This field book shows educators how to improve schools by developing group culture, enhancing facilitators' skills, and equipping groups to resolve complex issues around student learning.

Renew your teaching and your passion with this updated bestseller! When the teaching life gets tough, reflective practice reenergizes you—counteracting the effects of professional isolation and instilling a sense of meaning, renewal, and empowerment that benefits you, your colleagues, and your students. This bestselling book offers research-based ideas and strategies for using reflective practice individually, with others, and even schoolwide. Features of the newest edition include: Updated strategies for engaging adults and students and using reflective practices to create equitable outcomes New examples of reflective practice in action A new chapter on the core leadership practices for growing reflective practice A new companion website with resources and reflection protocols

The complete guide to getting the most out of every gathering of educators! Prevent meetings from descending into aimless rambling or counterproductive conflicts that end up wasting everybody's valuable time. This resource gives you a playbook to help anyone confidently lead group discussions so that problems get solved, not created. The authors, both veteran educators and experts in group dynamics, detail: How to prepare yourself to facilitate the discussion and keep it on task Best practices for squashing conflict without wounding pride Methods for dealing with “interrupters,” “subject-changers,” disputes, personal attacks, and other time-waster events

This book provides the busiest leaders with an accessible set of tools that can immediately be deployed to positively impact their school. Authors Ronald Williamson and Barbara R. Blackburn explore the COMPASS model—Culture; Ownership and Shared Vision; Managing Data; Professional Development; Advocacy; Shared Accountability; and Structures to Sustain Success—as an overall framework for school improvement. Chapters include in-depth discussions of easy-to-implement, useful strategies for improvement and address the most common concerns facing today’s school leaders. Supplemented with templates, charts, and other adaptable tools for ongoing, practical use, 7 Strategies for Improving Your School is your key guide to school improvement.

During the past quarter century, conceptions of leadership have evolved in concert with breakthrough discoveries in science and generative learning. Liberating Leadership Capacity captures these new ideas through the integration of the authors’ earlier works in constructivist leadership and leadership capacity. What emerges is a pathway through which educators can become the primary designers of their own learning and that of their students, thus creating sustainable systems of high leadership capacity. This vision of leadership reframes professional learning designs and knowledge creation, describing how these ideas are richly manifested in local, national, and international programs. The context is democratic communities; the learning is constructivist; the leadership is shared. The result is wise schools, organizations, and societies. Liberating Leadership Capacity speaks to all adult learners who are engaged in educational improvement. Book Features: A new concept of leadership as fostering capacity through the complex, dynamic processes of purposeful, reciprocal learning.Leadership strategies constructed from the values of learning, democracy, equity and diversity.Professional learning designed to involve community members in building leadership capacity. A timely approach for the effective implementation of the Every Child Succeeds Act (S. 1177).An in-depth analysis of the standards movement through the lens of capacity building.An understanding of systemic change as an organic process arising from practice rather than being imposed on practice—approaches that unleash a sense of agency and wisdom. “This book strikes a chord with those who believe that emerging leadership should define the experiences of students and teachers alike.” —Deborah Walker, Collaborative for Teaching and Learning (CTL) “The authors have designed a model that is at once sustainable, distributive, ecological, and transformational.” —Dean Fink, author and consultant “Describes organizational conditions that promote skillful dialogue, continual learning, building trust, and sharing a common vision among members. In such schools teachers become the leaders of learning and students become the leaders of the future.” —Arthur L. Costa, professor emeritus, California State University, Sacramento

Learn to speak up for what really matters In Having Hard Conversations, Jennifer Abrams showed educators how to confront colleagues about work-related issues through a planned, interactive, and personal approach. In this sequel, readers move deeper into preparing for those conversations while building expectations for meaningful outcomes. Emphasizing what needs to happen before, during, and after hard conversations, this resource explores What humane, growth-producing, and “other-centered” conversations sound like How to recognize and account for culture, gender, and generational filters How to spot and work with organizational dynamics that could influence discussions How to conduct hard conversations with supervisors

Keeping professional learning communities focused on goals: High functioning professional learning communities don’t happen by chance. They require deliberate efforts and structures to ensure efficiency and focus, and to ignite action. The first books in the PLC+ series challenged PLC teams to engage in difficult discussions about equity of access, high expectations for all students, and a commitment to building individual and team efficacy. All of this requires activation and skilled facilitation to move from discussion to action. The PLC+ Activator′s Guide offers a practical approach, real-life scenarios, and examples that show activators what to expect and how to navigate their PLC+ on a successful and collective journey. Readers will find: Templates to help activators prepare for PLC+ meetings Approaches for fostering and nurturing collaboration Vignettes from real schools that are implementing PLC+ Reflection questions with spaces for activators to record notes Solutions for addressing barriers that often arise in PLC+ teams Activators will find this an essential guide to keeping PLC+ team discussions goal-focused and the work centered on building the collective efficacy of the team.