More than mundane matters: an exploration of how schools organize professional learning teams

Abstract

Organizational tasks and processes are preconditions for organizing professional learning teams but are often neglected in research. In nine schools, we examined which organizational tasks and processes were set up for lesson study, a form of a professional learning team, and in what way. Schools set up three organizational tasks and processes: recruiting participants, giving credit for timeinvestment, and scheduling meetings. Recruitment of participants was sometimes difficult when potential participants worked autonomously within their departments or teams. Credit for timeinvestment was often constrained as schools gave credit in a way that made lesson study an additional workload. Scheduling meetings was very challenging. The scheduled meetings were considered satisfactory in only one school. Here, the school leader collaborated and communicated with her teachers to plan useful and uninterrupted meetings in the timetable. Our results show that organizational work is not mundane and simple but complex and vital for embedding professional development in schools.

The hullabaloo of schooling: the influence of school factors on the (dis)continuation of lesson study

“…Last, we chose to highlight school factors, as they have been underexamined and overlooked in research. Although we find that school factors have considerable influence on whether and how lesson study was continued after the LSPLN ended, other factors may be important, such as culture (Stigler and Hiebert 2016) or leadership style (Wolthuis et al 2020a).…”

Professional development in practice

“…Documents were used, for example, to examine the general idea, formal design, or the views of leadership on how routines are intended for the school (Hubers et al, 2017;Liljenberg & Nordholm, 2018;Spillane et al, 2011). Observations were used to investigate how routines were performed in specific situations (Spillane et al, 2011;Park, 2018) and interviews could reveal how people considered the script of a routine (Wolthuis et al, 2020a;März et al, 2017). Studies that examined routines as entities and had thorough method triangulation also incorporated these three methods of data collection.…”

“…The other 11 studies examined organizational routines. Some investigated externally designed routines, such as data use (Hubers et al, 2017) and lesson study (Wolthuis et al, 2020a). Locally designed routines that were investigated included the Five Week Assessment routine Spillane et al, 2011), study hall routines (Stelitano et al, 2020), speed team meetings and pedagogical cafes (Liljenberg & Nordholm, 2018).…”

“…Moreover, Woulfin (2015) showed how consistently teachers implemented a reading reform within their classrooms. Studies also gave insight into how artifacts can influence routines (Liljenberg & Nordholm, 2018;März et al, 2017;Tubin, 2015) and how people can influence routines (e.g., Wolthuis et al, 2020a;Tubin, 2015).…”

“…Several landmark articles have proposed using the concept as a tool to examine educational initiatives (Coburn & Turner, 2011;Farrell & Coburn, 2017;Horn & Little, 2010;Peurach & Glazer, 2012;Spillane, 2012). Accordingly, some education literature has adopted the concept of organizational routines to examine initiatives such as PLCs (Huguet et al, 2017), data use (Hubers et al, 2017;Spillane, 2012), lesson study (Wolthuis et al, 2020a;, and instructional rounds (Hatch et al, 2016) in practice.…”