Shifting from congenial to collegial inquiry conversations

Leading Deep Conversations in Collaborative Inquiry Groups

Key points:

• Need to probe deeply into teaching and learning through collegial dialogue (not just sharing stories of practice).
• Don't allow detouring away from the issues at hand.
• Avoid just skimming the surface of a problem & polite conversation.
• Make the time for this professional dialogue to occur.
• Start with a shared vision for what you would like to see happening eg. shared vision of student learning, or positive behaviour.  Use this vision to identify gaps.
• Identify a specific inquiry focus to work on and collect & analyse data on.
• Ask and pursue questions about learning goals, instructional practice and outcomes for students.
• 'Deep Talk' (Himley 1991): reflective or descriptive process (see and re-see).
• For impact to occur the conversational shift must go from sharing to inquiring.
• Need to lift teachers ability to have evidence-based dialogue. 
• If you have 'congenial school cultures' (Lieberman & Miller 2008) you will preserve the status quo and be only serving to avoid conflict.
• Break down norms of privacy.
• Takes risk-taking and trust to have conversations that could be seen to cause conflicts. 
• Each person brings different beliefs and perspectives to conversations about teacher practice and when we only 'share' ideas we will avoid the touch inquiry questions.
• Critical questions need to be asked about how practices impact students' understnadings/achievement and what evidence is there to support this.
• Must be a willingness to investigate teaching-learning connections and identify & negotiate differences/similarities in beliefs about teaching and learning.
• Set a group of collaborative inquiry norms: tikanga/protocols/roles/responsibilities/rules of engagment.  This develops an environment of trust and respect.
• Design a group generated set of inquiry questions to build capacity & develop shared meanings, and stimulate deeper conversations. Deliberately use this list.  This list can provide a foundation for a culture of inquiry.
• Approach conflict as a 'intellectual challenge' not an 'emotional' one. 
• See differences as a reason to generate deeper inquiry & learning, not threats to professional identity
• Leaders need to adopt and model specific strategies that support this to happen & help groups reflect on results.

Differences between kinds of talk (Garmston & Wells 1999)

• Dialogue: actively try to understand each others meanings by asking questions, posing counter examples, and suspending judgement.  Having a 'willingness to wonder' (Wells 1999)
• Discussion: comes after dialogue and is when the group advocates for an idea and comes to a decision about action.

By using dialogue first, all the relevant questions and supporting beliefs are conversed about.  This avoids conflict when it comes to decision time as they should all have been put on the table and talked about.    

Decisions are therefore based on clear understandings of the pros/cons and not from a personal perspective.

• "Honest talk" (Lieberman & Miller 2008) - characterise dialogue
• Use formal protocols to provide processes for eliciting ideas and feedback.
• At the end of a conversation, ask the group to reflect on their processes and progress to determine if it has made a difference or not.
• Frame statements as questions, rather than assertions, to invite perspectives from others.

Key elements to support developing more collegial inquiry

• Use probing questions about the reasons for, impacts of, and evidence that supports implementing specific decisions.
• Recognise that cognitive conflict is a way to gain a deeper understanding about the complexities of teaching and learning.
• Be accountable for the nature of dialogue in collaborative groups being intentional.
• Access and use tools to support this shift from congenial to collegial (questions list/tikanga etc).

As a leader I must be looking to guide group conversations in this way.  As an SLT we can model this as a team, by having deep conversations grounded in a cycle of questioning, reflecting on evidence, and taking action - internal evaluation!

Sample Questions for Framing Deeper Conversations in Inquiry Groups

Examining Instructional Practices

• Why are these meaningful learning goals?

• If we all teach this concept differently, what implications are there for student understanding of (related vocabulary, processes, subsequent concept building)?

• How do these lessons address students’ misconceptions?

Learning Expectations Represented in Student Work

• When students understand this, what will it sound or look like?

• What are our expectations for struggling students? For advanced students?

• What are misconceptions we might expect to see in students’ work?

• What other ways might students represent their understandings?

Identifying Patterns in Student Work

• What do you see or hear that suggests students understand /almost understand/do not understand?

• Which students are understanding/almost understanding/not understanding? What does that tell us?

• What do you see or hear that you did not expect to find?

Connecting Student Work to Practice

• How do students’ responses relate to the lesson taught?

• Why did I/you teach it this way? Are there other options? Why consider another option?

• What patterns in students’ work suggest I/we should continue what teaching this way, make some modifications, or try to use a different approach?

Examining Assessment Practices

• What does this form of assessment show us?

• What information about students’ understandings does this assessment not provide?

• What are alternative forms of assessments that might reveal more/other/all students’ understandings?

Reflection on Group Processes

• What does this conversation lead us to do next?

• Do I/we understand students’ thinking in a new way? How?

• Do we need outside help with anything? What?

• How did our conversation challenge me? Make me uncomfortable? What did I like? What don’t I want to repeat?

• Do we need a tool to guide the way we talk about assessment/student learning/teaching next time?