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A Culture of Learning:
TIME FOR LEARNING AND COLLABORATION

Sometimes we were given planning time, and we were able to get more done in a couple of hours than we thought we could. There were also some staff development days, but the majority of it was after school. It was really hard to learn new things at the end of the day because we were all so tired.

Teacher, Woodrow Wilson

School improvement, as Fullan stresses, is about time – making time, taking time, finding more meaningful ways to spend time. Just as traditional school organization isolates teachers, so, too, is it stingy with time for working and learning together. "Caught in the crunch of inflexible time," in Phillip Schlechty’s phrase, teachers and administrators feel they have little control over the way time is allocated in school. It is also one commodity – more precious even than money – that they do not have enough of: time to teach, to converse, to review student work, to develop rubrics, to create curriculum, to revise programs and policies, to know what happens in other classrooms. Many perceive time as the biggest barrier to school change. For these reasons, rethinking and restructuring time is central to building a learning culture.

Through a combination of creative planning and everyone pulling together, these award-winning schools demonstrated that they could find time to do what was needed, time both inside and outside the school day. A teacher at International High School describes the importance of teachers’ scheduled time together as well the pervasiveness of on-the-fly professional conversations and learning:

    Teachers’ schedules are creatively arranged so that we meet – and meet often. Though the important conversations take place everywhere, from formal committees to shared rides home, putting meeting time into teachers’ schedules ensures that the talking will occur.

Schools make teachers’ protected meeting and planning time available in several ways. They restructure available professional development and traditional meeting time to make it serve their goals. In some cases, they reschedule student learning time to provide extended periods for teachers to work together. Some schools use support personnel, such as substitutes, teacher assistants, student teachers, or interns, to release teachers from their classrooms so they can take part in professional development experiences. At Montview, job-embedded coaching is made possible because of the way Title I funds are used to create time – paying for classroom coverage so teachers can meet weekly with a coach, and paying for the coach position itself. (See "Coaching at Montview Elementary School.")

Faculty meetings and professional development days are restructured to get the most out of them. Rather than squandering faculty meetings on routine information that can be communicated through newsletters or e-mail, principals and teachers use this time to focus collaboratively on the "real work" of teaching. There are no more one-shot "topic du jour" presentations on inservice days, unless required by the district. In fact, there are no longer routine faculty meetings at Shallowford Falls, International High School, Montview, Hungerford, or Wilson. "We don’t have faculty meetings," says a Woodrow Wilson teacher. "We’re doing inservices when we get together as a staff. It’s not like the day-to-day list of agenda items; you’re just only talking about math."

Rescheduling the school day can free up extended blocks of time for teachers to engage in collaboration and planning. Ganado Intermediate grouped music, art, and physical education together, giving teachers a three-hour block of uninterrupted time weekly to plan with grade-level colleagues. At International High School, core-team planning time is used for professional development that teachers design themselves. At Mason, the school day starts late; teachers can get together for professional development before they meet their classes. The work other schools do in study teams, action research teams, and coaching sessions with teacher leaders is all made to fit into the school day. A few schools also use early-release days to provide teachers a one- to two-hour block of time for professional development one afternoon each week or month.

Teachers at each of these schools volunteer a tremendous amount of personal time, beyond the conventional workday, for professional development. This learning time occurs after school, before school, on weekends, and in the summer. Most of these teachers contribute one to seven hours of their own time per week for professional development.

Local universities offer classes at Ganado Intermediate’s facility after school and also in summer. At Hungerford, teachers take part in a popular ritual – periodic Saturday professional development sessions, for which the teachers themselves determine the content. While these unique sessions are voluntary, attendance steadily increases each year. At Shallowford Falls, Ganado Intermediate, Hilley, and Montview, teachers choose to participate in after-school professional development programs available through their districts.

With stubborn resolve and ingenuity, every school creates or sets aside the time needed for staff to plan programs, exchange ideas, and reflect together about instruction, student needs, and teacher growth. This vital resource of time is indispensable for all aspects of the culture shift we’ve examined so far.

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Many perceive time as the biggest barrier to school change. Rethinking and restructuring time is central to building a learning culture.


 

 

 

 

 

Though the important conversations take place everywhere, from formal committees to shared rides home, putting meeting time into teachers’ schedules ensures that the talking will occur.


 

 

 

 

 

Some schools use support personnel, such as substitutes, teacher assistants, student teachers, or interns, so teachers can meet weekly with a coach.


 

 

 

 

Rather than squandering faculty meetings on routine information that can be communicated through newsletters or e-mail, principals and teachers use this time to focus collaboratively on the "real work" of teaching.


 

 

 

 

 

Rescheduling the school day can free up extended blocks of time for teachers to engage in collaboration and planning.


 

 

 

  
 

Most of these teachers contribute one to seven hours of their own time per week for professional development.


 


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