Introduction to the PLC
- 1. A Journey Worth Taking
- 2. The very essence of a learning community is a focus on and a commitment to the learning of each student.
- 3. A PLC is composed of COLLABORATIVE TEAMS whose members work interdependently to achieve common goals for which members are mutually accountable.
- 4. When you hear “ does that mean? ”, what In a perfect world, what would you like to look like at RHS?
- 6. A constant search for a better way to achieve goals and accomplish success: ◦ Gather evidence of current levels of student learning ◦ Develop strategies and ideas to build on strengths and address weaknesses ◦ Implement those strategies and ideas ◦ Analyze the impact of the changes to discover what was effective and what was not effective ◦ Apply new knowledge in the next cycle of continuous improvement
- 7. Members of a PLC realize that all of their efforts – focus on learning, collaborative teams, collective inquiry, action orientation, and continuous improvement – must be assessed on the basis of results rather than intentions.
- 8. Organizations that begin the work of a PLC develop their capacity to help all students learn at high levels far more effectively than those organizations that spend time PREPARING to become PLCs through reading or professional development training.
- 9. Look at the school wide data. Trends? Where do we begin? ◦ What do we already have in place? ◦ What data should we collect? When do we want to review this data?
Editor's Notes
- #3: Why wouldn’t we want to participate in a PLC?
- #4: Every member of a PLC has a responsibility to participate in the process.
- #6: The most powerful learning always occurs in a context of taking action. They value engagement and experience as the most effective teachers.Deep learning requires experience, which requires taking action. It “is as much about doing in order to think ans thinking in order to do”. (Mintzberg, 2005)
- #7: The goal is not to simply learn a new strategy, but to create conditions for an environment of innovation and experimentation – not viewed as tasks to be completed, but as a way to go about learning and solving problems every day in all parts of life.
- #8: The focus on results leads each team to develop and pursue measurable improvement goals that align with school and district goals for learning. It also drives teams to create a series of formative assessments that are administered to students throughout the year to gather ongoing evidence of student learning. The team reviews results of these assessments to identify and address areas of learning where many students are experienceing difficulty. They also discover strengths and weaknesses in their individual teaching in order tolearn from one another. Most importantly, the assessments are used to identify students who need additional time and support for learning. Frequent common formative assessments are one of the most powerful tools in the PLC process.
- #9: Take the plunge! It is the habit of working together that creates high performing PLCs. You can’t learn working together though workshops that deliver information or reading material.Learn by doing and get the best results.