"Today, I am asking all of you to join me in this mission to change the culture and the taboos of our Professional Learning. Let us work together to create an environment where every teacher, no matter their experience, feels valued, helped, and supported. We become better teachers and ensure our students' success by supporting each other. In my presentation titled "Changing the Game: Connect-Collaborate-Grow,

I chose an alternative approach that transforms it into more effective and meaningful learning experiences for all educators. 

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My main goal is to issue a call to action to improve and renew these meetings, turning them into spaces where genuine collaboration, professional growth, and skill development are at the core. This call to action aims to redefine how we understand and conduct PLC meetings, ensuring they are about meeting a schedule and creating a space. Where every educator feels supported and motivated to improve continually. Through "Connect-Collaborate-Grow," I want to emphasize the importance of creating a work environment where exchanging ideas and authentic collaboration drive professional growth. Our traditional professional development sessions have yet to meet expectations, failing to inspire teachers or drive significant improvements in student outcomes.

Through storytelling, we uncover the challenges we face and the transformative potential of education to overcome them. I demonstrate that these sessions are ineffective due to their generic, one-size-fits-all approach and lack of engagement, support, and relevance to teachers' needs.

This goal relies on five fundamental principles: duration, support, engagement, modeling, and content specificity. Each of these principles is essential to creating a meaningful learning experience. We know that deep learning doesn't happen in a single session. Professional Learning meetings must be spread over time to allow ideas to develop and mature. We need ongoing spaces where teachers can return to topics, reflect, and improve throughout several. Some studies have concluded that teachers need as many as 50 hours of instruction, practice, and coaching before a new teaching strategy is mastered and implemented in class. 

The second principle is support. Professional learning should be a safe space where teachers can ask for help, share their challenges, and receive support. Mutual support among colleagues is essential for teachers to feel that they are not alone in their growth journey. However, increasing teachers' time alone in professional development is not enough. The time has to be spent wisely, with a significant portion dedicated to supporting teachers during the implementation stage. Support at this stage helps teachers navigate the frustration of using a new instructional method.

Teachers’ initial exposure to a concept should not be passive; instead, teachers should be engaged through varied approaches to make sense of new practice actively. Traditional workshops are primarily ineffective at changing teachers’ training and are a poor way to convey theoretical concepts and evidence-based research. This is because many professional development workshops involve teachers as passive listeners only. Again, just like students, teachers learn better when actively participating and making sense of the presented information (French, 1997).

Modeling is highly effective in helping teachers understand a new practice. We learn best when we see concrete examples in action. More experienced leaders and teachers should model effective practices so that others can observe, learn from, and apply these strategies in their classrooms.

Finally, the fifth principle is content specificity. Professional Development should focus on content relevant to each teacher's grade level and discipline. Only then can we ensure that learning is meaningful and applicable in the classroom. Districts often provide staff-wide training on the first days of school, assuming all teachers can benefit equally; the truth is, while there may be a few general principles that apply to all teachers, these are best understood and mediated with attention to how those general principles manifest within the content a teacher teaches pale in comparison to valuable concepts that are discipline-specific.

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These principles will be presented in different formats, including face-to-face sessions, interactive workshops, and online resources accessible (Newsletter) to all educators. This will allow for greater flexibility and access, ensuring that every educator can participate in and benefit from this initiative.

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cHANGE the gAME!
connect-collaborate-grow
 

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