Rethinking Professional Development

An idea came to me today while reading through the blog roll of David Jakes, specifically a post titled Words Matter | Professional Development. David questions the current popular definition of professional development. Professional Development carries with a sort of negative feeling. It is something that is required of you in order to continue doing that thing you enjoy doing, teaching. He recounts a colleague that begin each of his presentations with something he learned the night before. Something that may be completely unrelated to the topic but still sets him up as a learner, someone who strives to learn something new every day. He goes on to talk about creating a "learning culture";

Model it, live it, make it visible.  Do this, and you'll take some significant steps towards developing a learning culture...and that's the real prize.

image credit: JMSmith

I couldn't help but think about a recent conversation I had with a middle school principal I know. He explained that in addition to PLC and grade meetings, the teachers at his school are given weekly "reflection" time. Time that they were to use to look back on their week, think about what changes they need to make, or learn something new. When I asked how they made sure this time wasn't wasted he explained that each teacher needed to write out what they used their time for and explain what it was they did. I accepted this answer at it's face but I have continued to think that maybe this time was still being wasted. Maybe the teachers were simply making up the things they said they were doing. Really, who is going to take the time to read these essays? Are they graded? Do they get put into the teachers personnel file for later review? What real consequence is having them write it out besides busy work that we all hate assigning to students. I feel that this falls into Davids current definition of professional development and could be changed. 

Instead of having teachers write out their learning experiences for review by administration, why not have them post something they have learned each week to a school blog? Or have their learning experience emailed to a random colleague or posted on a board for the rest of the faculty to read? Why not hold a monthly "unconference" where teachers can get up individually or as a group and present a tool, technique or revelation they had during this time?

Don't get me wrong, what this middle school is doing is definitely on the right track. I think however that it can be taken to whole other level. I think that while they started correctly by encouraging teachers to learn, they reinforced the notion that learning happens while studying alone. Learning happens as part of a group. If there is nobody that is challenging or adding to what you are learning then how are you going to grow?