Keys to Effective Professional Development

In this Journal of Staff Development article, Laura Thomas (Antioch Center for School Reform, Keene, NH) shares her insights on what makes for effective (and ineffective) professional learning:

• Survey teachers and use their input to drive professional development.
• Plan on multiple sessions and follow up with small-group discussion and coaching.
• Administrators should sit in on professional development sessions.
• Focus up front on the desired learning outcomes.
• Make sure external consultants coordinate with each other and with teachers.
• Brief consultants on the situation in your school. Be candid.
• Don’t jump to a new initiative each year; give programs time to work.
• Don’t be seduced by glossy brochures and expensive programs; sometimes locally developed, in-house, or low-cost programs are the best.
• Don’t be fooled by hype; the key question is whether a program will be effective in your district.
• Be pragmatic with conferences and workshops; use what works.

“10 Good Ways to Ensure Bad Professional Learning” by Laura Thomas in Journal of Staff Development, August 2013 (Vol. 34, #4, p. 60-61), www.learningforward.org;

From the Marshall Memo #497