On Common Ground: The Power of Professional Learning Communities

by Barbara Eason-Watkins

On Common Ground brings the ideas and recommendations of many of North America's educational leaders into one resource for educators working to help their students achieve at ever-higher levels. Each... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1932127429
• ISBN13: 9781932127423
• Release Date: February 2005
• Publisher: Solution Tree
• Length: 272 Pages
• Weight: 1.50 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.0" x 6.4" x 9.3"

Customer Reviews

On Common Ground

As the processes of school improvement shifts from regulatory compliance to authentic work in schools, it is essential to build a broad understanding of decades of thinking on school reform. This book offers a strong summary of the concepts most likely to bring real change in the only place that matters, the classroom. We have spent decades talking about change and the learning community concept has the potential to be the catalyst of change. On Common Ground can build a broad foundation of knowledge however; other resources are needed to detail the specifics. The best highlights include: 1) Michael Fullan on building collective capacity. 2) Doug Reeves on anaylsis of student work and feedback. 3) Rick Stiggins on assessment for learning. 4) Jonathon Saphier on motivation. 5) Mike Schmoker on urgency. 6) Larence Lezotte on shared leadership. If your goal is to building common understanding about contemporary thinking in the area of school improvement, On Common Ground provides a great starting point.

How Many Ways...

In how many ways are we going to have to hear that the unexamined methods in which our schools have been organized, structured, staffed, and departmentalized work against our best efforts to create real, sustainable learning communities? The following items were a collection of thoughts on behalf of educators working at the Butte County Office of Education that gathered to discuss this book as part of their professional reading series. This book offers one of the most comprehensive, candid, and clear calls for reforming the ways in which we approach and engage students each and every day in our schools. By combining the ideas and research from today's most prominent thinkers on the development of effective environments for learning, this book serves as a wonderful, concise compass leading those of us in education who pick it up and care to pay attention to its guidance. Some guiding points of interest included: Assessing for Learning vs. of Learning Focus on the Positive Outcomes of Learning vs. the Punitive Consequences of Not Learning Collaborative Agreement of Essential Learning vs. Individual, Departmentalized Development of Learner Expectations Modeling Elements of the Learning Community vs. Merely Proselytizing those Elements