Thoughts on Professional Learning: Professional Learning Book Club: A reflection on a new practice
Professional Learning Book Club: A reflection on a new practice
Thoughts on Professional Learning
By Nadia Kader
Thoughts on Professional Learning
By Nadia Kader
Our book club formed when a desire to explore different modalities of professional learning(PL) merged with a desire for extended PL with our staff. At Propel, we continually explore new opportunities to design and develop PL. As times change and budgets shrink, we recognize the need for more PL that is not centered on in-person conferences or institutes. Propel coordinators are exploring asynchronous and hybrid formats for our offerings. Additionally, we are exploring how programs can conduct their own in-house PL. An organization can enhance interpersonal relationships, identify shared goals, and work towards program improvement through collaborative PL. We tested this idea out by running a PL book club with Propel staff.
Book club creation and first steps
The coordinator team has done a lot of self-directed PL on our own time, which includes reading books and applying concepts, attending conferences, webinars, and workshops, and taking courses. However, we have never read a book together as a group. We have not yet conducted PL with the consultants. To the best of my knowledge, the consultants have never explicitly performed PL for their roles as professional developers. The book club seemed like a prime opportunity to experiment.
The book club was optional; no one was required to participate. We read The PD Book: 7 habits that transform professional development by Elena Aguilar and Lori Cohen. We chose this book because two members previously read it and found it to be engaging, inspirational, and in line with the work we do. We worried that choosing a heavy theoretical text might deter participation, so we opted for a more practical book.
Out of the twelve original book club attendees, seven regularly attended the meetings and contributed to the creation of the final action plans. The seven members were a combination of full-time and part-time staff members. We read the introduction and chapter one before our first meeting. At the first meeting, we made the following decisions:
- Meet once per month
- 1 chapter read prior to each meeting, plus a final follow-up meeting to discuss action plans (9 chapter discussions + final follow-up meeting = 10 total book club meetings in 10 months)
- Have revolving facilitators
- No recording meetings, so everyone feels comfortable sharing
- Take notes at each meeting
- Create a template for facilitation to help standardize our offerings
- Design presentation training for practitioners
Full-time and part-time staff worked together to create this structure. From the very beginning, it was collaborative, which is a crucial aspect of the PL experience. PL has a greater impact if the learner has input on what and how they learn.
My action plan
After finishing the book, we developed action plans to apply what we had learned to our work. The action plans are intended to extend learning transfer, or the degree to which an individual applies previously learned knowledge and skills to new situations (https://theelearningcoach.com/elearning_design/learning-transfer-hard/). Writing this article for the newsletter is one of my final action plans for our book club.
My action plan is divided into two parts: a reflection piece on our experiences designing and facilitating a professional book club and a how-to template for starting a book club at your organization. This article is both a reflection piece and a how-to template. My action plan is based on my individual professional growth goals. These goals are to strengthen my writing skills and develop more opportunities for organizations to participate in PL. Writing is a significant part of my role at Propel, as designing and developing PL requires a lot of writing skills. Each blog post, newsletter, email blast, and training material I write enhances my skill set.
When I was a part-time instructor, it was incredibly challenging to make time for PL. We did have a minimum hours requirement for PL, but at the time, those hours were limited to in-person events. A local PL body organized these events, and they always started at 5 pm. Because I had multiple jobs, I would either have to leave one job early every day or arrive late for the in-person events. This put a strain on my relationship with my day job. I also struggled with retaining information because I was stressed about time and commitments. If we had opportunities to learn asynchronously or at least online, I probably would have gotten more out of my PL. Also, I was very isolated from my adult ed community because I was part-time. I never met another instructor unless I was at these PL events. When working in isolation, it's hard to know whether you're doing a good job or not. You have no one to talk to who can share ideas and methods with you. That is why community and networking are so important in this field.
Drawbacks of a book club model
The book club model has some drawbacks. First, it is a long-form commitment, depending on the book's length. Selecting to read one chapter a month could take nearly a year to complete, potentially delaying your action plans and extending the time it takes to see results from PL.
Second, differing political opinions can impact morale or lead to heated discussions. The authors of The PD Book employ a left-leaning, social justice lens in their approach to professional development, which led to some discomfort when discussing it as a group. The lens made some participants feel uncomfortable, which led to disagreements about the authors’ intentions.
Third, finding a convenient time to meet as a group proved to be difficult. We chose early Friday afternoons for our meetings, which did not always work for everyone. One participant read the entire book but was unable to participate in our discussions due to a schedule change. Their perspective was missing as we discussed the material and decided on action plans.
Finally, reading a book together is a large time commitment in addition to our regular duties. There were times when we were rushed to finish the material before our meeting, which was not always conducive to learning transfer. Additionally, it was challenging to stay focused when minds drifted to all the tasks that needed to be completed simultaneously.
Although there were challenges, we were overall pleased with the accomplishments we made. It can be taxing to try a new format of learning, especially one that involves a long-term commitment, but the effort was worth the results. Our team bonded, we developed new strategies for PL, and we committed to long-form projects to benefit the field.
Structuring your own professional learning book club
Structuring a book club takes some considerations. First, you need to figure out what area you want to cover and why. We chose The PD book because we haven’t had professional development-specific training as a whole group. We aimed to address the gaps in professional development practices, extending beyond the content knowledge of instruction and the use of technology tools.
These guiding questions can help you and your team get started deciding on a topic for your book club:
- What is an area for improvement in your program?
- Who are the experts in this area?
- What do you hope your program can achieve with the new knowledge and skill sets you gain after reading the book?
- What is your minimum time commitment for the book club?
- Is this for all staff, instructors only, or administrators only?
- What tools are you using to communicate and save notes?
Professional learning is all about changing practice. If the professional learning event you attended did nothing to change your practice, then what did you gain from it? Keep this thought in mind when you start your professional learning book club.
We have created a book club template for other programs to jumpstart their professional book clubs. You can find it here: Book club start template. The Google Doc link prompts users to create their own copy of the Doc. We hope programs use this template as a starting point to develop their in-house professional book clubs. We would love to hear from any programs or groups interested in using a book club model as a form of PL.
The Propel professional learning book club helped us learn more about structuring professional learning. It helped us engage in knowledge sharing and building. It grounded and motivated us to continue our professional learning together as a team and apply what we learned to our work.
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