Not So Distant Future

In their book Innovation, Curtis Carlson and William Wilmot talk about the difficulty many organizations have with adapting to change.

They point out, “A fundamental reason for this failure…to keep up is that they are, by definition, built to fight the last war. . . . They have well-defined organizations and processes designed to achieve those earlier objectives, but these very organizations and processes now resist the changes needed to exploit the new opportunities.” (p. 36)

One of the important components for innovation that they define is the importance of collaborative teams working together on key problems.   Collaboration is a skill we spend a lot of time talking about in education.   We work on identifying collaborative opportunities both offline and online, learn how to design more collaborative lessons and develop rubrics to evaluate collaborative efforts of our students.

And more and more, we talk about the importance of professional learning communities in our schools and the powerful learning that can take place when teachers work together.

Yet, as Carlson and Wilmot illustrate in their book, are our “systems” aligned with the goal of teacher collaboration?

They share an anecdote about an attempt by a university dean to create a center for joint research.  The center ultimately fails, because the professionals can’t seem to work together on a common problem.  The authors point out:

“. . .The university was not aligned with his goal.  The reward systems in his university, such as getting tenure and salary increases, recognized individual contributions, not team performance.”

As we ask teachers to work towards learning in professional communities, are we doing anything as a system to recognize or reward teachers for “team” work?   Is there any compensation, professional evaluation or reward system related at all to group efforts?  Certainly, the intrinsic rewards of learning are important, but what are ways we can support that sort of team effort systematically? 

If we are expecting to change the way teachers work together, then how do we align our systems to support our goals for professional development?

Quite a bit of conversation has been circulating around the blogosphere lately about personal learning networks and how to move them into the professional practice of teachers.

Scott Schwister pushed at that idea in a “must read” recent post, asking “How do we show the learning that happens through personal learning networks?”   He concludes by asking, “What is it going to take to bring professional learning networks in from the cold? Can the learning that occurs in a PLN be shown in a way that makes sense—and makes a case—to someone not already involved in their own network?”

My pushback to his post–if you’ll excuse me for citing myself but I am going somewhere with this–

“When we think of teaching something, we often talk about connecting to something our students already know and scaffolding their learning that way.

We can’t ignore the fact that most teachers already do have personal learning networks–maybe they are within their own buildings, but those are networks, nonetheless.

Perhaps building on the notion of the teacher down the hall connects into that.

When we talk about personal learning networks, I think we’re really thinking of something more far-flung.

But although this may seem obvious, I think for a personal learning network to really be personal, it has to fit the needs of the person who creates it.

I think this is partly about creating opportunities for teachers–opportunities for them to get professional support, share ideas, and learn.

But for something to be an opportunity, there has to be a perceived need. “

I’ve been thinking about Scott’s question while reading Made To Stick, by Chip and Dan Heath.  The authors write about what makes ideas appealing enough to move us forward.  In their chapter on emotion, they invoke Mother Teresa’s eloquent words–”If I look at the mass, I will never act.  If I look at the one, I will.” 

The idea of building a learning network seems overwhelming in the “whole” and those of us doing workshops have a network built already that we are sharing in conversations and workshops.  But how did we get there?  One by one, we built those connections.   I wrote a post a few months ago about specific steps teachers could take to build a network, trying to get at that idea of breaking down into the details.

I think as we talk with teachers about building a caring professional network, we need to help them look at the one, not the mass, as they begin.   We can’t get so carried away with our own enthusiasm that we don’t help them find entryways.

In the chapter in Made to Stick, the authors highlight a number of important factors in making a message stick that resonated with me in relation to personal networks.    Some of the factors are things I wrote about on Scott’s post, like connecting to ideas that teachers already know( like their within the building networks).    Bringing home how it will help a particular teacher and appeal to their own interests is also a significant way to make the idea of a personal learning network stick–it has to be personal to them.   

But, and this seems important as we work with teachers as a whole–stickiness also has to do with the identity of the group as a whole, according to the authors.  When making a decision, we may consider our own interests, but we may also consider how we fit into a group–asking ourselves, for example, “what do “teachers” who follow best practices do?”  Or “what do 21st century teachers do?”   The work Will Richardson and Sheryl Nussbaum-Beach are doing in this regard is an excellent example of helping teachers develop that identity.

 But associations can backfire too, as the authors point out.   (If someone in a workshop doesn’t consider themselves a 21st century teacher because they are reaching retirement age, will they buy in to that identity?)

The authors also point out that sometimes the “curse of knowledge” interferes with our ability to see. (p. 200)  Teachers are familiar with teaching ‘as it is’ and we know our jobs ‘as they have been.’   How do we push beyond the status quo, and ask “why?”  Why teach?  Why are we here?  Why are students here?  What are we hoping to accomplish?  The authors point out that “Asking ‘Why?’ helps to remind us of the core values, the core principles, that underlie our ideas.”(p. 201)  Drilling down through these questions may allow us to better explore what would make our classrooms more effective places for students, who are our customers, and sidesteps what the authors call the “curse of knowledge.”

Lastly, the authors circle back around to Mother Teresa’s words.   When we make the experience more particular to one person, it has more of an impact.  What if we ask teachers to think of that one student that they didn’t quite know how to help–and what it would have been like if they’d had a network of excellent and experienced teachers they could have asked for help?    Or what about that one lesson that they’ve struggled with conveying to their students?  What if they had a network of people to inspire them with a way to teach it?

I believe there is tremendous power for educators in building learning networks.   But if we bandy about the term it loses meaning(if it had any for teachers to begin with.)     I think part of making this happen is breaking it down from the global to the particular.

We don’t tell students, today we’re learning all of algebra, and algebra is really important.  We show them, step by step, day by day, particular detail by particular detail.

So, in a very roundabout answer to Scott’s question,  I think we need to keep it real.  I think we need to keep it specific.  I think we need to keep it personal.   I think we have to tie it into what teachers already know.  I think we have to tap into the need.  I think we have to help teachers identify what is in it for their students.  And I think we have to model being a connected, global teacher and invite them into that experience.

I’m still thinking about this–as Scott wrote, there’s a lot here to be delved into.   I know how significant developing a learning network has been for me in the last year.  I have felt more challenged, inspired, pushed, and enthusiastic than I have felt since college.   I’ve read more, written more, learned more, grown more, and shared more than I have had the opportunity to do in many years.  

So, what next?   Where do we go from here?

I’ve had staff development on the mind lately.

In his post “Why Staff Meetings Matter”, Chris Lehmann writes that “a faculty is greater than the sum of its parts.”

He goes on to say:

“That’s why it’s important to read articles together, build wikis together, agree on school policies together. That’s why it’s important to take the time to set goals together. “

I’m been watching Mr. Holland’s Opus for the first time while I write this, and listening to Richard Dreyfus sing the John Lennon song “Beautiful Boy” to his son, who is hearing impaired. 

And I’m thinking this is why staff development is important.  Not as a way to fill up time or fulfill requirements.  But because ultimately, what we learn and how we teach has to make a real difference for our beautiful sons and daughters.

And then, watching To Sir With Love,(must be teacher night on TBS) I hear one teacher ask another about learning from students, ‘Does it matter who you learn from as long you learn?’

I wrote the above two weeks ago, but it has been simmering in my mind as we begin our fall staff development modules.    Our campus has a new schedule which allows for staff development during the day each week, 7 periods a day, and I’m co-chairing the committee for planning that.

Last week we kicked off our series of staff development workshops.  We opened the session with this video where I interviewed some of our staff members about staff development.  (Warning: some humor ahead   Our staff did a great job helping me with this!)

Download Video: Posted by technolibrary at TeacherTube.com.

We then had time to do some brainstorming(flickr photos of session)–asking our teachers what they like/don’t like about staff development and to reflect on how they themselves learn.  It was fascinating to see all the different responses, and the variety of staff that we will be training.

One of the main things that has come across clearly is that teachers learn by doing  (every group on our faculty mentioned this, yet most workshops ask them to sit and listen),  that they do appreciate having choices and the ability to chart their own path through the workshop (makes it more relevant to their course), they want to walk away with something substantial, and they want follow-up.   (So much of what our staff said about their own learning applies to our students as well, but that is another post altogether!)

I was also somewhat surprised/dismayed to hear a few teachers sound like that they’d rather not attend staff development at all, or want to do it all on their own,  and that there isn’t much new for them because they are experienced teachers.  While this definitely brings up a concern about “one size fits all,”  I always find myself surprised by teachers who want students to sit and learn, but then they themselves come across as not being very “open” to learning.  There’s a lot of irony here that I’ve been really struggling with, but I also am reminding myself that all educators have different personalities and learning styles, just like our students, and also that many staff development experiences aren’t that helpful, or are repetitious, etc., so it’s natural for people to be frustrated.   

I just (being the Pollyanna that I sometimes am) hope that teachers will bring “themselves” –because really, that’s the most important thing we can bring to a workshop.

Our staff development committee has planned three strands for the fall, each of which will run three weeks(1 day per week), so as we work on this, we’re trying to consider all that our staff said about their own learning.   The strands are:  21st century learning, authentic student engagement, and ethics, but they will be fairly open- ended with lots of discussion and hands-on time with laptops as well as time to collaborate.

Now, this morning I’m reading a post by Clay Burrell about a staff development workshop he’s planning for his campus in Seoul, with lots of fascinating advice he has received, and the focus is very much on the same things that our own staff brought up, particularly that teachers don’t want one-size fits all learning environments (interesting that that is the kind of environment we most often provide for our students!).

This again, is the power of the network for me.   I’m committed to making this opportunity we have work better, but have been struggling, given the format we have, with how to do that effectively.  And here comes my network with some answers and advice!

One question I’m pondering–how much of the “collective” thinking is important, as Chris mentions, and how much of the “departmental” or “individual” and how to keep those balanced?

Clay’s post and the subsequent comments, like those of Wes Fryer, challenge my thinking and offer some solutions which will help us steer our way.  

Clay is creating a wiki (which he has invited others to assist with) to offer workshop pathways geared to the multiple intelligences of the teacher learners.   So collectively, we can collaborate to add sites and all use this tool, which I’m very excited about for my own campus.   The power of the network will help all of us provide better training for our own teachers.

In any case, it doesn’t matter who we learn from or where we learn, as the teacher in To Sir With Love Says–it just matters that we are learning. 

In keeping with the theme of staff development,  I thought it’d be a good time to look back at Ken Pruitt’s three questions for school districts, which Scott McLeod highlighted on his blog in July.

I’ll take the liberty of re-posting his questions here:

1. What are the 21st century skills we want our teachers to model?
2. How can we provide consistent and relevant training to 200 teachers?
3. Will adequate resources encourage teachers to integrate technology into their curriculum?

At our campus we are grappling with a new schedule that builds in more weekly time for staff development, with a combination of study groups, book groups, technology workshops, and curricular workshops that are offered weekly.   I’m one of a few charged with helping plan this whole effort.

It’s important to me to provide choice so that the learning is grass-roots, and teacher-driven, while still being able to hold scheduled trainings.   We’ve surveyed our faculty to get a sense of the areas they are interested in receiving training, and the types of delivery they would prefer.

Interestingly, the survey bore out the results we anticipated–teachers wanted more in-house workshops, more choice in topics, fewer large group presentations, and many of their requests focused on 21st century skills.

We’re planning to allow teachers to form study groups/book groups within their departments or across departments, and several of us have been helping compile a book list as a starting point for those groups.  

There will be other more traditional workshops or trainings offered as well, and trying to sort out how to coordinate these weekly is something I’ve been pondering.  We want to draw on our own teachers abilities and wisdom, as well as use tools like Skype to draw in outside guests.

One thing we have heard frequently from staff is that inservice often seems disjointed and disconnected.  So we’re trying to run technology and other workshops that are more thematic throughout a six weeks, so that they are more developmental over time.  I think Ken Pruitt’s question about consistency is a very important one.

I’m also hoping we can integrate blogs into the staff development pieces, as well, once the logistics are worked out–to provide more consistency and long term discussion.

Too often, it seems like there is little larger purpose in the smattering of inservice that teachers receive.  I think that defining the larger goals for the campus and district and centering all our efforts around those big ideas (BHAG) can turn inservice from something painful to be endured, to something powerful and authentic. 

Just as we want our students’ experiences to be meaningful and real, don’t we want the learning experiences our teachers have to be equally powerful?

As I read other blogs, across the world, from Texas to Shanghai to New Jersey and back to Texas, I see so much mindful thinking about how to bring authentic learning to our classrooms. 

So, as we approach the start of school, sincere hats off to educators all over the world who are preparing to begin anew to engage our students in learning.

School started in earnest for me on Friday, and I’ve felt a little dispirited.  On the one hand, I have learned so much this summer that I am enthused and eager about implementing.  But the tasks at hand right now aren’t necessarily those that will even get me there, but things I have to get done.  It’s reminded me of feelings reflected in a post that Chris Lehmann wrote about his own sense of disconnection as he started inservice.)

I’ve been aware that I’ve felt somewhat muddled the last week or so, but have learned in my semi-old age to be patient, because usually the muddle clears up and my thinking gels if I can give it time.  (Wish we could always do that for our students.)

I turned to my Bloglines account this morning for a little renewal, having not been doing much reading for the last week, and as I so often do, found inspiration, support, and creative thinking there that spur me on as we enter a couple of weeks of software training, and inservice.

Doug Johnson describes his use of Stephen Covey’s time management matrix and how it can be used administratively, and it struck me while reading his post that part of why I feel stressed and overwhelmed is that almost all the tasks I am charged with during the next week are in Quadrant IV.  But most of these are required, imperative(personal items) or imposed, which is crowding out the time for my own goals and mission.    So his post made me realize that before I get completely caught up in the rush, I need to carve out a little time for reflection.  (Maybe this is that time!)

I browsed over to the always inspiring LeaderTalk to reread a post I saw there a few days ago, regarding motivation and inservice, and as always found five more posts that were motivating and thought-provoking.

Tracy Rosen reminds me in her post “Motivation and change: Values and Passion” that motivation must be intrinsic for our students (and our staff), and asks, “What is it about teaching that touches your soul?” 

An excellent question this time of year, and the one I most need to focus on. 

Kelly Christopherson from one of my favorite blogs, Educational Discourse, writes an insightful post about beginning of the year “motivational workshops”, (something I struggle with a little and conversed with him about, I admit )  and asks “What motivates you?”    He writes about teacher motivation, what sorts of inservices could be provided to do that, and whether teachers need motivating in traditional ways in the first place.  Very interesting piece.

And after reading through these three posts, I realize that I have to be able to bring my motivation even to these tasks that seem tangential to my real passion–I need to bring my full self and full creativity to bear on them so that they all become opportunities, because as Tracy writes, “Values and passion are powerful stuff.”

I want to be able to take that “powerful stuff” into our school community every day.

Thanks to my colleagues from afar for the clarity and motivation this morning.  It is the network of professional support, this network that doesn’t even know it is there some mornings, that is enriching what I do so much, and I am very thankful for that.

School ended on Saturday(a makeup ice day)though I am working for a couple more weeks, teaching workshops, etc.    So I’ve been a bit quiet due to the rush of end of school, library, and family events, but also just needing some time to back off and reflect.

There’s a lot to process about the last year, and about my own exploration and sharing of web 2.0 tools.  As Christian Long depicts it, (thanks for the image!) we’ve gotten on the School 2.0 flight.  Only thing is, we are embarking into uncharted territory.

In a  post at Dare to Dream, Barbara, a K-8 administrator, describes her introduction to a Life Science model of education.    The tenets of it are:

• Equilibrium is a precursor to death
• Living systems move to the edge of chaos
• Self organization and emergence take place
• Systems can not be directed along a linear path

She comments: “Being comfortable with living on the edge of chaos is a real challenge for our educational system ( and myself as a type A personality) but I believe those of us who are embracing all things 2.0 see this as a reality.”

This year has felt that way.  Some days or moments you can see the “emergence” happening, a thread starting to develop, real change happening, and it is very exciting.  You can feel the “living system.”

Other days, it just seems like chaos, not organizable, and overwhelming.   

But it also strikes me that we have to think about what happens when equilibrium and the status quo are disrupted.   It can be uncomfortable, frustrating, and even make people feel angry.   For those who love change, it can be very energizing, but also frustrating when not everyone ‘gets” what the change is about.

One of the reasons I think educational reform is so difficult is that we try to find “top down” models that can be applied anywhere, but as this theory points out, “systems” cannot be directed along a linear path.   Every system, at every school, even within the same school district is different.   There has to be a fundamental respect and understanding for, and celebration of that.  We also have to respect and anticipate some of that discomfort, and work with staff on it.

Web 2.0 tools and new technologies have introduced that chaos into our systems in a major way.   Knowledge is a more flexible entity than the way it traditionally is presented in schools, textbooks, or on standardized tests—it is ever changing, and growing.   

As Barbara points out, citing another blog, Konrad’s Notes:

“We use blogs, wikis, podcasts, and many other Web 2.0 tools to help students understand that knowledge is an active process of construction and not something that arrives in a textbook, neatly compartmentalized into chapters or units.

How can we possibly help our students be co-contributors and researchers if we ourselves don’t engage as learners and experience what it means to construct knowledge?”

We cannot help our students understand the flexible nature of knowledge unless we ourselves are life long learners—be we librarians, teachers, administrators, or parents.   We have to model what we are asking our students to do and treat information as a dynamic and changing thing, not a static set of beliefs.  

And I honestly believe that life-long learners learn from everything.   We have to believe that knowledge and wisdom can be found everywhere, in many different fields, mediums, etc.  And we should encourage our students to seek connections everywhere.   That is one of the core benefits of utilizing web 2.0 tools in schools.  We can’t cordon off a certain zone of knowledge and tell students it isn’t valid or available to them and remain credible as learners ourselves.

But also as educators, we also have to acknowledge, I would add, that everyone learns differently.  Just as we expect students to have many different learning modalities and preferences, we have to expect that teachers/librarians/administrators will as well. 

I was struck by Barbara’s description of how her faculty worked on 21^st century skills during inservice meetings.  She commented on their end of year discussion that in discussing technology literacy, “much of the discussion was about pedagogy not the tools.” As Patrick Higgins also commented at Dare to Dream, “The conversations I have been having with my staff lately center less on technology, but more on the thinking we will need to keep pace with its capabilities.”

This was a good reminder to me as we move forward as a campus on this uncharted “flight” to keep the discussion focused on the teaching and learning and “the thinking we will need.”  As I teach workshops this summer, I want to make that focus clear.   

Fundamentally, the key to adapting to all of this change is flexibility and openness—openness to the chaos, so to speak.  And that is where I see the struggle in schools.  Schools are often built on “tradition,” a core set of knowledge, and creating a sense of stability for students.   So for schools to both embrace that sense of permanence, while also embracing a sense of constant change, is an interesting paradox.      

As we take this uncharted flight, we’ll have all of our baggage with us.  The difference is, we won’t entirely know where we are going until we get there.  But this trip isn’t about the destination, because as the cliché goes, it’s about the journey. 

As we end this school year, I enter the summer with a sense of adventure and hope.  Let’s see where we go.  

Photo Credits: 
http://thinklab.typepad.com/think_lab/2007/05/no_limits_only_.html
http://www.flickr.com/photos/troybthompson/333548881/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/sidereal/248660387/ 

Our technology and staff development committees are moving toward some good synergy and I’m excited about how the ideas from the two committees are coming together.  Next year we’ll have some extra time during the week for teachers to work together, be in a study group, take technology classes, etc. so this planning will hopefully make those experiences more worthwhile.

I was reading an article tonight that struck an interest in me. 

Wouldn’t it be a great experience as a component of our staff development if we could partner with a college, so that education professors could visit our campus and we could visit some college classes?  Depending on when some of us graduated, it’s been awhile since we were in a college classroom and it might be helpful to see where our students are headed.   Likewise, it’s probably been awhile since some professors were in high schools, to see what is going on there.

Or some of the study groups could invite a professor to be part of the study group.  We did that in a study group on poetry a few years ago, and it was really fascinating.

Just an “out there” idea…what do you think?