The Principal's Handbook

Planning Meaningful Professional Development for the School Year with Jacqui Le-Mon
[00:00:00] Welcome to the Principal's Handbook, your go to resource for principals looking to revamp their leadership approach and prioritize self care. I'm Barb Flowers, a certified life coach with eight years of experience as an elementary principal. Tune in each week as we delve into strategies for boosting mental resilience, managing time effectively, and nurturing overall wellness.
From tackling daily challenges to maintaining a healthy work life balance, I'm Barb Flowers. We'll navigate the complexities of school leadership together. Join me in fostering your sense of purpose as a principal and reigniting your passion for the job. Welcome to a podcast where your wellbeing is the top priority.
Welcome everyone to the principal's handbook. I am here today with guest Jackie Lamon and I'm so excited to have her on the podcast because she is one of my best friends that we have been friends since elementary school and both went into education. Both were teachers and now [00:01:00] administrators. We've had a lot of conversations about teaching, instructional leadership.
And so I'm excited today to have her on the podcast with us. And we're going to be talking about planning meaningful professional development. And so I want Jackie to just introduce herself, talk about her experiences, because she has a lot of experiences in curriculum and being an instructional leader.
And so I think she has a lot to offer on this topic. So Jackie, if you want to go ahead and introduce yourself and talk about your administration experiences. Yeah, absolutely. , so I'm very excited about this topic because it's something I'm super passionate about. I was a classroom teacher.
I've taught eighth grade, seventh grade, I've worked with ninth graders, and then I moved into a curriculum coordinator role. So that's where I really got an opportunity to do a lot more professional development with staff. And then I've been an elementary assistant principal for the past two years.
So learned a lot about , that [00:02:00] preschool through fifth grade. World. I'm in a, and now I'm going to be moving into middle school, again. I really love to think about professional development that's meaningful to teachers, , and really looking at, like, that full realm of, , that middle school, elementary school piece.
So how do you identify specific professional development needs of your staff? Whether it was when you were a curriculum coordinator, and now in an administration role, how do you figure out what they need and what would best serve them? Yeah. So, one of the things that I always to is, you know, the teacher evaluation being in classrooms, whether it's, you know, the formal evaluation process or informal poppins, whatever you want to call them when you're in classrooms, you tend to see a lot of things that are happening that are amazing instructionally, but also things that make you ask questions as to like, perhaps Why is this teacher doing this this way and I'm noticing this in a classroom [00:03:00] after classroom that I go into, so like an example that I have is, you know, I had a teacher who phenomenal teacher who was like, well, She's new in the district, but not new to teaching.
And , she was kind of like, well, we haven't really talked a lot about how we use learning objectives here. And I was like, Oh, well, that's good to know. Like, that's something that I need to think about and reflect. Okay. When I'm thinking about new teachers and mentor mentee that, you know, that professional development, as well as our more veteran teachers and full staff.
What is the expectation with learning objectives? Do we, have we talked about this? And , what do we want to do with it moving forward? So, you know, gathering that information through the teacher evaluation processes. Is really helpful. I think, obviously, the longer you're in a district to, for example, , does the district have initiatives that they, you want to move forward with, whether that's supporting the strategic plan, for example, [00:04:00] or, you know, whatever the, you know, The guiding, you know, the portrait of a graduate, whatever it is that the district, and therefore, and then the school is using, so I'll give an example, in my current district, we are a PLC model school and so PLCs are having our professional learning communities is it is an ongoing focus.
It's something that every staff member, They go to the PLC conference, they get trained, they, really should know and understand the critical questions, , and so it's about knowing that that initiative and that's like a goal of our building and therefore we should have ongoing topics and professional development in that area.
So I think knowing your district. Knowing your school, and then at your building level, really being receptive to what you're seeing in classrooms that as potential topics, and then asking for staff feedback, I think is really helpful. So one of the ways that I've done this for our, [00:05:00] new staff, our mentor mentee is sending out, you can send out like a nice tablet or something where you can get the teacher's feedback.
And ask them like two weeks ahead of a professional development or like , a mentor mentee meeting. Like what topics are coming up for you? You know, is there anything that you would love for us to talk about? And, getting that feedback, has been really helpful for me to know, like what new staff, what their needs are.
They're like, and they'll tell you like, Hey, I, I really don't understand what's happening. , you know, with like, evaluation. I'm new to this, like, or how does it look here? Our student learning objectives, whatever it is, , the staff will, will let you know. And then from there too, so I get feedback in that way.
And then at the end of meetings, you know, and you've spoken to this in some of your podcast episodes, but getting that feedback from staff in a short survey, I think can be really helpful too. And the last thing I would note is whether it's your building leadership team, we call it a guiding [00:06:00] coalition.
Whomever your teachers are that you're kind of meeting with, it's nice to get their feedback as a, as a leadership team to, you know, that shared leadership piece, what are some things that they're noticing or seeing that could be potentially helpful? So I think you've got to think district and then your school building, and then, you know, your new teachers, like all the different elements.
Yeah, you brought up a lot of really good things. One thing I want to add is I think those informal walkthroughs are huge to go in. I would try to get into classrooms daily and just see what teachers are doing. It seemed like in my elementary, a lot of teachers struggled with math because we spent so much time on reading, and then they didn't feel as comfortable teaching math.
And so These were some conversations we had that came up that then led to a need for, you know, more math PD, new curriculum, things like that. And also in PLCs, when you really have that collaborative environment, when they're talking about data, I think naturally out of there comes , Where teachers share this is where we need [00:07:00] more support.
This is where we need some, help or more PD in this specific area. So I think that's another way, like you said, PLCs as an initiative itself, but also those conversations that happen in PLCs are really great. That's actually a really that's a great point. We have, for example, if you adopt a new curriculum, and as you're going through the PLC process, and you're kind of thinking about the critical questions, , it's like, we're teaching this new math curriculum, and we're realizing, , this is happening in our scope and sequence.
And we don't know as much about , should we be changing it. So it's like these big critical conversations to that can lead to Not just instructional strategies, but also like your, utilization of , the curriculum itself. And do we need more guidance, or PD? So that's a great point. Well, and another thing is there's research that teachers need 30 hours of PD to get good at something.
And if you think about the PD that we offer, like I think about this all the time, it can be very [00:08:00] sporadic. So how do you try to get them PD? That's really meaningful and I guess not only is on one topic, but maybe even extends topics or is all related. So it's not like you just have PBIS and then you have differentiated learning and different things that aren't necessarily even related.
How do you do that? Yes, I'm like I think that we tend to do that, right? It's like oh this is gonna be our hot Topic this year and then you don't talk about it again. And honestly that Really drives me crazy I understand that there are certain things that come up that need to be addressed but If we're being really intentional, and it's hard when you're new coming in, perhaps as a principal or an administrator, but, like really looking at your year, your calendar and thinking about, okay, how many, whether it's early release how many professional development days are we looking at and Douglas Reeves would say, if you have more than like three initiatives, you've [00:09:00] got no initiatives.
, so what do we want to prioritize, , in the work that we're doing this year? And my big thing is , how do we Start the next year, the next session with a like recapping the why, , yeah, we've been taught, , for example, we've been talking about, this particular, , so one of the things that we talked about, last year in my district was, , Things that help us to, think through our unit planning.
And so we, worked with a consultant and, we had this protocol that we would follow. And so it shouldn't just be a one and done with the protocol. It should be, okay, here's a whole staff PD. Let's get into it. Let's talk about it. Let's introduce it. And then. What does it look like in our PLC meetings?
We should be revisiting it. We should be talking about it here and then it's a smaller intimate setting. So it's not going away. It's continuing to utilize the tool. And then when we come back as a [00:10:00] whole staff again, what are we doing to return to that? , whether it's a quick reflection or, A recap of why did we talk about this in the first place?
How are things going? I think sometimes we don't return to things and then they don't become embedded in our practice. And if we want it to your point, like embedded in our practice, , we need to spend more time on it. And then the following year too, I love the idea of like a menu or a quick overview.
Like these are things topics that we talked about last year. Here are the ones that we might build upon this year. and, , And I, my big picture thinker, so connecting it back to that why, why is it that we're talking about this, I think is helpful , for staff. Yeah, and I always like to think about what book studies we've done, what PD have we done that maybe even if we're not constantly revisiting it, so that if we have new teachers coming in, what could I fill them in on?
Because we've done book studies, , one was what I wish my teacher knew, and that's not PD that we necessarily need all this stuff. I don't know if it's time on or, but it's a good reminder and so that would [00:11:00] just be something good to refresh with staff or, you know, share the book with a newer teacher.
So I think just having everything also documented really well of the things that you've done. I know at our school, we had tried to do a lot of PD during staff meetings. You know, I tried to keep announcements to five to 10 minutes and then we would do some activities that would be good for the whole building.
That's a time where I would actually do a lot of coaching activities. We would talk about setting boundaries, things like that. But we've also had conversations about poverty and, just different conversations that are really beneficial to the entire building, because I think that's another issue with scheduling PD.
I assume every principal struggles, like we have in my previous district. Finding PD for the specialist, that's always the hardest thing, like art, PE, music. You want to find the meaningful PD that's not going to be a waste of their time. So that's always something that's in the back of my mind when planning PD is I will not have someone sit in something just to sit in it to say [00:12:00] that they got their PD.
Yeah. So like, how do you plan that? You know? Well, and I think it's one, it is helpful, , to be mindful of that. Like, I said, you've got that PD calendar or whatever your, your time is going to be. And then being mindful when you're thinking about that you've got all of your players and where are we going to put our players?
And so, I think the other piece, I can speak to that, in terms of specials is, getting feedback. You know, sometimes one thing is even your social workers or speech pathologists in the building, they might, they'll be like, Hey, like actually there's these trainings I'm supposed to be doing.
It would be really nice if I could have some time to do them. And you're like, Oh yeah. , I didn't even think about that. So getting that. feedback piece is really helpful too. , so that you're kind of mindful of , okay, this is a particular meeting where I need everybody to be together because it pertains to all of like, if like you said, poverty or culturally responsive teaching or whatever, like this is something else staff needs to hear [00:13:00] versus this next session.
Maybe would be a better breakout session where we're splitting up and we're able to, do things, that are more geared to like what we need to learn. And I, do think if we're really intentional about our time, which we should be because teacher's time is so valuable. And there's so little of it.
We, as, , people planning the professional development need to really think through that as much as possible. And I think also giving teachers, , as much notice as possible too, I've been places and it's like, you don't even know what the expectation is going to be until the day before.
And you're like, Oh yeah, I didn't realize I was going to be meeting with my team today. Like that's nice, but I wish I would have known. So how can we be, and I know it's hard, but as organized as possible to kind of. Share agendas and things with that's interesting because within the last two years, our union actually put that into the contract that we have to have the PD schedule out, one week in advance.
So the other principal and I would be like, [00:14:00] Okay, we've got to get this out because that day is coming. But yeah, I think that's a great point because they need to have the materials, especially we would have PD. With multiple elementaries where they weren't necessarily in their building, and so they had to have the right materials to bring and feel prepared, you know, to be ready to actually make that time valuable.
Yeah, I mean, we were doing some, some work with like collaborative scoring. Well, you, if you want collaborative scoring, you need to have the things to score. So like that is something where it's like, Like teachers need to know what they need to bring to the table so that they can participate effectively.
And, again, like the school year is just, you know, somebody once told me it's a, , very wise person. She told me it's a sprint in a marathon and like, like that , that idea of like, we are sprinting through the days, but you have to have a marathon view of curriculum and instruction and PD and some of those bigger things.
It is like the touch points throughout the year. Yeah. So as we finish today, what is one of the most valuable PDs you think you've ever [00:15:00] delivered to teachers? Oh, wow. That's a great question. You know, during early, it was like early COVID and, , we were like gearing up for this kind of like hybrid remote, like all of these things.
And I guess it was a lot of work for me because it was outside of my comfort zone. And, , but it was all of the different like tech tools that we would use. And, I didn't know them. So I had to like kind of learn them. And what I ended up doing is I created like an interactive document and I linked in all the materials and I even kind of made some, , like vidyard, like quick, this is how you like some teachers, you know, at the time, I think we all got a bit more tech savvy, but they're like, how do I add a Google extension?
You know? And so, , I worked really hard on that and I felt like, it was timely and it was something . That staff needed. I was happy to help because I felt like it was such an overwhelming time. , [00:16:00] so that was something that, you think about PD that's like meaningful, timely, the teacher, and then that idea that teachers should be able to walk away and use something.
And that's, that's always been important to me. And then I did another run on, , Formative assessment that I, I thought was, , really helpful because of the feedback that I was able to gather from staff. , and that was kind of cool because it was three sessions. So I, I met with them and, they were able to bring their own assessments and we workshopped.
And so anything that's practical for staff that they're able to take away and use is always important to me. And just remember as a principal as you're listening to this. So both Jackie and I are people who are very passionate about curriculum and that's our area that we love. But I understand that not every principal listening to this loves that.
I know there's some who might be like, I hate planning PD. I definitely do not want to deliver the PD. And if that's you just find the people [00:17:00] who love it, you know, whether you have an assistant principal, I worked with an amazing reading coach. She did so much reading PD for us. That was really good finding state things, , we call them ESCs,
educational service centers that are local. We have state support teams that come do PD. So there's lots of places that you can get PD. You can find outside consultants, things like that, you know, I love doing PD. So if you ever need anything, especially if it comes to like coaching things like that, , but, Finding those people that love it because if you don't love it and you're not passionate about it, then you're probably not the one who should be presenting on it.
I think that's such a good point. Also, like, real quick, like your social emotional learning team, like we had an amazing PD by our school psychologists and social workers last year. Just phenomenal, bring in your people who know things , for PD. , I think that's like a really good point.
, when you think about utilizing your people to, , having perhaps, devoted time [00:18:00] to teacher led PD, can be really great. One way that I've organized that in the past is, , surveying teachers to see if there's any topics they're interested in sharing, things that they're doing in their classrooms, , and then organizing one of your PD days.
I've done it for mentor mentee, which was very short 10 minute sessions within an hour where they went and rotated to the ones sessions of their choice. But the teachers organized that PD. That's one way to do it, but also longer sessions like an early release day, , where you organize it and it's , the same idea, but like more of like 40, 50 minutes, but teachers who are passionate about topics, you know, that's always a great way to get PD to, so serving your teachers and seeing who's willing to run it.
Yeah, that's a great way. I When I was student teaching, I was in a district and they had teachers leading the sessions and it was really good. And I know some districts are like, oh, we don't want to put that work on the teachers. You have to find those teachers who want to do [00:19:00] it.
And also, , I was part of our licensure committee. A lot of times teachers can get hours for putting things together that go towards license renewal. So get creative with it because most of the time it really helps teachers step up as leaders and , it makes them feel good that you ask them to do something because you think they're good at it.
So, yeah, agreed. I worked with a teacher who is so passionate about math, and so he would be so excited if I asked him to present now. Again, not every teachers like that but he would be happy to talk to teachers and model things and so just find those people find that support, but there's so many different.
PD topics you could do. You just want to be, like Jackie said, really intentional about what you are planning, how you're planning it, and get that feedback from teachers because it will give you that buy in on them being there and really getting the most of that PD and of that time. Well, thanks Jackie so much for being here.
I'm going to put some information on how you can contact her in the show notes, so if you want to get a hold of her, , in any way you'll be able to do that. But thanks again for [00:20:00] listening to the principal's handbook. I hope you found some tips that are helpful as you plan your PD for the rest of the school year.
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I hope you have a great week and I'll see you back here next time.
[00:21:00] Mhm. Mhm. Mhm.