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Last year, an email arrived from the Conference of Independent Schools offering teachers an opportunity to participate in a professional learning community with other educators from across Ontario. This innovative program was built around the principles of 21st learning and what it means to be a teacher in this global community. The year long initiative encouraged collaboration, an exploration of technology in the classroom and deep reflection on the practices of an educator. I jumped at this chance and spent almost a year immersed in the world of tweets, blogs, hash tags, action research plans and have yet to experience anything nearly as meaningful and transformative in my career as Cohort 21! Ultimately, what appealed to me was the opportunity to model being a “life long learner” for my own students and head back to “school”!
The Cohort 21 experience offered participants a chance to:
- be effectively embedding technology and best practices in their classroom
- actively reflect on their practices to a wider audience while taking part in a larger, meaningful discussion about the future of teaching and learning
- be reading, writing, and reflecting about teaching and learning
- become attuned to their schools mission statement and how it relates to the 21st century
- be a part of a highly motivated cohort of learners who will continue to critically assess their teaching in terms of student success (Cohort 21 website 2014)
The model encourages teachers to “learn through doing”. Over the course of the year, we had sessions on Twitter, WordPress, Google drive and a number of applications and tools for the classroom. Each member considered an area of interest to focus on through blogging, tweeting, conversations and ultimately, an action research plan. I chose to explore feedback and how to make it more meaningful for my students. I wanted to use technology to include my students in the feedback process and open the dialogue up. I spent the year meeting online and face-to-face with member school teachers, collaborating, sharing and reflecting.
As the year came to a close, I had come to realize that feedback MUST be collaborative and students need to be an integral part of the feedback loop! They need to be active participants and not passive receivers of feedback. Real effective feedback occurs when the learning is still happening so there is time to act on it! Technology speeds up that process so it becomes timelier. Finally, the more personalized I make the feedback; the quicker a student will access the right support at the right time and with the right tools. This year really gave me a chance to reflect on my practices and the change has the potential to redefine the feedback loop and shifting the process from a teacher-centered experience of providing feedback to a conversational review. No longer do I need a pen and tiny scribbled in the margins! I was able record my thoughts, suggestions and feedback right on the document itself within Google docs. If a student is struggling with a concept, I have begun to provide links for support within Google applications. I have also had a chance to use this when editing student work and the immediacy of the comments are so helpful for students and not limited by the writing centre hours or the classroom walls!
Throughout the process, I couldn’t help but notice how well this dovetailed with the plans for so many of our school’s missions to be 21st century learners as students and teachers. Here was a hands-on, practical and innovative way to explore technology and how it can work to improve student success. This experience has been one of exploration, collaboration, curating, and building relationships with like-minded individuals. I began this experience unsure of how I could contribute but immediately I felt valued, acknowledged and energized by people who wanted to continue to explore and understand their role as educator, technology integrator, and learners.
This was really a chance of a lifetime and I’m so glad my socks were rocked!
With gratitude for the experience,
Danielle Ganley
Cohort 21 2013-2014 participant and 2014-2015 coach
Your excitement about timely and useful feedback inspired me to do the same, which wasn’t even part of my action plan! This was indeed the best PD ever. See you soon!