What is it? Component D of Domain 4 is all about teacher participation in the professional community. It is crucial that teachers are involved within the professional community that they work in. Part of an educators responsibility is to impact not just their students lives but fellow educators lives as well. They must work and collaborate in order to properly plan the success of all students. This component is about helping students, other teachers, and the environment around them.
Why do we need it? We need component 4D because it ensures that we are building meaningful and symbiotic relationships with students and colleagues. Building these types of relationships enables mutual growth and learning which benefits everyone. Having this component to make sure that these goals are reached is essential to the bettering of education as a whole.
What are the elements? Component 4D is made up of a total of four elements. The first element focuses on relationships with colleagues. It is important for teachers to maintain a professional relationship with colleagues that both promotes and encourages collaboration when working toward improvements for student success. The next element is all about involvement in a culture of professional inquiry. The Danielson Framework suggests that teachers should contribute to and participate in a learning community that appreciates and encourages its affiliate's efforts to better their practices. The third element centers on service to schools. This means that a teacher should not contribute solely to their classroom, but rather to their classroom and the school at large. The last element targets the participation of teachers in school and district projects. Many schools and districts work on and fund projects to better the community and teachers should contribute to and support those projects.
What does implementation look like?
Teacher voluntarily and frequently attends school functions including sporting events, school board meetings, PTA/PTO meetings, etc.
Teacher can volunteer to serve on school committees or special projects.
The teacher frequently shares resources with colleagues for example, you could create a monthly newsletter for teachers in your school that informs them about new resources you have found.
Teacher shows active effort in developing and participating in their PLN.
If not already a regular thing, teachers can implement weekly meetings with the teachers in the same grade level or disciplines as them to share progress, concerns, etc.
Sources: Danielson Group » The Framework. (2017). Danielsongroup.org. Retrieved 21 September 2017, from http://www.danielsongroup.org/framework/