Chapter 10: The Impact of a Sustained Professional Learning Community Around Co-Teaching For ELLs

Professional learning can be frustrating if it is not meaningful, transparent, collaborative, engaging, and strategic. With key changes to policy concerning a shift from pullout or stand-alone instruction for English language development to an integrated model of content and language instruction for English language learners (ELLs), many schools are still faced with understanding the essential components of co-teaching for ELLs in general education classes. In the field, many teachers expressed various challenges with implementing integrated co-teaching practices, and support is needed for these practices to be sustained. Yet, DuFour and Reeves (2015) cautioned that a professional learning community (PLC) is much more than a meeting. It requires ongoing collaboration that builds upon recursive cycles of collective inquiry and action research. Similarly, Fullan (2014) stated. “When the school is organized to focus on a small number of shared goals, and when professional learning is targeted to those goals and is a collective enterprise, the evidence is overwhelming that teachers can do dramatically better by way of student achievement” (p. 79). As a result, my school district strategically implemented a sustained PLC around co-teaching for ELLs. Although practical challenges still exist in our system around planning, instructing, and assessing ELLs collaboratively, I hope to shed light on how one district addressed some of these challenges and present the impact collaborative learning had on various stakeholders.