Creating virtual learning communities to train supervisors and pedagogical leaders

Abstract

Constructing professional learning communities is an attempt to place teachers' practices at the center of training processes. The construction of these communities can be enhanced in virtual learning environments when based on collaborative work and reflection on educational practices. In this assumption a training workshop was developed with teachers from two Portuguese schools with coordinating and pedagogical leadership functions. This action is part of a project under development since 2017 that involves collaboration between schools and two universities aimed at promoting teacher professional development.

This article presents the process of constructing virtual learning communities, analyzes and discusses the results obtained through the narratives and artifacts produced by the participants, their interactions in the virtual forums and the individual reflective reports made at the end of the action. The results show the construction of new knowledge as well as the redoing of beliefs and attitudes about the role of pedagogical supervision as a strategy for innovation in schools and in teacher professional development. It argues about the relevance of these communities as a powerful tool in the formation of pedagogical leaders and supervisors for the possibility of developing reflective, collaborative, evaluative and leadership competences.