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Los Angeles middle school teacher Kathie Marshall returns to the classroom this fall after six years as a literacy coach. A national emphasis on collaborative teaching has emerged since Marshall's last full-time classroom assignment, and she welcomes the sound advice of a team of Louisiana middle grades teachers who won the 2006 Disney National Teaching Award for their teamwork. Marshall says the book is not a step-by-step guide but a "conceptual look at how to create collaborative relationships that support success for all students." By emphasing the importance of relationships and the "powerful motivators" of student achievement -- belonging, vision and purpose -- the authors add important perspectives to the burgeoning collaborative teaching movement.

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TeamWork, Setting the Standard for Collaborative Teaching, Grades 5-9
Monique D. Wild, Amanda S. Mayeaux, and Kathryn P. Edmonds
2008 (paperback; 192 pp.)
Stenhouse Publishers
ISBN: 978-157110-711-4
$18.00

Reviewed by Kathie Marshall
Middle School Teacher & Former Literacy Coach
Los Angeles Unified School District

I am returning to the classroom after six years as a literacy coach. Much has changed in education during that time, including a new emphasis on collaborative teaching. I’ve always had a sixth grade core partner, but I never really had a meaningful relationship with any of my partners because we still lived in the world of teacher isolation. Now, however, I have a partner eager to work with me.

So, whether you call it coincidence, serendipity, or plain old good luck, I found myself quickly immersed in TeamWork, Setting the Standard for Collaborative Teaching, because it met an immediate need as I began planning for my return to the classroom. TeamWork is written by three classroom teachers who won the 2006 Disney American Teacher Award, the first team to earn this distinction, so as I dove into the book, I knew I was in good hands. TeamWork is not a step-by-step manual, as the authors point out, but a conceptual look at how to create collaborative relationships that support success for all students.

In Part I, the focus is on building strong relationships between the teacher team members, students, parents, and administrators. As new teams form, the focus is on three key aspects: developing common goals, examining each other’s core beliefs, and identifying each member’s strengths. The book then goes on to explain how to create successful relationships by providing examples of their own journey, both successes and missteps. The authors also point out potential conflicts, such as the integration of a new team member, and how to proceed.

In Part I the authors also share some terrific ideas for demonstrating respect and valuing of all students, including shared identity activities, family surveys, and student-led conferences. As a former literacy coach, I was particularly happy to see how the authors identified the linking of literacy to every subject as a conduit to curriculum integration. “The impact of focusing on reading across the team amazes us year after year.” (p. 66) Other means of creating a culture of achievement included goal-setting and visualizing activities, and highlighting metacogition through brain studies and learning to learn strategies.

In Part II, TeamWork shifts to a focus on how to create substantive curriculum integration across all subjects rather than cute or superficial connections. The authors point out the importance of curriculum mapping and how to use it as a tool for curriculum integration, and they again mention their discovery that the use of language arts as the hub for integration was key. They also speak thoughtfully about their initial resentment toward state standards and their eventual realization that a focus on the standards actually helps ease the integration process. In keeping with their conceptual focus, the authors also explain how curriculum integration helps student understanding, engages students’ interest, and supports the needs of special education students.

In Part III, the authors discuss the importance of reflective teaching, asserting that isolated teacher reflection isn’t enough. As a literacy coach who has worked closely both with individual teachers and with teams of teachers, I was pleased to see the authors’ careful explanation of how collaborative reflection assists teachers in identifying and closing gaps for all students. In a sense, they define this process of collaborative reflection as job-embedded professional development to support effective teaching. Because the focus is on conceptual learning, this section on reflective teaching provides essential questions teachers can ask themselves as they work toward successful curriculum integration.

Finally, the authors use the Bill and Melinda Gates report on high school drop-outs, The Silent Epidemic, to address in turn each reason students give for dropping out and how collaborative teaching works to “catch them before they fall.” In the authors’ own words: “Belonging, vision, and purpose are powerful motivators.” And TeamWork, Setting the Standard for Collaborative Teaching, is a powerful motivator for further investigation of collaborative teaching.

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