Abstract
The staff meeting is a staple of school culture and is a vehicle for everything from announcements, updates, logistics, curriculum discussions, data review, to more conceptual topics such as mission and vision and reflections on pedagogy and practice. External professional development offerings are another avenue for adult learning and can focus on a range of subjects deemed important by the school or organization providing the opportunity. However, anecdotally, teachers often bemoan staff meetings and professional development as less-than-welcome experiences that take time away from other priorities. Research shows that teachers value gatherings that build trust, provide them with control over their craft, and support the transfer of adult learning into classroom practice. This is a case study of how one group of early childhood educators created meaningful intentional learning opportunities – both within their school's staff meeting structure and beyond their school walls with a local community of educators.
TopDuring the early 2000s the Eliot-Pearson Children’s School, a Preschool - Grade 2 lab school at Tufts University, enjoyed a stable staff of Lead Teachers (the authors were both members of this team), supported by strong cohorts of graduate student teaching assistants. The director at the time, Director, led the school via a vision of active engagement in reflective, intentional, developmental, inclusive and anti-bias practices. Initially staff meetings were primarily about logistics as well as community building and skill/knowledge transfer/building (through shared articles and presentations). However, the culture of this sacred time shifted as the desire for and demonstrated power of intentional learning structures, grounded in classroom practices and ponderings, were introduced and implemented with greater and greater frequency and fidelity.
Inspired by Rounds (Project Zero, Harvard University), a monthly educator discussion group designed and facilitated by HGSE faculty member Steve Seidel, Ben Mardell, then a Lead Teacher at EPCS, brought the first protocol to the school staff. For a year, teaching teams signed up and presented a piece of student or classroom work to discuss using the Collaborative Assessment Conference protocol (CAC). This work was new and inspiring, though limited in its nature by the structure of this particular protocol. The CAC protocol begins when an educator places a piece of student work in front of their colleagues, providing no further information about the context, the tasks at hand, or the students. Colleagues then describe the work, ask questions (that are not immediately answered) about the work, and speculate about what the student might be working on. Then, the presenter responds to what they heard, sharing their own thoughts and wonderings, which eventually leads to a collective discussion about the implications for teaching and learning. Protocol use has the power to bring equity of voice to conversations, and provides structure and scaffolding that makes conversations effective and efficient (McDonald, Mohr, Dichter & McDonald (2013). Studies also show that the adoption of specific tools and structures and a focus on student work is an integral part of the development of successful learning communities (Windschitl, Thompson, & Braaten, 2011). Tools that guide conversations in the form of protocols and group norms have been shown to keep teacher talk focused on student learning and make effective use of teacher meeting time (Blythe, Allen, & Powell, 1999; Curry, 2008; Dunne, Nave, & Lewis, 2000).
While a valuable process for upper grade level teachers who bring writing samples, posters, presentations, math journals, etc., the nature of a transportable, two-dimensional piece of preschool or kindergarten work did not afford a lot of depth and detail to describe and interpret. It turned out that a young child’s drawing without context or transcription of the child’s running dialogue didn’t often glean enough probing and discussion to be meaningful to the presenter. This brought up the questions about the limitations of the CAC and our initial interpretation of what constituted student work, as well as questions about what other tools might serve us better.
As this team of educators continued to work and learn together over many years, the work of Reggio Emilia and Project Zero influenced and expanded our vision and our tool kits. Teachers expanded their understandings of documenting children’s work, as they simultaneously became more familiar and fluid with thinking and learning routines (such as See Think Wonder), using them in both staff meetings and in the classroom.
Key Terms in this Chapter
Documentation: Documentation is a broad term used to describe the act of creating a record of a moment, event, or process. In the world of early childhood education, documentation is the act of observing, collecting notes, photos and artifacts (sometimes referred to as ‘raw documentation’); sharing, discussing and analyzing this collection (preferably with colleagues), determining a next step in the teaching and learning process to respond to what has been gathered and discussed, and collecting new documentation as learning proceeds. A culminating step of a documentation process (though not done for every curricular thread in the classroom) is the creation of a more final piece of documentation used to communicate the learning process and outcomes to the children, as well as other community members, such as parents and colleagues. This documentation might include photos, text, transcription, teacher reflections, and questions to provoke further thinking.
Protocols: Protocols (in our case we drew mostly from the School Reform Initiative Resource and Protocol Book) are tools that provide guidelines and structures one can use to facilitate collaborative, focused and productive conversations. Protocols are most effective when they are intentionally and thoughtfully selected to align with the needs of the presenting educator. When an educator can clearly articulate the type of feedback they hope to receive from their colleagues, together with the facilitator, they can select the protocol that will best serve the desired outcome. Protocols structure conversations in ways that suspend reflexive responses, build deep understanding, and lead a group to meaningful dialogue in which there is an equity of voice, careful listening, and rich learning.
BARWE: Building Antiracist White Educators (BARWE), founded by a group of educators in Philadelphia, is an intentional learning community model that uses a carefully designed structure for provoking and supporting the growth of white educators as they develop antiracist understandings, skills and practices. BARWE develops and shares annual inquiry series through which white educators are invited to read, view, or listen to carefully curated media, and then reflect and respond - both personally and in structured dialogue with colleagues. Content, structures and tools developed by BARWE educators are vetted through an accountability relationship with the Melanated Educators Collective, in Philadelphia.
(Looking at) Student Work: Student work is a term used to describe a concrete sample or artifact of the educational process. It is work produced by a student or learner. Intentional learning communities in educational settings often use student work to center discussions about student learning and outcomes. The artifacts are used for analysis, deep questions, and to make meaning of student learning experiences. Artifacts include assignments, writing, and in early education include drawing, video, transcripts of student talk, photographs of play - which can also be derived from the experiences of older students.
Pre-Conference: The pre-conference is an essential step in preparing for a successful feedback session using protocols to discuss a teaching and learning dilemma. The pre-conference provides a time and a space for the presenting educator to meet with a skilled facilitator to plan for the presentation. Together they define a guiding question, determine the student work or other artifact(s) to be shared, and select the ‘best fit’ protocol to ensure the presenting educator gets the feedback they most want and need from the group. If the protocol call for the presenter to share information about the work being presented, the context, the student(s), etc., this portion of the protocol might also be worked on or outlined during the pre-conference.
Project Zero: Project Zero is housed in the Harvard Graduate School of Education. As a broad program, Project Zero is a research group, a think tank, a professional development provider, as a place that explores understanding and supports human potential and development. Project Zero supports a wide range of educators and researchers to grow inquiry in a variety of contexts as a means to support the diverse range of human growth and potential. In terms of learning community work, early childhood educators are most familiar with Project Zero’s work around making learning visible - supporting classroom cultures of powerful learning.
Reggio Emilia Approach: The Reggio Emilia Approach is an early childhood educational pedagogy and philosophy that has developed in the city of Reggio Emilia, Italy - a city invested in the potential of its youngest citizens since the end of WWII. This approach is rooted in a powerful image of the child, respect for the child’s languages and contributions, appreciation of the keen observations and inquiry of educators, belief in collective and collaborative inquiry with all members of the community, and the use of documentation as a tool for looking deeply at teaching, learning and the potential to co-construct learning across multiple settings and moments with young children. The Reggio Emilia Approach has inspired many early childhood educators and programs throughout the world.
School Reform Initiative: The School Reform Initiative (SRI) was an organization founded and run by educators that “creates transformational learning communities fiercely committed to educational equity and excellence.” It provided a national forum for educators to engage in reflection on their work with the intention of not only improving educator practice in schools and classrooms, but to disrupt inequities in systems of schooling and improve learning conditions for students. It provided facilitation training with equity at the center, as well as consultation for districts and schools. In 2023 the School Reform Initiative found a new home in The Center for Leadership and Educational Equity (CLEE) and the work continues there with new leadership, structures, and mission.