Thought I would take a break from this student-led portfolio thing tonight. I experienced a Professional Learning Community today. At first blush, I like it, and can see great potential for this, IF it is used correctly and everyone buys in to the program. We brought an example of student work and a lesson plan we had used it with to a meeting, and met in small groups. Each teacher presented very quickly, and we were able to give feedback in a non-threatening environment.

I enjoyed doing this, especially since I have so much to learn as a new teacher. I did break with one part of the instructions and brought two sets of student work. The reason being, I wanted to present a group that was successful and one that wasn't. I presented it in this way to show what happened with something that I was trying, but fell down on, and presented my reasons why I thought that happened. At least I was able to show that I am not afraid of admitting my mistakes. Seems that I make them every day, LOL!

I also enjoyed seeing what other teachers were doing, and taking away some ideas from that as well. This is great, because the nature of our work sometimes forces us to work on a desert island with little to no contact with our fellow teachers except for our hurried 12 minute lunch in the work-room. It naturally follows that every teacher there knows more about this business than I do.

I had to make some parent contacts tonight about some failing grades in my classes. I'm happy to report that for the most part the parents I talked to were very supportive. I did enjoy that one parent remarked to me that I was the only teacher at the school that e-mailed her about what was going on in my classroom, and that to her, as a parent, it proved that I loved and cared about my students' success. :) That made my day. She's right, I do care, and I do love them.