On Going Professional Development
On Going Professional Development
Fan Out: Recently smaller groups have chosen pro-d opportunities and come back to spread the news. After a district professional day staff typically have time to discuss their learning during a collaboration assembly. This is when the administrators run school wide assemblies and staff have time to connect.
Creative Staff Meetings: Our staff meetings are held in a different room every month. The teacher who volunteers to host does a quick introduction of what is happening in their room that might be interesting to the rest of us. Also in the middle of a staff meeting there is a share out of super exciting new learning that is happening in classrooms. Yesterday we were introduced to a new outdoor education walking program. "Through walking we can enrich our students' sense-making abilities, we can enhance their very being and, as we go, we can seed with meaning the contexts in which they spend so many hours learning."(Judson, 2018). It was very valuable to share the learning with teachers who attended the professional development with an expert, teachers who have started using the program and those that are curious about it. I love hearing about what is happening in the classes so that I can purchase books for the students around the topics and provide the classroom teachers with reading material suitable for what the classes are curious about. The only down side of course are those little kindergarten chairs!
Bibliography:
Judson, G. (2018). A Walking Curriculum: Evoking Wonder and Developing Sense of Place (K-12). Vancouver BC: UBC Press.
Ritchhart, R. (2015). Creating Cutures of Thinking. San Francisco: CA: Jossey-Bass A Wiley Brand.
Creative staff meetings! I love the idea of visiting different classrooms each month as well as having time for teachers to talk about what is going on in their classrooms. So often when we collaborate with other teachers, it is only with those in the same or similar grades. I think it is important to see what happens in classrooms different from our own, as many of the ideas/strategies/activities could be useful at any grade level.
ReplyDeleteFan Out after Pro-D is such a great idea too! I would love to have the library open as a space for teachers to share what they learned in their professional development. There are way too many conferences to go to and topics to choose to focus on, that it is nice to talk with others about what they ended up choosing for their Pro-D and to share our own experiences as well.
Catherine, what an inspiring blog post. This truly get me excited to one day have my own classroom and school to work with. I have never head of a professional development book club, but what an amazing idea. Why not have a school focus with particular development. There is something special about true school community and honestly being a TTOC I can tell the minute I step into the staff room what the dynamics are in the school. Based on what you have described in your post I can see how much your school dedicates its time to working on community!
ReplyDeleteAs for your idea to "fan out" during professional development workshops I too had the same idea. Why not work together as a school and share our learning experiences with our school community. I feel this also provides some ownership to professional development. I don't know how many times I have heard teacher discussing their plans to work on a "self directed" development where they plan on catching up on some assessment or planning of their class defeating the purpose of this time. Finally your creative staff meetings is another great way to create a school community. I am so excited to be apart of the school district at a time where collaboration is of up most importance. I honestly believe this is such a positive time for teachers to work with each other creating a school community. By having administrators working together with the whole school providing time for teachers to share their development is amazing. I also love the idea of going room to room. This gives every teacher an opportunity to truly see what is going on in each classroom and a way for the teacher to showcase their development for the year. Thanks for sharing, I can't wait to read your next post!
Some very innovative and interesting ideas here! I have never heard of the moving staff meeting into other classrooms. We regularly have other colleagues share what they are doing in ours, but what a great idea to move the whole staff into a different space. As well, your book club experiences is a similar success in engaging staff with relevant options that support their personal choice and interest. Good overview of all the things working in your school community with some useful labels, links and resources.
ReplyDeleteAH! I really love your rotating staff meetings! What a great way to see what other teachers are doing! This is such a great way to draw out teachers who might otherwise feel shy or removed from the school community - inviting others into their space, where they get to be the expert might be really empowering for them!
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