ITQ Grant Summer 2014

1. Critical Friends:A Collaborative Option for Professional Learning CommunitiesSally barton-arwood, Ph.D. ITQ Grant Summer 2014

2. Teacher Collaboration • Teachers working together to align Common Core Standards • Teacher efficacy can shift from individual teacher competencies to maximizing collective and shared knowledge, resources, and skills. • Properly developed, implemented, and sustained Professional Learning Communities have been cited as essential to support these shifts.

3. Grant Objectives • Common Core • TEAM • Lessons • Meaningful dialogue • Professional Learning Communities (PLC) using a Critical Friends Group (CFG) framework • Engage in cross-disciplinary planning

4. Essential Question How can educators enhance their own professional learning in order to enhance the learning of all students?

5. Professional Learning Communities • A professional learning community is an ongoing process in which members of a team work collaboratively in recurring cycles of collective inquiry and action research to achieve better results. Adapted from New Insights on How PLCs Improve Schools presented by Richard and Rebecca DuFour, 2010

7. Professional Learning Communities Challenges • No processes for implementation • Quick to make recommendations • “Air time” is not equitable • Low depth conversations • Low – share materials, general discussion • Medium – more details on student learning • High –discussion of specific pedagogy & how students learn

9. Critical Friends Group (CFG) • A CFG is a professional learning community consisting of approximately 8-12 educators who frequently come together voluntarily. • Group members are committed to improving their practice through collaborative learning. (NSRFTM Self-Guided Tour of Critical Friends, 2012)

10. Critical Friends Don’t let the name get in the way! A critical friend • Typically a colleague or other educational professional • Committed in helping improve schools and student outcomes. • Encouraging and supportive • But also honest and agrees to speak truthfully about strengths, weaknesses, and challenges.

11. Purposes of a Critical Friends Group (NSRFTM Self-Guided Tour of Critical Friends, 2012) • A structure forPLCs • Make teaching practice explicit and public by "talking about teaching" • Help people involved in schools to work collaboratively in democratic, reflective communities (Bambino) • Establish a foundation for sustained professional development based on a spirit of inquiry (Silva) • Provide a context to understand our work with students, our relationships with peers, and our thoughts, assumptions, and beliefs about teaching and learning • Improve teaching and learning

12. Essential QuestionI can statement • How can educators enhance their own professional learning in order to enhance the learning of all students? • I can give and receive feedback to increase high quality instruction and build a collaborative culture.

13. Objectives Participants will: 1) Experience a mini-CFG meeting, using a tuning protocol. 2)Discuss and understand the critical attributes of a CFG and what distinguishes it from other PLCs. 3) Identify the basic structure and terminology of CFG.

14. What are Protocols? • Agreed upon guidelines for a conversation • The existence of a structure, which everyone understands and has agreed to, that permits a certain kind of conversation to occur • A kind of conversation that people are no in the habit of having (NSRFTM Self-Guided Tour of Critical Friends, 2012)

15. Fishbowl • Tuning Protocol • Protocol – agreed upon guidelines and structure for the conversation • See packet for materials • Norms • Hard on the content, soft on the people • Be kind, helpful, and specific • Share the air (step up, step back)

16. Debrief • What did you notice? • What do you wonder?

17. Key Characteristics of a CFG(NSRFTM Self-Guided Tour of Critical Friends, 2012) • Shared norms and values • Collaboration • Reflective dialogue • Deprivatization of practice • Collective focus on student learning • Spirit of shared responsibility for the learning of all students • Use of protocols

18. What are Protocols? • Agreed upon guidelines for a conversation • The existence of a structure, which everyone understands and has agreed to, that permits a certain kind of conversation to occur • A kind of conversation that people are not in the habit of having (NSRFTM Self-Guided Tour of Critical Friends, 2012)

19. Protocols • Descriptions of practice • Thoughtful listening • Feedback via questioning • Silence and reflection • Structured • Non judgmental or critical

20. Why use Protocols? • Create a structure that makes it safe to ask challenging questions of each other. • Build in a space for listeningand often give people a license to listen without having to continuously respond. TIME IS LIMITED RESOURCE • Make the most of the time people do have. Finally, it is important to remember that the point is not to do theprotocol well, but to have an in-depth, insightful conversation about teaching and learning.

21. Protocol Basic Structure • Facilitator – leads a protocol • Presentation by a member • Participants actively listen and reflect • All members give and receive feedback • All voices may be heard and honored Makes it safe to ask difficult questions. Allows participants to gain differing perspectives. Accomplishes much more than typically happens in a short period of time

22. Terminology • Protocol (BOTH CFG & MTV) • Facilitator • Presenter • Participants • Clarifying Questions • Probing Questions • Warm and Cool Feedback Remember: The point is not to implement a perfect protocol but to have an in-depth and insightful conversation about teaching and learning

23. Resources • Protocols for Professional Learning (Easton) • Book of Questions (Allen & Blyth) • National School Reform Faculty http://www.nsrfharmony.org/faq.html

24. Used for … Originally … • Tuning a lesson in development • Looking at student work • Critical incidents • Peer observation But also… • Developing trust • Building teams and developing norms • Looking at text

25. Matching Work to Protocol

26. Critical Friends Background(NSRFTM Self-Guided Tour of Critical Friends, 2012) The Annenberg Institute for School Reform at Brown University first developed the Critical Friends model for collegial dialogue. It is currently in use by an estimated 35,000 teachers, principals, and college professors in over 1,500 schools. In July 2000, the National School Reform Faculty program, which currently houses Critical Friends Groups and coordinates the training for Critical Friends Coaches, relocated to the Harmony School Education Center in Bloomington, Indiana.

27. Themes from Research (Key, 2006) Four themes about efficacy of critical friends groups as agents of professional development and school reform: 1. CFGs foster a culture of community and collaboration. 2. CFGs enhance teacher professionalism. 3. CFGs have the potential to change teachers’ thinking and practice. 4. CFGs have the potential to impact student learning.

28. Currey (2008) “ It’s really good to find out what people are doing in other disciplines and understand what their challenges are and especially to seek commonalties and even get help by getting ideas from other people. It’s cross-fertilization. And, it also . . . ties the school together. I always think in terms not just of how this is going to help my class, but it’s, how is this going to help the school? Because helping the school helps my class. It’s like it’s constantly tying the school together tighter.”

29. Currey (2008) “The CFGs [have] had a huge impact. . . . One of the big differences is that we talk about improving our practices … Now the focus is on, how can I improve my practice to help kids achieve? Because even at the beginning of CFG when we talked about what are the problems… I would hear the complaint, ‘Well the kids are this, the kids are that, they’re not motivated, they’re not this, they’re not that.’ And now we’re talking about how do we change our practice. And I think that’s a big switch in perception, tone, and attitude.”

30. Currey (2008) “Our theme has been going from congeniality to collegiality . . . I don’t know if prior to CFGs if we’d even really talked about professional community and what a professional community is. And even though we said we got along really well, I think there were lots of people who didn’t necessarily like each other. And one of the things that I think the interdisciplinary [CFG] groups has done is allowed us to get to know each other well enough and gain a respect for each other on a professional level and that has helped to close the kinds of gaps or the kinds of issues that used to be around. It’s amazing to me how some of that has created just a different view of each other. And I like that.”

31. Essential QuestionI can statement • How can educators enhance their own professional learning in order to enhance the learning of all students? • I can give and receive feedback to increase high quality instruction and build a collaborative culture.

32. Objectives Participants will: 1) Experience a mini-CFG meeting, using a tuning protocol. 2)Discuss and understand the critical attributes of a CFG and what distinguishes it from other PLCs. 3) Identify the basic structure and terminology of CFG.

33. This week … • Use Tuning Protocol to tune lessons you are developing (Wednesday and Thursday) • Discuss next steps for fall 2014 (Friday)