Interview with SIC+, SJKT Ampar Tenang, Sepang.

Greetings! My name is Mad Saipon Nizar b. Zainon. Here I am today to conduct an interview
session with you. This is a requirement for me and my fellow friends to complete a task upon
Saipon
doing master of education in management and leadership. Will you introduce yourself first
before we proceed with the interview?
SIC+ Okay, first of all, thank you for involving me in this interview. My name is…….
As a SIC+, you must be familiar with the term of professional learning community among
Saipon teachers or simply called as PLC, right? Will you explain the definition of PLC in terms of
education?
PLC or professional learning community which is very relevant to the educational system as
far as every teacher concerns. In a proper word, PLC is an ongoing process in which
educators or teachers work collaboratively in recurring cycles of collective inquiry and action
SIC+ research to achieve better results for the students they serve. PLC is one of the most beneficial
programs designed for teachers as well as educators to promote teacher collaboration that
increases student achievement. In simple words, PLC is a program for teachers to improve
themselves together upon enhancing education that will hugely assist students’ achievements.
I see. Since it is a great program design for teachers to improve and provide the best to their
Saipon students, there must be desired benefits of the PLC itself. Can you please generally elaborate
more on the benefits?
Just like I mentioned the definition of the PLC itself, among the benefits of conducting PLC
for the teacher can be analysed very clearly. To begin, PLC allows educators opportunities to
directly improve teaching and learning. PLC allows teachers an easy way to share best
practices and brainstorm innovative ways to improve learning and drive student achievement.
Good communication is key so that educators can share opinions and feel that what they are
doing in the classroom matters. These learning communities also enhance teacher reflection
of instructional practices and student outcomes. Meeting with your PLC gives you the ability
to share student progress, and when the data is shared across grade levels within the building,
educators and administrators take ownership of every child's education. Secondly, PLCs build
SIC+ stronger relationships between team members. The very essence of a PLC is a focus on and a
commitment to student learning. Meeting weekly creates a bond and builds a team of leaders
within the school or district that eventually extends regionally and globally. To build a strong
team, it’s important to define roles and relationships of team members. Next, PLCs help
teachers reflect on ideas. Learning from others in your PLC allows you to reflect on ways to
enhance your teaching and to adjust your practice. The more minds that come together from
different backgrounds, the more likely you are to add value and purpose to the field of
education. When PLC’s come together, they must focus their efforts on questions related to
learning and create products with the end result of answering questions that lead to student
achievement. Student success must be the focus of PLC collaborations.
Very clear explanation and indeed PLC is a great program. Hence, will you holistically state
Saipon
the examples of PLC in education?
SIC+ I will always divide PLC practices into three aspects. One, peer coaching. Two, sharing
personal practices or experiences. Three, the involvement of professional development
courses and practices. To explain, the peer coaching involves teachers to choose another
teacher as their partner and they would participate in their partner’s class when their partner
was teaching and vice versa. After observation, both of the teachers would meet up and have a
thorough discussion, giving each other constructive comments on how to improve their
current teaching practices. The discussion usually revolves around one specific topic in the
syllabus. It is a good thing that peer coaching is a real life discussion to improve education.
Meanwhile, sharing personal practices can be defined as PLC practices which occurred in
daily interactions when the junior teachers approached senior teachers for consultation on
 academic matters, but the interactions remained scarce. Apart from conducting PLC at the
school level like peer coaching and such, teachers also attended professional development
courses to learn how to mark papers and set exam questions as well as teach students how to
answer exam questions. Teachers would have like in-house training with other teachers for
knowledge sharing. Besides, professionals outside the school were invited for sharing
personal practices that focused on marking scheme in helping students to answer exam
questions.
Impressive. In fact, those practices of PLC are very convenient to be applied among teachers.
However, there must some sorts of challenges in order to implement such practices among
Saipon
teacher, right? Would you care on explaining such challenges of PLC that normally found in
today’s education?
Thank you for asking such question, Mr. Saipon. Of course such challenges emerged in
implementing programs. Here I would like to take this opportunity in highlighting the
challenges of PLC implementation nowadays. Firstly, I would like to point out the fact that
teachers who are passive upon their roles. Teachers having an ego by being unwilling to ask
opinions from other teachers regarding their teaching practices was a phenomenon in the
school. The ego grew with time, which resulted in senior teachers having a higher ego and
were reluctant to share teaching practices with other teachers. This is mostly because,
majority of teachers in the school have developed a ready mind-set, thinking that they were
right in terms of teaching practices. Hence, they felt reluctant to ask opinions from others. It is
hugely affecting the main objectives of implementing PLC among teachers. Plus, with such a
mind-set, teachers tend to opt for a passive role in the context of PLC, whereby they were not
SIC+ actively engaged while discussing suitable instructional strategies for students and teaching
practices. The teachers tend to wait for orders from the school on how to do it. The teachers
did not have the self-motivation in initiating the practice of PLC themselves. By behaving
passively, the teachers have lost the opportunity for professional development. Secondly,
another challenge would be the inconsistency in practicing PLC. This is true since there are
cases which PLC was only conducted twice or four times in a year with no follow-up action
in between the programs. Thus, the practices of PLC could not be impactful for teachers as
they only meet a few times a year to sit down to discuss their problems while teaching in the
class or the students’ academic problems. Even though the teachers were able to come up with
new teaching strategies to tackle the common problems faced by teachers, teachers could only
show a minimal shift to the strategies if the teachers were to practice it in a specific time
frame only.
As a one of the responsible person in ensuring the desired goals of PLC are achieved, please
Saipon
explain your roles in this matter.
Well, the school improvement coaches plus like me will act as the instructional coaches in
this matter obviously. The instructional coaches will work with teachers to help them
integrate instructional practices that are based on research. Furthermore, the SIC+ as
instructional leaders need to be able to unpack their teachers’ needs and collaborate with
teachers’ expectations to help teachers develop a strategy to meet their professional goals.
Instructional coaches must have an outstanding range of communication skills and have the
ability to empathise, listen and develop relationships and trust. Also, instructional coaches
SIC+
must be highly qualified to help teachers focus on their classroom activities, as must cognitive
coaches. This is how teachers will have a reliable source to improve more especially in
teaching and learning process which then will contribute their best to their students’
performance. In short, SIC+ will act as role model in conducting as well as implementing
PLC among teachers in school. An example would be encompassing a major aspect of SIC+
which is to help teachers write lesson plans effectively every day and to evaluate aspects of
the strengths and weaknesses of teachers.
Saipon There are a lot of points actually when it comes to PLC among teachers in school. Well, I
 think I’ll stop here for today. Thank you so much for your time.
SIC+ You’re welcome.