A look at the Talent Code....

1.  Stop + Struggle + Make Errors + Learn
-----this is the key to developing talent-------

10,000 hours of DEEP PRACTICE.
CHUNK IT UP ----- REPEAT IT ----- LEARN TO SENSE THE ERRORS.


2.  Keep Motivation Burning -- Triggered by WORDS!

Education is not the filling of a pail, but the lighting of a fire!

Our Purpose and Our Next Steps...

Our three PLCs.....are we reading their blogs?
Our coaching teams.....
Blogs are awareness for us...

Clarify the tool of the blog - individual conversations......
Address the members individually.....

 ...How can staff about how they are using the blogging and how the blogging is or can help them grow?

Our Purpose:  What are we doing to improve student learning?
Support and push staff so they can support and push students.
Redirect and refocus for staff growth.
Keep refocusing the work on student progress.
Almost being a critical friend to staff - asking questions to push staff to think deeply about why they do what they do.
Learn with staff and think with them about how they are progressing and growing.

Through questioning helping each other grow the PLCs at whatever place of development staff are.

Coaching, questioning, helping each other develop.

Push teachers to a more authentic PLC

Continually empower and elevate PLCs to drive our work.
...to continue to  learn, refine and define the work of the PLC.

...support each other in reflective conversations.

Focus on the continuous improvement cycle.

What is our focus?

WHAT WE HAVE SAID TO TEACHERS:
The focus of the Spring Showcase will be on answering the question:  How did our collaborative learning in our PLC contribute to students success in the classroom and increased student achievement for all students?

As we continue, remember that the focus of our PLC work is learning, collaboration, and results.

Our PLC work together is to be focused on efforts that will really make a difference in student learning. 
Big Idea #1: Ensuring That Students Learn

What will our PLC try that will impact student learning?

How will this contribute to student success in the classroom and increased student achievement for all students? 
Big Idea #2: A Culture of Collaboration

How will we work together to impact student learning?   
Big Idea #3: A Focus on Results
What results will we measure to determine if our effort improves student learning?

 SOOOOOOOO.......

WHAT IS OUR FOCUS WITH OUR LEADERSHIP TEAM PLC?

Some ideas that came from our discussion on Wednesday, January 30th:

• Are we looking at improving student learning, improving teacher learning, or BOTH?
• A couple of ideas for our focus question:
• How do we help each teacher succeed?
• How do we lead staff to ensure that the PLC work impacts student achievement?

Some of our tools include our coaching teams and our book studies.  We agreed to continue our study of the book "The Talent Code".  We are reading the first 100 pages.

Literacy Reform

Today we looked at the work by Brockton High School in MA and how they transformed their school through literacy.

See power points from the presentation HERE.

How can we get EVERYONE on board?

Test

Something to Blog About!

Please take a look at this article.
http://www.ascd.org/publications/educational-leadership/nov12/vol70/num03/Beyond-the-Scoreboard.aspx

Something to think about:
To improve the team, you don't study the scoreboard; you go out and practice. Considering the limited time educators have to do everything we must do, let's ask ourselves how much time we're spending looking at the scoreboard and how much we're spending in practice. We won't start winning until we do.

What does this mean for us????
Please blog about it!

The Talent Code

We spent some time today beginning to take a look at the book The Talent Code by Daniel Coyle.  The subtitle is Greatness Isn't Born, It's Grown.  The book is broken into three sections:
Deep Practice, Ignition (Motivation), and Master Coaching. 
Our first round of impacting quotes today circled around the struggle necessary in deep practice.
A dilemma that evolved over the discussion was:
How do we balance teacher expectations and 9th graders expectations in a way to lead to struggles but not course failures? 
We agreed to read the first section on Deep Practice though the lens of the above dilemma.
-------
So with our PLC, we agreed that our topic is:
Differentiated Professional Learning Communities that Impact Student Learning

Rufus is working on the beginning of a Prezi that illustrates our Collaborative Actions this Semester.
Logistical roles:
Facilities/Tables:  Pat
PLC Name Signs:  Cheryl
FloorPlan:  Brittany
Feedback Form:  Electronic and Paper - Katie

So What?
Teacher Feedback form still to be developed.