Content MMS A Professional LearningCommunity By Rick DuFour

Conceptual Framework for transforming schools into high performing communities focused on student learning.  Questions that Guide Content Teams:  1-What is it that we expect our students to know and be able to do?  2- How will we know what students have learned?  3- How will we respond to students who aren’t learning?

Characteristics of Content Teams  Shared mission and vision  Collaborative teams  Collective inquiry  Action orientation  Commitment to continuous improvement  Results orientation

Shared Mission and Vision  Why do we exist?  What kind of school or content team do we hope to become?  How must we behave in order to create the kind of school we hope to become?

Collaborative Teams  Signs of collaboration are:  -Inclusive membership  -Common language  -Groups are open and borders are crossed  -Meetings are energized and productive  -Sense of shared risk as well as success  -Information is shared openly and freely  What type of staff development is needed to reach this level of teaming?

Collective Inquiry  Public Reflection  Seek Best Practices  -Conferences  -Professional Publications  -Site Visitations  Focused Collaboration  -What do we want students to know and be able to do?  -How will we know when they have learned it?  -What will we do differently for those students who have not learned?

Action Orientation  Actions are linked to mission and vision of school  Develop and test hypothesis based on team’s goals  Decisions are based on research  Focus on a few, important goals  Willingness to experiment  Teachers support each other as they work with new strategies and evaluate the impact on student learning How can the administrator support this work and save you time? Such as, research Best Practices for you?

Continuous Improvement  Persistence to achieve the vision  What are our strategies for becoming better?  What criteria will we use to assess our improvement efforts?  The vision becomes the standard by which new initiatives are judged.

Results Oriented  Focus on the outcome desired rather than the inputs or means to achieve the outcome  Purposeful improvement is based on results rather than intentions How is student learning in your school monitored on a timely basis? How do teachers get those results?

The future of Content MMS?  Ultimately, we will only get better at what we do in our Content Teams and our students will become the beneficiaries of this focused work.

Success for EVERY child!  Success breeds success.  I dream of a school where SUCCESS is every where.  Every student, every day, experiences success in every class.

MMS Mission and Vision?  Our students must be prepared to meet the challenges of the near and distant future. Four major trends impacting the US:  1.Globalization  2. Demographics  3.Technology  4.Changing Values and Attitudes