Professional Learning Communities

All children can learn and schools control the factors to assure student mastery of the curriculum.

The Little Chute Area School District has made the shift from "teaching" to "student learning" with the adoption and evolution toward full implementation of concepts and practices of the Professional Learning Community (PLC) Model, which channels all educational practices around the following four questions:

1. What is it we expect our students to learn?
2. How will we know if they have learned it?
3. How will we respond when they don't learn?
4. How will we respond when they already know it?

An ongoing process in which educators work collaboratively in recurring cycles of collective inquiry and action research to achieve better results for the students they serve. PLCs operate under the assumption that the key to improved learning for students is continuous, job-embedded learning for educators. - DuFour, DuFour, Eaker, & Many, 2010

1. Focus on Student Learning - We accept high levels of learning for all students as our school district's fundamental purpose and are therefore willing to examine all our practices from the perspective of impact on student learning.
2. A Collaborative Culture - We can only achieve our purpose of high levels of learning for all students if we cultivate a collaborative culture through the development of high performing teams that focus on student learning.
3. Focus on Results - We assess our effectiveness based on results rather than intentions.
   • How will we respond when they don't learn it?
   • How will we respond when they already know it?

• Educators work in collaborative teams and take collective responsibility for student learning rather than working in isolation.
• Collaborative teams implement a guaranteed and viable curriculum, unit by unit.
• Collaborative teams monitor student learning through an ongoing assessment process that includes frequent, team-developed common formative assessments.
• Educator uses the results of common formative assessments to improve individual practice, build the team's capacity to achieve its goal, and intervene/enrich on behalf of students.
• The school provides a systematic process for intervention and enrichments.