September 21, 2018Hello Peter,

The following material between the dotted lines is from my work ** Fixing Instruction - Resolving Major Issues with a Core Body of Knowledge for Critical Instruction**, pp. 39-40 (2015):

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We have spent many reform dollars at the federal, state, local, and private levels over the last 50 years. Yet, teacher preparation, practice, and student achievement remains weak. This is because approaches to reforming schools and schooling typically address issues of organization, management, finance, standards, and assessment. They do not address the very foundation of instruction and learning. This is serialism, the long-standing and self-defeating [and rote-inducing] reasoning strategy used in teacher preparation, practice, and learning.

Here is an example. According to Bryk, Gomez, Grunow, and LeMahieu (2015), improvement science is an approach to problem solving involving networks of interested parties. They are called Network Improvement Communities or Professional Learning Communities. According to Bryk and associates, one such network involved teams from Maryland, New York, and Texas. They “focused on two processes that strongly affect new teachers’ lives: [1] the quality of feedback . . . new teachers receive for improving teaching, and [2] the degree of support . . . [they] sense in their relationship with their primary supervisor, the school principal” (p. 3).

As in typical in reform efforts, a key issue facing new teachers and professional practice is not addressed [by the PLC]. That issue is the serial-thinking basis (i.e., roteism) for how teachers and students currently come together cognitively and operationally in the classroom when engaging new and revisited subject matter.

This is but one example. In their deliberations, every element of the education culture [including PLCs], is a captive of the hidden [roteism]-based instruction mindset. To this end, the profession needs to minimize greatly the practice of [roteism]. We must instruct and learn in ways that make critical thinking for comprehension of subject matter the heart of the matter.

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Hope this is of use to you. PLCs that do not address the issue of conventional roteism practice will have little systemic and lasting impact on teacher preparation, development, and effectiveness and therefore on student achievement.

For more on roteism-based instruction and learning, and how its practice can be minimized with a core body of knowledge for critical instruction, visit www.criticalinstruction.com.

Vic Maiorana

Peter Brett ,

You can use google scholar with date restrictions to see recent research in this area:

https://scholar.google.com/scholar?as_ylo=2014&q=professional+learning+communities&hl=en&as_sdt=0,23

When reviewing the articles you should be able to tell peer-reviewed articles from others. For a large brush of initial review, try the Eric system:

https://eric.ed.gov/

That's a nice generic search strategy, Szymon and one that I will look to pass on to Higher Degree Research students. Thanks for taking the time to share.

Thanks so much, Ben - Yes I had identified some useful NCSL 'leading from the middle' references but it is helpful to have these names to follow up.

I thought that I'd share the list that I have collated so that responders don't reference something already here. I am sure that there is a great deal that I am missing and that could usefully inform my colleague's research:

Andrews, D., Crowther, F.. Hann, L. & McMaster, J. (2002). Teachers as leaders: Re-imaging the profession. The Practising Administrator 24 (1) 24-27.

BENNETT, N. (2003). Distributed leadership Full report. United Kingdom: Nottingham. National College for School Leadership.

Bennett, N., J.A. Harvey, C. Wise and P.A. Woods, 2003. Desk study review of distributed leadership. Nottingham, UK: National College for School Leadership/Centre for Educational Policy & Management.

Curry, M., Jaxon, K., Russell, J., Callahan, M. & Bicais, J. (2008). Examining the practice of beginning teachers’ micro-political literacy within professional enquiry communities. Teaching and Teacher

Education, 24 (3), 660-673.

Dampson, D., Havor, F. and Laryea, P. (2018). Distributed Leadership an Instrument for School Improvement: The Study of Public Senior High Schools in Ghana, Journal of Education and e-Learning Research, 5 (2), 79-85.

Evans, L. (2001) Delving into morale, job satisfaction and motivation among educational professionals: re-examining the leadership dimension, Educational Management and Administration, 29, 291–304.

FLETCHER, J.; KAUFER, K. (2003). Shared leadership: Paradox and possibility. In PEARCE, C.; CONGER, J. (Eds). Shared leadership: reframing the hows and whys of leadership. Thousand Oaks, New Delhi:

Sage Publications, p. 21-47, 2003.

Fullan, M., 1993. Change forces: Probing the depths of educational reform. London: Falmer Press.

GRONN, P. (2002). Distributed Leadership. Second International Handbook of Educational Leadership and Administration, 1 (2)., 653-696. DOI: 10.1007/978-94-010-0375-9_23.

Harris, A. (2008). Distributed school leadership: Developing tomorrow’s leaders. Oxon, UK: Routledge.

HARRIS, A. (2012). Distributed leadership: implications for the role of the principal. Journal of Management Development, 31 (1), 7-17.

Harris, A. and J. Spillane, 2008. Distributed leadership through the looking glass. British Educational Leadership, Management & Administration Society, 22(1): 31–34.

HULPIA, H.; DEVOS, G.; VAN KEER, H. The influence of distributed leadership on teachers’ organizational commitment: A multilevel approach. The Journal of Educational Research, 103, (1), 40-52.

Kezar,A. , Gallant, T.B. & Lester, J. (2011): Everyday people making a difference on college campuses: the tempered grassroots leadership tactics of faculty and staff, Studies in Higher Education, 36:2, 129-151.

MacBeath, J., 2005. Leadership as distributed: A matter of practice. School Leadership and Management, 25(4): 349-366.

Mayrowetz, D., 2008. Making sense of distributed leadership: Exploring the multiple usages of the concept in the field. Educational Administration Quarterly, 44(3): 424–435.

SPILLANE, J.; HALVERSON, R.; DIAMOND, J. B. (2004). Towards a theory of leadership practice: a distributed perspective. Journal of Curriculum Studies, 36, 3– 34.

Spillane, J.P. and K. Healey, 2010. Conceptualizing school leadership and management from a distributed perspective. Elementary School Journal, 111(2): 253-281.

Timperley, H.S., 2005. Distributed leadership: Developing theory from practice. Journal of Curriculum Studies, 37(4): 395-420.

Wise, C, 2000, Being a Curriculum Leader Helping Colleagues to Improve Learning, in Subject Leadership and School Improvement, in Busher, H, Harris, A and Wise, C, 2000, Subject Leadership and School Improvement, London, Paul Chapman Publishing Ltd, chapters 3 and 5.

Try these...

PLC's: Communities of Continuous Inquiry & Development - https://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/ED410659.pdf

Impact of PLC's - https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/7005/0f51d928cbedba2056a77a8f2c9b225c6821.pdf

PLC's - http://www.ecap-videos.ca/ecap/resources/Hord2009.pdf

Hi Peter!!

This book on PLCs by Stoll & Seashore-Louis is a handy one

https://books.google.it/books?hl=en&lr=&id=rB-hd9s60DMC&oi=fnd&pg=PA132&ots=CN0rXG13s0&sig=aMbdgoKm3IcAaFS6iNbKOGn0nqw&redir_esc=y#v=onepage&q&f=false

I'm currently looking into whether there have been recent critiques of PLCs (in response to a reviewer's feedback on a manuscript) - have you come across anything?

Also I see you have one of Dorothy Andrews' works in there - maybe these are useful too?

Cheers, Sherridan

Also Peter, your colleague might find this case study in a recent article by Conway and Andrews in the Journal of Educational Change useful: Article A school wide approach to leading pedagogical enhancement: A...

Thanks Raymond and Sherridan - helpful and relevant sets of references and projects to follow up.

Hello Peter. The literature on learning organizations might also support your student as it embraces this variable. Also research on school effectiveness and improvement might be of help (International Journal of School Effectiveness and School Improvement.

Google search would be my own suggestion to you for latest study in your proposed area.

I suggest that they (the professional learning community) take a look at some of the literature on culture--both school culture as a whole and understanding the role of culture in learning.

I can't remember the title of the book I want to recommend on school culture, so I will add that recommendation later. But for understanding culture in school learning, I highly recommend the following:

Hollins, E. R. (2015). Culture in school learning: Revealing the deep meaning (3rd ed.). NY: Routledge.

Thanks Nora and Clare. Yes - I recommended the school improvement literature, too, Nora, but it is good to have my instincts confirmed and to be introduced to a journal that I wasn't aware of. I also think that broader school culture (and the attitude of the Principal) makes a big difference, too, Clara. Slightly cautious in that this is a small scale case study of a particular professional learning community implementing a particular initiative. My hypothesis would be that the micro-politics of individual schools (and school cultures) do make a big difference to the success/effectiveness of professional learning communities. Thanks to both of you for your engagement. Cumulatively the wise advice gathering in this space is going to help this assistant principal with his on the ground case study research!

I agree!

September 21, 2018Hello Peter,

The following material between the dotted lines is from my work ** Fixing Instruction - Resolving Major Issues with a Core Body of Knowledge for Critical Instruction**, pp. 39-40 (2015):

===========

We have spent many reform dollars at the federal, state, local, and private levels over the last 50 years. Yet, teacher preparation, practice, and student achievement remains weak. This is because approaches to reforming schools and schooling typically address issues of organization, management, finance, standards, and assessment. They do not address the very foundation of instruction and learning. This is serialism, the long-standing and self-defeating [and rote-inducing] reasoning strategy used in teacher preparation, practice, and learning.

Here is an example. According to Bryk, Gomez, Grunow, and LeMahieu (2015), improvement science is an approach to problem solving involving networks of interested parties. They are called Network Improvement Communities or Professional Learning Communities. According to Bryk and associates, one such network involved teams from Maryland, New York, and Texas. They “focused on two processes that strongly affect new teachers’ lives: [1] the quality of feedback . . . new teachers receive for improving teaching, and [2] the degree of support . . . [they] sense in their relationship with their primary supervisor, the school principal” (p. 3).

As in typical in reform efforts, a key issue facing new teachers and professional practice is not addressed [by the PLC]. That issue is the serial-thinking basis (i.e., roteism) for how teachers and students currently come together cognitively and operationally in the classroom when engaging new and revisited subject matter.

This is but one example. In their deliberations, every element of the education culture [including PLCs], is a captive of the hidden [roteism]-based instruction mindset. To this end, the profession needs to minimize greatly the practice of [roteism]. We must instruct and learn in ways that make critical thinking for comprehension of subject matter the heart of the matter.

===============

Hope this is of use to you. PLCs that do not address the issue of conventional roteism practice will have little systemic and lasting impact on teacher preparation, development, and effectiveness and therefore on student achievement.

For more on roteism-based instruction and learning, and how its practice can be minimized with a core body of knowledge for critical instruction, visit www.criticalinstruction.com.

Vic Maiorana

Thanks Vic - I must read more about roteism. Would the criticism here be of teachers when they come together in PLCs thinking in the same way - or having a predisposition to keep doing the same things that they have always done....or a bit of both?

Peter

Mortier, K., Leroy, M., Van de Putte, I. & Van Hove, G. (2010) Communities of practice in inclusive education, Educational Studies, 36:3, 345-355, Laluvein, J. (2010) School inclusion and the ‘community of practice’, International Journal of Inclusive Education, 14:1, 35-48 Mortier, K. (2018) Communities of Practice: a Conceptual Framework for Inclusion of Students with Significant Disabilities, International Journal of Inclusive Education

September 22, 2018

Hello Peter. Yes, it is [a lot of] both, taken together; and not just by PLCs but the education culture in general. Thinking of subject matters’ facts and ideas in a serial, static, and one-dimensional manner goes back over two thousand years. Such serial thinking in all disciplines does not connect and integrate facts and ideas critically; it does not represent a critical reasoning process. The result is rote learning. Such roteism instruction defeats development of critical thinking, reading, and writing abilities in all learners: teacher educators, school and college faculty and students, professional developers, and textbook/software authors.

So, there is a school and college-based learned (and not a natural), predispositionto keep doing the same thing (i.e., inducing rote learning, which is a consequence of roteism-based instruction). But why is this the case? How is that the largest and most important profession is the least prepared to carry out its most basic mission: to lead school and college students to think, read, and write critically when engaging new and revisited subject matter? Here is my view.

For expert practice, a profession requires practitioners to own, (1) a common language of practice, (2) foundation principles and skills for practice, and (3) related operational standards. Instructionally, these three required core elements for critical instruction have never existed in the teaching profession.

Regarding item 2: The essence of teaching is critical thinking, reading and writing directed at subject matter. Yet, as a profession The profession continues to operate without a theory and practice of critical thinking directed at subject matter; and without a theory and practice of subject matter itself. We continue to practice without a critically cognitive foundation for critical literacy or subject matter. In other words, there has been no core body of knowledge for critical instruction in teacher education, school and college classrooms, and textbooks. This is why roteism practice continues to define the profession.

Here is something that can be done when a PLC has its first meeting. Ask members this fundamental question [From a case study (page 119), in **Preparation for Critical Instruction – How to Explain Subject Matter While Teaching All Learners to Think, Read, and Write Critically (2016)**]: “How do you know when you understand something?” They are to take their time and respond in writing.

Based on my experience with elementary through college faculty, three typical responses will emerge: “When I can explain it,” “When I can teach it,” and “When I can apply it.” None of these responses address the use of an explicit reasoning process. For example, “When I can explain it.” does not address the cognitive basis (i.e., the reasoning process) used when the subject matter explanation unfolds.

The challenge for PLCs and the profession is to first get its members to appreciate the depth of the self-defeating roteism issue. It can then make the minimization of roteism instruction through use of critical instruction.

part of its PLC program. Vic

Note: The underlined words represent links to pages in www.criticalinstruction.com.

I appreciate you developing and explaining the concept of roteism in the context of teacher education, Vic. As a teacher educator who tries to promote a complex appreciation of subject matter (Humanities and Social Sciences Education) and who seeks to educate critically reflective beginning teachers, I feel a touch on the defensive, but there are important and robust arguments to engage with here. I'll keep out of the way and let others engage first. You have certainly made me think and I expect others as well..

Thanks Frederic - I was aware of the communities of practice literature (and like it) but hadn't made the connection to PLCs - shows how we tend to think of things in silos.

Is the PLC trying to solve a specific problem or set of problems? Or are they looking for a way to collaborate across all areas of the curriculum? If it is the latter, I recommend using themes to tie the learning together. One resource I have used is The Timetables of History which links events across many interest areas such as music. Another tool I have effectively used is joint lesson planning. I would survey my colleagues about their upcoming subjects and incorporate those into my French and Spanish classes. If students were learning the Pythagorean Theorem in math, I'd teach the same lesson in French and Spanish. In this way the neural pathways are strengthened and students are more likely to recall both the language and the subject matter. Hope this helps.