Who We Are

As a publishing and professional development company, MiraVia brings learning theory into practice.

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What We Do

MiraVia provides learning-focused professional development and products presenting practical strategies, useful resources, and innovative ideas for thoughtful educators.

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Why It Matters

Navigating the demands of the current climate requires a professional culture committed to learning.

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Leading Learning Focused Teams

A team is not a static thing; it is a living system with the potential for growth and positive change.
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Facilitating Learning Focused Data Work

Teachers blaze the path to knowledge generation when pairs, small groups, and entire faculties purposefully use data as a source for analyzing progress and proactively planning for improvement.
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Conducting Learning Focused Conversations

The ability to structure and facilitate powerful learning-focused conversations lies at the heart of building productive relationships and enhancing professional expertise.
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Creating Learning Focused Classrooms

Discover the bridge between current learning theory and effective classroom practice.
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MiraVia offers keynote presentations that inspire, inform, and instruct. These interactive sessions provide relevant content based on compelling educational issues. Our keynotes deliver research-driven ideas and effective tools that put theory into practice in your schools. Learn More

Spotlight

Now available: The new Presenter’s Atlas, developed by Kendall Zoller, is your easy to access resource for a full range of presentation and facilitation settings, This simply designed 4-panel Atlas serves as a go-to guide for honing your skills and increasing your effectiveness as a presenter.  Learn More

Engaging Adult Learners: Designing Virtual Staff Meetings and Work Sessions

Structuring productive staff and team meetings matters more than ever as many of those sessions have moved online. In these times of change and uncertainty, it is impossible to predict how long we will be working in a digital environment. As with students, virtual work sessions for adults require rethinking approaches to group development and adapting conventional meeting design to ensure interactive learning practices that promote collaboration, engagement, and meaning making for group members.

The spring/summer issue of Washington State ASCD’s journal includes an article, Virtual Engagement Strategies for Adult Learners written by three Tacoma educators who have adapted many of the strategies in our book, Groups At Work: Strategies and Structures for Professional Learning  for an online learning environment.

We share it to support you as you design and lead work sessions that incorporate fundamental principles of adult learning and growth.

Here at MiraVia we are adapting many of our course offerings and incorporating these strategies and others to a variety of online platforms. The learning curve is steep and stimulating. Please be in touch if you’d like more information about the available seminars, have ideas to share, or just want to co-learn about how to get increasingly nimble with meeting the challenges ahead.

 

 

Don’t Over-facilitate Your Group

In our book, Leading Groups: Effective Strategies for Building Professional Community , we describe seven essential premises for guiding and growing positive and productive groups.

  1. Groups develop and their development can be positively influenced.
  2. Human behavior has a biological and sociological legacy.
  3. There are predictable dynamics in groups.
  4. Work sessions should be learning sessions.
  5. Investing energy in design saves energy in delivery.
  6. Shaping the discourse determines direction.
  7. You can’t lead where you won’t go.

These premises need to inform the decisions and behavior of all group leaders . But, there are hidden dangers for group leaders who are not clear about their intentions, behaviors, and expectations when planning for group development and guiding group member interactions. LEARN MORE