PLC - Professional Learning Community

Learning together

A Professional Learning Community (PLC) is a schoolwide system of teacher teams who collaborate on issues of instruction, assessment and other school topics with the goal of improving student learning.  PLC is not a program but is something we 'become' so that our work is more productive, focused and effective.

Teachers and leaders within a PLC themselves become lifelong learners, using research from the field as well as data from their own classrooms to inform curriculum, instruction and assessment.

They collaborate continually, sharing resources and knowledge to achieve schoolwide improvement of teaching practice.

All this is done with the primary goal of increasing student learning: success is measured not by what or how teachers teach, but by how much students learn.

Our work is focused on learning, results and collaboration.

Our PLC Vision

It is the purpose of St Mary’s Primary School to ensure that all students can achieve a high level of learning

Our PLC Mission

What must our school do to accomplish our vision?

  • build teacher capability
  • high expectations
  • shared understandings
  • know the curriculum
  • work collaboratively
  • use data to drive the learning
  • commit to PLC
  • believe all kids can achieve
  • know the students and how they learn
  • focus on the learning

6 PLC Questions

Teacher teams use the following questions to drive their work in planning learning opportunities for each student:

  1. What do we want students to know? (curriculum)
  2. How will we know if our students are learning? (assessment)
  3. How will we respond if our students are not learning? (instruction)
  4. How will we enrich and extend learning for students who are already proficient? (instruction)
  5. How will we increase our instructional competence? (teacher development)
  6. How will we co-ordinate our efforts as a school? (leadership)