Today’s Agenda

http://plpconnectu.wikispaces.com/

Let’s Meet our Community

Community Leader- Susan Carter Morgan

Connected Coaches-Co-directors: Lani Ritter Hall Dean Shareski

Program Admin-Mary Worrell

School Teams

How will education be different tomorrow because of our meeting today?

How will you contextualize and mobilize what you learn?

How will you leverage, how will you enable your faculty or students to leverage- collective intelligence?

Native American Proverb“He who learns from one who is learning, drinks from a flowing river.”

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Sarah Brown Wessling, 2010 National Teacher of the YearDescribes her classroom as a place where the teacher is the “lead learner” and “the classroom walls are boundless.”

Lead Learners

Define Community

Define Networks

A Definition of Community

Communities are quite simply, collections of individuals who are bound together by natural will and a set of shared ideas and ideals.

“A system in which people can enter into relations that are determined by problems or shared ambitions rather than by rules or structure.”

(Heckscher, 1994, p. 24).

The process of social learning that occurs when people who have a common interest in some subject or problem collaborate over an extended period to share ideas, find solutions, and build innovations. (Wikipedia)

Virtual CommunityA virtual space supported by computer-based information technology, centered upon communication and interaction of participants to generate member-driven content, resulting in relationships being built up. (Lee & Vogel, 2003)

A Definition of NetworksFrom Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Networks are created through publishing and sharing ideas and connecting with others who share passions around those ideas who learn from each other. Networked learning is a process of developing and maintaining connections with people and information, and communicating in such a way so as to support one another's learning.

Connectivism (theory of learning in networks) is the use of a network with nodes and connections as a central metaphor for learning. In this metaphor, a node is anything that can be connected to another node: information, data, feelings, images. Learning is the process of creating connections and developing a network.

“Understanding how networks work is one of the most important literacies of the 21st Century.”

- Howard Rheingold

http://www.ischool.berkeley.edu

What does it mean to work/learn in a connected world?

What does professional development look like in the 21st Century?

Photo credit: Alec Couros

What does it mean to be a connected learner with a well developed network?

What are the advantages or

drawbacks?

How is it a game changer?

Inclination toward being open minded

Dedication to the ongoing development of expertise

Creation of a culture of collegiality- believing that "None of us is as good as all of us" and that the contributions of all can lead to improved individual practice

Willingness to be a co-learner, co-creator, and co-leader

Willingness to leaving one's comfort zone to experiment with new strategies and taking on new responsibilities

Dispositions and ValuesCommitment to understanding gained through listening and asking good questions related to practice

Perseverance toward deep thought by exploring ideas and concepts, rethinking, revising, and continual repacking and unpacking, resisting urges to finish prematurely

Courage and initiative to engage in discussions on difficult topics

Alacrity to share and contribute

Desire to be transparent in thinking

PLP takes a 3-pronged approach to PD

- Professional Learning Communities- Global Communities of Practice or Inquiry- Personal Learning Networks

PLCs = local, f2f, collectiveCoPs = online, deep, collectivePLNs= online, nodes, individual

The driving engine of the collaborative culture of a PLC is the team. They work together in an ongoing effort to discover best practices and to expand their professional expertise.

PLCs are our best hope for reculturing schools. We want to focus on shifting from a culture of teacher isolation to a culture of deep and meaningful collaboration.

Professional Learning Communities

Communities of Practice

Personal Learning Networks

Community is the New Professional Development

Cochran-Smith and Lytle (1999a) describe three ways of knowing and constructing knowledge that align closely with PLP's philosophy and are worth mentioning here.

Knowledge for Practice is often reflected in traditional PD efforts when a trainer shares with teachers information produced by educational researchers. This knowledge presumes a commonly accepted degree of correctness about what is being shared. The learner is typically passive in this kind of "sit and get" experience. This kind of knowledge is difficult for teachers to transfer to classrooms without support and follow through. After a workshop, much of what was useful gets lost in the daily grind, pressures and isolation of teaching.

Knowledge in Practice recognizes the importance of teacher experience and practical knowledge in improving classroom practice. As a teacher tests out new strategies and assimilates them into teaching routines they construct knowledge in practice. They learn by doing. This knowledge is strengthened when teachers reflect and share with one another lessons learned during specific teaching sessions and describe the tacit knowledge embedded in their experiences. 

Community is the New Professional Development

Knowledge of Practice believes that systematic inquiry where teachers create knowledge as they focus on raising questions about and systematically studying their own classroom teaching practices collaboratively, allows educators to construct knowledge of practice in ways that move beyond the basics of classroom practice to a more systemic view of learning.

We believe that by attending to the development of knowledge for, in and of practice, we can enhance professional growth that leads to real change.

Cochran-Smith, M., & Lytle, S.L. (1999a). Relationships of knowledge and practice: Teaching learning in communities. Review of Research in Education, 24, 249-305.

Passive, active, and reflective knowledge building in local (PLC), global (CoP) and contextual (PLN) learning spaces.

http://www.elearnspace.org/Articles/google_whitepaper.pdf

about co-learning, co-constructing meaning, co-

leading : through—

(PLNs, PLCs & CoPs)- Use a 3-pronged approach

PD in the 21st Century should be…

Dynamics of Different Network TypesCommunity of Practice

Project Teams Informal networks

Purpose Learning SharingCreating Knowledge

Accomplish specific task

Communication flows

Boundary Knowledge domain

Assigned project task

Networking, resource building and establishing relationships

Connections Common application or discovery- innovation

Commitment to goal

Interpersonal acquaintances

Membership Semi - permanent Constant for a fixed period

Links made based on needs of the individual

Time scale As long as it adds value to the its members

Fixed ends when project deliverables have been accomplished

No pre-engineered end

Co-created content

Celebration

Connection

Communication

Collaboration

Community is established through …

Characteristics of a healthy community

Lots of PLP Experiences Available

SupportPowerful Learning Practice is designed as a self-evolving system• loose governance of scaffold-driven leadership • natural leaders emerge • in the launch phase a number of people involved in supporting and coaching community members.

Two all day workshops that build capacity, community and develop 21st Century skills.

WorkshopsLive meetings where teams meet, listen and then reflect in small groups.

ElluminateWhere we deepen understanding, network, share resources and grow as a community of practice.

VLC

Professional Learning Teams

Job embedded teams who meet f2f and work towards scale and alignment of 21st C skills with school improvement goals

Powerful Learning Practice Delivery Model

Collaborative Tools

• Wikispaces

• Delicious or Diigo

•Twitter

• Elluminate

• NING (our VLC)

“Collaboration with others in my district and learning new tools was the best part of PLP.Connecting with other teachers in my district for new ideas and connecting with other schools for new ideas made PLP the best PD ever!”

- Science teacher in WNY

TEAM PROJECTS

Your team will work in a Professional Learning Team to co-create a project- based unit which will be posted in your Global 2 spaces.

These projects will be showcased at our culminating event and online for the world to see!

“The project allowed me to work closely with other people in my district in order to accomplish a common goal. Discussing projects from the other districts was very informative!”- school level technology coordinator

"The greatest danger in times of turbulence is not the turbulence. It is to act with yesterday's logic." - Peter Drucker

http://pixdaus.com

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Powerful Learning Practice Team Building Activity

1. Individually- Write at least 3-5 assumptions on (gasp) paper that you have about how your team will operate as a 21st Century Learning team and any team learning goals you have . 5 min.

2. Place all the ideas in the center of the table: Stack and shuffle.

3. In turn, each person picks an idea to read aloud to the table. Engage in dialogue and discussion about the assumptions. 15 min.

4. Someone needs to share these assumptions on the wiki or later in NING.

PLP Community Activity

Do a round-robin style introducing yourself and then answer the following prompt.

1: What about the world and society has changed since you went to school?

2: What about students has changed since you went to school?

3: What about schools has changed since you went to school?

4. What should School 2.0 look like in order to meet the needs of the 21st Century learner?

In light of the changes that have taken place in our society in the last twenty years, what will it mean to be an educated adult in the twenty-first century? What do graduates need to know and be able to do to be well-prepared for college, careers, and citizenship?