Welcome back, everybody!

Did you come back with an extra emphasis on punctuality for your students? If you remember, that was the only change that we agreed we would be able to enforce without more agreement and research—which I think was a wise move. And have we seen results? Are kids showing up to class in a more timely way? We can discuss tomorrow in our next installment of the Classroom Management PLC.

Where are we at? What have we learned?

As a brief recap from our session before the break, here is the summary from our minutes:

• The PLC went well, but the notion to do a breakout session on the first day was too ambitious so neither group got to really dig in. Compensate upon return.
• We will need all of the old and new protocols and behavior management policies in order to conduct a review before making recommendations.
• Nick and Pat have agreed to be main facilitators.
• Some research for context and new ideas needs to be underway by October 16

As you may remember things went a bit pear-shaped when Anna and I found a number of our presumptions about who would go where and how many would go where and how long it would take (etc.) were upended. So both the Edmodo and the Classroom Management session didn’t really get to dig in. These things happen when you are working with a big group of teachers, lesson re-learned. :)

Where are we going?

But we did manage to agree on two broad areas to tackle to be handled by two teams, led by two brave souls: Pat will be facilitating a large group focused on adherence to an environment conducive to safety, and Nick will be working with another large group striving to choose, create and/or align clear rules and protocols. Please think about which one of these teams you would like to be on, and maybe how you could fit into that team as a specialist or a sub-team leader. For example, you see that Adam has proposed a special focus on conflict resolution, so tomorrow he could:

• Form and lead a breakout session on conflict resolution, which could:
  • Agree to spend some time looking up resources on conflict resolution, then share the ones they like best at first glance, and then agree to all research the shared resource before the next PLC meeting…or…
  • Brainstorm specific student examples of conflict, and then do targeted research on those areas in order to discover methods and techniques for students to deal with those situations…or….
• Remain in a large group—and do something similar to the ideas above.

And of course Nick’s group could also decide to break down into smaller groups, or remain in one large discussion group. It really depends on how the team wants to organize. As teachers, you have the freedom to organize the way you deem best, do research and share information the way you want, and produce policy and practice recommendations the way you want.

Where do we pick up?

Agenda for October 9th:

• Assist our two team leaders in organizing and actioning the teams
• Introduce SS teachers to the teams and item breakdowns (the ones who went to the Edmodo breakout session)
• Delegate responsibility to each item on the list (or at least all we agree on and want to focus on)
• Research and begin to assign evidence-based reading/video viewing relevant to the broader subject and the sub-items for each team

Questions to ask ourselves as we prepare to move forward:

• What do we want our students to learn?
• How will we know that they have learned it?
• What have we done that has helped them learn it?
• How can we ensure this becomes a part of their life-long learning?