PD: Productive Discussions

I'm not going to lie...I like meetings. 

That's not entirely true...I like productive meetings.  I tend to view meetings as unique learning opportunities.  They are learning opportunities when we get to talk to each other about issues that are critical to the success of our profession and the betterment of the learning environment. My perspective is that if the material could have been covered in an email, that is how it should be distributed. 

Thankfully, I had such learning opportunities today during our professional development.  This morning, our Lead Learning Team met with Heather Feuerhelm, our Area Education Agency Literacy Consultant who, quite honestly, is a wealth of knowledge and resources and nothing short of the most passionate educator I know.  I may be biased because she was my high school teacher, college professor, role model, and our AEA consultant in my previous school.  What can I say?  AEA folks are highly valuable and I appreciate the knowledge they are able to share.  Needless to say, our time was used wisely as we planned our afternoon of leading discussion groups centered on the use of think-alouds. 

Our afternoon was spent in several groups of 8-10 teachers, all of whom had been previously asked in professional development to use the think-aloud reading strategy in a lesson.  Each group contained educators from all content areas in our K-12 district. In my room we had a spectrum from high school PE to kindergarten to elementary music. I never know what to expect when I have such a wide range of teacher talent and areas of experience.  I was completely impressed today.  Each educator brought a great example of how to use the think-aloud reading strategy.  It is simply telling your thought process as you read, view, or experience something in your content area.  Yes even the "non-reading" content areas of music, art, technology education, and career/technical educators do this too...and well...even though they may not have a prescribed "text."  After all, when I look at a painting or hear music, I think and feel things that I can share with my students.  Text isn't just words on a page and reading isn't restricted to books.  Not surprisingly, we used all of our time together to share, critique, and converse with our colleagues. It was delightful!

A critical component of professional development is the opportunity to engage in a productive, professional discussion.  When given the chance to talk, teachers have a great deal to say.  These discussions are cathartic, inspiring, and in some cases, all too infrequent.  Time to talk, reflect, collaborate, and research are critical to providing meaningful professional development.  Lunch isn't enough time for this.  In fact, lunch is the one place many educators go for a rest in the middle of the day and the last thing they want to talk about is education theory.  Providing these unique learning opportunities for productive discussions should be a focus for those in charge of planning PD.  With that in mind, I offer some guiding thoughts on participating in productive discussions.

1. Does the discussion provide a path to improving instruction?

2. Are the ideas shared free of bias or marginalization?

3. Is the discussion accessible for teachers of many content areas?

If you can answer yes to these, the conversation will likely be more beneficial than a complaint session (which may also be cathartic but may not productive). Providing time and resources for our colleagues to discuss professional issues is critical to maintaining professional health and improving the culture of the craft.