This updated third edition provides teachers and administrators with strategies and resources for examining and discussing student work, such as essays, math problems, projects, artwork, and more. The authors describe two ways of looking together at student work—The Tuning Protocol and The Collaborative Assessment Conference—including how to choose work to present and examples of groups using each protocol. This new edition also offers suggestions for addressing some of the key challenges that emerge when groups first begin to share and discuss student work, as well as guidance for using protocols once groups have progressed beyond the initial stages. This book will be useful to teachers, administrators, teacher educators, coaches, and others who are involved in the work of improving teaching and learning for all students.

New for the Third Edition:

• The addition of The Microlab Protocol, a relatively quick and easy way to introduce groups to protocol-guided conversation.


• Facilitation strategies and more detailed notes for presenters about how to select work and prepare for their roles.


• Updated examples and a new case focused on a school's use of protocols to develop teachers’ understanding and application of the Common Core State Standards.


• Current research on the effectiveness of practices that involve the collaborative examination of student work.

“School leaders looking for systemic strategies to improve student achievement would be well served by Looking Together at Student Work.”

—The School Administrator (first edition)

“This is a book that is at once brief, elegant, and useful. . . . These authors know as well as anyone on Earth that the practice of collectively accountable teaching is messy, but they also appreciate the fact that people in the midst of it nonetheless need some kind of map.”

—From the Forewordby Joseph P. McDonald, New York University

“This excellent book will be very helpful to teachers, school leaders, and parents who want to improve teaching and learning, and to researchers who want to understand school improvement.”

—David Cohen, John Dewey Collegiate Professor, School of Education, University of Michigan