Learning Circles: Creating Conditions for Professional Development

"A fine blend of analysis and highly practical advice. Useful for anyone interested in the professional development of teachers as a collaborative learning process."
Stephen Brookfield, Professor
University of St. Thomas, St. Paul, Minnesota

Encourage your teachers to form study groups to enrich their professional development programs.

This book shows how "Learning Circles"―small groups of learners who come together to support each other in learning―can make great improvements in the quality of teaching and learning in your school.

Based on six key conditions, teachers form Learning Circles by learning how to:

1. Build "community" with other learners

2. Construct knowledge through personal experience

3. Support other learners in their reflective practices

4. Document reflections on professional experiences

5. Assess growth expectations

6. Improve the culture in classrooms, schools, and communities

Help your teachers see how reflective practice can boost their effectiveness! They can make significant, positive differences in your school by improving how people relate to each other and sharing a vision for change.

Michelle Collay is a School Coach for the Bay Area Coalition for Equitable Schools (BayCES) in Oakland, California, a private non-profit organization supporting urban small school initiatives.  She supports school leader development and coordinates classroom-based teacher inquiry for the purposes of improving student achievement. Previously, she worked as a faculty member and administrator in teacher preparation and graduate teacher education in public and private universities.  Collay conducts seminars and workshops about professional learning communities, constructivist learning design, and portfolio development. Before completing doctoral studies in Curriculum and Instruction at the University of Oregon, she taught music and mathematics in elementary and junior high school and continues to play the bassoon in local ensembles. She and her husband, George Gagnon, write, teach, and parent together and are parent leaders in their children’s neighborhood school in Oakland.

George W. Gagnon, Jr. is the Director of K-12 Partnerships in the College of Engineering at the University of California, Berkeley. He works with teacher and parent partners to support students who would be the first generation in their family to be engineers or scientists. George uses Math Models he has designed to support students in developing a conceptual understanding of mathematics. George has studied learning for thirty years as a teacher, principal, and teacher educator. Now he applies his research on constructivist learning design, appropriate assessment, and learning communities to encourage educational equity in urban public schools. George and Michelle live in Oakland, California, and are actively involved with the neighborhood public schools their children attend.