Today's school leaders need to prioritize the development of leadership capacity in classroom teachers. Leadership development commonly involves either teachers expressing an interest in leadership or school leaders finding talent in those teachers whom they believe have the capacity to grow into formal leadership roles. School leaders must be…

Almost always, teachers need help in one of two general categories. The first category relates to the ability to provide students with "meaningful work." Teachers who are in need of improvement in this area may struggle to design and implement effective, best-practice strategies that engage students. Teachers also often need help in another…

This paper reflects on the role of mobile learning in teachers' professional learning. It argues that effective professional learning requires reflection and collaboration and that mobile learning is ideally suited to allow reflection-in-action and to capture the spontaneity of learning moments. The paper also argues for the value of…

In this article, the author recounts her experience, through three practices: collaboration, inquiry, and reflection, when she first encountered the practice of Critical Friends Groups (CFGs) and describes how she creates a CFG-inspired learning environment. As a middle-school principal, she has found that the three practices--collaboration,…

Getting personal requires that teachers do what they can to give life to their talents and dreams. Doing so means thinking about what they value in teaching and searching out practices that bring success and satisfaction. Getting personal asks that teachers trust their instincts and intuitions and requires that they learn from what they do. The…

The paper describes efforts to support the development of reflective practice at a basic school in Brno, the Czech Republic. The aims, structure, content and methods are mentioned, as well as some preliminary results. Also, the authors suggest a few preconditions of the success of possible future actions. The specific case is seen from the…

Describes collaborative teacher and administrator training in cognitive coaching, a form of teacher supervision in which the administrator acts as a facilitator of teacher reflection on teacher's own teaching practices and the thinking behind them. Includes one principal's thoughts on his own professional development as he proceeded through the…

In this article, the authors describe their experiences in working with superintendents, principals, assistant principals, and teacher-leaders in New York City, embedding NSRF work into all their professional development efforts, and how responsive facilitation and using NSRF's principles of reflective practice, collaboration, and shared…

Presents strategies from six schools and two districts that won this year's U.S. Department of Education Model Professional Development Awards. Some of their strategies include teacher collaboration to plan professional development; teachers as leaders of learning for themselves and their peers; external partners providing expertise and resources;…

Across the US, some schools are hallmarks of high academic performance. These schools display consistently high test performance, and their students are sought after by competitive colleges and universities. These schools are successful, with consistently above-average test scores, low dropout rates, high percentages of children attending college,…

In England school teachers and head teachers are faced with a myriad of challenges in coping with the pressures of managing the dynamic and diverse institution which is their school within an imposed, centralized, standards-driven change agenda. It could be argued that many of the national policies and initiatives over the last 15 years have…

In the context of a professional-development reform movement in Quebec, the Ministry of Education asked universities to participate in the training of school principals so that they could implement a culture of continuous learning in their own schools. The university researchers used a bottom-up approach to initiate collaborative inquiry with 37…

As a high school principal, the author came to realize that the traditional teacher observation and evaluation model did not help teachers become reflective and improve their practice. Because his own use of brief, frequent principal walk-throughs had given him valuable insights into the need for instructional improvements, he decided to offer…

This article describes the work of the school principal in building a vibrant learning community for staff and students. The descriptions emerged from a series of investigations into teaching, learning, and leading practices within schools that have high capacity for effective teaching and learning. These investigations demonstrated that the…