Collaborative+Culture+5

What norms has your grade level/team established? Have they been discussed and agreed upon by all members or are they unspoken agreements? How would establishing a set of written norms help your team be more productive?

(Start after the bullet)
 * As a grade level, we establish norms our grade level will participate in as a whole such as planning for career week. We have a set schedule for speakers and a plan to carry out the activities for the week. Our norms written or unwritten are understood and established for the benefit of our students.(C. Depreast)
 * Some of our team uses norms that are agreed upon, such as, we meet in the summer, before school, and after school in order to come up with long-term plans as well as short term goals. By doing this, all of our classes are on the same page and doing the same things so we can share assessments so we don't reinvent the wheel everytime. (H.Witt)
 * Our grade level works well with the norms that have been established. I don't think any are written down, but we have discussed and accepted them. Some of the norms we've established are: how to plan trips and who plans them, planning lessons together, running copies for each other, what types of assignments are taken for a grade, and many more. We work well with the norms that have been established. (J. Layman)
 * Once again, I feel very blessed to be with such a great "team" with my grade level. We are constantly taking turns making the copies for one another, we all contribute to part of our weekly "homework packet" and we plan together. There are even some units that we each will teach a different lesson, and we will rotate classes among the teachers of our grade level. All of these ideas are not necessarily written down. We just meet often as a grade level and we have a verbal agreement and thankfully, everyone is great about following through with what they say they will do. (Jessica Wimberley)
 * The norms that our grade level have established are often written down. Not because we feel someone will not do their part, but because we need reminders. Many times we plan units together. This is not necessarily written somewhere unless we include class rotations for that unit. Our team works very well together and we each take on responsibilities to help each other. It makes it much easier to concentrate on your class when you can share the load.(A. Robinson)