The speaker drones on through the Power Point, hoping that the audience will scribble notes and transfer the expert ideas into practice. She's not a bad speaker - engaging, interesting, a little cornball in her humor, but she keeps our attention.
I keep thinking of the people in the room. She has no idea that the language arts teacher to my left is a master at differentiated instruction. She has these rotating learning centers on the peripheral of her classroom that allow students to choose the help they need in the modality that they prefer. The speaker talks of discourse, but if we really want to see discourse in action, we should visit Javi's class, where the students guide the critical thinking questions.
Collectively, we don't lack the skills. What we lack is a platform to share these ideas in a safe place, with deep questions and a horizontal system of collaboration. We need to recover a sense of the teacher's commons.
* * *
Pseudo-reformers have hijacked one of the most democratic terms in our lexicon and turned it into a tool for standardization. Originally, the notion of common, meant shared. The public commons was a place for debate, for leisure, for the open exchange of ideas and social interaction. It was the public square that managed to balance the collective values of the public while respecting the rights of the individual.
We still retain the notion of a commons in ideas like Creative Commons or in conversations about teaching as a common craft. Yet, within the context of a school system, the notion of "common" is often reduced to a heavy-handed, hierarchichal mandate of tests, training and curriculum.
We need to recover the of a shared set of a knowledge, an open exchange of ideas or a mental and physical space for democracy.
* * *
A few years back, I had the chance to pilot a different format of professional development. I began with a notion of a teachers commons. It wasn't my idea. It just sort-of emerged from an initial needs assessment I had conducted. Here's what I learned in the process:
- Define the space: I began with a slogan, "connect, create, collaborate." It sounded great to me, but the group quickly changed the concept to "a place to share."
- A hybrid model works best: the teachers commons was a mental space where we shared, a physical location of our meetings and an online space where we shared ideas and resources. We used the name Teachers Commons as a basis for our mini-community that developed.
- Be flexible: Initially, I had all kinds of methods I expected people to use. However, the group hated the wikis and preferred Google Docs. They weren't fond of sharing on IM, but they loved leaving comments on blogs. We liked an open meeting format for discussion, but some teachers really wanted an agenda for our PD sessions. I quickly realized that it had to grow organically.
- Allow teachers to participate in the commons outside of PD time, but don't require it. Some teachers liked the notion of adding resources or asking questions to the group during their weekend lesson planning. Others liked the idea that the community existed only during the structured PD time.
- Make it aesthetically pleasing. I know, I know, this sounds lame. But the physical room, the hang-out space as well as the blog (or whatever platform one chooses) should create a sense of atmosphere. Part of why people hate professional development is that it often requires them to sit on hard plastic chairs under the incessant buzzing of the fluorescent lights.
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