Mentoring with Meaning by McCray Carlos R.;Cooper Bruce S. ;

Author:McCray, Carlos R.;Cooper, Bruce S.,;
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: undefined
Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers
Published: 2012-08-15T00:00:00+00:00

Elements of Collaborative Cultures

As Fullan (2008) states, “Collaborative cultures generate greater student learning” (p. 8). According to Deal and Peterson (2009), “Success flourished in schools with a primary focus on student learning, a commitment to high expectations, and social support for innovation, dialogue, and a search for new ideas” (p. 10). Positive school cultures emphasize the idea of the school as a learning community, not just for the students, but also for the leadership, teachers, and support staff. Hence, teachers become creative problem solvers as they utilize student data to engage in a continuous cycle of inquiry, reflecting and improving their practice according to the needs of their students.

However, teacher collaboration alone does not guarantee better outcomes. Little (2006) describes “professional community” as it “refers to close relationships among teachers as professional colleagues, usually with the implication that these relationships are oriented toward teacher learning and professional development” (p. 15). Little (2006) discovered that schools with “norms of collegiality and experimentation” adapted to change better and showed higher levels of student achievement than in schools that did not possess these attributes (p. 15). In addition, Little notes that in schools where norms of collegiality and experimentation existed, that teachers were found to be “talking frequently about their teaching and how to improve it, . . . observed each other, . . . spoke in focused ways about classroom practice, . . . developed and shared materials, . . . were open to giving and receiving advice, . . . and participated in professional development, helping one another learn new ways of teaching” (p. 16).

McLaughlin and Talbert (2001) found that teachers in collaborative cultures take “collective responsibility for all student learning” (p. 139). In these cultures, where “professional interdependence, experimentation, and reflection . . . were the norms . . . student success is explicitly everyone’s responsibility” (pp. 51–52). Moreover, teachers in collaborative communities placed their students “at the center” and “adapt their practices to accommodate students,” embracing the assumption that it was their responsibility that all students learned (p. 56). As teacher collaboration situated within professional community became the focus of more research, the following common elements emerged:

Element 1: Common/shared mission, vision, values, and goals

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.