Schools as Professional Learning Communities
Collaborative Activities and Strategies for Professional Development
- Sylvia M. Roberts - City College of New York, CUNY
- Eunice Z. Pruitt - Educational Consultant, Texas
Foreword by Susan Sullivan
Professional Learning Communities | Reflective Practice | School Change, Reform, & Restructuring
Schools as Professional Learning Communities, Second Edition, a one-stop sourcebook for building a learning community, presents research-based activities and strategies that offer ongoing support for teachers. All activities are appropriate for use with study groups or school leadership teams as they seek to build their learning communities. Leaders will be able to offer teachers meaningful opportunities to meet, discuss, and work together to build and strengthen their understandings about teaching and learning and improve learning experiences for all students.
In this new edition, the authors have added:
- A Making it Work! activities section within each chapter to help teachers reexamine their educational beliefs and assumptions that guide their behaviour
- The School Improvement Framework for Learning Community Schools - a discussion of new strategies for classroom observation
- New information on e-portfolios, coaching, the importance of emotional intelligence, and the impact of No Child Left Behind
"Brings a completely different philosophy of schools to the forefront and provides specific strategies and activities that promote the school as a learning community with student learning as a focus."
"An excellent resource for teacher leaders, administrators, or mentors as a tool for establishing useful collaboration. There are specific examples and tips that can be applied to collaborative groups."
"Roberts and Pruitt offer practical advice to educators who seek to address one of the greatest obstacles to creating effective schools: how to get school staff to collaborate and learn from each other. Their insights and suggestions are smart, useful, and demonstrate a genuine understanding of how schools work."
"The wealth of ideas and information leads readers to make their own deductions and formulate their own vision and mission. This is an important step toward school improvement. The book is also very practical and has excellent examples."
"The case studies, examples, and references to additional sources of information such as Web sites make this an excellent study guide and reference work for leaders who are engaged in the difficult task of building learning communities."
"Provides aspiring educational leaders with the tools they need to build learning communities among school teachers. The activities are not only creative but allow for the development of complex skills critical to leading and transforming contemporary schools. This is a must-read book for those looking for school-based professional development activities and for those preparing leaders to be change agents in the 21st century."
"Roberts and Pruitt have created a guidebook that those in leadership positions can use to successfully implement the learning community model. The activities included skillfully address the issues that teachers and leaders face as they strive to transform their schools into places where learning opportunities for all can be maximized. This book is a storehouse of information with many practical applications and ideas that can be used by those who are engaged in the school improvement process."
Well designed and aligned with the goals of the course. Students found this book applicable outside of class.