Forging a Path to Student-Centered Learning

By Debbie Woelflein

Ten years ago, our district embraced the New Hampshire vision of professional growth based on reflection, self-assessment, student performance data, and deliberate planning, all documented with a body of evidence.

We began by shifting our emphasis to job-embedded professional learning, helping staff members gain confidence in their ability to plan for and carry out personalized growth plans that included collaboration with their peers.

Working with outside consultants from WestEd Learning Innovations, the district leadership team studied and applied the Concerns-Based Adoption Model and sought training in cognitive coaching to help staff progress through the seven Stages of Concern in accepting change (Holloway, 2003, p. 3).

Our district planned a four-year entry into a new model for professional growth, working slowly and carefully to provide support while challenging each educator to put student learning at the center of his or her plan. We have moved during these 10 years from the “awareness” stage of the Concerns-Based Adoption Model all the way up to the “refocusing stage,” with two revisions of our district professional development master plan.

This shift in the way that district educators viewed their own learning laid the groundwork for Merrimack Middle School’s work in moving from a teacher-centered, individualistic approach to a student-centered, collaborative way of doing business.

Instructional leaders read Kate Jamentz’ Isolation Is the Enemy of Improvement (2002), slowly coming to understand its message as they experienced the energy and excitement that comes with real collaboration, far more significant than the collegiality that they had previously aimed for in meetings that they grudgingly attended.

One veteran teacher’s first reaction to the standards-based shift was, “Just leave me alone. I’m getting ready to retire, and I don’t want to change. I want to be left in peace to do my own thing. I don’t need to talk to anyone about what I do.”

Visitors to our school tell us that they feel the difference in every part of the building. Noting model products on display, evidence of frequent team teaching, standards and objectives posted in classrooms, they see signs of consistency across teams combined with creativity within each area. They point out the number of educators who serve as facilitators of learning, not only in their classrooms, but also with their colleagues.

The most powerful testimony about teacher learning, however, comes from the educators. That resistant veteran teacher has become an influential instructional leader, an early adopter of technology, an avid reader of research on assessment, and a force who lures other veterans into his classroom to share his enthusiasm about his successes in making learning come alive for students.

References

Holloway, K. (2003, February/March). A measure of concern: Research-based program aids innovation by addressing teacher concerns. Tools for Schools, 6(4), 2-9.

Jamentz, K. (2002). Isolation is the enemy of improvement: Instructional leadership to support standards-based practice. San Francisco, CA: WestEd.