Beyond Collaboration: The Power of Joint Work

Teacher learning influences student learning and achievement. Students get better when teachers get better—and teachers get better when they come to know and understand their practice differently and thus shift their beliefs about what they and their students are able to accomplish. When the learning of teaching is done collaboratively and teachers' everyday work becomes the source for professional learning, it has a lasting effect on classroom practice.

An example of how this process unfolds comes from our experience working with a team of 2nd grade teachers in a large elementary school in Sarasota, Florida. Many of their students were having difficulty identifying patterns in mathematics; addressing that gap became the main focus of the team's "joint work" (more on this later). Although the team had been meeting weekly, they recognized their student outcomes were not improving over time, so they needed to rethink how they were working together. Thus, we helped them to engage in a lesson study process. By deconstructing the mathematics standards and co-creating lessons, the teachers were able to draw upon each other's knowledge and expertise. By observing the delivery of those lessons and resulting student outcomes (misconceptions and eureka moments), the teachers were able to gain a greater understanding of what students were experiencing. By debriefing as a team, finally, the teachers were able to refine their teaching strategies and make improvements to their individual practice.