Tips on Teacher Collaboration

Every teacher has different personalities and sometimes these personalities can interfere with building effective collaborative relationships. In a teacher's first year, positive collaborative relationships are essential to raising a new teacher's confidence as s/he survives with lesson planning and managing a classroom.

New teachers often feel hesitant to network with other teachers because they feel they have more experience. While you can't network with everybody, the key is to find the right teacher personality that suits your needs.

One way to scout out good collaborators is during your staff meetings. Share a small success story that happened during the week. It can be a small experience and it should give you an indication of who is your "fan" or your supporter. In the beginning, you'll want collaborators that have the time and energies to invest in working with you even if it is just a half an hour a week. Keep to these tips:

• Share your success stories and see the reactions you get.
• Make a mental note as you notice your comfort level and trust your intuition.
• Avoid making decisions. Think about how you felt after the meeting and again, trust your intuition.

Now that you've had a few good laughs and vented your frustration, you'll want to get down to serious business of lesson planning. The act of collaboration involves a great deal of tolerance, understanding, patience and flexibility. You may not always agree with your teacher friend. You may need to set back a little if you are used to having things done quicker and more automatically. Avoid confrontation at all possible, just stick to the goal: you both want to plan a lesson together, or decide on the guidelines for a high school research project.