Ruth’s Ruckus

I just read Steve Dembo’s post http://www.teach42.com/2007/10/18/building-out-the-choir/  and I realize he is right. So many of us here in the “Blogosphere” are connecting with each other over and over again; each time we hook up we reaffirm our need and dependence on Web 2.0 technologies. We need to move beyond that to an “each one, reach one” strategy in order to share the wealth. As a teacher trainer, I have opportunities to share, but so many of my teachers still need the basics. I have teachers who “don’t have time” to read email…what they fail to realize is that they truly don’t have time NOT to. All of these tools increase our productivity. They help us to get or find the resources that we need in shorter amounts of time.

Well Steve, thanks for the hint…I have the opportunity to reach 50+ reading educators at a meeting next month. I had planned to just give an overview of some websites, but I am determined to sneak a bit of Web 2.0 in…maybe I’ll mention http://del.icio.us  and explain how they can bookmark sites that are of interest. I’m not quite sure how, but I’ll come up with something.

Of course the test of my resolve to blog biweekly would be to look at my blog.  So no wonder that 6 weeks have gone by without a single entry…Well I continue to try.  

I found an interesting entry at 21^st Century Collaborative on professional learning communities. In the post Beach talks about a learning community including administrators and staff working and learning collaboratively to improve student learning.  I find it interesting that this approach while endorsed by ASCD and many others (Beach quotes Senge who I had to read as part of my school administration studies) is not being carried out  in the school division.  Several of the schools are in dire need of some intervention…we’ve got sweeps, school improvement plans, after school programs, but we’re not sitting down to learn together or from each other.  When research says that this approach could turn a school around, why aren’t we trying it?  My department is driven to be a learning community…whether we like it or not.  We meet weekly to share best practices, discuss the literature and learn new techniques.  We are challenged to reflect on our practice so that we can become better trainers. Even though she is way too busy, our supervisor subjects herself to many of the same things that she expects us to do.  This way, we learn together.  It does work for us, although we do a monumental amount of stretching ourselves.

What would it take to get administrators and teacher to develop a learning community?  I guess it would have to be driven by the administrator.  How do you get an administrator interested in doing that?  Why has this practice not been brought to our division when it has the potential to make lasting change by changing the very culture of the schools?