Learning Walks Build Hearty Appetites For Professional Development

Learning Forward

Equity and excellence in teaching and learning.

Learning walks build hearty appetites for professional development

Mike Carbone has been the principal of Kickemuit Middle School in Warren, R.I., since 1990. He’s seen some bad times there before a dramatic turnaround. When asked what finally got his school’s engine revved and moving the school forward, he said without hesitation: “Learning walks.” The walks weren’t his idea. His superiors in the Bristol Warren Regional School District hired the Institute for Learning (IFL) from Pittsburgh to help all the district’s schools improve. Learning walks are the institute’s signature professional development tool. Essentially, the walks are visits to classrooms by a small team of school adults using a specific protocol. But Carbone, Rhode Island’s 2007-08 Middle School Principal of the Year, never imagined that “just getting everyone out to take a look for themselves”

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