A TEAM approach to NZ teacher professional learning

If you are a school leader who deals with professional learning for your teachers then the following two questions will be in the forefront of your mind:

1) How do we find professional learning experiences which actually produce change in teachers?  

2) How do we maximise the benefits from the professional learning?

Learn Implement Share courses are quality, two to six month learning journeys for teachers. The learning is delivered via fully facilitated, high quality, online courses. Each course requires participants to implement strategies and resources from the course and to share their implementation experiences with their course colleagues.

One way to maximise the benefits from a Learn Implement Share course is to enrol teachers as a TEAM. A TEAM could comprise all or some teachers from one or more departments.  

In addition to the obvious benefits which individual enrolees gain from a Learn Implement Share course, TEAM members get to collaborate with their school colleagues on site. These collaborations may be organised by the school. However, often the most powerful collaborations are the spontaneous kind which spring up between two-or-more teachers of a team over a coffee in the staffroom.   

A TEAM participant testimonial from the course ‘The Engaged Maths Classroom’. 
'This course has been great for discussions on professional development level in the staffroom. It has been a joy to come to school with Brett and Prue to find out what their next set of ideas were. It’s been freeing. The course has certainly let me think over what I am doing.' Louise Horsburgh, St Catherine's Catholic College, July 2015.

Learn Implement Share has been providing Professional Learning opportunities for teachers, mostly in Australia, since 2009 and has recently established a base in New Zealand.