Networking And Learning Together

Book review:

The Power of Professional Learning Networks: Traversing the present; transforming the future.
Graham Handscomb and Chris Brown. John Catt Publishing.

There can be no doubt that the restrictions imposed during the recent global pandemic made people reflect on the importance of the supportive networks of family and friends. This book – The Power of Professional Learning Networks edited by Graham Handscomb and Chris Brown – reflects in a similar way from the perspective of schools and the education system more generally. It offers insight into a myriad of differing professional learning networks, all focused on the core concern of driving improvements to teaching, learning and student outcomes through the building of capacity in the education system.

The introduction by Handscomb and Brown succinctly sets the context for networks with a particular focus on the pandemic and the impact on PLNs. Following on each chapter has a similar accessible structure, starting with an introduction and then a list of key words which reflect the major themes in the upcoming writing. This sets the focus for the reader and helps them decide whether to read the book cover to cover or as stand-alone chapters following personal interests. The book has been structured in two distinct sections, involving 33 authors working  individually or collectively and reflects the diversity of composition, nature and focus of PLNs.

Part one provides insights into PLN’s and their structures and systems involving a combination of stakeholders including teachers and school leaders from different schools and local and national policy makers. Some chapters use large data sets – such as Talis and an ESRC project on Teacher quality and education – to offer a more empirically informed insight into the power of collaboration and learning communities for school improvement, whilst others provide a more theoretical background to collaborative working in networks. Established networks, such as the chapter about WomenEd, report on how they continued to grow and thrive during the pandemic as circumstances created time and need for individuals to focus on the purpose and outputs of networked learning.

Part two – entitled ‘Flourishing practice’ – provides a variety of case studies describing particular types of PLN. Including the development of grass roots networks this section offers insight into the development and challenges of sustaining hybrid PLNs. These PLNs offer a mixture of examples of some that emerged spontaneously through individual teachers, school leaders or schools reaching out locally or across international spaces bridged by digital connections for mutual support during challenging times. There are also chapters examining established PLNs which reflect on how network members innovated and developed their traditional network structures during the pandemic. In this section practical examples are offered to the reader to take away, including networks that focused on supporting school leaders, developing pupil voice, promoting and facilitating teacher research groups and connecting rural schools. The book finishes off with an enticingly named concluding chapter ‘Collaborative caldrons’ serving up the value of PLNs as agents of change and offering some suggestions for the sustainability of PLNs and the skills and competencies required for successful network participation.

The book offers a refreshing slant on the recent pandemic suggesting the rapid growth in schools making use of digital communication to provide online learning has led to a dynamic reimaging of PLNs whereby people have become far more confident connecting via a screen. Several authors consider how digital opportunities opened radically different forms of professional learning with the profession talking to itself resulting in transformations to the form and structure of professional learning networks. However, Handscomb and Brown note that digital communication is not a new phenomenon but suggest the pandemic was almost a perfect storm forcing schools to be quickly fully committed to its adopted alongside a pre pandemic growth in grassroots network activity amongst educators. Teachers and schools came together in various new and contemporary PLNs, to offer collegial support, resources and professional development across the education system united in an unprecedented time. Several chapters reflect that PLNs developed at this time were underpinned by a focus on well-being, professionalization and identity alongside the more traditional approach of improving teaching and learning. This all took place in a variety of contexts involving stakeholders from small rural schools, those supporting students with learning difficulties, mainstream schools and HE institutions. Although the book uses professional learning networks for context it offers the reader so much more with many chapters exploring broad themes such as professional development, Initial Teacher Education (ITE) and teacher identity.

So much of this book resonated with me and the experience I had of the pandemic working in school as a teaching school leader throughout the pandemic and it is reflective of much of this experience. It is refreshing to read about this period of time with a positive spin as opposed to the popular ‘catch up’ narrative; whilst all the authors note the challenges of the turbulent time (for example, Braunberger and Hamilton noted the difficulty of school disruption for pupil with learning difficulties not just on learning but also the mental health of students) they offer a wealth of examples of how creative and innovative educational professionals can be. I was particularly fascinated to read how much was happening involving schools and other partners such as the Education Development Trust and the social enterprise of Big Education.

This book is an enjoyable and thought provoking read. The collection of authors in this book offer a hopeful vision of how involvement in PLNs can contribute to maintaining and raising the achievements of the profession. It leaves the door open to a second edition in the next few years where it would be interesting to see the development of the networks that grew out of the pandemic now the immediate need of partial school closures has subsided in addition to developments and progress in the more established networks. It would be an opportunity to explore, as Handscomb and Brown (2022) conclude whether such professional learning networks have developed and are now seen as ‘a cauldron of ideas, a formative test bed for development and facilitating learning for the whole system’

Jane Flood was Head of Netley Marsh Church of England Infants School and is currently completing her PhD at Durham University