Module 1: Why PLCs - PLC Case Study
West Roxbury middle school teacher John Clancy was troubled that although his students would write with enthusiasm, the quality of their essays had reached a plateau. They were stuck; so was he. One day, he brought some student essays to his team’s Tuesday PLC meetings. “It was a breakthrough,” he says. “We talked about the essays, and I realized I’d been too vague about the requirements. The kids needed more structure, more feedback on the technical aspects of writing, more direct instruction on things like
paragraphing.”
Talking about student work also presses teachers to design more complex assignments. “We realized we needed to give our students assignments that would give them more control and the chance to use their minds to show other kinds of learning.”
In West Roxbury teachers designed assignments that reinforced student learning from one class to another. Math teacher Mary Driscoll says, “A small example: I was going to have the kids compare quadrilaterals and triangles. The fact that we were talking together meant I could learn what other teachers were doing in their ‘compare and contrast’ assignments. They were using graphic organizers that I could use, and I saw I could introduce content to the kids that would reinforce what others were teaching.”
As teachers talked together about the qualities they were seeking in student work, they also realized the importance of communicating shared expectations for “good work” to their students. Mary Driscoll explains, “In our first year together, we designed a poetry rubric for a unit we were all doing. I’m a math and science teacher, but that discussion helped me be clear
about the expectations my colleagues had for our students. And this meant we could all be more effective with our students.”
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paragraphing.”
Talking about student work also presses teachers to design more complex assignments. “We realized we needed to give our students assignments that would give them more control and the chance to use their minds to show other kinds of learning.”
In West Roxbury teachers designed assignments that reinforced student learning from one class to another. Math teacher Mary Driscoll says, “A small example: I was going to have the kids compare quadrilaterals and triangles. The fact that we were talking together meant I could learn what other teachers were doing in their ‘compare and contrast’ assignments. They were using graphic organizers that I could use, and I saw I could introduce content to the kids that would reinforce what others were teaching.”
As teachers talked together about the qualities they were seeking in student work, they also realized the importance of communicating shared expectations for “good work” to their students. Mary Driscoll explains, “In our first year together, we designed a poetry rubric for a unit we were all doing. I’m a math and science teacher, but that discussion helped me be clear
about the expectations my colleagues had for our students. And this meant we could all be more effective with our students.”
>Return to Table of Contents