be seen in schools throughout the United States as well as all over the world. This literature review will address what exactly a professional learning community is and what purpose drives the work of the PLC as well as what they focus their time and energy on. Research on what an effective PLC looks like and what support is in place for those teachers who work in a professional learning community will be examined, as well as an overview of what obstacles face a PLC will be discussed. Finally, there will be an examination on what a non-traditional professional learning community is, what obstacles are unique to their collaborative process, and what has been suggested to help overcome
Organizing schools for improvement: Lessons from Chicago. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Collins, J. (2001) Good to great: Why some companies make the leap…and others don’t. New York: Harper Collins.
I have been a teacher for fifteen years, worked in two different school districts, and I have attended many professional development classes. I have had both positive and negative experiences from professional development.
...also believe in their own ability and the schools to teach students regardless of the circumstances. Students have to feel safe and be able to trust their school as well as the employees and other students in it. This means that rules and policies must be established otherwise it’s not an effective school. The school cannot be too small or too large to be an effective one either. Also, the parents and community definitely have to be involved in the education of their children or neighbor’s children in order for the school to be an effective one. This pertains to me because once I graduate and start looking for a place of employment I will want to work in an effective school. The knowledge that I have gained from this book will help me in choosing an effective school to work at.
...o expand knowledge of subject matter is through read books, journals, and magazine, participate in professional development activities and attend conferences. The value of participating in professional associations and organization helps teacher to move towards expertise to become engaged, active, and passionate and connect to their students (Laureate Education, Inc., 2009). As the teacher enhance and grow in the professional development can have a greatly impact on student learning, “Expert teachers know more than novices and organize that knowledge differently, retrieve it easily, and apply it in novel and creative ways” (Garmston, 1998). Therefore, there is such a significant value of participating in professional development through joining association or organization to help teacher to grow in expert in teaching and making an impact on student learning.
The learning environment connects the classroom to the community through a democratic approach. This community based learning brings the world into the classroom so students can implement social change and challenge social inequalities. The curriculum focuses on student experience and taking social action on real problems such as hunger, violence, and discrimination. It is important to instruct students to explore in group settings so they can work together to analyze and develop theories that can help each other and make a real different in the world. As a future educator, it is important to not only to teach my students the issues in our world, but how we can work together to find