Teachers know that curiosity fuels learning. We intentionally design lessons that spark students’ questions. We celebrate inquiry, encourage exploration, and recognize that students often learn more deeply when they wrestle with uncertainty rather than simply receive answers. A classroom where students wonder, question, and investigate is a classroom alive with learning. Yet somewhere between the […]

Teacher to teacher conversations are powerful when they expose us to perspectives we would not generate on our own. Left to ourselves, we tend to revisit familiar assumptions, interpretations, and solutions. We think within the boundaries of our current mental models. Dialogue creates the opportunity for those mental models to be challenged, refined, or expanded. […]

One focus of my work with PLCs is increasing the degree to which PLCs function as teams rather than as meetings of franchise holders. In many schools, teachers can unintentionally operate as owners of separate classrooms, courses, or content areas. As true teams, however, teachers share accountability for the success of all students represented by […]

Collaborative work in schools is often measured by structures: scheduled PLC meetings, common planning time, walkthroughs, data reviews, and team agendas. But simply placing educators in these “meetings” does not automatically produce collaboration. Teams can meet regularly and still leave with very different understandings of what they are trying to accomplish. Recently, I encountered Rod […]

The end of a school year is often treated as closure. Yet for learners, it is also a transfer point. Students leave carrying far more than content knowledge and grades. They carry beliefs about themselves as learners, strategies that helped them succeed, habits they developed, and questions they still hold about their abilities. During the […]

Year-end PLC reflection is an often-overlooked leadership practice. Without it, teams repeat patterns rather than build capacity. Recently, I received a request to assist a K-12 school staff in doing a year-end reflection on the impact of their work in PLCs during the past year and to consider some plans and goals for the next […]