Findings from this study affirm the research-based practices on which this district's implementation plan was based, while suggesting that schools' existing practices and professional development experiences, culture, and the readiness of school leaders be considered and analyzed prior to initiating a districtwide implementation of PLCs. The study concludes by recommending that districts consider providing differentiated supports and targeted professional development to schools during their first years of PLC work to ensure growth among all PLC teams.
The purpose of this study was to explore teachers' lived experiences in professional learning communities, conceptualized in Ohio as teacher based teams. This study was carried out against the backdrop of state policies addressed to poorly performing schools. School culture must change in failing schools. In order to change culture (Kowalski, 2006) and to effectively impact student learning in underperforming schools, new shared beliefs and behaviors must come to fruition. In an effort to improve student achievement in underperforming schools across the state of Ohio, the Ohio Department of Education has mandated that these schools engage a process called the Ohio Improvement Process (ODE, 2012). This process requires schools to develop a two-way system of collaborative data analysis among three levels of stakeholders: district leadership teams (DLT), building leadership teams (BLT) and teacher based teams (TBT). The focus for this study was one Ohio urban middle school and its teacher based teams. According to DuFour (2004), professional learning communities place an emphasis on organizational learning, collaboration and collective accountability for student achievement. This concept of creating a learning organization by DuFour was an outgrowth of the work conducted by Senge (1990). The study took place at a school that performed in the lowest five percent of all Ohio's schools. I was an insider to the school district but not to the school itself. This school was considered urban, with high poverty and a high number of minorities. Participants (N=14) were middle school teachers selected from the teacher based teams in the areas of reading, mathematics and one intervention specialist from each of the seventh and eighth grade levels. Narratives of teachers' experiences, perceptions, and beliefs were solicited through one-on-one, face-to-face audio-taped interviews. I transcribed part of the interviews, assisted by a colleague (an outsider) who transcribed part of the interviews. I alone coded and interpreted the meanings of teacher voices. From the interpreted meanings I constructed three spheres of influence on the likelihood that TBTs maintain a sole focus on student learning: teachers as resources to each other, student performance data and allocated time. These three spheres of influence capture the experiences of the 14 teachers. Literature on professional learning communities (teacher based teams) have elements that delve into two spheres: teachers serving as resources to each other and utilizing data to drive the instructional decision making process. However, less focus on sufficient allocated time, the third sphere of influence, was found in the literature. I drew implications from these findings, including questions to teachers, administrators, and policy makers overseeing the consequences for poorly performing schools in Ohio. I suggest future studies of teachers' experiences that might serve to add to a growing body of research about professional learning communities that might aid educators in their quest to improve student academic achievement.
This publication sheds light on the evidence base that can be used to redesign initial and continuing teacher education to help practitioners effectively teach diverse students.
The purpose of this reputation-based, multiple-site case study was to explore professional learning communities' impact on teacher classroom practice. The goal of this research was to describe the administrator and teachers' perceptions with respect to professional learning communities as it related to teacher practice in their school. Educators and administrators were asked what types of practices teachers took from collaborative professional learning communities and tried in their classrooms. This reputation-based, multiple-site case study was important to Nebraska educators because many school districts had implemented professional learning communities in a variety of forms in the schools. There had been little, if any, investigation on what impact professional learning communities have had on teacher practice and the extent to which that had impacted students. This study focused on the teachers' perceptions of the impact professional learning communities had on their pedagogical practice as a result of collaboration and interactions in professional learning communities. ^ This study involved three schools in one Midwestern school district. The schools and district had operated professional learning communities for 6 years. The researcher found that professional learning communities had impacted teacher practice in that teachers had changed what they do from a pedagogical standpoint, as a result of interactions and collaboration in professional learning communities. The extent to which teacher pedagogical practice had been impacted is open to judgment. The fact that teachers had positively changed their pedagogy as a result of professional learning community function, including collaboration and interactions in professional learning community groups, is not open to judgment, as that is the primary finding of this study.
Based on six-month fieldwork in a junior secondary school in Shanghai, this book qualitatively investigates the implementation of Teaching Research Groups (TRGs), a form of school-based Professional Learning Communities (PLCs) in China, and teachers’ different professional learning experiences within the structure of TRGs. The author situates teacher professional learning in TRGs within broader historical, social, and cultural contexts and further suggests that the practice of TRGs reflects the Chinese approach of balancing the seemly complex dualities (e.g., commitment and control, collaboration and authority, and individual and collective approaches) in educational settings. This book supplements the present knowledge base on PLCs in the context of China and thus enriches the global discussion on constructing effective PLCs for teacher professional learning. Scholars and students studying teacher professional learning and development, PLCs, school improvement, and Chinese schooling would find this book helpful.
Currently, many states are adopting the Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS) or are revising their own state standards in ways that reflect the NGSS. For students and schools, the implementation of any science standards rests with teachers. For those teachers, an evolving understanding about how best to teach science represents a significant transition in the way science is currently taught in most classrooms and it will require most science teachers to change how they teach. That change will require learning opportunities for teachers that reinforce and expand their knowledge of the major ideas and concepts in science, their familiarity with a range of instructional strategies, and the skills to implement those strategies in the classroom. Providing these kinds of learning opportunities in turn will require profound changes to current approaches to supporting teachers' learning across their careers, from their initial training to continuing professional development. A teacher's capability to improve students' scientific understanding is heavily influenced by the school and district in which they work, the community in which the school is located, and the larger professional communities to which they belong. Science Teachers' Learning provides guidance for schools and districts on how best to support teachers' learning and how to implement successful programs for professional development. This report makes actionable recommendations for science teachers' learning that take a broad view of what is known about science education, how and when teachers learn, and education policies that directly and indirectly shape what teachers are able to learn and teach. The challenge of developing the expertise teachers need to implement the NGSS presents an opportunity to rethink professional learning for science teachers. Science Teachers' Learning will be a valuable resource for classrooms, departments, schools, districts, and professional organizations as they move to new ways to teach science.
Make the transition from traditional, whole-group reading instruction to the 21st century classroom by integrating three innovations that will dramatically improve elementary reading instruction: RTI, differentiated instruction, and technology. Detailed ex
This qualitative research piece asks former teachers and administrators of a multibuilding rural district to recall their experiences implementing Professional Learning Communities. Their offerings are compared to established literature in an effort to lend insight into their own processes and procedures and to benefit others who may be considering or revising their own implementation. Topics explored include basic tenets of Professional Learning Communities, best practices in educational leadership, and a sampling of thoughts on change theory. The participants’ narratives are woven into a single piece recalling the experience in a single story. Findings and implications are discussed both as anecdotal phenomena and as broader lessons to be learned for other school districts. Recommendations are offered with careful reference to the pertinent literature.
For many years, the authors have been fellow travelers on the journey to help educators improve their schools. Their first coauthored book focuses on district leadership, principal leadership, and team leadership and addresses how individual teachers can be most effective in leading students—by learning with colleagues how to implement the most promising pedagogy in their classrooms
