I love to learn. As a classroom teacher, I have always tried to improve my practice by reading academic and practice-based articles, attending trainings, and connecting with fellow educators to share resources and solve problems. The ability to learn and grow is part of what made teaching dynamic and energizing for me.
Despite my love of learning, I was not very fond of most professional development sessions. The way the sessions were facilitated often contradicted research-based teaching strategies. It’s also frustrating when pre-packaged PD sessions are disconnected from your specific school context and student population.
For most teachers, this criticism is not surprising. PD gets a bad rap in educational circles, and it’s not because teachers resist professional learning. Instead, teachers want professional learning that is practical, engaging, and relevant.
The impact of poor and irrelevant PD is also noticeable to students.
In 2017, I formed an after-school student activism and leadership club with a small group of seventh graders. I wanted this club to be youth-led, so I relied heavily on student conversations to guide our work. One thread that quickly emerged from our initial discussions was teaching practice. Students were frustrated by their teachers’ lack of focus on building community in the classroom and supporting students’ self-confidence.
After these discussions, I posed a question to my students: “Do you all want to lead a training for us, your teachers, focused on how we could do better?”
My students unanimously responded “YES!” but he quickly became skeptical of the idea. “Wait, can we DO that?” Underpinning this skepticism was the core belief, reinforced by schools, that the young are solely the learners and the adults are solely the teachers. My students were ready to disrupt that dynamic.
Planning a Student-Led DP
Our first step was to get into the school’s PD calendar. Fortunately, this step turned out to be the easiest. A group of students from the club met with the principal and explained his idea of leading a PD to build community in the classroom and support students’ self-confidence. By the end of the meeting, they were able to secure a 30-minute slot during the next month’s staff meeting.
Then came the hard part: planning an engaging professional learning experience. I started by asking my students two sets of questions to generate ideas that were rooted in their experiences:
“Think about times when you lacked community or self-confidence in class. What did/didn’t the teacher do that led you to that experience? On the other hand, think about times when you felt a great sense of community or self-confidence in class. What did/didn’t the teacher do that led you to that experience?”
After brainstorming independently, meeting in small groups, and discussing as a large group, my students came up with powerful ideas and moments of surprise:
“I feel more confident when teachers recognize the effort I put into my work, not just my final grade.”
“I feel a lack of community when teachers publicly point out negative behaviors, instead of talking to students individually.”
“I feel a lack of community when teachers yell.”
These realizations, rooted in personal experiences and stories, kept coming.
Once my students had a clear idea of the lessons they wanted their teachers to learn, they came up with a plan to present this information. “I don’t want it to be boring like school,” shared one student. “Yes! We should do activities to show teachers how we like to learn!” another student added.
In other words, they wanted their PD session format to be a model for how their teachers should teach; this insight felt profound and brought my students a new level of energy and a sense of possibility. From there, the students developed their plan to create an engaging learning experience.
professional development in action
In the end, his session looked like this:
- Opening question: How is everyone’s day?
Fundamental reason: My students wanted to show that teachers don’t need to jump right into the content, but start the class by connecting with their students. - Purpose Overview: Show teachers what to do and what to avoid to build community and support self-confidence in the classroom.
Fundamental reason: Many students shared how helpful it was when teachers gave an overview of their lessons, so they wanted to reinforce this practice. - Brief Direct Instruction: Explain to teachers what practices and actions damage their sense of community and self-confidence.
Fundamental reason: My students wanted to start with the key lessons so teachers would be well informed of where their students were coming from. My students also believed that direct instruction was often too long, making it difficult to stay focused. They wanted their direct instruction to be less than five minutes. - Perspective Taking Skits: My students chose two examples of actions to avoid and developed skits to act out with the teachers. In their plays, the teachers volunteered to act as students and my students acted as teachers. One skit, for example, focused on data walls; the teacher called a student to her desk and gave the student an anonymous pin for the data wall: “Great job! You got 90% on the exam. Go put your pin on the data wall.” The teacher then called out to a second student: “It looks like you had trouble on this test. You have 60%. Go ahead and put your pin on the data wall.” This student was instructed to walk up to the wall of data looking embarrassed and dejected.
Fundamental reason: My students understood that for their PD to have an impact, teachers had to really experience what it was like to be a student. They designed their skits to give teachers real life context for how these harmful practices can show up in class. - Brief Guidance Instruction: Explain to teachers what practices and actions they need to do or continue to do to support community and self-confidence.
Fundamental reason: Rather than just focus on the negatives, my students wanted to highlight some of their positive experiences to encourage teachers to stick with them. - Reflection: What will you take away from this training?
Fundamental reason: My students wanted to make sure that teachers identified at least one way that their training will affect their teaching in the future.
Reflecting on Student Impact
The process of guiding my students through planning their PD session by simply asking questions, providing structure (i.e. requiring my students to write an agenda), and offering feedback affirmed an important part of my teaching philosophy: creating experiences. engaging learning requires honoring learners’ autonomy. and focusing the experiences lived by the students.
For my students, leading this PD session and experiencing a shift in traditional power dynamics opened up a new sense of advocacy possibilities. Following this, my students began meeting with administration to advocate for changes to the school’s dress code policy. They realized their own collective power and understood how to use their power to make meaningful and effective change.
Teachers across the building also expressed how impactful this training was in gaining insight into their students’ experiences and building more empathy. Many teachers talked about incorporating more relationship building activities and providing more positive feedback to their students. In the days that followed, my students confirmed the impact of their PD session on their teachers. “Mr. Homrich-Knieling, you really listened! My math teacher has started class by asking us how we’re doing!
Often in traditional professional development sessions, students are discussed as a summary, while adults make guesses about what their students want and need in a learning community. Creating space and support for students to lead from their personal experiences and teach their teachers how to meet their needs radically alters that traditional PD dynamic. Students deserve a voice in their own education, and it’s about time we honor that.
