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What started out as inspiration from Cohort 21 alum Mike Arsenault, has led me on a in-depth journey to get into other teachers classrooms and have other teachers come into my class. Day one of class, Mike had a sign on his door saying to the effect of ” The door is always open in my class. Come on in and watch my class, and provide feedback to help me grow. #observeme”. This sign was so simple yet so profound. We always say our class is open, but Mike was taking the next step and actively seek people out. I went in that day and learned a new activity, provided him some feedback, and all around had a great experience. This prompted me to think, why can’t this happen more? This led me to the beginning of what eventually would be my action plan of “How might we create a culture and framework for teacher to teacher classroom observations to improve student learning?”
My action plan was initially quite simple. Try to get into as many classrooms as possible and get as many people into my classroom as possible. This action plan would hopefully build on what Mike started and start to create a culture that breaks down the ever present silos that exist between us and our colleagues. Overall, I am happy with the progress of my action plan. I don’t think I could ever get into as many classes as I wanted, but I did manage to get into enough to feel that I had made an impact. My goal was to get into 5, and have 5 people come into mine. I surpassed my goals in both categories, and I hope to continue to get into classes this year and the next.
The most exciting part of this action plan is where it is going. The beginning of the end is a fitting description. LCS has decided to use teacher to teacher classroom visits as a main avenue for professoinal growth in order to improve student learning. I will be part of a team that is traveling to Harvard Graduate School in May to take part in training for instructional rounds. Instructional rounds is a method of classroom visits that uses evidence to give feedback to the teacher to support student learning.
It is my hope that this PD on teacher to teacher classroom visits will be the model of professional growth at Lakefield. I hope to continue this work next year and see how far myself and my colleagues can take this program. I am thankful that Cohort was able to aid me down this path of growth and development!
