Beyond PLC Lite

BEYOND PLC Lite

Evidence-Based Teaching and Learning in a Professional Learning Community at Work®

ANTHONY R. REIBEL

TROY GOBBLE

MARK ONUSCHECK

ERIC TWADELL

BEYOND PLC Lite

Evidence-Based Teaching and Learning in a Professional Learning Community at Work®

ANTHONY R. REIBEL TROY GOBBLE MARK ONUSCHECK ERIC TWADELL

Copyright © 2024 by Solution Tree Press

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: Twadell, Eric, author. | Onuscheck, Mark, author. | Reibel, Anthony R., author. | Gobble, Troy, author.

Title: Beyond PLC lite : evidence-based teaching and learning in a Professional Learning Community at Work / Eric Twadell, Mark Onuscheck, Anthony R. Reibel, Troy Gobble.

Other titles: Beyond Professional Learning Community lite

Description: Bloomington, IN : Solution Tree Press, [2024] | Includes bibliographical references and index.

Identifiers: LCCN 2023051841 (print) | LCCN 2023051842 (ebook) | ISBN 9781949539134 (paperback) | ISBN 9781949539141 (ebook)

Subjects: LCSH: Teaching teams. | Teachers--Professional relationships. | Teaching--Methodology. | Teacher-student relationships. | Student-centered learning. | Effective teaching.

Classification: LCC LB1029.T4 T83 2024 (print) | LCC LB1029.T4 (ebook) | DDC 371.14/8--dc23/eng/20240125

LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2023051841

LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2023051842

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Acknowledgments

From Anthony:

To my wife, Kathy, you are a special person. Your care and love for our family are without equal. To my boys, Tony and Andrew, I am proud of you both. No need for awards, trophies, or “winning”—I love you just as you are. To Eric, Troy, and Mark, I consider our collaboration over the past ten years one of the most special times in my life. If this is our last project together, what a ride it has been.

From Troy:

To my wife and kids, Danielle, Adeline, Claire and Owen, I love you more every single day.

From Mark:

To the educators I have the honor of collaborating with every day, I’m so grateful to work among dedicated faculty, staff, and administration who always keep thinking, creating, and looking forward.

From Eric:

To Poppy and Grandma Joan, your unwavering support of and dedication to Twad Fam have been immeasurable.

Although it is widely considered the birthplace of the Professional Learning Community at Work (PLC) movement, Adlai E. Stevenson High School in Lincolnshire, Illinois, is not immune to the difficulties and challenges of creating and sustaining a culture of continuous improvement. In fact, after the U.S. Department of Education identified the school as “the most recognized and celebrated school in America,” we at Stevenson High School found ourselves stuck in our own version of PLC Lite by the early 2010s. While teachers were working tirelessly on behalf of our students in 2012, many of our instructional, assessment, and grading practices looked very similar to how they did in 2002. To move beyond PLC

Lite, we knew we needed something more than incremental change. We needed to rethink the fundamental assumptions underlying much of our work. What began as an experiment with rethinking and retooling some of our more traditional grading and reporting practices turned into a significant leap into what we describe now as evidence-based teaching and learning. Since 2012, we have witnessed a massive shift in our curriculum, instruction, assessment, and grading practices. Most importantly, we have more students learning at high levels, with agency, efficacy, and a strong sense of self, than ever before. This book outlines our journey out of PLC Lite and into evidence-based teaching and learning.

The evidence-based practices you will find in this book were made possible with innovative thinking, hard work, and relentless dedication to the continuous improvement of Adlai E. Stevenson High School’s faculty and staff. Given the numerous accolades the school has received over the years, one would not be surprised if the faculty and staff lacked a sense of urgency. Fortunately, nothing could be further from the truth. The faculty and staff are constantly searching for and exploring new ideas. They are open and excited to engage in professional development to push their capacity for helping students learn at deeper and higher levels. The significant improvements and changes that we outline in this book would have been impossible without these amazing faculty and staff.

The faculty and staff here at Stevenson are supported by an administrative team that represents the very best that American education has to offer; the shift to evidence-based teaching and learning could not have happened without their leadership. We are also grateful for the support of our current board of education members Amy Neault, Steve Frost, Terry Moons, Gary Gorson, Roni Ben-Yoseph, Don Tyer, and Grace Cao; and former board members Merv Roberts, Bruce Lubin, and Dave Weisberg. Our board of education has long been committed to our mission of success for every student, and our work toward this success is only possible with their visionary leadership and support.

We continue to be grateful to our friends at Solution Tree—Jeff Jones, Ed Ackerman, Douglas Rife, Claudia Wheatley, Todd Brakke, and everyone who was supportive and patient as we worked to clearly describe Stevenson High School’s journey to evidence-based teaching and learning practices.

Finally, we feel blessed to be able to serve the students of Adlai E. Stevenson High School. The best part of our work is when we have the opportunity to spend time and collaborate with our students. Students bring us a sense of joy and fulfillment that only educators can appreciate and understand. As with all our previous books, the authors’ royalties from this project are being donated to the Stevenson High School Foundation, which provides financial support for students in need, scholarships, and mentoring for first-generation college students.

Solution Tree Press would like to thank the following reviewers:

Doug Crowley

Assistant Principal

DeForest Area High School

DeForest, Wisconsin

Janet Nuzzie

District Intervention Specialist, K–12 Mathematics

Pasadena Independent School District

Pasadena, Texas

Christie Shealy

Director of Testing and Accountability

Anderson School District One

Williamston, South Carolina

Kory Taylor

Reading Interventionist

Arkansas Virtual Academy

Little Rock, Arkansas

Ringnolda Jofee’ Tremain

Director of Professional Learning

Texas Leadership Public Schools

Arlington, Texas

John Unger

Principal

West Fork Middle School

West Fork, Arkansas

Steven Weber

Assistant Superintendent

Fayetteville Public Schools

Fayetteville, Arkansas

Visit go.SolutionTree.com/PLCbooks to download the free reproducibles in this book.

About the Authors

Anthony R. Reibel, EdD, is the director of research and evaluation at Adlai E. Stevenson High School in Lincolnshire, Illinois. In 2006, he became a Spanish teacher at Stevenson, where he served as a curricular team leader, core team leader, coach, and club sponsor.

In 2010, Anthony received recognition from the state of Illinois, and in 2011, Illinois Computing Educators named him Technology Educator of the Year. He currently sponsors two clubs: (1) KIVA, which gives microloans to entrepreneurs living in areas lacking financial institutions, and (2) FIRE, which promotes equality and respect among Stevenson students and staff through conversation and advocacy in school and throughout the community.

Anthony is the author and coauthor of seven books on education. Some titles include Embracing Relational Teaching: How Strong Relationships Promote Student Self-Regulation and Efficacy; Small Changes, Big Impact: Ten Strategies to Promote Student Efficacy and Lifelong Learning; Proficiency-Based Assessment: Process, Not Product; and Pathways to Proficiency: Implementing Evidence-Based Grading. Each of these explores the relationship among student efficacy, pedagogy, and learning.

Anthony is also the publisher and chief editor of The Assessor (www.assessormag.com), a publication that features short articles written by teachers and administrators to support conversation about formative assessment.

Anthony completed his doctorate, which studied the effects of cognitive bias on teachers’ evaluation of student performance, at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign.

Troy Gobble is the principal of Adlai E. Stevenson High School in Lincolnshire, Illinois. He previously served as assistant principal for teaching and learning at Stevenson. Troy taught science for eighteen years and served as the science department chair at Riverside Brookfield High School in Riverside, Illinois, for eight years.

The U.S. Department of Education has described Stevenson as “the most recognized and celebrated school in America”; it is one of only eight schools to have won the U.S. Department of Education’s National Blue Ribbon School Award on five occasions. Stevenson was one of the first comprehensive schools that the U.S. Department of Education designated a New American High School as a model of successful school reform. It is repeatedly cited as one of America’s top high schools and the birthplace of the Professional Learning Communities at Work process.

Troy holds a master of science in educational administration from Benedictine University, a master of science in natural sciences (physics) from Eastern Illinois University, and a bachelor of science in secondary science education from the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign.

Mark Onuscheck is the director of curriculum, instruction, and assessment at Adlai E. Stevenson High School in Lincolnshire, Illinois. He is a former English teacher and director of communication arts. As director of curriculum, instruction, and assessment, Mark works with academic divisions around professional learning, articulation, curricular and instructional revision, evaluation, assessment, social-emotional learning, technologies, and Common Core implementation. He is also an adjunct professor at DePaul University.

Mark was awarded the Quality Matters Star Rating for his work in online teaching. He helps build curriculum and instructional practices for TimeLine Theatre’s arts integration program for Chicago Public Schools. Additionally, he is a National Endowment for the Humanities’ grant recipient and a member of ASCD, the National Council of Teachers of English, the International Literacy Association, and Learning Forward.

Mark earned a bachelor’s degree in English and classical studies from Allegheny College and a master’s degree in teaching English from the University of Pittsburgh.

Eric Twadell, PhD, is the superintendent of Adlai E. Stevenson High School District 125 in Lincolnshire, Illinois. Prior to his role as superintendent, Eric served Stevenson as a social studies teacher, curriculum director, and assistant superintendent for leadership and organizational development.

Stevenson High School has received five National Blue Ribbon School Awards from the U.S. Department of Education, and is one of only eight schools to have won this award on five different occasions. Stevenson was also one of the first comprehensive schools that the U.S. Department of Education designated a New American High School as a model of successful school reform. The U.S. Department of Education has described Stevenson as “the most recognized and celebrated school in America.” In the popular press, Stevenson High School has been repeatedly cited as one of America’s top high schools and the birthplace of Professional Learning Communities at Work.

In addition to his work as a teacher and leader, Eric has been involved in coaching numerous athletic teams and facilitating outdoor education and adventure travel programs. He is a member of many professional organizations, including Learning Forward and ASCD.

Eric earned a master’s degree in curriculum and instruction and a doctorate in educational leadership and policy studies from Loyola University Chicago.

To book Anthony R. Reibel, Troy Gobble, Mark Onuscheck, and Eric Twadell for professional development, contact pd@SolutionTree.com.

Moving Beyond the Futility of PLC Lite

Adlai E. Stevenson High School District 125 in Lincolnshire, Illinois, is a school many educators view as the gold standard for operating as a Professional Learning Community at Work® (PLC at Work). At one time, Stevenson was not a desirable place for parents to send their children to, but by the late 1990s, this school was transformed into one of the most successful and celebrated high schools in America. Under the leadership of Rick DuFour, the school culture shifted from one focused on teaching to one focused on learning. Stevenson’s educators (whom we count ourselves among) stopped working in isolation and began working in collaboration. We stopped measuring effectiveness based on intentions and instead focused on results. As of 2023, Stevenson has received numerous awards, has repeatedly been designated the best school district in America, and is one of only a select few schools to have received the U.S. Department of Education’s National Blue Ribbon School Award on five occasions. Because Stevenson was the laboratory for many of the original ideas of the PLC at Work process, the school is also known as the birthplace of the PLC movement.

Although Stevenson achieved significant success by the early 2000s, there were times when the cycle of continuous improvement did not produce the expected results. The period of 2005–2010 was one such time. By 2005, Stevenson had all the foundational practices and protocols of a Model PLC, but the improvement cycle seemed to have stalled. There was a level of comfort with the way things were—and keep in mind, things were good! Teachers met every week in their curricular teams, articulated and taught a common curriculum, gave common formative and summative assessments, made data-based decisions on reteaching, and identified students for interventions. In short, we functioned just as you would expect a Model PLC at Work to function. However, a few of us felt that we had become complacent with the way things were, rather than embraced the way things could be.

By 2010, we realized we had an opportunity and responsibility to assess the “current facts and brutal reality” (Collins, 2002) of the teaching and learning process and our PLC at Stevenson High School. While others were recognizing us as a Model PLC at Work school, we felt we needed to dig deeper to move beyond our version of PLC Lite. Our collaborative teams began to look closer at our teaching and learning cycles; our assessment, feedback,

and grading practices; and our tiers of interventions. What we found was that although our practices were very, very good, there was significant room for improvement.

The single most important realization we had during this close examination was that our assessment and grading practices were outdated. To be honest, assessing and grading students at Stevenson in 2010 looked a lot like we imagine it did when the school opened in 1965. We needed to change. We needed to shift from our traditional assessment and grading practices, which focused on accountability, punishment, and measures of central tendency, to an assessment and grading framework focused on self-efficacy, improvement, and evidence of learning.

To make this shift, our school’s leadership had to create learning opportunities for our teachers to explore their practices and their students’ challenges and complexities, and we had to create policies and practices grounded in agency development (Bandura, 2023). To do that, we needed to renew our focus and dig much deeper into the three big ideas of the PLC at Work process: (1) a focus on learning, (2) a collaborative culture, and (3) a results orientation (DuFour, DuFour, Eaker, Many, & Mattos, 2016). Although we recognized the need for innovation and a shift to more student-centered teaching, learning, assessing, and grading, we were met with a lot of questions about making this change, and some resistance too. Significant change can be demanding and challenging, but thoughtful collaboration, a commitment to learning, and a focus on results helped us unite our work and lead our efforts beyond what Michael Fullan and Joanne Quinn (2015) describe as outdated instructional assessment and grading practices.

Our traditional practices emphasized teaching explicit knowledge, facilitating teachercentered instructional practices, and focusing on summative assessment results. These traditional practices were running up against a time when technology and information were more powerful and pervasive than ever. Students carried phones and tablets with more information available on them than they could find in all the textbooks in the school combined. We realized we needed to be more effective in meeting the evolving needs of our students. Our challenge as leaders was to strike a balance between the growing need for change and the desire to support and respect the experiences and expertise of our teaching staff.

This began Stevenson’s journey to move beyond PLC Lite and dig deep into evidence-based teaching and learning practices by first going back to the basics and doubling down on uniting the three big ideas of a PLC. We find these core principles to be the most significant levers for school change, and they continue to serve as the foundation for our school’s culture of continuous growth and improvement. However, this does not make us immune to the inherent challenges of bringing about change. Even with our strong foundation, the change process can be an emotional roller coaster, often requiring individuals to confront difficult situations, overcome potential stigmatization, and address feelings of helplessness or a lack of control (Zmuda, Kuklis, & Kline, 2004).

Against that backdrop, this book aims to help teachers and leaders interested in moving beyond PLC Lite and learning how the PLC at Work process can support meaningful change and a focus on evidence-based teaching and learning practices utilizing a ten-action framework. Throughout the rest of this introduction, we will prime you for the information and

essential actions to come by exploring the persistent knowing-doing gap in schools and the challenges schools must overcome to avoid the trap of PLC Lite. From there, we will offer additional insights about how to approach this book.

A Persistent Knowing-Doing Gap in Schools

In their groundbreaking book The Knowing-Doing Gap: How Smart Companies Turn Knowledge Into Action, Jeffrey Pfeffer and Robert Sutton (2000) state:

One of the great mysteries in organizational management is the disconnect between what we know and what we do. We have more knowledge than ever before about how to create effective organizations, but we still struggle to put that knowledge into practice. (p. 74)

In other words, when we know what to do, why don’t we do it? There are many reasons why schools cannot close the knowing-doing gap and move beyond the “futility of PLC Lite” (Reeves & DuFour, 2016). Through our work with schools across North America, we’ve identified five challenges that schools commonly encounter when trying to move beyond PLC Lite: (1) a relentless commitment to the status quo, (2) the absence of a guaranteed and viable curriculum, (3) a failure to accurately define success, (4) a focus on “coblaboration” over collaboration, and (5) a focus on inputs more than outputs.

A Relentless Commitment to the Status Quo

There are many reasons for a culture of complacency, where inaction becomes the norm and new ideas and changes are ignored to keep things the way they are. These reasons include ignorance, fear, anxiety, lethargy, and apathy (Johnson, 2014), and they can keep people, groups, and institutions unrelenting in their commitment to the status quo.

Many schools of this century operate based on policies and practices that were used in schools over a hundred years prior. Schools need to look, feel, and work very different from the schools of the last century. Moving beyond PLC Lite involves recognizing that the traditional glacier-like pace of change in schools needs to be replaced with a process of innovation and iteration that results in a culture of continuous improvement. While we are not advocating for a reckless and haphazard approach to school improvement, we are suggesting that the time is now to make changes that will result in high levels of learning for all students. Moving away from the status quo in school is not easy; this effort requires patience and persistence. We should heed the advice of our tech industry friends, who seemingly live by the motto, “Fail early, fail often, fail cheap, and fail forward.” PLC Lite is safe. Becoming a fully functioning PLC takes dedication, commitment, and a relentless pursuit of better, as we will show throughout this book.

The Absence of a Guaranteed and Viable Curriculum

The original sin in most failed PLC efforts is a failure to clearly articulate a guaranteed and viable curriculum. A guaranteed and viable curriculum serves as the foundation of the PLC at Work process (DuFour et al., 2016). In Leaders of Learning, Richard DuFour and Robert J. Marzano (2011) recognize the curriculum gap that exists in many schools and suggest practices to close it:

One of the most powerful things a school can do to help enhance student achievement is to guarantee that specific content is taught in specific courses and grade levels. This might seem obvious, but in actual practice, few districts and schools can make this guarantee. (p. 89)

They continue:

The only way the curriculum in a school can truly be guaranteed is if the teachers themselves, those who are called upon to deliver the curriculum, have worked collaboratively to do the following:

• Study the intended curriculum.

• Agree on priorities within the curriculum.

• Clarify how the curriculum translates into student knowledge and skills.

• Establish general pacing guidelines for delivering the curriculum.

• Commit to one another that they will, in fact, teach the agreed-upon curriculum. (DuFour & Marzano, 2011, p. 91)

While it is true that many schools have failed to develop and implement a guaranteed and viable curriculum, we are equally concerned (if not more so) that many schools have developed and implemented a curriculum that is no longer relevant for students in the 21st century. We see many districts and schools prioritize the transmission of information and knowledge and neglect the development of students’ skills, abilities, and understanding (Caplan, 2018; hooks, 2014; Tyler, 2013; Walker, 1971). A focus on content, memorization of facts, or explicit knowledge often occurs at the expense of the development of skills and a focus on implicit and tacit knowledge.

In chapter 4, we outline a skills-based approach to curriculum design, one that uses agencyrelevant skills as its anchor instead of content standards. We show how content standards support the development of enduring, life-ready skills that a student can use to build a sense of competence and agency.

A Failure to Accurately Define Success

When you are moving out of PLC Lite, it can be difficult to measure student success. How do you know and define student success and make that success visible? The idea of success is difficult to define, and the relevance and equity of success metrics are hotly debated. In a widely cited book, Clayton M. Christensen, Michael B. Horn, and Curtis W. Johnson (2011) contend that “the world of education is one in which there is little agreement on what the goals are, let alone the methods that are best-suited to achieve them” (p. 6).

Notably, the most common proxies for success are defined by standardized tests. According to Adrian Wooldridge (2021), however, standardized tests have historically perpetuated inequality. Therefore, it is important to recognize that relying solely on standardized tests to measure success can perpetuate and exacerbate existing disparities in educational outcomes (Wooldridge, 2021). Focusing only on student achievement scores can also have negative consequences for students’ overall growth and well-being (Emdin, 2021; Kohn, 1999, 2004, 2011, 2015; Robinson & Aronica, 2019).

At our own school, we have often thought that if all our students graduated with perfect ACT and SAT scores, had the highest GPA possible, and scored 5s on all their Advanced Placement (AP) exams but we wouldn’t invite them over for Sunday dinner with our grandparents, then we probably hadn’t done our job well enough. In other words, success isn’t just about academic achievement. Christopher Emdin (2021) emphasizes, “Test scores matter, but they don’t matter more than joy. Curriculum matters, but not if it erases the student and kills their passion. This work is about recovering the authentic self that reaches the authentic student” (p. 10).

In our efforts to reimagine our teaching and learning practices, we were focused on developing both smart and good students. Tony Wagner and Ted Dintersmith (2015) point out that schools and communities tend to be obsessed with standardized testing and metrics, which actually end up hindering students’ intellectual growth, critical-thinking skills, and creativity. This narrow interpretation of achievement that focuses exclusively on grades and test scores can also result in reduced drive, less involvement, and increased stress and anxiety for students (Kohn, 1999; Pink, 2009). That was not the direction in which we wanted to move our school culture. We recognized we didn’t want to be a school that viewed students as numbers instead of unique individuals with different needs and strengths (Zhao, 2018b). We wanted to be better, do better, and rethink how we could approach our educational goals more holistically and more thoughtfully.

As a result, we reestablished our belief that schools can and should prioritize students’ skills and social and emotional competencies instead of just test scores (Rose, 2016). We recognized that a comprehensive education prepares students for real-life situations, not just exams and assessments (Emdin, 2016). In this book, we share our approach to evidence-based practices that prioritize student agency, efficacy, and belonging as essential to achieving a student-centered, holistic, and inclusive school.

A Focus on “Coblaboration” Over Collaboration

In our experience, a chief cause of PLC Lite is the failure of some schools to move beyond so-called coblaboration to meaningful collaboration. One reason for this is that many educators synonymously use four terms—(1) congeniality, (2) cooperation, (3) coordination, and (4) collaboration—which mean very, very different things. The failure to move toward meaningful collaboration most often results from spending too much time focusing on congeniality, cooperation, and coordination.

In his wonderful book Strengthening the Heartbeat: Leading and Learning Together in Schools, Thomas J. Sergiovanni (2005) writes:

The emphasis on human relations management has resulted in the value of congeniality becoming very strong in the way schools are managed and led. Congeniality has to do with the climate of interpersonal relationships within an enterprise. When this climate is friendly, agreeable, and sympathetic, congeniality is high. Though congeniality is pleasant and often desirable, it is not independently linked to better performance and quality schooling. (p. 12)

While reading the last line, one might think Sergiovanni (2005) has buried the lead. Yes, congeniality is important. We should be nice, kind, caring, and supportive of one another. And we know school leaders spend considerable time and energy creating a school climate in which congeniality is high. However, Sergiovanni (2005) makes it clear that just because we are nice, kind, caring, and supportive of one another, it doesn’t necessarily mean that students will learn as a result.

In addition to believing that congeniality is important, we also believe that educators must understand the differences among cooperation, coordination, and collaboration. At a simple level, if we were to identify synonyms for cooperation, coordination, and collaboration, we might consider the following.

• Cooperation  sharing

• Coordination  planning

• Collaboration  interdependence

A school with high levels of cooperation might have teachers sharing lesson plans, sharing ideas and strategies, and even sharing students for intervention. There is a school culture of openness and sharing when cooperation is high. In a school with high levels of coordination, we see teachers working together to identify essential standards, develop units of study, write common assessments, and plan for interventions. Both these things are important—sharing ideas and strategies and planning together are vital in becoming a Model PLC. We like to think cooperation and coordination are necessary but not sufficient for true collaboration.

Collaboration is very different. Richard DuFour and colleagues (2016) define collaboration as “a systematic process in which teachers work together interdependently in order to impact their classroom practice in ways that will lead to better results for their students, for their team, and for their school” (p. 12). In a school where collaboration is running high, we don’t just share ideas and practices, and we don’t just identify essential standards and write common assessments; we actually interdependently analyze the impact and the results of our work. In other words, we focus more on the output than the input.

A Focus on Inputs More Than Outputs

A pervasive symptom of PLC Lite is an aversion to focusing on the actual evidence of student learning. Schools spend far too much time focusing on cooperation and coordination—focusing on the sharing and planning parts of the work. Although this work is important, we know teams that focus more on the outputs (the actual results) of their work will see higher levels of student learning and achievement.

As we work with schools across North America, we see many teachers working in teams to identify essential standards, develop proficiency scales, create common assessments, and plan for interventions. While all these actions are essential components of the PLC process, they are very much on the input side of the work. We consider them necessary but insufficient to move beyond PLC Lite. We prefer our teams to spend more time on the outputs

of our work, using evidence of student learning and data to improve individual practice, enhance the work of teams, and facilitate student-specific interventions and supports.

By focusing on the actual evidence of student learning, collaborative teams and teachers put themselves in a stronger position to support students and one another, affirm their best practices, and gain new strategies and tools to help students learn at higher levels.

How to Read This Book

Closing the knowing-doing gap and moving beyond PLC Lite are demanding yet doable. Schools face a significant challenge in what Jim Collins (2002) describes as the “good to great” problem. To paraphrase Collins (2002), a big obstacle to creating great schools is there are already quite a few good schools. Many schools are comfortable with being good. When things are already good, or even just pretty good, schools often lack the incentive and drive to move beyond PLC Lite. This book is for those teachers and leaders who are interested in disrupting the status quo, busting out of PLC Lite, and persistently pursuing a culture of continuous improvement.

This book serves two purposes. First, it provides teachers and leaders with clear and compelling ideas and strategies for moving beyond PLC Lite. Second, and just as important, it presents a new evidence-based structure for developing a student-centered approach to teaching and learning within a PLC. In this book, we share our experiences, policies, and practices that draw on the work of researchers, authors, and practitioners who have emphasized placing students’ agency, efficacy, and well-being at the center.

Chapters 1 and 2 highlight the significance of having a clear change plan and a learning map and breaking the implementation process into manageable stages (actions). The remaining chapters function as a detailed outline of how to develop and implement evidencebased teaching and learning using a ten-action framework.

Chapters 3–11 are each devoted to one essential action for collaborative teams to extend beyond PLC Lite. Chapter 3 explores how to strive for the success of every student by defining success through the lens of a PLC. Chapter 4 discusses how different types of knowledge inform curriculum, explores different curriculum structures, and addresses common obstacles to collaborative curriculum design. Chapter 5 guides readers in how to create scales and rubrics that focus on student skills, with a particular emphasis on competency-focused and conventional rubrics. Chapter 6 provides strategies for designing formative and summative assessments and countering assessment models that are unproductive. Chapter 7 discusses how to establish a skills-focused scope and sequence to assist in long-term knowledge retention. Chapter 8 explains the gradual release of responsibility model and why it encourages meaningful participation. Chapter 9 covers both evidence-based grading and reporting systems and the drawbacks to conventional grading practices. Chapter 10 explores how to incorporate a balanced feedback approach that equally considers the teacher’s and students’ perspectives and experiences. Finally, chapter 11 explains how to evaluate diverse student feedback and examines the four critical questions of intervention: (1) What is the student’s current learning story? (2) How can you substantiate their story? (3) Have you

maximized differentiated Tier 1 interventions based on this profile? and (4) If so, what is the logical and appropriate subsequent step?

This book also documents our journey of transforming the teaching and learning culture within Stevenson High School. Although our school had received numerous awards and accolades, we knew there was room for growth and improvement, just as there is in every school around the world. We hope the practices in this book can support teachers and leaders looking to move beyond PLC Lite by focusing on creating a student-centered approach to teaching and learning that prioritizes student agency and efficacy. The blueprint provided in this book is designed to be implemented within the PLC at Work process.

Focus: Taking Theory to Practice

When schools are stuck in PLC Lite, the teachers and administrators understand the three big ideas and four critical questions of the PLC process but fail to make lasting shifts in their culture. We hear questions like, “We implement the three big ideas, use the four critical questions, have team collaboration time, and use common formative assessments. Why are we not seeing change in student performance or culture?”

We assume readers of this book have similar questions, and for whatever reason, your school might be stuck in PLC Lite. In this chapter, we provide a plan and action steps for examining your culture and current practices and refocusing them on the intersections of the three big ideas (chapter 1, page 9), where student, teacher, and collective efficacy live. We believe that in doing so, you can help create a culture of continuous improvement and move your school beyond PLC Lite.

Key Learning

It is crucial to focus on the intersections of the three big ideas of a PLC, as they offer unique opportunities for PLC growth and improvement. These intersections provide you a chance to focus intently on particular areas and consider how they overlap and impact one another. For example, how does a collaborative culture intersect with a results orientation? Further, what if your culture has a healthy intersection of those two ideas but not a focus on student learning? You can scrutinize these overlaps to understand the full impact of the three big ideas and maximize their benefits to the teaching and learning process.

Short on Time?

Read This

The following are the most critical actions to take away from this chapter.

• Study theoretical frameworks for transformative innovation (such as the law of diffusion of innovation; Rogers, 1962).

• Create professional learning opportunities for the change initiative based on the nature of learning (see Csikszentmihalyi, 1990, 2014).

• Track progress, seek out diverse feedback, investigate challenges, and celebrate successes. In other words, listen, be curious, and think deeply—in addition to doing the work.

• Know both the product and principle outcomes of the change; the latter are often ignored or minimized for the sake of the product.

This chapter outlines how our school, Stevenson High School, moved beyond our version of PLC Lite and refocused on the three big ideas—learning, collaboration, and results— as well as their intersections to develop an evidence-based model of teaching and learning. We then introduce the ten actions of our evidence-based model of teaching and learning and the action steps you can take to implement this model. (See the appendix, page 247, for a table summarizing these actions.)

A Theory for Why Theory Often Doesn’t Become Practice

At Stevenson, we had an implementation theory sitting on our metaphorical bookshelf. Enter—or, might we say, re-enter—the law of diffusion of innovation, which is a sociological theory originated by communication theorist Everett M. Rogers in 1962. It posits that the rate of change (success, scope, and scale) for innovations within an organization are based on five factors. Those factors—two value based and three data based—along with associated questions, are as follows.

1. Relative advantage (value based): Is the innovation better than existing solutions or products?

2. Compatibility (value based): Is the innovation consistent with existing values, past experiences, and needs of potential adopters?

3. Complexity (data based): Is the innovation difficult or easy to understand or use?

4. Trialability (data based): Can the innovation be tested on a limited basis?

5. Observability (data based): Are the results of using the innovation visible to others?

Everett M. Rogers (1962) finds that without clear answers to these questions, it will be hard for a change initiative to cross the chasm to success, as he refers to it. Many innovations and changes start strong, with innovators and early adopters setting the pace and creating initial momentum. But to truly achieve full implementation of these innovations requires a larger group of adopters—the early majority. This next group of implementers will not be convinced to embrace innovation without sufficient answers to the preceding questions and a clear plan for adoption—a plan that provides stability and mitigates the potential risks of making the change. This is what Rogers (1962) finds—that many initiatives flounder or fail because there is no plan to cross the chasm. However, once teams or institutions cross the chasm, the momentum toward success is almost unstoppable (see figure 2.1).

Getting across this chasm is the key challenge. In our experience working with schools that are stuck in PLC Lite, it is clear these schools have not been able to cross the chasm in implementing the PLC process and its best practices.

We have not been immune to the challenges of implementing change at Stevenson. We’ve seen initiatives stumble and fail over the years, including many attempts to move to standards-based grading. We had the intelligence, the resources, the commitment, and the resilience, but when we look back, it is clear we couldn’t move beyond our version of PLC Lite because we didn’t have a plan for pushing innovation across the chasm.

Source: Adapted from Rogers, 1962.

Figure 2.1: Law of diffusion of innovation.

The Ten Actions for Evidence-Based Teaching and Learning

With a previous failed attempt at moving beyond PLC Lite, it is a wonder that we even tried another large-scale attempt. But we did. We knew that we had to cross the chasm. But instead of rushing to implement new ideas and practices, we paused and developed a plan. We needed a straightforward yet systematic plan, one that allowed teachers to navigate a transformation of this scale—a plan that was visibly organized with intent, gave purpose to each step, held up to scrutiny, and clearly aligned with our school’s vision and values. The result was a ten-action (or ten-stage, if you prefer) framework for evidence-based teaching and learning, a framework that still serves as the cornerstone of all our teaching and learning improvement processes to this day.

For many of our teacher teams, working through this framework’s actions took a full academic year, a timeline we still recommend. The sequence of these actions is purposeful, with grading and gradebook reform being two of the last steps. We know that many readers of this book are especially interested in best processes and practices to implement grading and reporting reform (chapter 9, page 175). However, we find that collaborative teams should grasp and apply the learning of how to change their pedagogy before altering grading or gradebook practices. Starting with a gradebook change often results in a superficial change and a failure to identify the core reason for a transformation—efficacy (chapter 3, page 39).

Each action represents an important aspect of the teaching and learning process and outlines specific action steps for moving beyond PLC Lite. While this plan contains numerous subtleties, figure 2.2 (page 26) provides an initial summary. Additionally, the plan features each action’s anticipated products (artifacts). For instance, the first action, defining student

Create studentcentered mission and vision statements.

Create a portrait of a graduate. Reproducible

Utilizing evidencebased assessments

Action step 4.1: Audit your culture of assessment.

Action step 4.2: Establish assessment purpose.

Action step 4.3: Design assessments.

Action step 4.4: Develop questions and align them to the assessment purpose.

Action step 4.5: Provide reperformance and retakes.

Action step 4.6: Consider culminating experiences.

Reproducible 1: “Culture of Assessment Audit”

Reproducible 2: “Assessment Inventory Template”

Reproducible 3: “Assessment Inventory for Natures of Knowledge”

Reproducible 4: “Assessment Design Template” 5

Creating a skillsfocused scope and sequence

6

Aiming for evidence-based instruction

Action step 5.1: Understand performance windows.

Action step 5.2: Create and manage performance windows.

Action step 5.3: Be mindful of other considerations.

Action step 6.1: Design instruction for self-generated learning.

Action step 6.2: Consider the purpose of homework.

Reproducible: “Creating a SkillsFocused Scope and Sequence”

Reproducible: “Student-Does-First Lesson Plan (DiamondsModel)”

Ask question 1 (“What is the student’s learning story at this moment?”).

Action step 10.2: Ask question 2 (“How do you know their story?”).

Action step 10.3: Ask question 3 (“Have you exhausted differentiated instruction [Tier 1] relative to the student’s profile?”).

Action step 10.4: Ask question 4 (“If so, what is the next logical and appropriate action?”).

Reproducible 1: “Learning Story Chart”

Reproducible 2: “DRIP Check”

Reproducible 3: “Guiding Questions for Generating Differentiated Instruction Ideas”

Reproducible 4: “Readiness to Collaborate With Evidence”

success, endeavors to establish student efficacy as success, and the resulting artifact is a portrait of a graduate, an illustration of the characteristics of an autonomous, competent, and relationally minded student.

In the following sections, we offer some initial insights into each action and action step described in figure 2.2. The remaining chapters in this book cover each in full detail.

Action 1: Defining Student Success

This action includes redefining the term student success and aligning it with the ideas of autonomy, agency, and efficacy. While teachers still expect students to have competence in skills and desired knowledge states, they primarily focus on helping students become selfreliant, self-governing, and self-defining individuals.

• Action step 1.1: Perform a student audit. To create a culture that focuses on student agency and efficacy development, you first need to know who your

Figure

students are. Learning is different for each student, and so is agency and efficacy development. Performing an audit of the characteristics, goals, needs, dispositions, and lives of your students is the first step toward meaningful school reform.

• Action step 1.2: Create student-centered mission and vision statements. Another action step is to review your current mission statement to ensure it speaks about student behaviors, actions, and characteristics, not adult ones. Too many school mission statements describe adult actions and what those adult actions can do for the students (for example, “Our district creates students who . . .”) instead of focusing on who the students are and what they can and will do to be successful (for example, “Our students are and can . . .”).

• Action step 1.3: Create a portrait of a graduate. This action refers to codifying the new definition of success in a publicly available document that outlines the attributes you hope to see in your students when they transition (that is, from elementary school to middle school, middle school to high school, or high school to college or career).

Action 2: Creating an Enduring Skills-Focused Curriculum

This stage involves building a curriculum around the ideas of enduring skills and lasting competence. This is a departure from the conventional curriculum structures that prioritize content and what students need to know. The focus is instead on what skills students must develop to become self-reliant and efficacious and how well they can put knowledge together with different aspects of learning to demonstrate competence in those skills.

• Action step 2.1: Identify enduring skills. Focusing on skills that are transferable, leveraged, and aligned with student efficacy can help ensure that students develop essential competencies that they can apply across different disciplines and realworld contexts.

• Action step 2.2: Identify essential standards. Once you have identified the essential skills and corresponding proficiency-based learning targets, you must define the expectations of quality. Clearly articulating what constitutes high-quality performance can help ensure that students and other stakeholders understand what is expected of them and what the learning goals are.

• Action step 2.3: Create success criteria. The criteria for success qualify as explication for a given context, time period, or scenario. These are typically the look-fors of quality and the unit content or subskills needed to reach the larger enduring skill of the curriculum.

Action 3: Creating Skills-Focused Proficiency Scales and Rubrics

Skills-focused rubrics are designed to assess specific skills or competencies rather than just the overall quality of a product or performance. These rubrics break down the targeted skill into specific components or behaviors and provide clear descriptions of what mastery of each component looks like.

• Action step 3.1: Create competency-based rubrics. Conventional rubrics often focus on assessing a student’s skill or knowledge at a single point in time, which may not fully capture their development or potential for improvement. In contrast, competency-based rubrics emphasize identifying the student’s mastery of a particular skill. These competency-based rubrics focus on specific skills or competencies rather than broad performance categories. They also have clear and concise descriptors of performance levels tied directly to the targeted competencies.

• Action step 3.2: Teach with competency-based rubrics. Teachers can use competency-based rubrics to guide their instruction and assessment. This fosters a growth mindset in students, as they are encouraged to view their skills and knowledge as malleable and capable of improving over time. This final step involves bringing together all aspects of your evidence-based curriculum, including skills, standards, scales, and criteria. By synthesizing these elements into a cohesive whole, you can create a comprehensive curriculum that supports student learning and improvement.

Action 4: Utilizing Evidence-Based Assessments

This stage focuses on creating proficiency-focused assessments that are specifically tied to the learning process of students, rather than solely being tools for verifying learning. It emphasizes building proficiency in skills, using those skills in various contexts, and helping students develop self-knowledge.

• Action step 4.1: Audit your culture of assessment. Establishing a culture of evidence-based assessment is crucial for assessments to function effectively. We aim to move schools beyond the traditional culture of assessment, which focuses on evaluating students’ knowledge of specific topics, to a culture that promotes selfreliance and connectedness, allowing students to develop essential skills.

• Action step 4.2: Establish assessment purpose. Knowing the intent of your assessments is crucial, as it informs both the structure and the content of the assessments. Understanding the purpose of an assessment can help ensure that it aligns with the desired learning outcomes, provides meaningful and useful feedback to students, and accurately measures student performance.

• Action step 4.3: Design assessments. When designing assessments or learning experiences, teachers must prioritize the development of enduring skills. They should use these skills as a guide of sorts to create assessments that provide evidence of student learning and improvement in these areas. In other words, assessments not only show how well students know the content but, more importantly, show how students are developing in the course-specific enduring skills. To ensure that assessments accurately measure student learning and provide meaningful feedback, teachers need to create assessments that have enough of the right questions, have the right level of rigor, and align with the appropriate level of proficiency on the assessment. In addition to measuring content knowledge, assessments provide opportunities for students to reflect on their learning and self-knowledge. Students can

reflect through self-assessment or reflective writing assignments that prompt them to think about their own learning processes and strategies.

• Action step 4.4: Develop questions and align them to the assessment purpose. Developing practical questions and aligning them with the purpose of an assessment is critical to creating meaningful learning experiences for students. This requires careful consideration of the expectation of competence and desired outcomes. Teachers can begin by identifying the purpose of the assessment and the specific skills or competencies they wish to evaluate.

• Action step 4.5: Provide reperformance and retakes. Reperformance can be a valuable part of the assessment process, allowing students to demonstrate their understanding and mastery of the material after receiving feedback and making improvements (Black & Wiliam, 1998a, 1998b; Brookhart, 2013a; Hattie & Timperley, 2007). However, it is important that teachers approach reperformance with some caveats to ensure that they use it effectively. They can aim to provide the opportunity to reperform only after students have completed some form of remediation, such as additional instruction or targeted feedback on areas where they struggled. Teachers can clearly define the conditions for reperformance in advance so that students understand what is expected of them and what the consequences of their performance will be.

• Action step 4.6: Consider culminating experiences. We see culminating experiences (for example, midterms or final exams) as unnecessary in this system since students are continuously engaging in scrimmage- and game-like assessments throughout the grading period. Instead of culminating experiences, conversations about students’ bodies of work take place, and the teacher and student determine the student’s grade together. This system does not prioritize large “prove your learning” moments.

Action 5: Creating a Skills-Focused Scope and Sequence

This stage focuses on pacing units of study based on skills. Instead of focusing on content, teachers decide which skills they want to develop in what contexts.

• Action step 5.1: Understand performance windows. Performance windows are designated time frames for students to provide evidence of their mastery of skills, competencies, or content knowledge. Understanding performance windows involves setting realistic expectations for students’ progress and ensuring adequate time for students to demonstrate their mastery of course skills and material.

• Action step 5.2: Create and manage performance windows. Creating and managing performance windows requires careful planning and organization. Managing performance windows may involve regularly checking in with students, adjusting time frames based on student progress, and monitoring performance evidence to inform instructional changes.

• Action step 5.3: Be mindful of other considerations. Educators should be mindful of potential barriers that may hinder student success within the

performance window and proactively work to address these challenges. We will discuss several vital considerations that teachers should keep in mind.

Action 6: Aiming for Evidence-Based Instruction

This stage focuses on shifting away from traditional, teacher-centered instruction, during which the teacher delivers information and evaluates student learning. An evidence-based instructional model is more student centered; the teacher’s role is to facilitate learning experiences and respond to students’ actions and thoughts to determine whether the students are making progress toward the enduring skills.

• Action step 6.1: Design instruction for self-generated learning. In self-generated learning, the focus is on the learner, not the content, meaning students act or think for themselves before the teacher teaches (Brown, Roediger, & McDaniel, 2014; Saunders, 2022). We believe teachers should design learning experiences to accommodate the different learning styles and preferences of their students. Once students have made some progress in their learning, teacher involvement can be introduced. The teacher’s role is to provide guidance and support as the student drives their own learning.

• Action step 6.2: Consider the purpose of homework. We believe teachers need to seriously question the old assumptions behind homework. Rather than assuming that homework is necessary or required, you can make homework available and optional, with the need for homework determined by evidence of student progress.

Action 7: Implementing Evidence-Based Grading and Reporting

In Pathways to Proficiency: Implementing Evidence-Based Grading (Gobble, Onuscheck, Reibel, & Twadell, 2017), we define evidence-based grading as a process in which teacher teams use their professional judgment to make calibrated proficiency expectations with a bias toward recency. This stage focuses on helping teams learn how to grade a body of work using their professional judgment.

• Action step 7.1: Understand the principles of evidence-based grading and reporting. This action involves committing to the seven commitments of evidencebased grading, which can support teacher teams in learning how to grade student work. These commitments are (1) outlining and reflecting proficiency expectations, (2) reflecting evidence of student proficiency, (3) calibrating expectations and interpretation of evidence, (4) professionally interpreting student-produced evidence, (5) separately reporting academic grades and behaviors, (6) producing usable grades for self-reflection and self-evaluation, and (7) reporting learning stories. By prioritizing these commitments, teachers and teams can ensure grading practices are grounded in evidence and aligned with the needs and strengths of their students.

• Action step 7.2: Mark and score assessments. The focus of this action is marking and scoring assessments using a proficiency scale. This process is typically inductive

and requires calibration among colleagues to ensure that they are using the scale appropriately and effectively. By using a proficiency scale, teachers and teams can provide targeted and specific feedback to students and their families, helping them understand the students’ progress toward specific skills and competencies.

• Action step 7.3: Determine a grade from evidence. This action involves practicing modal interpretations of student work, which can help teachers and teams determine grades without relying on outdated grading scales and practices. By engaging in grading conversations and communicating with students about how their evidence and body of work are being interpreted, you can provide meaningful and transparent feedback that supports ongoing learning and improvement.

Action 8: Restructuring the Gradebook

Gradebooks should be more than just a compilation of averages. Gradebooks can tell a story of learning and emphasize the development of skills and competencies rather than averages and final grades. This requires careful consideration of how to structure the gradebook to effectively capture and communicate evidence of student improvement.

• Action step 8.1: Structure the gradebook around stories of learning. There are many stories to learning; however, four are particularly important for the purposes of the gradebook: (1) “How am I growing?” (2) “How am I doing?” (3) “How am I behaving?” and (4) “How am I preparing?” This action involves creating codes and structures within the gradebook to effectively capture and communicate these stories. By using clear and specific codes, educators can provide targeted and meaningful feedback to students and their families, helping them understand the students’ progress toward specific goals and expectations.

Action 9: Stressing Feedback and Reflection

There are two voices in feedback and reflection: (1) the teacher voice (in the form of feedback) and (2) the often-overlooked student voice (in the form of reflection). In this stage, teachers and teams learn how to give students better feedback to ensure acceptance and action, and they learn how to teach students to give themselves feedback and then reflect to build their efficacy and agency.

• Action step 9.1: Activate student voice. This action asks teachers to prioritize reflection as a central part of their instruction and encourage students to use their reflective and expressive skills. By creating opportunities for students to express themselves, educators can help them develop a deeper understanding of their strengths, areas for improvement, and ways to improve.

• Action step 9.2: Refine teacher feedback. By making feedback not purely evaluative and focusing on agency, competence, and belonging, teachers can build stronger relationships with their students and help them see that their thinking is a valuable learning tool.

Action 10: Responding to Students’ Learning Stories

This stage is about reacting appropriately to student proficiency and evidence of learning. This includes seeing the whole student, their work, their knowledge, and their life. Who they are is just as important as what they do in the classroom.

• Action step 10.1: Ask question 1 (“What is the student’s learning story at this moment?”). Interventions are more effective if teachers base them on student learning stories rather than cutoff scores, averages, or grades.

• Action step 10.2: Ask question 2 (“How do you know their story?”). To understand the learning stories of students, teachers and teams must gather sufficient and appropriate evidence that accurately reflects the students’ progress, context, and socio-emotional reality at a particular moment. By collecting diverse evidence, teachers can develop a comprehensive and nuanced understanding of each student’s learning journey.

• Action step 10.3: Ask question 3 (“Have you exhausted differentiated instruction [Tier 1] relative to the student’s profile?”). Implementing differentiated instruction is often the first critical step in any effective intervention program. During this step, teachers carefully analyze and reflect on each student’s learning story to identify their unique strengths, needs, and interests. This information provides valuable insights that can help guide the development of targeted and individualized instruction, which is essential for promoting student improvement and success.

• Action step 10.4: Ask question 4 (“If so, what is the next logical and appropriate action?”). This action outlines the collaborative process involved in evidence-based interventions and support. Teams are encouraged to bring student work to meetings, review the work together in relation to the skills and scales, judge the work for proficiency, and decide on a student’s learning story. By engaging in regular collaborative discussions and using evidence to guide decision making, teams can ensure that all students receive the support and resources needed to achieve their full potential.

Alignment of the Actions and Action Steps With the Intersections of the Three Big Ideas

We can align these actions and action steps with the intersections of the three big ideas of a PLC, as seen in figure 2.3 (page 34).

In order to “cross the chasm,” teachers and collaborative teams must engage in professional development and learning to implement these ten actions and move beyond PLC Lite. The subsequent chapters of this book are the professional development (action steps and corresponding reproducibles) for each action described here.

Action5: Creatinga Skills-Focused Scope andSequence Focus on Collective Effcacy

Action 2: Creating an Enduring SkillsFocused Curriculum

Action10: RespondingtoStudents’ LearningStories

Action 1:Defining Student Success

Focus on Student Learning

Action3:Creating Skills-Focused ProficiencyScales andRubrics

AimingAction6:InstructionEvidence-Basedfor Focus onStudent Effcacy

Focus on Collaboration

Focus on Results and Evidence Continuous Improvement

Action4:Utilizing Evidence-Based Assessments

Action 7: GradingEvidence-BasedImplementing and Reporting

ActionandFeedbackStressing9:Reflection

Action 8: Restructuring the Gradebook

Focus on Teacher Effcacy

An Observable Impact

Following Stevenson’s implementation of the ten-action framework for evidence-based teaching and learning, we noticed a shift toward a more student-centered culture (chapter 3), a curriculum focused on developing specific skills (chapter 4), and an assessment process that encouraged conversations about learning (chapter 6). Over time, we observed further changes in our instruction and grading practices (chapters 5, 7, and 9–11).

Ultimately, teachers became more responsive to student-led learning and less focused on delivering lessons. They provided students with opportunities to demonstrate mastery and took a student-centered approach to instruction (chapter 8). Our teacher collaboration gradually became more student focused, with teams discussing more than just tests and data

Figure 2.3: The ten actions as they relate to the three big ideas of a PLC.

(chapter 11). We observed them calibrating assessment scoring, sharing feedback ideas, and evaluating their common assessments more frequently. While these changes impacted the teachers themselves, the most significant impact was in culture (chapter 1). The remaining chapters of this book detail these impacts and the lasting influences we see. However, here are a few of the most salient changes.

An Improved Culture of Efficacy

One significant impact was that our school culture became increasingly focused on efficacy (Donohoo, 2017), and we observed a shift in our school from a culture of achievement to a culture of agency, efficacy, and student self-efficacy. A visitor to our school in 2023 emailed us to say that they had come in order to learn about how to move beyond PLC Lite but had left with the realization that our school was a culture of efficacy, with efficacious learners and teachers, and an institution dedicated to continuous improvement. Educators with a high sense of collective efficacy work together, not in isolation, to remove barriers to learning and are relentless in their pursuit of success for all students (Donohoo, 2017; Saphier, 2016).

Positive Interdependence

Positive interdependence among all stakeholders is a critical aspect of a healthy school culture and impacts student learning immensely (Johnson & Johnson, 1992, 2015). Over time, we created more avenues for interdependence rooted in a focus on evidence. For example, our student services department (counselors) used evidence of work to initiate discussions with students about their learning habits. Our interventionists restructured their systems to prioritize larger course skills and proficiency levels rather than cutoff scores and averages. Additionally, our students had a voice in the grading process and learned how to self-evaluate their work and assess their emotional responses to it.

These outcomes, among others we discuss in upcoming chapters, created a community where everyone was more dependent on each other in supporting the students; the conversations all of us were having about students and learning were far less siloed than they had been.

Improved Third-Party Exam Scores

Despite giving our students more autonomy in their learning and focusing on coursespecific enduring skills, our third-party exam scores improved. Students who have the autonomy to make choices and take responsibility for their learning tend to be more motivated and engaged, leading to greater academic success (Brown & Ferriter, 2021; Reeve, Ryan, & Deci, 2018). We have found this to be true through instruction, relational assessments, and enduring skills that align with not only student agency but also the third-party exams; for example, making an argument, analyzing text, engaging in expository writing, and synthesizing data are important skills for most Advanced Placement exams.

Increased Student Autonomy

Self-reliant learning habits were obvious outgrowths of this approach. Our students acquired the ability to self-manage their learning to such an extent that teachers became learning

guides and mentors. When students are empowered to take charge of their own learning, they develop important skills such as critical thinking, problem solving, and self-reflection, which serve them well throughout their lives (Bandura, 2023; Zimmerman, 2013).

Students began making decisions about their learning, and teachers helped them work through the positive and negative consequences of those decisions. There were reciprocal learning interactions as the students developed the capacity to assume responsibility for their actions (Ryan & Deci, 2017). Consequently, we saw an increase in the number of students who advocated for themselves as learners, engaged in self-inquiry to discover who they were as learners, and developed accurate concepts of self.

The Teacher as Innovator

An important implication of this work is the culture of innovation that is renewed across the school. Empowering teachers to be decision makers and innovators in the classroom creates a sense of ownership, fosters professional growth, and ultimately leads to better student outcomes (Donohoo, 2017; Hattie, 2023). Teachers are using their deep knowledge of their subjects and their pedagogical skills to develop their students’ learning agency and efficacy (hooks, 2003).

Better Relationships With Students

Finally, what has become clear is these practices have positively influenced our teacherstudent relationships. While we were stuck in PLC Lite, many conversations between teachers and students were one-sided, often transactional, and mostly focused on accountability. Now, we are finding teachers have more autonomy and information to focus their conversations with students on evidence and support their students in the learning process (Zakrzewski, 2012).

True North: If You Are Not Sure Where to Begin, Start Here

Our goal for this chapter has been twofold. First, we wanted to provide a game plan or road map to support schools looking to move beyond PLC Lite. Second, we shared ten actions and their associated action steps that can guide teachers and teams as they look forward to making significant and lasting change in their school’s journey as a PLC.

If you are not sure how to begin, we suggest the following.

Familiarize Yourself With the Plan

Start with the ten-action chart and its short descriptions of each action (figure 2.2, page 26). The basic summaries of the actions should give you a good foundation for initiating discussions about where to begin.

Start Small, Think Big

We suggest starting small. Create a pilot group to stress-test the ideas and practices, working through any challenges before scaling up. To assemble a pilot group, identify a group of teachers or teams who are interested in implementing differentiated instruction, and provide them with the necessary resources and support to get started. By starting with a pilot

group, schools or districts can ensure that they implement evidence-based teaching and learning practices in a thoughtful and intentional way. Down the road, it will be beneficial to have teachers and teams that have struggled through the challenges and found pathways to successful implementation.

Go Slow to Go Far

We recommend using a deliberate, slow, and phased approach to implementing evidencebased teaching and learning practices. This approach reduces the risk of frustration and fatigue, as teams can comfortably work through the actions and not become overwhelmed by change all at once. An action-oriented approach aims to create a sustainable culture of continuous improvement where stakeholders are likely to stay engaged and committed to long-range success. As leaders, although we are terribly impatient, we have experienced that going slow and using a model that can successfully be implemented over time represents a thoughtful, mindful, and sustainable approach to continuous improvement.

BReaders will:

BEYOND PLC Lite

Evidence-Based Teaching and Learning in a Professional Learning Community at Work®

“There has yet to be a guide like BeyondPLCLite, which makes a distinct contribution to the field by taking the audience through a journey that breaks collaborative teams away from deeply entrenched grading and assessment practices, ensuring they operate as part of a true, high-functioning professional learning community.”

ecoming a PLC is no small feat—it requires years of collaboration and commitment. Once your school has put in the work to become a PLC, it is easy to become complacent and satisfied with “good enough.” In Beyond PLC Lite: Evidence-Based Teaching and Learning in a Professional Learning Community at Work®, Anthony R. Reibel, Troy Gobble, Mark Onuscheck, and Eric Twadell share how they elevated their own PLC outcomes with an approach that emphasizes student efficacy and development of self. They empower school teams to move beyond PLC Lite with an evidence-based ten-action framework that enhances student agency, curriculum and assessment, grading and reporting, and feedback and intervention. With abundant sample rubrics, worksheets, and templates, Beyond PLC Lite enables teams to sharpen their focus on the three big ideas of a PLC and achieve remarkable, sustainable results.

• Learn the ten essential actions to elevate their PLC to the next level

• Understand the intersections of the three big ideas that support continuous improvement

• Encourage meaningful student participation through the gradual release of responsibility model

• Design curriculum and assessments centered on student agency and well-being

• Implement evidence-based grading and reporting to uncover students’ learning stories

—CHRISTIE SHEALY Director of Testing and Accountability, Anderson School District One, Williamston, South Carolina

“The authors do a wonderful job of starting the book off with the need for student agency and efficacy, and the directions and tools provided throughout each chapter help readers know how the PLC process leads to high-level action. This book will be a tremendous resource for teams that are already deep in the PLC process but need to go back and revise their practices to make the learning and culture even better.”

—JOHN UNGER

“BeyondPLCLite is my new go-to playbook for supporting teams transitioning from only sharing ideas and practices to using student evidence to make better decisions about teaching and

SolutionTree.com Visit go.SolutionTree.com/PLCbooks to download the free reproducibles in this book.

Principal, West Fork Middle School, West Fork, Arkansas