GROWING OUR PLCBEN FRANKLIN TEAMGLEN ELLYN, IL“Growing Our PLC”

Ben Franklin School

Glen Ellyn, Illinois

Where are We? We are in our second year of working toward a

successful PLC. Teachers have time collaborate as grade-level

teams on a weekly basis. Collaboration has been beneficial to our

classroom teachers and students, but has not solved all of our problems.

We currently lack time for specialists and non-certified staff to communicate with teachers.

We also lack time for cross-grade level articulation.

What can we do to improve?

As a team we came to the consensus that although we have improved in our communication between grade-level teams, better staff communication as a whole is necessary.

We decided to survey the staff to see if using a social networking tool would be an appropriate solution to our problem…

Survey Results Which social networking tools/sites have you

used?

Which of these do you use regularly?

Survey Results How comfortable are you with investigating and learning

new technologies independently?

How likely would you be to use a social networking tool as a means of extending/improving the Franklin School PLC process?

Survey Results Please rate the items below in terms of barriers

to your using a social networking tool to connect with our Franklin PLC.

Time (This was the only factor that was a major barrier for many people, others

included were lack of training, know-how and interest.)

Moving Forward… Our goal is still to improve professional learning

and collaboration among the entire staff, and to incorporate technology.

Continue discussion on whether the staff is ready to move forward using a social network, such as a NING.

Looking at data on comfort level with social networking, discuss what type of PD will we need to provide.