Teachers' Net Uruguay: SALA DEPARTAMENTAL IN ARTIGAS: PREVIOUS MOMENTS

It is often said that the most important asset of any enterprise is the talent and enthusiasm of its workforce. Education is no exception to this premise.
Being teachers such a vital element in the educational process, when designing policies aimed at getting better academic results, what policymakers must not forget is that teachers are no different from employees in the private sector. They want to succeed in their jobs and they demand the tools, the respect, and the sense of empowerment necessary to reach this goal.
As University of Washington scholar Dan Goldhaber stands, "It appears that the most important thing a school can do, is to provide its students with good teachers".
But teachers are known to improve when they analyze, evaluate, and experiment with colleagues in purposeful learning communities (Fullan, 2001). Fullan also suggests that the school level change strategy is developing professional learning community within schools and emphasize the importance of strong teacher community. Therefore, teachers need to be enabled and encouraged to establish a community of learners among themselves (Lave & Wegner, 1991). Maclaughlin and Talbert (2001) also indicated that a collaborative community of practice in which teachers share instructional resources and reflections in practice appear essential to their persistence and success in innovating classroom practices (p.22).
Building up organizations that are able to learn – according to Kofman and Senge- requires basic changes in the ways people think and interact. “The heart of the learning organizations are communities of commitment. Without communities of people genuinely committed to the organizations’ goals, there is no real change”.

sábado, 26 de septiembre de 2009

SALA DEPARTAMENTAL IN ARTIGAS: PREVIOUS MOMENTS

We usually say "Plans should be FLEXIBLE". On planning our Sala, we never imagined we would be asked to include teachers of other subjects in the workshops we had planned. Well, we WERE. At the very beginning we had History, Geography and Spanish teachers with us. Apparently some people that were expected to come didn't show up, so we had to do our share to collaborate with the organization of the different salas that were supposed to take place at the very same time.

Some minutes later, however, dispositions changed and only teachers of Spanish stayed with us. We adapted some things in the Agenda and included some others, and luckily everything went smoothly.

The above pictures show the Sala's previous moments. More pictures will be published soon.