An overview of how and why collaborative teaching counts, designed for school teams in Burnaby. Elizabeth Garder, Tanis Anderson, Faye Brownlie

1. Collaborative Teaching
Faye Brownlie, Tanis Anderson, Elizabeth Gardner
October 16, 2018

2. What is one thing that
your colleagues at
work do not know
about you?

5. Dalai Lama XIV
The Book of Joy: Lasting Happiness in a
Changing World
“We create most of our suffering, so it
should be logical that we also have the
ability to create more joy. It simply
depends on the attitudes, the
perspectives, and the reactions we bring
to situations and to our relationships
with other people. When it comes to
personal happiness there is a lot that
we as individuals can do.”

6. Burnaby Learning Support
Services Mission Statement
The Burnaby School District’s Learning Support
Services Team works collaboratively with schools
and parents to create supportive, inclusive, and
caring communities where all children, specifically
those children who have exceptional learning
needs, can reach their full potential.

7. Learning Support
Services, We Believe In…
 Valuing the uniqueness of
each child; their strengths
and contributions;
 Creating partnerships
with the home and
community to support the
education of each child;
 Supporting diversity as a
natural and inherent
condition of the school
environment;
 Striving to create an
effective, inclusive learning
environment for each child;
 Providing access to
appropriate educational
environments that meet
the individual needs of the
child;
 Having high expectations
and monitoring results for
each child.

8. BC CASE Vision Statement
All students should receive a high quality
schooling experience leading to meaningful
participation in our community, by
supporting the development of a
continuum of instructional support that
builds from the primacy of the
classroom teacher to specialist support
that is ‘in addition to’ and ‘aligns with’
quality classroom instruction.

9. What is inclusion?
“…the principle that all students are entitled
to equitable access to learning,
achievement and the pursuit of excellence
in all aspects of their education. The
practice of inclusion is not necessarily
synonymous with integration and goes
beyond placement to include meaningful
participation and the promotion of
interaction with others.”
BC Ministry of Education, Special Education Services:
Manual of Policies, Procedures, and Guidelines

12. Embracing Diversity - The
Starting Point
 Beliefs and teaching practice rooted in
inclusion
 Every child is unique, different
 Every child is good at some things, and
not so good at others

13. Where to begin, what to do if staff
is not on board?
Start with beliefs and attitudes about
inclusion, inclusive practice

14. Growth Mind Set Fixed Mind Set

19. Classroom teachers,
Planning for…
UNIVERSAL SUPPORTS
ALL
SOME
FEW

21. Why Collaboration/Co-Teaching?
 Based on the belief that collaborative
planning, teaching and assessing better
addresses the diverse needs of
students by creating ongoing
effective programming in the
classroom
 It allows more students to be reached
 Learning in Safe Schools, page 102 Chapter 9

22.  It focuses on the ongoing context for
learning for the students, not just the
specific remediation of skills removed
from the learning text of the
classroom
 It builds a repertoire of strategies for
teachers to support the range of
students in classes
 Learning in Safe Schools, page 102 Chapter 9

23. A Key Belief
When intervention is
focused on classroom
support it improves each
student’s ability and
opportunity to learn
effectively/successfully
in the classroom.

26. No plan, No point

27. Questions to Guide Co-Teaching
 Are all students actively engaged in
meaningful work?
 Are all students participating by answering
and asking questions?
 Are all students receiving individual
feedback during the learning
sequence?
 How is evidence of learning from each
day’s co-teaching fueling the plan for the
next day?

28. Co-teaching Models
(Teaching in Tandem – Effective Co-Teaching in the Inclusive Classroom –
Wilson & Blednick, 2011, ASCD)
 1 teach, 1 support
 Parallel groups
 Station teaching
 1 large group; 1 small group
 Teaming

31.  FI Grade 3 at Sperling
 Lisa Stringer and Danielle Burkett
 1st write in English
 Goal: increase descriptive language, using
personification
 What can we do with two teachers to
increase student independence that I couldn’t
do alone?

32.  Read Owl Moon previously and talked about
figurative language.
 Create a web of figurative language as recalled
by the students.
 Project an image.
 All 3 teachers write, using personification, to
describe the picture.
 Students ‘notice’ what works in the writing.
 Present a new picture.
 Students write for 5 minutes, trying to use
personification in their writing.
 Meet in 3 groups to share a favorite sentence
from their writing.
 Students, as a whole class, form an appreciation
circle and appreciate someone who sparked their
thinking, took a risk, impacted their learning…

33.  Notice that’s:
◦ Objects have voice
◦ Find the action words (verbs)
◦ Notice these make the non-living living
◦ Details