Component Three: Professional Development

The program provides high-quality and continual teacher and staff professional development and training.

Introduction

Professional development is a term applied to activities that help teachers and other members of a school staff learn, apply, and refine new skills and knowledge. It is a critical component of any comprehensive school reform plan. This section provides guidelines for planning, delivering, and evaluating professional development activities, and it describes how to structure professional development to create and sustain a culture in which teachers and school staff are involved collectively in continuous learning.

Driving Comprehensive School Reform

A comprehensive school reform effort involves making significant changes on a number of fronts, such as classroom practices and instructional strategies, how the school is organized, school governance, and values and beliefs. This section focuses on how to design, conduct, and evaluate professional development activities by using the following guidelines:

1. Adults learn more effectively when they work as a team to solve a problem that represents a shared concern and when they are involved in planning how they will learn.

Strong, effective implementation of new practices and higher motivation on the part of those involved in using the new practices will result when professional development:

• Is directed toward a job-related problem that represents a collective concern (Snyder, Brookfield)
• Involves participants in planning the activities (Little, Teachers' Professional Development)
• Encourages and supports collaborative approaches to solving the problem
• Provides support following the initial training (Joyce, Showers, Student Achievement through Staff Development)

A planning team might ask the following questions:

• What do our teachers and staff see as problems worth solving as they implement the model and our plan?
• How will teachers and staff be involved in planning the professional development activities necessary?
• How will teachers and staff work together in these activities?

2. Change is personal. It creates legitimate concerns for individuals and groups. The idea is to support people as they experience change rather than just supporting the change.

Everyone involved in change experiences a range of concerns (Hord, et al.). The support an individual needs varies according to the type of stress he or she is experiencing. Early in the process of learning new ways of doing things, an individual will probably need straightforward information and reassurance that he or she is not alone in feeling apprehension. Later, that same person will want opportunities to connect with others who can work with him or her in a collaborative approach to solving problems. Providing the right kinds of support costs little but pays enormous dividends

A planning team may want to verify that a plan is in place to:

• Provide information about this change up-front
• Help people deal with how the change will impact them personally
• Provide practical answers to "how-to" questions as they arise
• Determine how teachers will get feedback on how this change is impacting students
• Provide opportunities for teachers to work together so the desired impact of the change is multiplied

3. Professional development can be structured in a variety of ways. Choosing the most effective structure means matching what you are trying to do with the strengths and weaknesses of the different structures or models.

While the training model is the most familiar, there are at least four other good models of professional development, including:

• Individually Guided
• Observation/Assessment
• Involvement in Curriculum Development or School Improvement Process
• Inquiry Model

If a reform model is selected, the model's design will suggest the preferred structure(s). If a school is using its own model, someone on the staff, a teacher or administrator, will be interested and knowledgeable enough to work through the process of matching desired outcomes to the different models of professional development. Resources helpful in this task are listed in the bibliography under the following names: Sparks, Loucks-Horsley, and Collins.

A planning team will ask

What are the desired outcomes of the professional development activities we are providing, and which structure is most effective in producing these types of outcomes?

The fourth guideline speaks to building a culture for continuous improvement.

4. New practices are learned most effectively when the school becomes a professional learning community where everyone is committed to learning and to supporting others in their learning—where learning is a way of life.

A professional learning community stimulates ongoing, collective inquiry into teaching and learning. It involves everyone in highly visible learning experiences. Teachers, administrators, and staff members learn from each other, with each other, and for each other. When the faculty and staff are learning together they model lifelong learning for students. Students see significant adults putting a high priority on learning. Finally, being a part of a professional learning community improves the professional lives of teachers; it legitimizes change and makes it an accepted part of school life. For additional information on professional learning communities, see the article, "Educators as Learners: Creating a Professional Learning Community in Your School," and the forward written by Roland Barth. (Note: Barth wrote only the forward; the rest of the article is a compilation from others.) Those who are planning professional development as a part of the comprehensive plan should address this question:

How will we provide adequate time for teachers and others to participate in these professional development activities?

5. Professional development activities should be scheduled when teachers are fresh, not tired. Activities should be conducted in uninterrupted blocks and balanced between school days and non-student-contact days.

Teachers cannot be expected to conduct serious collective study and reflection concerning curriculum and instructional practices only at the end of a regular school day (Raywid). The energy needed to teach today's students leaves little in reserve. Time on professional development needs to be spent in uninterrupted blocks of substantial length. Some professional development activities can be conducted during the summer, but most should occur during the school year so teachers can immediately apply what they are learning. Teachers themselves can come up with many creative, no-cost ideas for using time efficiently so that small groups of teachers are freed from other duties to work on professional development. Engaging teachers in brainstorming or problem solving activities to generate new ways of using time can be an effective strategy. For more information on finding time for professional development, see the Spring 1999 online version of the Journal of Staff Development.

6. Continual assistance will be needed to support teachers as they put the new practices in place and begin to gain skill in using them.

Providing ongoing support for professional development activities is crucial. Joyce and Showers report that without follow-up, only one teacher out of ten will be able to stick with a new strategy long enough to add it to his or her repertoire. But when coaching or some other type of continual assistance is provided, as high as 90 percent of those trained can achieve mastery of a new strategy. The planning team might ask:

What kinds of ongoing support will be available to teachers as they begin using the new practices?

A number of examples are listed below.

Examples of Continual Assistance I observed a teacher demonstrate the new strategy in his or her classroom. The trainer or another "expert" was available for questions and follow-up sessions. I worked with other teachers to collect and/or analyze information on how students were responding to the new strategy. I collaborated with at least one other teacher in planning to use the new strategy. Another teacher shared materials with me for use with this strategy. A teacher gave me an idea for applying the new strategy in a new way or in a situation different from the ones used as examples in the training activity. A teacher gave me an idea for using materials with the new strategy in a new way or in a situation different from the ones used as examples in the training activity. Someone gave me encouragement and/or moral support related to my use of the new strategy. Someone exerted pressure upon me to use the new strategy or to use it more effectively. I engaged in problem solving related to the new strategy with other teachers. Someone made me feel less anxious so I would keep trying the new strategy, even when things weren't going well. Another teacher was very open in talking about his or her use of the new strategy. Other teachers made me feel like we were "in this together" when it came to using the new strategy. Planning and talking with other teachers about the new strategy made me think more objectively about my own use of the strategy. I joined a study group to help myself and others implement this strategy.

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