The following is from Professional Learning in the Learning Profession: A Status Report on Teacher Development in the United States and Abroad
written by Ruth Chung Wei, Linda Darling-Hammond; Alethea Andress, Nikole Richardson, and Stelios Orphanos.
Published by the National Staff Development Council and the School Redesign Network at Stanford University, February 2009.
The excerpt is from page 21:
Learning from Professional Community beyond the School
Positive effects of professional communities that operate beyond the school level have been documented by a number of researchers (Darling-Hammond & McLaughlin, 1995; Fullan, 1991). These are often organized via networks that connect teachers around subject matter or other shared educational concerns. Lieberman and Wood (2002) reported on the work of the National Writing Project (NWP), one of the most successful teacher networks, to understand how teacher learning in a community can be a source of efficacy and confidence. The NWP first focuses on creating community amongst a small group of teachers during a five-week summer institute in which teachers engage in writing, share their work, and critique their peers. In the process of making their work public and critiquing others, teachers learn how to make implicit rules and expectations explicit,and how to give and receive constructive feedback for students.
In addition, the authors found that the institutes, which were designed to promote risk taking and collaboration, provided a foundation for ongoing learning for teachers once they left. Newsletters, annual conferences and opportunities to lead workshops were catalysts for the continuous engagement of those teachers with each other and with teachers in their home contexts, creating the intersection of professional learning communities within the school and across the profession.
