One step at a time

I have been thinking a lot about professional learning lately. Changes in my role, the expansion of my PLN and unique collaborative opportunities have all contributed to this thinking. Professional learning has always been critical to who I am as a teacher, I value the opportunities for collaboration, challenge and growth as a teacher and a person that come from being an active participant in professional learning.  Recently moving from classroom teacher to school leader has meant I am much more aware of my responsibility for our school’s collective effectiveness.

In the Australian Charter for the Professional Learning of Teachers and School Leaders from AITSL (Australian Institute for Teaching and School Leadership), the stated aim is to “change the professional practice in ways that improve the learning, engagement and wellbeing of every student in Australia.” An essential part of this is reframing professional learning in schools for maximum impact and sustainable change.

As a teacher of many years experience, I have no doubt that teachers DO want to take responsibility for and be actively engaged in professional learning.

As a school leader, I know how essential it is that we engage in and model effective professional learning and empower teachers in the building of a learning and development culture in schools and system wide.

I couldn’t agree more that professional learning needs to be relevant, collaborative and future focused.

I know from experience that professional learning between the hours of 3.45 and 5.00 is not necessarily the most successful option. I firmly believe that all teachers really do want to improve their practice and student learning outcomes – we just need to find the time, place, method, group, learning opportunity  … that works for each individual.

My big questions are …

SO ….. Professional learning

share an experience that worked for you or in your school.

I was privileged today to have the opportunity today to participate in a PLN (Professional Learning Network) workshop at the SLV. It promised to be a ‘challenging and interesting exploration of social media and the role of networks in changing education systems’  exploring our ideas around collaboration, networking and education systems. And that it was.

I came away asking more questions than I have answers for. That seems to be the story of my life – I can explain why I don’t like the status quo, why I want to be part of the change, why I want to be the grade four girl at the top of the ski run – but I still struggle with what the alternative looks like, sounds like and feels like.

As someone who has been in education as a learner and teacher since the BC (before computers) era I am continually exploring and challenging the ‘way I learn’ and the ‘who I am as a teacher’. There are many aspects of social media and networking that I still find challenging, yet upon reflection they are often the same things that I find challenging in real life. I thrive on listening (lurking), being part of other’s conversations, I love the challenges to my thinking, the new ideas, or old ideas with a new perspective but I continually struggle with the best way to articulate my thinking. I don’t want to be the person that takes and doesn’t give – but I am still working out what I have to give. Because all I seem to have is questions and not answers.

We joke in our family about my husbands propensity to be a ‘problem solver’. He was much happier when he finally decided that our youngest daughter was not a whinger – she was just stating facts. Therefore he no longer felt that he needed to solve her problems. 

This is how I have been feeling – that to be a networker I needed to be a problem solver, contribute answers, solutions and actions. My new thinking is that being a networker and a collaborator is not about having the answers, it is about ‘stating the facts’, about asking the questions. It is about the communication, the collaboration, the critical thinking and the networking as we explore our thinking. Is that where the answers come from?

I used to think …. that I had to have the answers, now I think … that the answers come from the power of the connections and the networks. And that the answers simply create more questions.

So what does this mean for ME …………

It means that I have to trust that what I have to say adds value to the network, it means that I have to tweet the thoughts in my head – because they have no traction if I don’t share them, it means I have to take risks online and it means I have to stop over thinking my half-formed tweets and just send them. It means I have to tip my skis over the edge and let them run …………………………..

Footnote : This blog has been my opportunity to reflect and explore who I was becoming as a learner/teacher  - a change of school, a change of role has been all consuming – it is time to start reflecting again.

This story is only a beginning, not an end

Visit #motm12 to find out more

STRANDED
72 student, 3 teachers and 2 support staff make up our learning community this year. Only the 19 Grade 6 students had worked with us last year. We have 39 grade 5 and 14 grade 4 students.

Our plan was to run a couple of challenge days (whole unit, all day challenges) early in the year. Our challenge days have varied educational purposes mostly centred around student learning. However I have to confess that the two we are running at the start of the year day had the ulterior motive of releasing one of us to undertake assessment.

I happened to see a tweet last week from @Steve_Collis which led me to his blog post, The Most Audacious ‘Class’ I’ve Ever Seen, about a day he had witnessed at NBCS. At the time I was excited by the possibilities, but knew that with our mix of students and the fact that very few had worked in this environment previously it had the potential to be a challenging and maybe even disastrous day. But this year our mantra is “Be brave”.

So we did we decide to let our student’s loose with minimal teacher support and minimal direction in a format they were not used to. It certainly wasn’t because it looked like a fun thing to do, but because we actually wanted to find out about our students. Who were leaders, who could self manage, who displayed independence, persistence, problem solving skills, who could work collaboratively, who took responsibility for achieving group goals, who knew what it meant to work as part of a team and who was so far out of their comfort zone they couldn’t cope.

We learnt a lot about our students, a lot about our planning and have some very clear goals for student learning needs as we travel down the collaborative/challenge/problem based learning path.

What did we learn?
• We have a lot of work to do
• You cannot assume … when you ask teams to do a team building activity to get to know each other better, just after they have discovered they are stranded on an island, of course they are going to BUILD something
• Our students do not read written instructions very well – anything after about the first 10 words is not important – does that mean we have to change how we present information or guide them to be better readers of instructions or both?
• SO much about SO many of our students
• Not everyone thought it was great (one Grade 6 girl was heard to say – “if they think this is going to make us step up …..”)
• Everyone who is challenged, uncomfortable and confused reacts differently
• We have some amazing students
• Even big kids love the opportunity to build cubbies, boats and anything else they could think of

The panel discussion and debrief with the students after the event was a powerful experience. The opportunity to discuss their reactions when they arrived at school, what they did first, what their group did first, who were the leaders, what they would do differently next time was invaluable. The thoughtfulness and honesty of their responses was the first step to building a strong cohesive learning community

We asked our students what they thought the purpose of Stranded (Challenge day) was, their responses covered it all:
• Getting to know people
• Creativity
• Teamwork
• Teachers can observe us
• Collaboration
• Fun
• Working independently
• Communication

In the words of one of our students …. “My brain wasn’t working to its full ability when I was working in my group. I think this was because I didn’t know what to do some of the time and I was confused. I think if I do this kind of activity again I will be more calm and let my brain think properly. I have practised how to handle situations where things don’t go my way and I have practised working in a group and communicating with everyone. Overall it was fun, but it was a bit uncomfortable for me.”

Next week’s challenge day could be big – what are we doing? Don’t know yet, hoping for another twitter inspiration. But whatever it is – we have a very clear purpose. That is to build on the discussions around effective collaboration that we started with our students this week and facilitate opportunities for them to collaborate, next comes problem solving, decision making, creating, innovating and the list goes on.

Here is our moment to shine, 3 schools, 100 students, song and choreography shared online …. what a day.

I can remember attending the first F2F day and being somewhat daunted by the faces in the crowd. Educators I had admired from afar through my slowly developing PLN. The fact that my reason for taking on the challenge of PLP was because I wanted to ‘go global’, only added to my fear. These were educators that had taken that step and seemed so comfortable online. I wanted to step over that edge and open up opportunities for online learning for myself and my students.

PLPConnectU was the catalyst that gave me the opportunity to clarify thoughts around teaching and learning and bring together concepts I had been struggling to make sense of over recent years. I have been teaching for a very long time but the last few years have seen the greatest changes for me as an educator.

These are my musings as I try to make sense of the powerful learning that took place for me as part of this experience.

Sometimes my first choice is not necessarily the best

In the beginning, I remember contributing many ideas for PLP projects, had a few possible directions in my head, and then …..

I was away with no Internet contact the week the project ideas hit the wiki. This meant none of my first choices were still available. I have to admit I was bothered by this.

But everything happens for a reason. And the group I joined, the environment team ended up being pretty close to perfect. Perfect for me, because it was exactly what I needed. Teachers who also wanted the challenge of collaborating on line, teachers who wanted to get things happening, teachers who challenged thinking, who were good at articulating ideas and a coach who just seemed to provide exactly what we needed.

Remember to look upon every challenge as an opportunity to grow and learn

I can give up total control

I am a control freak, I used to spend hours planning lessons that ‘hit the mark’, achieved my purpose, delivered content in exciting, interesting ways, that engaged my students. Now I spend hours learning, exploring and working out how to give that control back to the students and still know where they are at with their learning, where they need to go next and what I can provide to support them.

This PLP journey has been the impetus to bring together many ideas that have been bubbling around in my head for a while. The elluminate sessions, the ning, the challenges to my thinking, the opportunity to question what I do all contributed to clarifying and changing my thinking around a number of education issues. Mainly that I should not, will not and do not control other people’s learning. However I can provide support, challenges, ideas, tools, knowledge, information, guidance and direction when needed and when asked.

We should each OWN our own learning and be responsible for the direction we take.

Learning is messy, challenging, uncomfortable and glorious

The uncertainty for me of no clear plans, structures or directions when we started PLP created very uncomfortable feelings. How would we know if we were getting it right? Who would decide what was going to happen? How would we know what to do? Being asked to work with a group of people I didn’t know or wouldn’t necessarily choose to work with was challenging. Yet I often ask this of my students.

It was messy, but as our team navigated our way through the mess, started to know each other, shared our goals and our skills, discussed, negotiated and challenged we could see the value of the process for us as learners. So much so we used the same process for our students. They too experienced much from that messy, uncomfortable not knowing what to do feeling and also got to know each other, shared goals and skills, discussed, negotiated and challenged each other, learnt the importance of clear and precise communication, found out you can never assume and walked away at the end with varying degrees of success.

How glorious to stand at Federation Square on Thursday as we prepared for our Flashmob and watch our student’s work on the big screen, the faces of our students as they saw themselves, each other and our schools up there for all the world to see. How glorious to listen to the buzz, hear the anticipation and feel the excitement as they waited for the signal that it was their time to shine. And then to reflect on the speed with which it was all over and the memories that would last for much longer.

For real learning to happen it has to be messy, challenging, uncomfortable and glorious

Failure is an option

I want to shout this from the rooftops and write it in large, bold, capital letters. This has been my biggest shift and my greatest challenge. For students, teachers, anyone to learn we have to be allowed to fail, to make mistakes, to not get things right, to not get things done, to do nothing, to change our mind, to change our goal and to get it wrong. If we don’t fail, we don’t learn to problem solve, to ask why, fight to succeed and to value success.

Learning is the trips, stumbles and falls on the journey not the arrival at the destination

Student voice is powerful

Another big mind shift has been opening up our planning to student voice. I realised if I was serious about students taking ownership of their learning, they had to have opportunities to be involved in planning for their learning.

I have had to do some deep thinking about what does it mean to plan with the ‘end in mind’. The end for me had usually been some predetermined task and/or creation that every student worked towards achieving. I hope for my future student’s sake I never fall in to that trap again. The end has become … what we (students and teachers) want to know and do and we should decide together how to get there.

We still haven’t got it right all the time but involving the students in term planning is a start. Working together to explore VELS, working out what that means, asking students how they want to learn, expecting them to be responsible for that, setting goals and success criteria together has led to many successes and some failures.

Our most powerful learning is coming from the failures and the endless questions we are asking ourselves. How do we support all students to be independent in their learning? Does it take longer for some students to take on responsibility for their learning, their failures and successes? Do we allow students enough time to succeed before we step in? How do we measure success? How do we maintain accountability? How do we cover the curriculum? What is essential learning?

We are educating for an uncertain future – but what is certain – is it is not the past

So to the environment team, I thank you for being an inspired group of hard working, passionate educators. We did good!

• 2 teachers
• 22 students + netbooks
• 2 data projectors
• 2 laptops
• Term 3 plans – sorted

One of those days …. you sit back and think WOW, this is what learning should be about!

At our school each teaching unit traditionally has a planning day to prepare for the next term. A few weeks ago my teaching partner and I decided if we wanted our students to take responsibility for their learning they needed to be part of planning day

Today was the day … about half our 5/6 students took up the invitation to attend, some reluctantly. We had made a decision that our school leaders (house captains) should participate. We had an incredibly representative group of students choose to join us. Should we have expected them all to attend? Maybe ….. but given that we weren’t sure how the day would go, we wanted the students that were there to be committed and enthusiastic. Will more students opt to be part of it next time? I would hope so. We started small – planned Integrated Studies and Writing.

What came out of the day ….

• the value of using Back Channel to add to discussions and give a voice to all students ..Class planning Today’s Meet
• students working together to understand VELS
• our Integrated Studies goal for next term …… to understand how we affect the environment and what we can do about it
• a range of ideas as to how we can achieve those goals
• a recognition of the importance of providing choices in task and options for working styles and that one student’s challenge is not necessarily another’s
• the importance of supporting students to build knowledge but recognising that they like to do that in different ways  (some want instruction, other’s like to explore for themselves
• a Term 3 ‘writer’s festival … comedy, film & story’  -  the discussion that led to this idea was a perfect example of not settling for your first thought.
• a very animated and sometimes heated discussion on homework – that is still to be resolved
• a sense of excitement and anticipation about next term
• the level of student involvement – everyone’s willingness to contribute
• student’s ability to rise to the occasion

 My favourite comments for the day …..

 ”We want to do something the teachers haven’t done before so we are all learning together”

“I have been waiting all year for something like this to happen”

“The people that don’t do homework shouldn’t get consequences because missing out on the things that we do and learn sort of is a consequence”

The planning is messy, the documentation is not formalised, but the ideas and understanding of where we are heading is clear. Will we do it again – absolutely.

Report writing time is always a time to groan, complain about your loss of weekends, eat copious amounts of chocolate and lollies and CREATE. I find the process of writing reports and reflecting on student learning seems to provide a level of insight that promotes new thinking. Though I do wonder sometimes if the new thinking comes from overdosing on chocolate.

This weekend whilst writing reports and thinking about where we are heading for term three – the big question came to me. Why are we doing the planning, why aren’t we asking the students what they think we should be learning?

I gave this concept some more thought – (anything to avoid writing another report) and sent an e-mail off to my teaching colleague asking what he thought.

The answer came back – great idea, let’s give it a go.

So in the last week of term when the teachers in each area of the school are released for a day to plan together, we are actually going to work with our students to plan the term three curriculum program.

How many students will choose to be involved? – we don’t know yet

What will it look like? – we are not sure yet

How will it go? – we have no idea

What we do know ……

• We want our students to own their learning – how can you own your learning if you are not responsible for it.
• We want our students to be engaged – how can you be engaged if someone else makes all the decisions
• We want our students to know how it feels to make mistakes, be uncomfortable and not be in control – therefore we need to put ourselves in the same situation
• We want our students to take risks and be challenged – fair enough that we do the same

In the last week of this term we will break out the VELS writing curriculum documents, the school two year Integrated Studies planner and work with our students to plan the direction for writing and our environment studies for term three.

Why not all curriculum areas – because we are not ready to throw away the floaties yet.

‘Small steps’

Having just spent 3 days on camp with our grade 5/6 students, I had lots of opportunties for reflection of a different sort as I watched our students collaborate, communicate, create and challenge themselves and each other all in the great outdoors.

As I watched & listened:

• the Grade 6 boys persist at the rock climbing wall because the only one to achieve initial success was the smallest Grade 5 girl
• students spending hours (minutes) together investigating seaweed on the beach, working together to dig holes and build sand castles, create their own rules for beach soccer, stand at the water’s edge and have in depth discussions about the waves 
• students challenge themselves to perform in front of the group, engage in theatre sports, sing with joy around the campfire
• students celebrate their successes and the physical and mental challenges they overcame

I wondered …. how do we get more of that in our learning back at school.

How can we make sure we set up the same opportunities for our students to …… investigate areas of interest, explore ideas in depth, challenge themselves to achieve beyond expectation, encourage and support each other in risk taking. How do we bring the camp into the classroom?

We (my teaching partner and I) are already exploring many of these questions - but we can do it better. 

I am currently participating in PLPConnectU, one of our group members asked the  question “I wonder how long it will take for us to realise that students no longer need teachers, but rather they need leaders and guides in building their resilience, knowledge and skills to embrace life of tomorrow?” This question really resonates with me – yes they do need leaders and guides (this is a  role I played so much more effectively on camp)

So in the midst of report writing, assessment, student led conferences …. we will be thinking about how can we be leaders and guides. What do we need to do differently? How can we provide an environment that promotes challenge, risk taking and learning? 

I wonder what would happen if next term we ask our students what they need to learn? And then we supported them to learn it? No naplan, no testing, no reporting – the perfect term to jump off the deep end and see what happens. Might just need to invest in a good pair of floaties.