How Teams Become Highly Effective, Part 1 with Bob Sonju and Kim Monkres

At this point, most schools have teacher teams, but not every teacher team is highly effective. In this episode, I got to sit down with Bob Sonju and Kim Monkres, co-authors of The Handbook for Highly Effective Teams, to explore what separates groups of educators who simply meet from teams that genuinely improve teaching and learning. Bob and Kim explain why collaboration isn't something educators automatically know how to do well and why creating a strong team foundation is essential before diving into curriculum, assessments, and student data. They share practical strategies for building trust, establishing meaningful team commitments, navigating conflict, and creating a shared understanding of what students truly need to learn. I loved this conversation (and their book!) because of all of the actionable ideas, templates, tools, and protocols to help teams move beyond meetings and toward meaningful collaboration that benefits every student. Note that highly effective teams perform FOUR roles, and this podcast covers the first two (see the next podcast for the last two). HIGHLY EFFECTIVE TEAMS: 1. Build a strong foundation 2. Outline the essentials of what all students should learn 3. Effectively use assessments and data 4. Provide extra time and support when students don’t learn Walk away with MAIN IDEAs… 1 FIRST STEP: Have your teams assess themselves on the 15 critical actions that highly effective teams take (on pp.62-63 of the book or the Solution Tree website) to see where to start with this work. Here is a rough version of the self-assessment. 1 RESOURCE: Bring in the authors to come work with your school or district — Bob Sonju, Anisa Busby-Baker, Kim Monkres Book: The Handbook for Highly Effective Teams Connect with Jenn: [email protected] Get monthly book summaries from Jenn (The Main Idea) Join an outstanding PL experience for leaders: Jenn’s Mastermind My 1-pager for this book If you got something out of this podcast, I hope you’ll follow me so you can listen to Part 2. Thanks!