Episode Transcript

Speaker 1: This podcast is produced by Benchmark Education.

Kevin Carlson: In this episode: Professional learning that works. I'm Kevin Carlson and this is Teachers Talk Shop.

David Liben: If you're doing this professional development and you're new to it and you've got it wrong before or you were doing things that wouldn't work, well, fess up to that. That's rarely done.

Kevin Carlson: That is Dr. David Lebin. He is one of our two guests for today's episode. The other is Kareem Weaver.

Kareem Weaver: It's a cultural shift that has to happen, that has kids at the center, and that's us saying, “The kids in the center are the priority. First. Everything else comes a distant second, at best.” And with that mindset, everything's possible. But without it, man, you’re in a world of hurt.

Kevin Carlson: David Lebin and Kareem Weaver are two of the country's leading experts in professional learning. David is an educator, school leader, and literacy curriculum expert who, with Meredith Liebman, founded Reading Done Right. It provides practical, effective literacy support and learning opportunities to schools, districts, and publishers, along with strategic planning and evaluating the quality of literacy programs.

Kareem is a co-founder and executive director of an organization called FULCRUM, for Full and Complete Reading is a Universal Mandate. Its mission is to accelerate a movement of leaders who embrace and apply evidence-based literacy practices to improve student reading outcomes. FULCRUM believes literacy is the fundamental civil right of our time. Weaver is also the Oakland NAACP's second vice president and chair of its education committee.

Recently, author and educator Patty McGee spoke with Kareem and David about professional development, the need for unity around PD among competing interest groups, and the idea that students should be at the center of it all. Here is Patty with Kareem Weaver and David Liben.

Patty McGee: David, Kareem, thanks for joining me. Let's talk a little bit about usability and professional learning. Why must the two be inextricably linked?

David Liben: There’s so many places to start. But I'll start. And I know Kareem will pick up too. There's professional learning before you start the program, before the school year begins or before you've adopted the program. There's professional learning while the program is in place. And then there's professional learning that's part of an evaluation towards the end of the year that looks at what worked and what didn't work. So it's kind of that before, during, and after framework. Now, with “before,” a lot of the usability when you're adapting—we've got these new programs now that are knowledge-based programs and that are different and that have systematic phonics, both of which are really different than many programs that many teachers and many schools are used to. So the first element of usability with professional learning is, you've got to find the time to do it. If you're going to have two days, and those two days are included with—to do everything to start the school year, as well as two days to learn about an entirely new curriculum, different with foundational skills and different with comprehension—if you don't devote enough time to it, then it's not going to work, even if everything else falls in place.

Number two—and I think, thank goodness we're now at the point where everybody acknowledges this—professional learning should be geared to the program that the people are using. It shouldn't be a generic professional learning, even though for my entire lifetime in education, which is now 50 years, for most of those 50 years, professional learning was generic. It was not necessarily connected to the program that people were using. And that's even more important. A lot of the professional learning now is not done by the developer itself, it’s done by NGOs. Now, I've worked with all of those NGOs from the very beginning. Like anything else, they vary, but the same thing: Find out, “Okay, you used NGO A—how did that go?” And then go to another place: “You used NGO B—how did that go?” So all of this is before adopting the program or, even if after it's adopted, lining up the professional learning. I think that's “before.”

Now, “during”—most places will either have a coach in the school who is responsible for professional learning with the implementation of the program, or they'll use someone from the publisher or from the NGO that they're working with. In my great deal of experience with numerous schools, the schools that were happiest with their professional development, whether it was an NGO person or a person from the publisher, [were] the ones [that] felt they could reach out to this publisher, this professional developer. They didn't have to wait to the scheduled time. They could email that person, they could text that person, and that person responded to them. Those schools that had that, which is an element of usability and efficacy, definitely thought higher of their professional development.

Another thing: There was a very large IES study—the Institute for Educational Science—of teacher learning, done for foundational skills and comprehension. They had 30 hours of professional development in this study, in addition to a coach trained in the methods that were done during—the 30 hours were during the summer. In addition to that, there was a coach pledged in each school, to work with the school, and they did two things: They evaluated, “Well, did the teachers learn this? We're teaching this about the Science of Reading. Did the teachers learn what we taught them about the Science of Reading?” Well, in fact, they did. “Did it affect student outcomes?” Not at all. Now, one reason of course, was they were implementing programs that weren't usable, so it didn’t matter how much they knew. Another thing: They might have been using no program, and that doesn't help either. Another reason: They might have been using the wrong program. Probably it was a combination of all three. But like with a lot of research, when you dig into it, sometimes you find gems of insight.

The researchers, who were very clear that it didn't work, said, however, some of the better results, in terms of student outcomes, were in the schools where teachers were observed and videotaped one-to-one and given one-to-one feedback. The interesting thing about that is it doesn't even have to be live. A teacher could be videotaped—as long as the teacher volunteers. As long as the teacher understands this is professional development, it's not evaluation, they're videotaped. The videotape goes to the person who they've been working with, and they get that one-to-one feedback. The programs that had that got better. They still didn't improve student outcomes statistically significantly, but they did better than the other programs. So that's something to consider in terms of professional learning: Non-threatening, one-to-one observation of a teacher implementing the program and feedback from the professional developer, whether it's NGO or the publisher.

Patty McGee: I'm so curious what you have to say too.

Kareem Weaver: Well, I'll cover a different aspect of it. The first development is very, very important. It's another one of those five elements that AFT talked about needing to be in place. But sometimes, oftentimes, school systems will switch the approach to reading. They'll go from balanced literacy to structured literacy. And they have the same people, the same teams, the same coaches, the same principals, the same people who just the year before were saying, “Do it this way,” then are pivoting and telling staff, “Okay, this year, do it this way.” Credibility is an issue. So you have to have folks who are willing to go through the professional development themselves. The leaders have to get professional. We often talk about professional development for the teachers, but it's the grade-level chairs, the assistant principals, the coaches, the principals, the central office—they need it too. And as a leadership move, they have to be able, depending on their culture and how they communicate with their staff, they've got to be willing and able to let people know that that they're on this journey, as well. And they have to be able to do that. And if they can't do that, this isn't the season for just managers. You need instructional leaders. And to have instructional leadership, you have to be able to show people how you can learn, as well, so that you can give them respectable guidance. I think that's critical. You can't assume that everyone's going to be able to make that transition. You just can't. You just can't.

You have to give people an opportunity to make the transition and then see what they do. You owe that to your teachers. Because remember, for years they've been taught to do things a certain way and told, “You’ve got to do it this way, here are the materials, go.” And now you switch it and say, “Okay, well, now this year we've—I went to the conference and I heard that something is different now. And so we’ve got to do it this way.” And that's a tough sell. So you’ve got to have people to be hopefully humble and vulnerable enough to say, “Hey, we blew it. We blew it. But you know what? I'm right in the trenches with you. We're going to learn this stuff together. I'm going to give you the support that you need.” And if it's not in their skill set, if it’s not in their knowledge base, then they'll go get the help.

But you can't assume that the people who are on staff last year are going to be the exact same people on staff this year that are going to move the ball down the field. They may have to have a season of learning themselves. So just to put that out there for PD, we often think about PD for classroom teachers and that's fine. But it's bigger than them. It's bigger than the teachers. Everyone in the system has to be on the same page. And to do that you have to have professional development available for all stakeholders.

Kevin Carlson: After the break: Differentiated professional development. Stay with us.

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Patty McGee: Can you dig more into what that professional development would look like for different stakeholders at different positions?

Kareem Weaver: Sure. There are a lot of different options out there, and I am a proponent for having a variety of options that are aligned. Based on experience, that's my personal preference. I'll give you an example: You've got AIM Pathways. So AIM has an institute and then they have the professional development arm and they have professional development for teachers, they have pathways for leaders or school principals, they have pathways for other stakeholders. They're not necessarily the exact same thing, but it centers on what the leader needs to know to lead the work. And then it focuses on the nuts and bolts of what a classroom teacher needs to know to actually do the work. And so if you're going to give feedback to a teacher, you have to know what domain you're talking about. You’ve got to know your stuff. But there are other options out there. Many of them are asynchronous, which means you can go in there and do it kind of at your own pace, so to speak. I know the Reading League's got some stuff. There's some Orton-Gillingham training. Everybody just shouldn't get letters training. I know that's the thing. “Now everybody go get letters.” No. Guess what? I'm sorry, Alexia, it's going to take more than just one professional development outfit. And I would say that, the professional development provided should be tailored to the needs of the stakeholders.

I would love for parents to have some training and some support on the Science of Reading, but they may not need the exact same thing that the principal does, you know what I mean? Parents need to know the scope and sequence, they need to know the different skills that are being taught, they need to know certain methods, but they don't need to know all these adaptive leadership moves that school principals need. And so it just varies by stakeholders—board members, superintendents, chief academic officers, They need professional development as well. These administrators. So I would just say there has to be more than just the teachers getting the professional development. And what that looks like, like I said, there are range of different outfits out there. I'm sure I could name 20 different ones. But just know that we have to make sure, not just in terms of content, but also how robust it is.

And this is something that I think a lot of administrators miss out on. Not all professional development series are created equally. Some can be done in a few hours. Others, it's a semester-long class and it's fine. But you have to remember, you're trying to get to all your folks. So what are you going to do? I would highly recommend having some things that are aligned, that people can kind of pick and choose from, to get the knowledge in the building. You don't want to just leave people out there because, “You know what? I've got a sick child at home. This year I can't take the graduate level class and OG. I'm sorry, I just can't do it. But I can take the three-hour class on the weekend.” Okay, at least you're on the bus heading in the right direction, the PD are aligned, they're not conflicting, and I'm at least able to engage in conversation and even share what I learned with my colleagues. You're creating a professional climate in the building. So, you know, to the degree people are a monolith and can do the same thing, great, wonderful. But oftentimes you're going to have to diversify that portfolio of offerings so that you're going to hit all stakeholders or make it accessible for them to do. In addition to, of course, honoring their time and making sure that they're compensated and all that goes with that.

David Liben: Well, a few things: The study that I mentioned, about 30 hours and so forth? That was a letter study, actually. So it didn't lead to student outcomes and it didn't lead to student outcomes because of some combination, I believe, of—and this is not to denigrate Louisa Moats, I learned a lot from Louisa Moats, I have enormous respect for her and for letters. But if the programs that teachers are using is not the right program or is not usable, then it doesn't matter how much you know. And connected to what Kareem was just saying, we don't know exactly how much teachers need to know, and we don't have endless time. So that's kind of a question mark—how much do teachers need to know and what's the right mix of the right program? Well, I think if it's not the right program, it doesn't matter how much teachers need to know. But we don't have research that shows us how much teachers need to know.

Making something asynchronous and doable, which I think Kareem also mentioned—Meredith and I created a program called Improving Reading for Older Students, IROS, an asynchronous course geared towards middle school and high school, ostensibly, although a lot of upper elementary school teachers took it. Five thousand teachers took that six-hour course, five thousand, because it was doable, it was asynchronous and we thought it was pretty straightforward.

Kareem said something that is almost never mentioned: Admitting mistakes. We're almost finished with our second book, which is on all of reading. Our first was just on foundational skills, this is on everything. We admitted all the mistakes we've made. We've been involved in the national literacy movement for like, certainly since the standards, but really in many ways before that. And we've made mistakes along the way. And I think when someone's coming up, as Kareem said, and they're saying, “Well, we're going to make this switch,” that's really important to admit what you were doing, if you're doing this professional development and you're new to it and you got it wrong before, you were doing things that wouldn't work, well, fess up to that. That's rarely done. And we fessed up to a number of mistakes in our work. And I think that that's important. And I've never heard, until Kareem talked about it, I’ve never heard anybody else talk about it.

Kareem Weaver: There has to be some level of humanity to all this. You know, if everyone was perfect, the kids would all be reading, right? So clearly there have been enough mistakes made all the way around. There's no reason to fake it. Okay, we blew it. It doesn't mean that people are trying to mess up. We were sold a bill of goods, we believe this, we thought that, we tried this—whatever the story is, teachers aren't dumb, okay? And you're giving your life to something. Your time, your talent, your treasure. You just want to know that everyone's operating in good faith.

Mistakes can be made. We all make mistakes. But don't shine me on. And that's when people become cynical. If you don't acknowledge your errors or your mistakes as a leader, it's hard for me to trust you. It just is. But if you say, “Listen, I tried this, I blew it, and I apologize, deeply apologize. But you know what? I'm committed to getting it right, and I'm gonna learn right alongside with you. Our best thinking is this: The district is headed this way, I've gone to some professional developments already, it looks good, and I'm gonna be right there with you…” People understand that. They're more much more willing to open up their practice, to have grace, and be willing to work with you, if you're honest. But a lot of, unfortunately, too many leaders are insecure in their position and just don't feel the call for vulnerability, or they just don't answer the call for vulnerability. And I think that's a really big mistake.

Patty McGee: I remember you saying this is a "We" movement. So we've spent a lot of time thinking about usability, we've talked about usability in terms of professional learning and all the things that are out there, and that we're all learning in some way. We're all outgrowing who we were yesterday as teachers, there's always—and school leaders and educators and school board members. There's always a better version of ourselves right around the corner. And we think about this as a “we” movement, that together, we're moving ahead. So I'm wondering if both of you could comment on that as we wrap up.

David Liben: When No Child Left Behind came out, the Education Department, they wanted to show that teacher certification didn't have to be through traditional means. It could be through these new alternative programs, not just Teach for America, that everybody is familiar with, but there are a bunch of them. So I was working at the time with the Vermont Strategic Reading Initiative. This was before the standards. And we got a contract because we had a tool, an observation tool for teachers geared towards curriculum. Why did they pick us? Because they Googled “observation tool for teachers” and they got us. Apparently nobody else had named something like that. I can't believe it wasn't out there. But anyway, I helped design the tool because—actually, the tool we had was for math. I helped design the tool. What the tool did, it had teachers in the same school and a teacher from the alternative certification be observed, and a teacher with traditional certification would be observed, meaning an education school. And I remember you weren't supposed to know who came from what, but generally speaking, the younger teachers tended to come from the more alternative program. It didn't matter, but I observed this, I remember observing this teacher, and she was using a basal, a traditional basal, I don’t remember which one—with a great story, actually. The questions were terrible. They were just awful. And I had to observe two days.

The next day I came back and she knew that she was going to be observed by this guy in the back of the room. But she finished the unit and she couldn't start a new unit. So she had the kids come up to the front of the room again, and she made up her own questions. And her own questions were really good. Now theoretically, I wasn't supposed to talk to her. In fact, not theoretically—my instructions said, “Don't talk to the teacher.” But she came up to me and she asked me, so I couldn't resist, she says, “Well, do you have anything?” She’s been teaching, like, a few months. “Do you have anything you can tell me? Anything at all?” So I said, “Yeah, you know, today your questions were great. Yesterday they were really not. Why?” And she stopped. And she said, “You know, when I use the basal, I stop thinking.” None of these programs that are new require a teacher to stop thinking. If you didn't have to think, maybe usability wouldn't be such a problem. But they all require a teacher to think. Adopting a new program, different than what you're used to, doesn't mean you stop thinking. Adopting a program doesn't mean you stop thinking. And that's the best example I can come up with of it's a “we.”

David Liben: The next day I came back and she knew that she was going to be observed by this guy in the back of the room. But she finished the unit and she couldn't start a new unit. So she had the kids come up to the front of the room again, and she made up her own questions. And her own questions were really good. Now theoretically, I wasn't supposed to talk to her. In fact, not theoretically—my instructions said, “Don't talk to the teacher.” But she came up to me and she asked me, so I couldn't resist, she says, “Well, do you have anything?” She’s been teaching, like, a few months. “Do you have anything you can tell me? Anything at all?” So I said, “Yeah, you know, today your questions were great. Yesterday they were really not. Why?” And she stopped. And she said, “You know, when I use the basal, I stop thinking.” None of these programs that are new require a teacher to stop thinking. If you didn't have to think, maybe usability wouldn't be such a problem. But they all require a teacher to think. Adopting a new program, different than what you're used to, doesn't mean you stop thinking. Adopting a program doesn't mean you stop thinking. And that's the best example I can come up with of it's a “we.”

Patty McGee: Yes. Kareem, any final words on the "we" movement?

Kareem Weaver: Let me put it like this. Education is a reflection of society. And society, we don't have much “we” right now. We just don't. And it's a problem, it's a cultural shift that's happened over the last 30 years. “We” is like a foreign concept, it seems like, and unfortunately, this doesn't get done without us being on the same page. It just doesn't. I taught for a long time and I admit I was siloed. I liked it that way. I was an independent-type character. But there came a point where I had to decide the students collectively in the school were important to me enough to step out of my silo and work with others.

Now that's at the school level. It's the same thing societally. It's the same thing politically. It's the same thing culturally. We gotta get over ourselves as adults. That's the best way I can say it. Our tribes, our political ties, our cultural, all that—wonderful. All that's edifying, I get it, most of it is, I get it. And it's killing us. It's killing our kids. Our kids will not survive without “we” being strong. And that's just not our mindset right now.

Kareem Weaver: I understand. “Get yours.” “Rugged individualism.” I understand a political—I get it. I'm just saying our kids are withering on the vine because they're not being cultivated in a way that only unity can do. That means when we go to the board meeting, it's “we,” it's not just the second-language learners, it's not just the black kids or the soccer moms or the dyslexia moms, it's “we.” When we start talking about choosing curriculum, it's, “Oh, I have to make sure this works for that group too. And that group and that group and my kid.” That's a “we” thing.

I could go on forever with this one, but it's a cultural shift that has to happen, that has kids at the center, and that's us saying, “It's got our stuff.” What it means is, the kids in the center are the priority. First. Everything else comes a distant second at best. And with that mindset, everything's possible. But without it, man, you're in a world of hurt, trying to get anything done without some form of unity among these different stakeholders that are involved in education.

Patty McGee: Well, let me end with, I am glad we had this conversation, this very usable conversation about usability in education. To hear both from both of you and not just the practical parts, but your passion that we feel.

Kareem Weaver: My pleasure. Thank you so much.

Patty McGee: All right. Thank you.

Kevin Carlson: Thank you, Kareem Weaver and David Liben. Thank you, Patty McGee. And thank you for listening to Teachers Talk Shop. Our previous episode also featured Kareem and David in a conversation about usability in instructional materials. If you enjoyed hearing them talk about professional learning in this episode, please take the time to check out that episode, as well.

This episode is the last one in this season of Teachers Talk Shop. Here are the people we've had the opportunity to talk with and learn from this season: Gina Cervetti; Tim Rasinski and Lynne Kulich; Peter Afflerbach; Allison Briceno and Claudia Rodriguez-Mojica with teacher Claire Hood; Diana Leddy; Jan Hasbrouck; Nancy Young; first-grade teacher Cameron Carter; David Liben and Kareem Weaver. There is a lot of expertise to learn from. Please check out any episodes you missed and learn more by visiting our website, Teachers Talk Shop dot com.

Our goal is to explore current understandings and nuances of teaching and learning literacy. We want to present a 360-degree view of literacy instruction that positions us to address the needs of all students in today's classrooms. Plans for our next season are under way and we have some great episodes in store for you. If you haven't done so yet, subscribe to the show. You can do it right now. That way, when the next season is ready, you will be too.

Thanks for listening. For Benchmark education, I'm Kevin Carlson.