Trying to Change Education? Focus on Learning

In the past week I found myself feeling out of sorts professionally and wasn't exactly sure what was going on until yesterday when I had a conversation with Drew Perkins and we talked about teaching and learning. You see, conversations about teaching and learning make me happy and all the other business discussed in education I find extraneous (but often necessary) to my bigger mission and sense of purpose in life. Subliminally, I must have known what was causing my despondency because when I submitted my professional growth plan for the year, it focused entirely on...you guessed it...innovative teaching and learning.

Sir Ken Robinson often talks about how children are born voracious learners but begin to lose the appetite for learning when we send them to school. Traditional school models can suck the love of learning out of students just as they can rob teachers of the autonomy they need to do what they do best--engage students in learning. I know I felt this way when I left the high school classroom six years ago. Since then I have immersed myself in work directly connected to supporting teachers because I believe great teachers have the power to create experiences that engage students and make them want to learn.

Fortunately, I'm surrounded by others who also care passionately about improving public education. My hope is that when we discuss what needs to be done to transform education, we never lose site of the focus on learning. Sir Ken Robinson articulates what I feel in this video around the 14:24 mark.

"...we can spend all day talking about education and never mention teaching or learning but if there's no teaching and learning happening, there is no education, so if we're going to improve it we have to improve that bit and everything else has to take place around it and not get in the middle of it or in the way of it."

As he occasionally does, my oldest son railed against me yesterday afternoon for my decision to be an educator. He feels my husband and I should have chosen more lucrative careers. When I grew quiet amid his chatter, he concluded "well, it's not a total loss because at least you and dad like what you do."

How can I not like what I do?  I have the opportunity to work with great teachers, great teachers who...

"...excite people, engage students, pique imagination, fuel creativity and drive passion"

Read Hacking Education: 10 Quick Fixes for Every School If You Want to Make Immediate Changes in Your Classroom

Three months ago, I ran across a social media feed where a woman bemoaned the word hack saying it should be used only when talking about a terrible cough or trying to get into a computer system illegally. While those might be more traditional dictionary definitions of the word, the word hack is common in technology and education circles today. The New Yorker dates the playful (white hat) use of the word to 1955 at M.I.T. in this March 2014 article. While I'm not sure how hack permeated the education world, I'm guessing it started in ed tech circles. I found myself using hack once in a conversation with an educator in a rural district and quickly realized she perceived negative connotations, so I tried to explain myself. Too bad I hadn't yet come across the Hack Learning series. The first book I read in the series, Hacking Education: 10 Quick Fixes for Every School by Mark Barnes and Jennifer Gonzalez, conveys an optimist tone throughout as the authors offer practical can-do now tips to transform teaching and learning.

Barnes and Gonzalez suggest that we don't need to wait for new policy changes, district decisions, or school leaders to change our work as educators. Each of the 10 ideas (hacks) solves problems using ordinary and readily available objects, systems, and people. The authors show others how to creatively address problems by repurposing and reimagining resources. They encourage us to behave like a hacker.

"Embrace the concept of iteration, of continually reviewing and reworking a solution until it becomes the perfect fit for your particular needs."

Each chapter tackles a different problem, offers a solution, provides suggestions for implementation, shares advice for dealing with pushback, and provides examples of the hack in action. 

The problems

1. Time consuming meetings
2. Little to no opportunity to observe fellow teachers
3. No peace and quiet (especially a problem for introverts)
4. Classroom management
5. Lack of tech support
6. Teacher turnover
7. Flipped learning doesn't always work
8. Students aren't reading enough
9. Learning isn't shared beyond classroom walls
10. Students referred to as data points

Read about creative solutions for all problems represented in the book while you feel a positive culture of ongoing learning coming from the authors. From student run tech-teams to anecdotal data records as a means for knowing your students better to glass classrooms focused on student-centered learning, the authors share practical ways to overcome problems with simple solutions and specific ideas for immediate implementation. No need to wait until next semester or next year. You can implement these hacks now. 

One of my favorite hacks includes the use of student tech gurus to solve the lack of technology support available in schools. 

"Apart from troubleshooting, a team of student tech gurus can also work proactively, training students and staff in basic skills, so the whole school learns together." 

Think about how much your students already know and can do with technology and what they might teach you and your colleagues. From a parent perspective, I also imagine my own son would thrive on a student tech team if offered the opportunity.

Another hack I really like is the Track Record for recording specific objective observations about student behavior. I especially appreciate the focus on recording positive behavior. For example, if a student has problems with being tardy, record how many times she/he is on-time in a week, instead of how many times the student is late. The idea is if the system is put into place with good intentions and is managed well, it's likely to reduce behavior problems. 

Finally, I must mention the Book Nook, and though this idea is not necessarily novel, the idea that the books are gifts, not loaners, is new to me. This minor difference is almost magical, especially for students who don't have many books in their homes. The idea is also simple, easy to implement and focused on building a culture of readers in a school. 

"For every person who sniffs that an idea is "nothing new," there are ten more who have never heard of it. It's the variations, the iterations, that can make an old idea fresh again."

The word hack belongs because the concept is on improving education through a process of multiple iterations and scaling change. I certainly look forward to reading other books in this series. How about you--have you read any of the books in the Hack Learning series? 

Sunday Salon: What I Read Online September 1-7

Homework practices

In this post Jason Bodnar talks about three types of homework and which one to avoid.

As a parent and an educator, I related well to this post by Donalyn Miller where she argues for more meaningful assignments and reading practices in language arts classes.

A Quebec elementary school is giving its students a year off from homework.

Teaching and Learning

Ashley Hurley, one of my Achieve EQuIP colleagues blogged about the ABCs of giving feedback to peers when they design lessons when she blogged for The Teaching Channel.

I, too, had the opportunity to blog for The Teaching Channel. It was a fabulous experience and opportunity to share ideas about how to calibrate on a rubric.

This excellent blog post by the National Paideia Center argues for more doing and less lecturing in our classrooms. I'm a huge advocate for the Paideia approach and like to use it in my class with pre-service students just as I did in my high school classroom previously. 

Lillie Marshall writes about effective uses for social media in teaching.

Sherri McPherson shares digital tools for providing feedback on student writing.

Sandy Merz deconstructs a teacher leadership cliche. My favorite line from this post is "like most clichés, this one intends to stop thought rather than deepen it. To deepen thought one needs to probe challenging views rather than dismiss them."

Science and Math

Patrick Goff reflects honestly in this post about questioning and modeling in his middle school classroom.

Both Patrick and Tricia Shelton are leading science educators in Kentucky, and they are involved in national conversations about the new Next Generation Science Standards. In this post, Tricia encourages others to blog about their NGSS implementation and learning.

I appreciate this math 101 reading list for life-long learners, and I added a few titles to my to-read shelf in Goodreads.

Kelly Stidham shares innovative tools for implementing new math standards.

 Other topics of importance to me

Walking! Since I still can't walk, and my body and mind are begging for it, I enjoyed reading this article "Walking Helps Us Think" and dreaming about a day coming soon when I'll be able to walk normally again.

 With sadness, I continue to watch the events happening in the Middle East. This post by Sarah Shroud offers thoughtful commentary.

Don't resist looking at these 52 Powerful Photos of Women Who Changed History Forever

Will all the National Board Certified Teachers in the Room Please Stand?

Sandwiched between big name leaders such as Secretary Arne Duncan and North Carolina's former Governor Hunt were delightful speeches from former National Board Certified physical education teacher--Barbara Kelly, and Susan Hopgood, President of Education International.  Delightful speeches by these women brought inspiration amidst political and controversial conversations that  take much of the stage in the follow up blogs and news articles about the Teaching and Learning Conference last week in Washington, D.C..

With tears rimming my eye lids, I listened intently as Barbara Kelly shared a story about a recent tennis match where her tennis partner asked her to come to net because they were about to lose if she didn't step out of her comfort zone and approach the net. She spoke of the early years of the National Board for Professional Teaching Standards where at meetings they regularly asked all NBCTs to stand, and then she asked us all to stand if we were NBCTs.  Hundreds of teachers stood and were then encouraged by Kelly to step forward as teacher leaders and raise our voices to make an impact on education in our country.  Barbara Kelly was honored with the James A. Kelly (no relation to Barbara) Award for demonstrating clear, consistent and convincing evidence of her ability to foster the legacy of accomplished teaching.

Just when I thought my tears would dry up and I could move on to listening to the politicians speak of education reform in our country, Susan Hopgood from Educational International approached the podium to speak.  Her comments about gender equality struck a chord with me given my study and efforts over the past year.  Her call for a global campaign around more just, peaceful, and tolerant societies to set the stage for education goals around the world appealed to my interests as well.  In America, it's easy to get lost in our own world of education reform and to forget about the millions of women and girls around the world who have no access to education.  When we consider the statistics, we realize we must do something at this critical time for the world to make decisions that will affect children for many years to come.

"Together we can make a difference for the education of girls around the world" 

                                                                        ~~Susan Hopgood

Hopgood's organization believes teachers are at the heart of education, so it was fitting that she spoke to thousands of teachers because quality education for all cannot be attained without investment in teachers.

Children from Lexington perform in event planned by Mahika

Because her short speech was so inspiring on day one, I selected to attend another session where Hopgood served on a panel day two.  In this session on Lessons Learned from High Performing Countries, Susan Hopgood, Pasi Sahlberg Mary Cathryn Ricker, and Dan Montgomery talked about the lessons we should learn from other countries.  Sahlberg suggested instead of comparing our PISA test results from country to country like a competition or beauty pageant, we should dig deeper into the patterns and trends of our own systems. 

 One of the biggest differences between America and other countries is that many other countries hold teachers in higher regard than we do here, and if you have been reading my blog since I started it, you will recall that one of the reasons I left the classroom was because I was tired of the lack of respect for the profession.

 A lack of respect was not obvious at the Teaching and Learning Conference.  In fact, quite the opposite.  Over and over there was a celebration of teaching and learning by everyone, and there was special recognition for all National Board Certified Teachers, especially when Barbara Kelly asked us all to stand.

Where Knowledge Meets Inspiration: Learning & Networking at the T & L Conference

Where Knowledge Meets Inspiration-a germane tag line for the 2014 Teaching and Learning Conference in Washington, D.C. last week given the inspiring and informational sessions offered. As a National Board Certified Teacher, it was incredible to be surrounded by two thousand other knowledgeable and inspirational education professionals at the Walter E. Washington Convention Center.  

Though my flight was delayed and I missed a pre-conference workshop at the National Geographic Society, I wasted no time connecting with fellow educators via Twitter for a dinner at Pi Pizzeria for a day early celebration of Pi Day.  Our conversations ranged from discussing our own NB

certification process to our own children and families at home holding down the fort while we were off to our Nation's Capital to learn with and from fellow educators.  Before leaving the restaurant, we had each mapped out the next day and shared our plans with one another.

On Friday morning, a friend and I met up with the Director of NBCT from Kentucky's Education Professional Standards Board (EPSB) to attend a session about the SEED (Supporting Educator Effectiveness Development) grant of which Kentucky is a part.  In this 8:30 am informational session, we learned about work taking place over the next three years to transform systems of support for encouraging more NBCT candidates in high-needs schools.  We also learned about the redesign of the NBCT process, including a total revamping of the assessment center part of certification and a redesign of the portfolio entries, with the primary change being an opportunity to complete only one or two components per year over two years rather than squeezing the entire NBCT certification process into a single year.  With this, new NBCT candidates will be able to spread out the hefty payments for certification as well.  All told, a very practical session focused on not only logistics and what needs to happen but on why we need to make these changes--a more intense focus on the 5 Core Propositions.  The new process also allows candidates to reflect thoughtfully and maintain high levels of teaching during the certification year.  An additional session on the SEED grant and Instructional Leadership later in the day brought occasion to learn more about how we can encourage and support more NBCTs as teacher leaders in our respective states.

The Plenary Session with Bill Gates was by far the most popular session of the day, with people lining up to gain entrance an hour before the doors to the ballroom opened and security checking tags for everyone who entered.  His speech focused on encouraging us to remain steadfast with the Common Core State Standards.  He mentioned our great state of Kentucky when citing examples of effective CCSS implementation because we all know poor implementation and too much focus on standardized tests are what's causing much of the recent backlash against the Common Core.  Following his speech, Gates was joined on stage by George Stephanopoulos who asked questions previously submitted by teachers, allowing a response from Gates.


A few of my favorite quotes from Bill Gates on 3.14.14

"...I'm not politically sophisticated, so I made the assumption people opposing them would have actually read the standards..."

"...the Common Core State Standards give every child an equal chance..."

"...handing out a worksheet will not be seen as a way to provide homework..."

"...I hope people are willing to read long books..."

Each of these quotes is significant to me because they speak to many of the topics I address in my own blog as well as to philosophies of teaching and learning I appreciate, so I linked each quote to a previous blog post I've written on a similar topic.

Our day ended with another plenary session, this one with Secretary of Education Arne Duncan.  Again, a Kentucky reference.  Secretary Duncan referenced a Kentucky teacher who divides his time between teaching and providing professional development.

We also learned more information about new initiatives such as Teach to Lead and T3 (teachers leading efforts in turnaround schools!).  This project enticed me given that I've taught in low performing schools and know that the test prep mentality often employed only brings temporary success at most, and it does nothing for real learning and engaging students toward the futures they deserve and desire.

Debriefing the day over Indian food and beverage with a teacher friend included conversations about our experiences with the Common Core, travels with students to foreign countries, and family life, all in the name of keeping ourselves healthy and balanced individuals, something teachers often need reminders to do.

**Stay tuned for another post on the conference because there was too much to say in just one post**

My Teacher Preparation Program Didn't Teach Me Everything

"Are you sure you want to teach there--you should know they haven't had a teacher in months, only subs, and they've been turning over desks and not doing anything all semester."  Such was the comment uttered to me when I accepted my first high school teaching position.  "Absolutely" was my response.  I felt confident and prepared but also aware that I still had a lot to learn.

Teacher preparation has been on my mind for a few months.  Perhaps because a report this summer indicated many programs "have become an industry of mediocrity, churning out first-year teachers with classroom management skills and content knowledge inadequate to thrive in classrooms with ever-increasing ethnic and socioeconomic student diversity."  Perhaps because I taught a pre-service eight week course at the local university and will teach another course in the spring.  Perhaps because my state was one of seven selected for a new pilot program to transform teacher education.

 The teacher preparation program I completed 15 years ago did prepare me to enter the classroom, but it didn't teach me everything, nor could it have.  The most important thing I learned was the value of reflective and thoughtful practice.  Sure I learned theory (mostly constructivism) and pedagogy, but I also learned that I wouldn't know everything.  By situating myself as a life-long learner and accepting my responsibility to have a student centered classroom, I was well on my way to preparing my students to be thinkers and responsible community members who would be ready for life in the present as well as life beyond high school (the term college and career readiness had not yet been coined, even though the ideas behind CCR have been around for decades).

Pre-service teachers have an obligation, too.  It's not just the university or college that's responsible for their preparation.  You get as much out of a program as you're willing to put in, and if you are willing to be persistent, flexible, reflective, and student centered, you are more likely to possess the dispositions necessary in the teaching profession. 

Now don't get me wrong, possessing the dispositions to be an effective teacher is not all that's needed. In addition to teacher dispositions, I also needed to know how to listen to my students, how to have a classroom wherein my students helped create the classroom rules and helped to determine what we would learn, and how to adjust learning based on the individual needs of my students.

No, it (teaching) was never easy but I didn't expect it to be easy.  I expected, however, to be treated as a professional who was willing to learn and grow.   Sadly, that wasn't so much the case when I was in the high school classroom, and often still isn't the case for many teachers in America. 

What about you--did your teacher preparation prepare you to enter the profession? If you are a classroom teacher or were a classroom teacher--are you treated as a professional?

Six Tips for Facilitating Workgroups

People assume educators know how to facilitate teacher teams or workgroups with other adults, but my experience tells me we all have something to learn about facilitating work with our adult peers.


1)  Listen.  Just like students tell us when we are not reaching them, our adult peers let us know when a workgroup or team is not functioning effectively.  If we listen and respond to the needs of the group, we are more likely to accomplish our goals.  This might mean we have to adjust our own style and approach to meet the needs of the team/work group we are facilitating.  This doesn't mean we are losing track of who we are as an individual, but it does mean we are creating an environment conducive to learning and achieving our common goals.

2)  Set Goals.  We establish objectives and goals in classrooms, right?  We should also establish goals for how teams working together.  The goals should be established as a team and posted with the norms for the group.

3)  Establish Norms.  This one was hard for me to understand when I first started facilitating groups because I'm of the mind that everyone should just be nice and play fair!  Experience has shown me norms help ensure a team functions effectively toward

Mount St. Helen's 2013

achieving the stated goals.  (Sports teams have rules and procedures for a similar reason, right?  And, what about emergency teams who deal with volcanoes erupting?  They have protocols, too.  Side Note:  In 1980 when Mount St. Helen's erupted, protocols and procedures were what ensured rescue workers could save lives)  When groups are learning to work together, some even need to have the norms posted on the wall with protocols for what to do if someone in the group is not adhering to a norm.

4)  Use Protocols.  Speaking of emergency management teams, in education--we could learn from protocols that provide step-by-step approaches to a particular aspect of the work.  For example, teachers have become accustomed to using protocols for examining

student work.  Protocols can also be used for designing units of study or for sharing ideas.  Depending upon a particular group, more formal or less formal protocols might be needed.  It's a good idea to have a few protocols ready when facilitating a group anyway (e.g., a tuning protocol is almost essential).

5)  Reflect.  Educators who facilitate PD or other workgroup events are usually pretty good about distributing evaluations at the end of the day or end of the session, but how often do we debrief and reflect together following those individual reflection minutes?  Reflecting in a debriefing sort of format allows the good, the bad, and the ugly to be addressed immediately with decisions made as a group about how to change the working session for the next time. 

6)  Revise.  Educators are queens and kings of revision.  It's what we do in our quest to ensure learning meets the needs of students.  As a facilitator we must also think about learning from the reflection and debriefing time and revising.  Sometimes we can't wait until the end of a session--(just like we can't always wait until the end of a class period) some situations call for immediate revision.  This will be facilitated more naturally if we are following the first tip on this list--listening.

What do you think?  What am I missing from this list of tips for facilitation?  Do you have any resources to add to my list of favorites below?

Some of my favorite resources on facilitation and/or protocols.

Coalition of Essential Schools.
http://www.essentialschools.org/resources/250

All Things PLC
http://www.allthingsplc.info/

Introducing Principals to the Literacy Design Collaborative

This week I had my first opportunity to meet all the middle and high school principals in our district.  As the primary point of contact for a major literacy grant, it was important for these administrators to know who I am, and more importantly, to know about the ongoing professional learning experiences we are facilitating for their teachers.  Since we believe in modeling best practice, my colleagues and I decided to stage an argument about the content the principals would learn (In this situation, the content happened to be writing instruction and impact of writing programs in schools).  The argument was designed to set the context and engage the learners/readers in two articles with opposing view-points.  

I’m really happy to be back in the district working closely with teachers and schools, and for the most part it’s going well.  However, I do have one little issue.  My colleague and I don’t agree on the appropriate approach for writing instruction, so we need your help.  We are going to give you two different articles and ask you to help us decide an answer to this question—is it necessary to omit personal connection to produce good writing?  I don’t think it’s necessary to do so, but my colleague does.  Will you help us settle this argument by gleaning evidence from two texts?

My science colleague distributed The Writing Revolution, and I distributed In Defense of Freedom Writers but only after I talked about the power Manuel Scott’s presentation had on me a couple of weeks ago.   Then we gave each administrator a few text dependent questions to accompany both articles, set a timer for 20 minutes and then paced, re-read and watched as a room full of principals and associate principals read the two articles with their pens in hand.  Following the reading of the two articles, our social studies colleague continued the staged argument by telling the principals she didn’t agree with either of us—she was in the middle.  She then facilitated a fish bowl discussion to engage the principals in conversation around the two points of view conveyed in the two articles.  She charted ideas and the principals on the outside of the fishbowl recorded additional thoughts on sticky notes when it wasn’t their turn to talk.  A few struggled to keep quiet when they were on the outside of the fish bowl because they felt so strongly about what they had read.

These are the same conditions teachers are creating as they introduce a Literacy Design Collaborative (LDC) task to students in science, social studies and English Language Arts.   Before we went into the rest of our presentation on LDC, we told the principals the argument had been staged, and they got it.  They understood we had set the context for learning more about the content.  Teachers in our district, across many districts in Kentucky, and in several other states in the United States are utilizing the LDC tools to implement the Common Core State Standards for Literacy in History/Social Studies, Science, and Technical subjects.

We are using LDC because we see the importance of engaging students in meaningful and authentic reading and writing opportunities in every discipline.  Think about the response above--A few struggled to keep quiet when they were on the outside of the fish bowl because they felt so strongly about what they had read.   Exactly.  Imagine this happening in classrooms full of excited and engaged adolescents!

If you’ve been reading my blog for any length of time, you will know this is exactly why I left the state department to be closer to schools, closer to the teaching and learning that will make a difference in the lives of students.

Starting a New Year and a New Semester

Today was the first day of a new semester for the students in our local public school district.  My two boys (5th and 3rd grades) ambled out the door this morning, weary from a short winter break filled with family, fun, and festivities.   As a teacher, there was always work do be done during holiday breaks, and still, in my current position, there was work to be done amid the flurry of fun and festivities.  I felt a twinge of sadness for not being in a classroom with a room full of students today because I love (and I mean it) love teaching and learning; one of my passions in education is learning and inspiring others to learn.  That's why I spent over a decade in the classroom working with students grades 5-12 teaching students English language arts, arts and humanities, and even a semester of earth science. 

 My current position in education is with a state department, so I have the opportunity to work with teachers, meet new people, and be a small part of some decisions made about public education in our state.  It's not all glorious, that's for sure.  In fact, I often have to be reminded by friends (including one who called me earlier today) about the importance of work beyond the classroom. 

A goal I set for myself this year was to start a blog on the art of teaching; this blog will encapsulate my musings, readings, and conversations about teaching and learning.  I felt inspired to start blogging on the first day of a new semester for a number of reasons:

1)  I decided to stop waiting for everything to be "perfect" before starting a blog on teaching and learning.  (After all-since I consider myself a lifelong learner, shouldn't this initial blog be more about my process of learning to muse?)

2)  I needed a place to reflect on what I missed about the first day of a new semester. (students excited, talkative, and full of energy from their break)

3)  I reflected on a recent twitter post by Kylene Beers who said “Teaching is not a cause; it is a calling. If you're entering the profession for 3 yrs of being a good volunteer, don't”.  (I like to think I care first about the calling to teach.)

4)  I needed to think about why what I do now matters.  (I've often been accused of taking my job too personally--probably true--but doing things right in public education matters to me on a professional and personal basis.)

So, if you return to my blog regularly, you will learn more about why lifelong learning and teaching are important to me personally and professionally, and you will hopefully feel inspired to make a difference in public education.

Happy New Year!

Renee

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