It's true that teaming does strengthen us. I am thankful to be a part of this team.

I have some basic ideas about teaming and its extreme importance, and I have many personal experiences that prove its worth to me. However, I have not really ever read/researched or wrote about this, so it will take me some time to get to the point where I'm ready to write on the page itself. I'm working on it in my head, so for now, please accept my main conviction that teaming leads to greater strength. To me, that is the bottom line on teaming, but of course, there is much more to say on this topic. Thanks for being willing to wait for me here.

so we have some annedotes we can talk about: .... how what we started here could no way be done by any one of us... how the teaming to help your room cleaning brought us together (invested ourselves in each others problems), and how the teaming on the leadership committee helped us learn more about our shared values...

When teachers work as a team, students benefit. It's six (or however many) pairs of eyes watching out for a kid. It's six professionals evaluating a kid. Six problem-solvers, etc.

Middle school teachers working as a team can really help so many kids. You must see all or nearly all of the kids at your grade level. You have individual experiences with children that, when shared with your colleagues, become shared experiences with children. This sort of shared knowledge can only benefit the child. As you know, at the elementary level, we have one group of kids all day. I don't interact with Tracy's kids. Your teaming at the middle school level is so much richer and truly can work to the immediate good of many middle school kids. I feel that teaming at the elementary level isn't(can't ever be?)as beneficial for the students. It's more about us, the teachers,at this level. Am I wrong? I'm trying to say that the fact you all know and have contact with many more kids and that we have contact with a limited group of kids somehow makes your teaming, in my mind, more child-valuable.

I cleaned up our goofy comments and accidently erased JN's first comment. Here it is again for the record, "Teaming strenghten' us"

But this space is a form of teaming too. So is the brown bags. In some ways all my interactions with EO were very "teamish". So I am optimistic that there are other really poweful models for teaming too, beside the ones in place for grade level.

I understand what you're saying, Chris, although I also think that a strong grade-level team, regardless if they actually share students or not, can work together to help each other as individuals, yes, but they can also work together to develop plans/strategies/solutions to use to work with individual kids. The commitment would need to be there from the members to agree that it's worth the time and effort, but it's definitely possible. I agree that literally sharing the kids makes it a bit easier to start, but I think that good things can come from real discussions about kids that other teachers may have never met, if the team mind-set is there. It would take dedication from every team member involved. In an unrelated, but analogous example, my teammates could have said that they really don't care how messy and unorganized my room is, and they could have found ways to get out of helping me even if I asked for their assistance, but they didn't...it may not be their personal goal to help me with something that is really just for me (or for a specific student only you have) but if the team is functioning as an strong, effective team, they would do it because we're a team, and a team shares and works toward common goals.
I'll get into this more when I finally put my thoughts on the teaming bearing...still gathering my thoughts...

Question: How do we get mandated team members to work as a team? Do we set the teaming example and hope they follow? Is that part of the struggle to create a solid team? What if CK is the only team member wanting to form a team with his mandated team members? Should he seek team unity elsewhere, through Awakening? What can we do to help him build teaming with his current grade level team?

productivity, love, and fun in combination are contageous. He should seek teaming with awakening, but believe with all of his heart that the day will come (soon perhaps) when his team will alse be ready for its first baby step. Each step that is sucessful can build exponentially. I know I will sound like a wacko hear, but I don't think is one person in the building who can't be swept up in what is and will continue happening. Already we have seen some hard to believe transformations this week.