The PD Book. Elena Aguilar
too! I love my group.” Someone else said, “And I also love everyone else I've met in these days outside of my home group!” There was more chatter as participants concurred.
Elena smiled and observed the 60 educators who had convened for this residential professional development institute on emotional resilience in educators. They had traveled from across the United States to a retreat center in the mountains above Santa Cruz, California, for three nights and three‐and‐a‐half days. A few participants came from the same organization, but most were strangers when they'd arrived. Knowing this, Elena had grouped them into “home groups” of four or five people.
On the first evening, after dinner, Elena asked them to spend two hours telling stories in home groups. They could sit around one of the outside fire pits or in the massive infinity hot tub that overlooked the redwoods, and they had a protocol to follow and storytelling prompts. That evening, Elena wandered around and observed these educators, who had met only six hours before, tell stories about heartbreak and life‐changing decisions, about fears and hopes and dreams. She observed them listening to each other, affirming each other, and building community.
Throughout the retreat, home groups sat together for sessions, had delicious meals together and went on walks in the forest, and processed and practiced all the content. They also interacted with other participants in the retreat, but they spent a lot of time in their home groups.
The design of the retreat was complex, but the answer to the question “How did you know to put us together?” was simple.
“The truth is,” Elena said, “your groupings were totally random. Sometimes I'm super intentional about creating groups—usually when I'm meeting with folks for multiple sessions, but in this case, I knew very little about you.” Elena remembers feeling a little embarrassed revealing this—she had wanted to say, oh, it was all so intentional! Every single thing! But that wasn't the truth, and it wasn't what made the retreat so powerful.
We, the authors of this book, work for Bright Morning, an organization founded by Elena Aguilar, which brings transformative learning experiences to educators working to create equitable schools. In our workshops, we teach people the art of connecting to themselves, to each other, and to those in their communities. Sometimes the learners in our sessions are amazed by what we orchestrate and experience the facilitator as having access to magic. Obviously, we're not wizards, and because we aspire to teach others the strategies we use, we pull on the thick ropes of the stage curtains to reveal how we create powerful PD.
This entire book is an attempt to pull back the curtain all the way and share how we design and facilitate learning experiences. We want to tell you how to design and facilitate professional development that transforms how participants think, feel, and what they do—and sometimes feels magical.
We'll come back to Elena's workshop and hear how she pulled back the curtain for the benefit of the participants. But first, we want to usher you into this book by inviting you to recall a transformative learning experience that profoundly altered what you do, how you think, and how you feel. This could have been a cooking class, a communication seminar, a meditation course, a trip abroad, a lecture, or anything that felt like it opened up possibilities and potential.
Pause and remember that experience of transformative learning.
Visualize where you were and the people who were around you. Try to recall how you felt, maybe what you were thinking. Do you remember exploring new ideas and acquiring new skills? Can you recall the intellectual buzz of being challenged and stretched in a good way? Do you remember connecting meaningfully with someone else during the process? If you had a sense of your own growth at the time, did you feel satisfied or excited or hopeful? Think about how you've applied your learning and how doing so changed your life.
Now that you remember this experience, can you identify what made it so good? Perhaps you were pursuing interests and passions: Maybe you'd wanted to learn to play an instrument all your life and it felt good to finally begin learning. Maybe the experience provided you with skills you could use immediately. Or perhaps what made the experience so memorable were the other people—you made new friends or had profound conversations.
Sometimes powerful learning happens alone: Traveling abroad, reading books, and backpacking solo can be transformative. Often powerful learning happens with others, perhaps under the guidance of a mentor or teacher. In the positive learning experience that you just recalled, who was with you, and who guided you? How did other people contribute to your learning experience?
If you didn't recall a learning experience in which you had a teacher or guide, see if you can remember a time when someone facilitated a powerful learning experience for you. Reflect on these questions:
How did your teacher make you feel?
How did you know you could trust your teacher?
What did they do to build community if you were in a group with others?
If you've had firsthand knowledge that transformative learning is possible, then recalling the physical, social, emotional, and intellectual memories of your own experiences can be a source of energy and insight. Those memories can guide you toward a holistic vision for adult learning.
While we hope that you've had an opportunity to experience masterful facilitation, if you haven't, we know that you can still become a transformative facilitator because we've guided thousands of educators toward that end. You'll need to draw on other kinds of positive learning moments—from when you were a kid to recent forays into developing a hobby or learning within your professional field. Your bank of memories might contain only fragments of transformative PD (perhaps you experienced a dynamic speaker or an engaging activity or a beautiful setting), but you can piece together the elements of transformative PD. And we're going to tell you so many stories in this book that you'll be able to round out your imagination with visions of what could be possible.
“I've learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.”
—Maya Angelou
A Couple Notes on Anonymity and Terminology
When we use the term we, we mean both Lori and Elena, unless we're explicitly referencing a larger group or we identify others we're including. When we tell stories and write about other people, we change their names and other markers that might reveal their identities. Also know that we use the traditional pronouns he and she, and in recognition of nonbinary gender identification, we also use they.
Pulling Back the Curtain
When Elena revealed the truth behind the random groupings at the workshop, some people looked disappointed. “However,” she quickly added, “I think this is a question about how to get a bunch of strangers to connect quickly and deeply around what really matters.” Heads started nodding. “You're asking about how I created the conditions for learning, the conditions in which each of you could show up fully. What created the conditions for learning that would have allowed you to develop a deep connection with anyone here—because it was about the conditions that I created for you as individuals and for all of you as a group.” A lot of heads were nodding at this point.
“Yes! So how did you do that?” someone asked.
The participants in Elena's workshop fell silent. What they all wanted to know was how the magic happened. Elena hesitated. Rather than giving them the answers, she wanted participants to identify the critical moves. Doing so would help them become stronger facilitators. “Well,” she said, smiling, “what did you observe me do to create the conditions for learning and deep connection?” Elena invited silent reflection and then provided time for participants to