Professional Learning Community
What is a Professional Learning Community?
“An ongoing process in which educators work collaboratively in recurring cycles of collective inquiry and action research to achieve better results for the students they serve. Professional learning communities operate under the assumption that the key to improved learning for students is continuous job-embedded learning for educators.”
Check back for upcoming PLCs that will be offered.
See below for past PLC offerings.
PLC Option for PreK-8th Grade Teachers*
Station Rotation with Digital Practice (in ELA, Math or Science):
Explore the Station Rotation learning model and tinker with ideas to reinvent a lesson using Station Rotation.
PLC Option for 3rd-12th Grade Teachers*
Rethinking the Traditional Workflows:
Teachers do far too much of the work in classrooms. Teachers must rethink traditional workflows and encourage students to take the lead.
*Participants will be divided into grade-level groupings, based on the number of teachers who sign up.
*LincSpring cycles will be used as a framework for these PLCs, and may or may not be used in future PLCs.
What does it look like?
Small groups of teachers working together to learn about, or address a specific teaching practice or topic. An instructional coach or coaches will facilitate the PLC, however most of the real work of a PLC is accomplished through teacher collaboration. The PLC will meet for 5- 6 sessions that last about one hour. Teachers will go through a cycle of identifying goals for their classroom, collaborating on new strategies and ideas, testing out those ideas, and sharing results with each other and the staff at large.
What's in it for me?
The opportunity to participate in peer based professional development keyed to your specific needs and classroom. A PLC is not a "sit and get" type of learning, but instead an action based collaboration with peers which has been shown through research to be highly effective.
In addition to the professional growth, teachers who participate in a PLC will receive PD hours that can be applied to their teaching license.
What are my responsibilities?
If you choose to join a PLC, you should plan to attend as many meetings as possible. Much of the work will occur during the one hour PLC sessions. Outside of the PLC sessions you will be implementing what you learn in your classrooms so that you can share your experiences with your fellow teachers.
The Professional Learning Community
The PLC has long been a mainstay of excellent schools. Jonathon Saphier (PDF) found:
The reason professional learning communities increase student learning is that they produce more good teaching by more teachers more of the time. Put simply, PLCs improve teaching, which improves student results, especially for the least advantaged students.
Typically a Professional Learning Community is "a group of educators that meets regularly, shares expertise, and works collaboratively to improve teaching skills and the academic performance of students."
But this isn't a "book group." A PLC is made up of "a school's professional staff members who continuously seek to find answers through inquiry and act on their learning to improve student learning." (Huffman and Hipp 2003)