Collegial Learning Part 1:

The Technical Side of Collegial Learning.

Today I thought I'd start a new string of posts about one of the current "buzz words" floating around the teaching arena, "Collegial Learning".  We've probably all heard it and many of us have been doing it for years.  Schools have team meetings and the like for a reason and this is why.  I will admit though that I never understood what massive learning potential was locked inside that phrase.

Now I've looked at this before, launching from a TED video from Bill Gates (the actual TED video this time, the Teacher part starts at about the 8 minute mark!).

Oh No!  She's harping on about THAT video again!

Particularly the quote "It takes great teachers to make great teachers".  Although I have to admit that I've recently had to re-evaluate exactly to what extent I believe that quote and I'll deal with it in a follow-up post.

At this stage of the game , I'll add in a "technical document".  It took no time at all to find, I just Googled "Collegial Learning" and looked at stuff for a few minutes until I found one that said what I needed it to.  It's not the best, it's not the most comprehensive, it was just the first one that laid the groundwork for what I needed to say.

Collegial Learning and Collective Capacities <- Click to follow the link!

Looking through that one you can also pick out the other associated "buzz word" of "Collective Capacities", "Collective Learning" and others if you wish to google further.  You can also add in all those terms that you know which mean basically the same thing like "Team Teaching" and others where researchers have given it a new name to show it's their personal spin on the basic concepts involved.

Whether your state or country calls you a Casual Relief Teacher, an Emergency Teacher, a Substitute Teacher or any of the other names out there for us?  Collegial learning from our casual/emergency/substitute teacher peers is just as important as any other collegial learning we can access.  

It gives us direct access to years of knowledge, strategies and resources that directly relate to what we are going to experience as CRTs.  To give you some idea of how much?

Out of idle curiosity I've been asking off and on how long many of our members have been teaching for, whether it be CRT teaching, Full Time teaching or occupying a leadership position in a school.  Thinking back to our last meeting, adding up just the ones I know (which was less than half), there was over 100 years of CRT experience (over 200 years of teaching experience) sitting in one room.  Everyone in attendance was eager to participate, sharing resources and strategies or helping to create new ones to solve new and unique issues for those in the room!

The Collegial Learning in that meeting was a proverbial gold mine for the education of the Teachers present.   So many years of experience and so many different viewpoints all targeting and solving the specific issues of others. 

This is precisely why the Victorian Institute of Teaching started it's CRT Network Initiative and having been in it for a couple of years now I often wonder why other education departments aren't following their lead.  In Victoria it was recently released that 12% of all teaching in classrooms is done by CRTs.  That's a pretty significant chunk and, while I can't state percentages for other states or countries, it makes it pretty important for us to be as good as we can be!

Collegial Learning is one of the foundational tools that will help us get there as quickly and as easily as possible.

Also on the way;

• Part 2, my personal story.
• Part 3, Collegial Learning from CRTs Vso ther teaching professionals.
• Part 4, Getting in on collegial learning.

Regards,

Mel.