The Design of Professional Learning and Implementation Fidelity

ERLC District Contact MeetingSeptember 2015

Student learning is dependent on high quality teaching in the classroom and high quality teaching practices emerge from effective, purposeful professional learning. However, some professional learning is more about activity and less about learning.

Steven Katz and Lisa Ain Dack, in Intentional Interruption; Breaking Down Learning Barriers to Transform Professional Practice contend that...

Turn and TalkWhat is working in our professional

learning efforts?Share Evidence

What is not working in our professional learning efforts?Share Evidence

Choose one or two areas in your district where you would like to see improvement in professional

learning delivery.

Assessment (PBL, Inquiry...)LiteracyNumeracyFirst Nation, Métis and Inuit EducationEd. TechnologyInstructional Leadership (COP, PLC, Learning Coaches...)Inclusive EducationCTS/CTFMFWHSROther_______________

So, how can we lift the quality of professional learning to result in

successful and engaging student learning?

Katz and Dack describe this action as "intentional interruption",

purposeful action that creates permanent change in thinking, behavior,

and/or practice.

1. Using protocols2. Making preconceptions explicit3. Ensuring that activities and interventions are rooted in problems of practice4. Recruiting contradictory evidence5. Viewing mistakes as learning opportunities6. Encouraging a growth (rather than a fixed) mindset7. Ensuring that problems of practice (focus) are questions that people are curious

about8. Giving people autonomy in time and task From Intentional Interruption by Dr. Steven Katz and Lisa Ain Dack, p.

9

The following intentional interruptions allow professional learning to be enabled:

1. Establishing and supporting clear learning foci (the )

2. Collaborative inquiry that challenges thinking and practice (the )

3. Instructional leadership (the )

Three key enablers of professional learning that change classroom practice:

There are a number of that stand in the way of optimal professional learning.

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Mental Shortcuts We don’t think through all of the possibilities.

Confirmation Bias We focus on confirming our hypotheses, not challenging them.

Illusory Superiority We consider ourselves to be exceptions.

Vividness Bias We pay too much attention to things that are vivid.

Omission Bias We hesitate to take action in a new direction.

Imposter Syndrome We don’t want others to see our vulnerabilities.

Cognitive

Biases

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Name that Bias

We need to create "the conditions for real new learning" that interrupts the culture of superficial niceness and personal biases (barriers) that exist in order to move teams forward with the true professional learning that needs to be in place

for effective instruction and engagement for all students.

From Current research we now know that in order to have teachers and students learning at high levels, professional development needs to shift as follows:FROM: TO:Focus on teacher needs only Focus on student learning needs and what learning teachers will need

in order to help students learn at high levelsFocus on individual development Focus on individual, school and system-wide learning and

improvementTransmission of knowledge, skills, strategies Inquiry for teaching and learningPull-out training Job-embedded learningGeneric teaching skills Combination of content knowledge and content-specific pedagogy

Fragmented, piecemeal, one-shot Driven by clear, coherent, long-term strategic plan

District direction and decision-making School direction and decision-making in alignment with school improvement plan

Professional developers as trainers Professional developers as coaches, consultants and mentors

Professional development is some people’s job Professional development is everybody’s jobProfessional development for teachers Professional learning for everyoneProfessional development as a frill Professional learning is essentialProfessional development for teacher improvement Professional learning for the community of learners in support of

student successAwareness and one or two session workshops only Professional learning that provides adequate time for learning,

practice and follow-upIndividual decisions Collegial discussions and decisionsIndividual/general application Engaging and Supported “thin slices” of learningProfessional development without accountability for student achievement

© Missouri Department of Elementary and Secondary Education

Professional learning that sets student learning outcomes which defines equitable expectations for all students to achieve high levels and holds educators accountable for implementing appropriate strategies to support student learning

...the logic is that if teachers learn something new through professional development activities, they will teach differently and thus have a positive impact on their students. However, as we all know this connection between professional development and changed practice breaks down during implementation.

Why is professional development not making a difference?

The gap between “knowing and doing is huge”.

The old truisms tell us that "what gets measured gets managed" and "you get what you inspect" and they

survive as truisms because they are manifestly true (p. 176). It's simple: If we want better schools, we have to monitor the implementation of our highest priorities.

Schoolchildren will continue to wait until we monitor and ensure that our priorities are being implemented.

Marcus Buckingham, The One Thing You Need to Know, Free Press, N.Y., 2005

If the expected result of professional learning is significant changes in teacher practice, the plan must be realistic about the kinds of learning opportunities and sustained

follow-up needed to foster these changes.

The plan must set realistic expectations about the time necessary to ensure adequate opportunities for practice

and feedback, and set reasonable expectations around the time it takes to see a change in student learning.

is "the degree to which . . . programs are implemented . . . as intended by the program developers".

acts as a potential moderator of the relationship between interventions and their intended outcomes.

Implementation fidelity...

Much about putting fidelity in place will be challenging to schools, especially because it usually involves changes at the surface level (climate) and at a deeper level (culture).

Surface level changes involve addressing vision, mission, goals, and structure. Most change efforts are changes at this level. We can think of them as changes in the climate.

For fundamental changes, you have to go deeper. Deeper level changes involve changes at the second-order level—changes leading to a change in the culture.

Second-order changes are more difficult, take longer, and encompass individual values and beliefs, traditions, norms, and leadership.

...conceive and implement a new initiative without creating, on the front end, a sound process for documenting and reporting how the project unfolds and what it achieves. ...ignore the challenges of determining what data you will need to collect, the availability of the data, who will be responsible for collecting the data, at what intervals, and who will analyze and use the data to prepare a written narrative describing the progress, problems, and outcomes of the initiative.

Hayes Mizell, 2009 Learning Forward

Teacher collaboration does not occur naturally; it runs

against prevailing norms of teacher isolation and

individualistic approaches to teaching.

Collaborative inquiry is among the most promising strategies for strengthening teaching and learning. At the same time, it may be one of the most difficult to implement.The biggest risk in moving to establish collaborative inquiry is to do so without providing the necessary leadership and support.

What's One to Do?

1. How effective is this teacher professional learning?

2. Have teachers changed their attitudes and beliefs towards teaching?

3. Have teachers gained the new knowledge and skills required to teach?

4. Have they applied the new knowledge and skills in their teaching practice?