Flexible scheduling

[Melissa Brumsted]

Hi everyone,
I'm scheming to present my ideas for changing from a completely set schedule of classes in our library to a flex/fixed model. I've been reading lots of good articles but am having a hard time finding any examples of what other schools have done to make up for the loss of teacher planning time (which is what the "specials" are partly used for in my school). Does anyone have ideas about this, experience, resources, etc?

Thanks for your thoughts-

[Judi Moreillon]

Hi Melissa,
My main thought is that it is the administrator's or school district's job to provide educators with planning time. It is important that teacher-librarians do not take it upon themselves to remedy a school-wide or district-wide administrative issue.

That said I served in district with an early release day (Wednesday). ALL educators in the district had an extra hour during contract time to engage in professional development activities. Sometimes these were determined at the district level; sometimes at the site level. In all cases, collaboration discussions were part of the mix. Principals could also designate this as collaborative planning time.

At one elementary school where I served as the teacher-librarian, the PTA sponsored Friday afternoon clubs. All the students participated in clubs facilitated by members of the greater learning community while the classroom teachers and I engaged in grade-level, joint planning time.

Although I haven't experienced it, I've heard that some principals provide substitute teachers so that the faculty can engage in shared planning time.

This is an on-going challenge, particularly at the elementary school level. Engaging the entire school community in a solution is the way to go!

[Paula Brown]

In my elementary school, I cover teacher prep time and common planning time on two days and have a flexible schedule on the other three days. I am new this year, and this schedule was initiated by the principal, who really wanted the librarian to be available for collaborative lesson planning as well as prep coverage. I have worked with teachers on five different research projects this year. The planning is still done on the fly, as so often happens, but I am hoping that teachers will be coming to me more often, as time goes on, for collaborative projects. I do also barrage the teachers with emails about resources of all kinds ( and I do mean barrage). I want to be a very visible presence in the school.

[Shawn]

Hi Melissa,
I too have scheduled classes throughout the day. A common misconception that my school has is that I do not do anything when I do not have classes and that because I have an aide I have plenty of free time. The teaching staff and administration use 'special' teachers as a break for classroom teachers. I am not certain that I could convince the school administrators to go to a flex schedule as classroom teachers would have a fit! Good luck to you and let us know how it works out. If you get them to let you switch tell me how!

[Lucy]

I teach Spanish at a K-2 school in Georgia. Our DOE mandates that media centers have flexible scheduling. Like Shawn says, specials teachers (art, music, Spanish, P.E., etc.) are used to provide planning time for regular classroom teachers. When our school transitioned from a fixed to flexible schedule, our teachers did not lose any planning time. Due to the number of specials teachers at our school, each regular classroom teacher receives 45 minutes of daily planning time. Good luck! I'm interested in what you decide to do.

[Tracie King]

We have a flex/fixed schedule in our library and it works really well. All classes are required to come as a whole group for about six weeks to go over mandatory lessons in the library which include bookcare, check out procedures, Dewey Decimal System, etc. After that the students can come anytime they want, as many times as they want each week. K-3 usually come the same time each week as a group but the teacher is required to stay with the class. The older students come when they want and only come as a large group if we are working on a special project. The younger students are still allowed to come back if they need to each week. The library is always open to small groups for checkout, research projects, etc. I have an aide that is also in the library so even if I am teaching a lesson someone is available to help students. It does take adminstration buying in to how great it is to collaberate on projects and how students learn the skills better if the teacher is actively participating in the lessons and learning along with the students. This is our schools second year of this type of scheduling and it was even better this year. I hope next year every grade level really participates and we integrate even more technology and research into our every day learning.

Tracie
Littleton, CO

[Allan Cutler]

As part of a grad school assignment I surveyed teachers on how they were using their LMC time. It was interesting to see how little of it was alloted to the purported purpose, team planning time.
Allan in Denver

[Norene Skiles]

I have a fixed flexible schedule and have had for several years. The computer resource teacher and I have an every other week schedule. I see my kindergarten classes every week for a 20 minute time (I am a planning time for them), and all other classes have a day that one week is library and the other computer lab. Example: Monday is 1st grade and I have 2 or 3 set times that I have a first grade class. One week I have 2 classes and the next week I have 3 first grade classes. It leaves a lot of time open and flexible. The computer teacher and I meet with every grade level once a month and we plan our lessons. They offen start in the library and finish with a multimedia project in the lab. My teachers come with their classes when we agree that the students need both of us and when I can I let the teachers have some planning time for part of the lesson block. I like the schedule and it seems to work for us. I generally don't have trouble scheduling additional times for extra projects or small groups. I do have an assistant that handles circulation etc. so I can concentrate on teaching.

[Shawn]

My schedule last year was set in stone. We have 6 classes per grade plus 1 PK (37 classes). We have a six day rotation and each day I see one class per grade level (5,4,3,K,1,2) except on day 3 I also see PreK. Next year we are moving to a 7 day rotation where the 'special' teachers have to come up with a "club" to accommodate an extra class as 2nd grade is adding a 7th class and 5th grade is losing a class. We are not sure what the schedule will look like next year. It will be interesting.

[Carole Pancake]

Melissa and Group
I had this transition solved for me. My admin needed to solve their shortage of "specialists" in the wheel and a teacher wanting more time in the library suggested that the library be added to the wheel. I fought this tooth and nail and lost. Neither admin or the teacher actually thought this "plan" through very well. I will be scheduled for 1 fifth grade class daily (I'm only in the wheel for this one grade level), but on our 5 day rotation there will no longer be enough periods to accomodate all of the remaining classes. I am excited about getting all the 5th graders so that I can teach really meaningful research units preparing all 5th graders for that big middle school transition. But since there are not enough periods remaining to accomodate the other classes, I've decided to make the rest of the day flexible, booking in a floating prep, lunch and work-period for myself. My questions are logistical. I should note this is a PreK-5th school with 900+ students and no tech or help:
**How do I handle the schedules for teachers to sign up? Only offer a couple of weeks at a time? What do I do about the teacher who insists on Tuesday at 1:00 every week and the rest be damned?
What about the class that never comes?
** I liked the idea of the first few visits being mandatory "library lessons". I need more of these process-type ideas.
**How do some of you get help if you don't have an aid or tech? I've tried volunteers, but you can't build a program around their sick kids, dr. appointments, vacations, etc.
**I used to read aloud and provide lessons (even when teachers weren't in a project) so that all students had exposure to multiple resources and how to use them. Now, I'm afraid that teachers will want the quick run in and checkout, and the kids will lose that information.

I'll have a multitude of other questions as I work this through, but this should get me started. Thanks for your input and expertise.
Carole

[Julianne Kaye]

Another school in S.C. had "guidance" lessons once a week.. There was also a school that had "clubs" once a week on Friday and students had a choice of things like, art club, p.e. club, book club, ...
Just a few ideas.