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What Is a Highly Effective and Learning-Progressive School?
These four PLC critical questions serve as the basis for the action research collaborative teams conduct. The answers to these simple questions allow collaborative teams to articulate clear, consistent, and obtainable learning targets; develop common formative assessments that align to these targets; and develop interventions and extensions for students who may need additional support or the opportunity to go beyond the articulated curriculum. Yes, it’s that simple. When teachers ask and act on these questions, students learn more.
I have heard schools talk about “doing PLCs.” When asked to explain what they actually do in a PLC, their answers often refer to doing clerical work as a department, planning lessons, studying a book together with other teachers, or identifying a personal and professional goal with colleagues and holding one another accountable to that goal. These are all wonderful activities and certainly have a place in schools, but a school is not a PLC if teachers are not regularly and systematically answering the four critical questions of learning within their collaborative teams.
A highly effective school is a school that adheres to the tenets of a PLC and commits to ensuring all students learn at high levels (Stuart, Heckmann, Mattos, & Buffum, 2018). These PLCs have all the systems and structures in place and the mindset necessary for students to succeed in the acquisition of the knowledge, skills, concepts, and dispositions necessary to thrive in this ever-changing world.
A highly effective and learning-progressive school adds one important construct to the mix: student agency. Giving students agency over their own learning allows them to personalize their learning and achieve higher levels of learning. It’s one thing to be a school where the adults have clarity about the desired learning targets, assessments that align to those learning targets, appropriate interventions for students who are not learning, and extension opportunities for students who demonstrate mastery of those learning targets. It’s another thing altogether when teachers give students the opportunity to own their learning by asking and answering the same critical questions: (1) What is it that I want to know, understand, and be able to do? (2) How will I demonstrate that I know it? (3) What will I do when I am not learning? and (4) What will I do when I already know it (Stuart et al., 2018)?
