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| 1A.1 Getting Started 1A.2 Getting Acquainted 1A.3 Sharing Perspectives 1A.4 Maintaining Community |
 Step One - All Files   1R.1 Best Practice Teacher Standard
1R.2 INTASC Teacher Standard
1R.3 Instructional Strategies that Increase Student Learning
1R.4 National Staff Development Council Standards for Staff Development
1R.5 Thirteen Principles of Best Practice
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1A.2
Getting Acquainted:
Why get to know one another?
Creating a learning community is not the same as becoming friends. Participants don’t need to socialize or become buddies. It is simply an agreement that for this professional interaction, participants view each other as individuals who possess unique perspectives and can contribute to developing shared knowledge.
Providing a structure for sharing allows each person to contribute his/her voice to the community and helps people see each other as individuals with different perspectives.
You may use the following activity, Where am I in this piece of art? to begin developing a spirit of professional camaraderie, or you may want to create your own activity using this as a model. The important idea is to take the time to build working relationships within your community and to maintain that spirit by reconnecting each time you meet as a group.
Where am I in this piece of art?
1. Lay out a selection of art
prints, several more than the number of participants. These do not have
to be expensive prints, you may use pictures from art calendars, postcards
from museums, or old art books. It is more interesting if a variety of
impressionistic, abstract, and realistic styles are included.
2. Ask people to select the picture they find most interesting at this particular moment.
3. Ask people to pair up and explain their
answers to the following three questions to a partner.
• What about the picture
was appealing or interesting? (Why did you choose it?)
• Where are you in the picture? (How is the picture similar to or
a representation of your life?)
• How is the picture different from your life?
4. Ask people to share their answers with the larger group. (If the group is larger than ten, you may want to split into two groups.)