But Why Not?

Angela Langlands
Oct 14
2 min read

This week, I was speaking with someone about my new venture. When I tried to explain the learning community model, they asked, “But why?”

And like a third-culture kid trying to answer the question “Where is home?” I was momentarily curfuffled. There are so many whys that part of me wanted to respond, “Well, why not?”

But I didn’t.

Instead, I shared this story.

The Hallway Interaction

Walking down the second-grade hallway, Marie*, a former colleague, saw two boys arguing just outside their classroom door.

Before she could say a word, one of them turned around, pointed to the other, and said, “Miss Marie, he did—”

Marie stopped him mid-sentence, surprised. “How do you know my name?” she asked.

The boy straightened up. “I’m Ollie Chang’s* brother. You taught him when he was in third grade.” Then, with a knowing tone, he added, “I’ve heard stories.”

And as kids do, he went right back to listing his complaints.

To most, that exchange might seem insignificant—a fleeting hallway moment in a busy school day. But Marie held on to it and shared it with our former team (who still have a WhatsApp group, of course).

You see, Ollie is now a seventh grader. Four years earlier, he’d been part of the learning community Marie co-taught in. He wasn’t in her home base; she hadn’t worked with him every day. She remembered him, sure—but she hadn’t realized the impression she’d made.

Yet here was his little brother, years later, calling her by name.

If a student still talks about a teacher from their learning community four years later—if her name has become part of the stories shared at home—then the model must be doing something right.

So, to my friend who asked why, here’s my first answer: Because in a learning community, no child is invisible.

The Unseen Impact of Shared Teaching

Marie didn’t realize she had been part of Ollie’s story. She wasn’t his homeroom teacher, didn’t have daily check-ins with him or long conferences with his family. Yet something about the learning community—the shared ownership, the way adults moved through spaces, the way students saw every teacher as their teacher—had left a mark.

This is what happens in a true learning community: visibility multiplies.

In a traditional classroom, a child’s circle of care is limited to one adult. But in the learning community ecosystem, that circle expands. Every teacher becomes part of a child’s narrative—part of the network that holds them.

When we work in isolation, relationships are confined by walls and schedules. When we teach in community, relationships spill over them.