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Professional Development

Providing ongoing training for educators is absolutely critical to building knowledge and skill in the use of technology, curriculum development, instructional practices, classroom management, and keeping abreast with changes to federal and state accountability measures. Time is required to provide training experiences so educators can build these skills, and time is necessary for teachers to collaborate with their peers on effective practice.

Gibbon Public School’s has implemented a concept called Professional Learning Communities (PLCs) to provide that needed time. Experts and researchers have identified PLCs as a powerful school improvement strategy that improves student achievement, increases the level of academic performance expected for all students identifies interventions to help students who struggle, and provides enrichment opportunities for students who have already experienced academic success. Implementing PLCs is a journey and Gibbon Public Schools has begun our journey by unpacking academic standards to define the skills, knowledge, and dispositions all students are expected to know and be able to do.

Professional Learning Communities (PLCSs) meet on Mondays and this will typically happen twice per month. Students will be dismissed at 1:45 p.m. on those Mondays providing a time when PLCs meet, plan, and discuss student performance. Teachers collaborate within grade-level teams and in content area teams to identify standards that all students are required to master, identify and agree upon the level of performance expected for all students, and review and discuss several pieces of information that confirms all students are achieving at high levels of learning.

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