10 Innovative Ideas To Provide Time for Professional Development and Collaborative Learning

Finding time for teachers to meet and learn together is often very difficult, but a resourceful school team can utilize creative ideas that have worked well in other schools.  It is important to put these structures in place early in the year.

Here are some ideas for providing time for educators to learn together.

1. Provide teachers on a particular grade level or who teach a common subject with a shared prep so they can plan and study together.
2. Invite teachers to determine how their shared preps can be used for any study group they can imagine.
3. Organize some regular large group activities for children.  Some schools have a weekly K-2 sing-along run by the music teacher on Friday mornings, allowing K-2 teachers to meet in a weekly study group.  On Friday afternoons, an activity for the upper grades could be planned.  Other schools organize large group gym activities, like Olympics or Field Days, run by the gym teachers and educational assistants.
   

Solution to combatting lonely, isolated educators: #PLN

Feelings of isolation occur with some regularity among educators, especially those who teach in specialty areas and/or small schools. Teachers spend much of their day separated from peers in classrooms that can become silos. However, technology is providing new ways for teachers to connect with peers both near and far. In this show, listeners are invited to join BAM radio's Rae Pica for a discussion about overcoming isolation by builidng a personal learning network.

Joining Pica are four innovative educators who walk listeners through the process of getting connected. They are:

• Rob Mancabelli is co-author of Personal Learning Networks: Using the Power of Connections to Transform Education.
• Nicholas Provenzano is a high school English teacher who is passionate about integrating technology into the classroom.
• Erin Klein is a second grade teacher who has her Masters of Education in Curriculum and Instruction and is the technology co-chairperson for the Michigan Reading Association.
• Lisa Nielsen (that's me!) is a seasoned public school educator and administrator and author of the book Teaching Generation Text

 You can listen to the program on the BAM radio site here!

Mandate Against Professional Blog URLs in NYC DOE Signature

Apparently I prompted a mandate by the NYC DOE that no employee can have their blog url in their email signature. I find this particularly upsetting because as the PD manager for the Office of Instructional Technology for the NYC DOE I think having a blog is a great way to get the digital footprint conversation going as well as model best practices for using 21st Century tools to build professional learning communities and personal learning networks that support the work we do. In fact, I think it would be terrific if all educators with professional blogs celebrated and shared their work in their email signatures. Heck, I think it would be great if educators were just consumers in the blogosphere and if we held them accountable to standing behind a blog url in their signature…that would be a fantastic professional learning vehicle for them and modeling tool for their students and/or staff.

But alas, as of today I received a call informing me that as a follow up to the standardization email I received last month, legal has advised that if you work at the NYC DOE your blog url must be removed from your signature. Additionally, I will have to add a disclaimer to all posts and comments (that I will receive soon from legal) that goes something like...the views expressed here are my own and do not represent that of the DOE. What happened to the idea of celebrating the successes among us and promoting the idea of authentic publishing and sharing and collaboration of ideas? I'm okay with a disclaimer on my blog (although I think a disclaimer on comments is extreme), but not so happy on the mandate to squelch the sharing of the existence of my blog ideas by eliminating the url from email signatures.

I'm well aware of other ways to share my blog url, but putting it along with my contact information helps identify me with more than just and email and phone. It enables me to connect my name to my ideas in a signature which enables my network to learn and grow as well. Yes they are my ideas, but so are all my emails. If people want to brand themselves (with a professional blog or an ethical quote for that matter) and share and establish their safe, appropriate, and acceptable professional digital footprint...shouldn't they be able?

Thoughts? Opinions?

Follow the Classroom 2.0 conversation on this topic here.

Further Reading from Joyce Valenza.

What Not to Blog Part 1

What Not to Blog Part 2

CIS 339 Brings Professional Learning Communities Into The 21st Century

I'm always on the lookout for schools that are effectively putting smart teaching and learning 2.0 practices in place. CIS 339 is one of those schools that has become a pioneer in embedding 21^st Century tools into the way they do business to enhance education. 

To start, as leadership expert Michael Fullan says, you need to get the right people in the right seats on the bus. 

The school’s committed leader, Jason Levy did just that by hiring Dan Ackerman, a former technology coach, as his assistant principal. Because of his background, Dan was prepared to support this effort. He also put Christina Jenkins in place as a full-time technology coach who among other accomplishments put a strong online infrastructure in place in addition to providing ongoing coaching and PD support. Additionally he retained Patrick Wagner an ed tech consultant. He also purchased a 21st Century literacy and social studies curriculum from Teaching Matters that includes onsite support from staff developers to support the program. Finally, he worked to secure teachers that were enthusiastic about using 21^st Century tools in the classroom and excited to be teaching in a school where every teacher had a laptop, projector and internet access to support instruction. 

Mr. Levy didn't have a miracle budget either. He had the same support on hand as most other NYC schools. He just ensured that the resources and staff he secured and purchases he made had innovative educational abilities at the core.