1.What are Professional Learning Communities?
Professional Learning Communities (PLCs) are communities of educators forming groups dedicated to meeting, discussing, and sharing ways to improve their pedagogical skills. Astuto, an educational researcher called these groups professional communities of learners (1993); communities where teachers and administrators seek, on a consistent basis, to share their expertise with one another and then act on that shared experience. Other authors have called these arrangements communities of continuous inquiry and improvement (Hord, 1997). Regardless of the name, the common thread uniting these communities is a desire for the members to be life-long learners in a collaborative setting.
PLCs can meet on a monthly, biweekly, or weekly basis depending on the availability of time and the will of its members. Membership can be either voluntary or mandatory although there is a growing body of evidence to suggest that voluntary communities are more productive and last longer. Louis and Kruse (1995) identified a number of specific factors that support productive learning communities: (1) dedicated time to meet and discuss; (2) size of the school (small schools producing more effective PLCs); (3) teaching roles that are interdependent; (4) established group communication structures; (5) teacher autonomy; and (6) teacher empowerment. Additionally, staff participation in the selection of new teachers and administrators for the school with the possibility of encouraging staff that are not in tune with the program to find work elsewhere is also considered a vital component of PLCs that envision a shared leadership of the school.
2. Why Professional Learning Communities?
In addition to the list of attributes listed above, some researchers have suggested that PLCs can also provide opportunities for teachers at different professional stages to improve on their subject matter knowledge and their instructional strategies (Borko, 2004; Grossman et al., 2001). Research supports the notion that established PLCs help teachers improve their pedagogical practice by learning from each other and/or from outside experts (Ball & Cohen, 1999; Borko, 2004; Wilson & Berne, 1999). Institutional efforts to encourage professional development programs through the promotion of PLCs also seem to create new learning opportunities for novice and veteran teachers and help prepare them to meet the needs of a diverse student population (Darling-Hammond, Bullmaster, & Cobb, 1995). Teachers participating in high quality PLCs become leaders in their schools, support other teachers in improving the quality of science teaching and learning (Spillane, Diamond, Walker, Halverson, & Jita, 2001a). Finally, Newmann (in Brandt, 1995) shows a link between student learning of high intellectual quality and school professional communities that achieve the same degree of academic excellence.
3. Where did PLCs originate?
In 1990, Peter Senge’s book, the Fifth Discipline, caused a minor sensation in corporate boardrooms across America. Senge suggested that performing for someone else’s approval -- rather than learning to become more adaptable and to generate creative solutions to problems -- creates the very conditions that ensure mediocre performance. Senge further suggested that frequently dictates designed by well-meaning performance-enhancement committees end up paralyzing those individuals charged with carrying out the actual performance of the company. At best, dictates from higher up on the organizational structure only allowed workers to maintain the status quo. Rather than reflecting trust in those across the organization to use their creativity in order to find localized solutions to problems – solutions consistent with the purpose and values of the overall organization – solutions that are mandated are usually poorly suited to the real problem at hand.
Senge advocated, instead, a different organizational structure better suited to a complex, interdependent, and fast-changing society. Senge's envisioned organizational structure is oriented toward learning rather than controlling mechanisms. Senge saw this newly conceptualized learning organization as one “where people continually expand their capacity to create the results they truly desire, where new and expansive patterns of thinking are nurtured, where collective aspiration is set free, and where people are continually learning how to learn together” (Senge, 1990, p. 3).
Over the next year or so, Senge’s book and his description of learning organizations moved into the educational environment. As Senge’s paradigm was explored by educators and shared in educations journals, the label became professional learning communities. Studies by McLaughlin and Talbert (1993) seemed to support this fledgling educational paradigm as they confirmed that when teachers had opportunities for collaborative inquiry, the result was a body of wisdom about teaching that could be widely shared. In a professional learning community, teachers could consider educational goals and their meaning in terms of their own classrooms, their own students, and their own subject area. Teachers who made effective teaching adaptations for their students belonged to a professional community that encouraged and supported them in transforming their teaching. Through discussion with other teachers and administrators in the professional community, teachers' ideas of good teaching and classroom practice were defined (McLaughlin & Talbert).
4. What are some benefits of PLCs?
There is substantial research that shows PLCs have a positive impact on teacher practice (Grossman et al., 2001; Little, 2002a; Lachance & Confrey, 2003; Stein et al., 1999). Hord (1997) lists an extensive litany of the many benefits of successful PLCs. A shortened version of this list follows:
· a reduction of isolation of teachers;
· an increased commitment to the mission and goals of the school;
· an increased vigor in working to strengthen the mission of the school;
· a shared responsibility for the total development of students and a collective responsibility for students' success;
· a powerful learning that defines good teaching and classroom practice and
that creates new knowledge and beliefs about teaching and learners;
· an increased meaning and understanding of the content that teachers teach and
the roles they play in helping all students achieve expectations;
· a higher likelihood that teachers will be well informed, professionally renewed, and inspired to inspire students; and
· more satisfaction, higher morale, and lower rates of absenteeism.
Conclusions
Professional Learning Communities are worth exploring. If professionalism demands a constant need to update and improve, and if indeed, we as professional educators are to model being life-long learners for our students, then PLCs may be a natural evolution in our profession. If community is a key ingredient in improving teacher instructional practices and student achievement, then mechanisms that encourage and support PLC membership should be carefully encouraged and facilitated.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Ball, D. L., & Cohen, D. K. (1999). Developing practice, developing practitioners: Toward a practice-based theory of professional education. In L. Darling-Hammond and G. Sykes (Eds.), Teaching as the learning profession (pp. 3 – 31). San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.
Borko, H. (2004). Professional development and teacher learning: Mapping the terrain. Educational Researcher, 33(8), 3 – 15.
Darling-Hammond, L. Bullmaster, M.L., &Cobb, V. L. (1995). Rethinking teacher leadership through professional development schools. The Elementary School Journal, 96(1), 87 – 106.
Grossman, P., Wineburg, S., & Woolworth, S. (2001). Toward a theory of teacher community. Teachers College Record, 103(6), 942 – 1012.
Hord, S.M. (1997). Professional learning communities: Communities of continuous inquiry and improvement. Austin: Southwest Educational Development Laboratory.
McLaughlin, M.W. & Talbert, J.E. (1993). Contexts that matter for teaching and learning. Stanford, California: Center for Research on the Context of Secondary School Teaching,Stanford University.
Senge, P. (1990). The fifth discipline: The art and practice of the learning organization. New York: Currency Doubleday.
Spillane, J. P., Diamond, J. B., Walker, L. J., Halverson, R., & Jita, L. (2001). Urban school leadership for elementary science instruction: Identifying and activating resources in an undervalued school subject. Journal of Research in Science Teaching, 38, 918 – 940.
Wilson, S. M., & Berne, J. (1999). Teacher learning and the acquisition of professional knowledge: An examination of research on contemporary professional development. Review of Research in Education, 24, 173 – 209.
