Top 10 Tips for Leading in a Crisis

This past week an episode from the Innovator’s Mindset podcast came out that I was privileged to be a part of. The interview was from the very beginning of Illinois’ Stay at Home order that resulted in our school buildings shutting down and switching to remote learning. Listening to it has been a wonderful reflection tool for leading and learning during a crisis. Although almost six weeks later the themes we discussed still ring true, there is definitely more that I have learned in this journey.

Below are my greatest takeaways thus far.

1. Continue to Focus on Relationships

This is truly the most important thing that we can do at any time, as leaders and as human beings. Whether by email, text, phone call, virtual meeting or letter in the mail, find a way to regularly check on your staff and families solely for the purpose of seeing how they are doing. Like George said in the podcast, this includes everyone. People who you may think are completely fine may not be. See if they need anything and just have a friendly conversation. I have sincerely appreciated staff members who have reached out to me as well. One of my teachers sends me funny memes and pictures on a regular basis. I look forward to them so much! They’ve helped really bad days when there’s a lot going on turn into manageable ones. Social distancing may mean that we can’t be physically close, but shouldn’t mean that we distance ourselves from continuing meaningful relationships.

2. Take Care of Yourself

You’ve probably heard this many times, but you can’t pour from an empty cup. I know it’s hard. I’m in 8 million virtual meetings on a daily basis myself while trying to balance with family responsibilities it can feel impossible to find the time, but you’ll be better if you do.

At the beginning of this I thought I could do it all. I went about two weeks at full throttle and almost completely lost it by day 15. My usual positivity was really forced. It was hard to think and I don’t know that I was making the best judgment calls. I had to change something fast.

For me, the taking care of myself ended up being a change in routine. Monotony is my worst nightmare and I was trapped in a cycle of just that. I started walking outside during some of my meetings. I picked up coffee at a local coffee shop a few days a week for a treat. I gave myself permission to not be busy every minute of every day and to sometimes just sit. I started working on things outside of school that fed my creative soul. It all made a huge difference and I am sincerely a better leader and human because of it. Please, please, please take time for yourself each day. You’ll actually get more done in the end and be happier doing it.

3. Continue to Connect with the Community

Connecting with families is such an important part of leadership in any time, but when we don’t have the four walls of daily interaction to keep us all connected, it’s imperative that we find new ways to do so. As an anchor of the community, supporting teachers, students and families will only make us stronger in a time of crisis. Because there isn’t physical connection, regular facetime is imperative. Look for ways to provide structure and routine that mirror what was happening before while also bringing in new and innovative ways that capitalize being at home.

At Jefferson, this connection has included:

A daily morning message that is a hybrid of home and school. I start the announcements celebrating birthdays each day, acting as the host. The rest of the announcements is run by student contributions such as leading the pledge, sharing a talent, a challenge for other students, a wondering or even an example of some family fun. It has been wonderful getting to see students show off talents that we might not have seen at school like acrobatics on a trampoline or cooking demos. Today’s announcements included our PTA president and his two sons playing a rock version of the Star Wars Thrown Room Song. I always close it with some encouraging words of positivity for the kids and/or parents.
Both staff and student bedtime story read-alouds that come out at 3:00 p.m. on our YouTube Channel.
Opportunities to connect virtually both synchronously and asynchronously through GoogleMeet, Zoom, FlipGrid Challenges, Instagram and Seesaw posts. Every Friday in May I meet with groups of 5th graders to catch up and talk about their thoughts about going to Middle School.
Spirit Week and last week of school activities developed by our Student Council that include a whole school virtual picnic and Field Day.
Social Media posts about what our students have been up to while they have been at home as well as individual daily posts celebrating our graduating class of 5th graders.
Staff collaboration videos sent to our families sharing how much we appreciate and miss them as well as what we’ve been up to at home.

Make sure that the sharing is not just one way. Look for ways to incorporate families as well as staff in the community connection.

4. Consistent Focus & Messaging

Since the beginning of this crisis, we have focused on two major things: Connecting with kids and consistent communication. Although there have been some shifts as to what this looks like as we continue to gain experience in the virtual world of learning, our focus continues to be the same. I continue to reinforce this during team meetings, emails, 1:1 conversations as well as in my weekly Friday newsletter to staff and to families. Feedback from our families has been incredibly positive in the area of both communication and connection as a result.

We have had some shifts from our district office throughout the time we have been at home related to various aspects of operations, grading and planning. When these occur, I’ve found that significant changes are best communicated in a whole group virtual meeting (actually recommended to me by one of my awesome 5th-grade teachers). This makes sure everyone hears a consistent message as well as gives opportunities for feedback which leads me to my next tip…

5. Create Feedback Loops

Giving and receiving feedback is critical at any time, but especially when we are remote and not seeing on another on a regular basis. Throughout this process, I meet with teams weekly to find out their needs as well as to receive feedback on processes and information being shared. Our teachers have been asking both the parents and students for their feedback on our eLearning plans as they have progressed. During the first month, I also hosted a “Town Hall” at our April PTA meeting to share with parents our plan as well as receive feedback on how we were doing in meeting Jefferson students’ needs remotely. At the end of this month, I will also be sending out a final survey to families for positive feedback as well as suggestions for the future. All of these things combined contribute to the regular improvement of our processes and helps to keep everyone connected as well. It also will help to bridge a shared vision of education when we return in the fall or if we have to continue remote learning at any time in the future.

6. Trust the People Closest to the Kids

This message is critical to the success of our students learning and feeling cared for at home. Our teachers have been working with students since the beginning of the year and know them best. They were rocking it when we were in school, but I have been blown away by the ways my teachers have been shifting their teaching practices to meet the needs of the students at home. Trying out new technology, new ways to present lessons, and new ways to connect with kids have all come from my amazing staff. This was rooted in a foundation of trust in staff expertise. When we empower others, as opposed to limit their abilities based on a singular interpretation, great things happen for kids.

The same applies to trusting our parents who know our students better than anyone on the planet. Including parents’ ideas and feedback as well as supporting them when they need help is all an important part of the learning process, inside of school and out. One of my greatest hopes after this is all over is that the collaborative and trusting relationships that we have continued to build during this time will continue when we return to our brick and mortar buildings. The level of trust we give to our parents is a large factor in the success of this. We can’t just ask for feedback, we need to act on the suggestions given. If the idea is not feasible, it is important to explain why.

7. Keep Meetings (& Messages) Short & Flexible

I don’t care if you are the funniest, most charismatic person ever, no one, and I mean no one wants to sit in a 3-hour virtual meeting. People are trying to manage working remotely with taking care of family and 8 million other objectives of the day. Prioritize your agenda to what is most essential. The other items will still be there when we return to brick & mortar education and will be heard in a much more meaningful way when they actually apply to the work being done. The same holds true for emails. Keep your messages short and to the point. When in doubt, default to what is reasonable.

8. Professional Learning Should Match Teacher & Student Need

Just like when we are in the four walls of a school, professional learning should include choice and be directly connected to the work teachers are doing. Instructional coaches are making a huge difference during this time. Our instructional coach at Jefferson attends virtual team meetings weekly and looks for ways she can support teachers to take things off of their plate. She has created instructional tutorials for parents & students, modeled how to use tech tools to aide in synchronous and asynchronous teaching, offered office hours for families if a teacher is introducing a new way of learning to students and more. She is thoughtful in the ways she shares new ideas or resources by communicating one new idea once a week at a scheduled time. The things she shares are connected to conversations she has heard in team meetings or build upon the prior week. Teachers can also reach out to her for coaching on any topic of their choosing. For more information for how she is supporting our staff in new and innovative ways, check out my post, Coaching During a Crisis.

Avoid assigning articles on theory or required learning like scheduled webinars. Assigning blanket learning for all, especially when it is disconnected to the work currently being done is a major misstep that shows a lack of empathy as well as creates a perfect breeding ground for mistrust and resentment. The most meaningful learning that will happen at this time will come directly from your staff. We need to value their time and knowledge base as well as educator’s natural inclination and gifts in seeking out information and new ideas. When we do, their teaching will far surpass anything we could have possibly imagined.

9. Celebrate & Share the Good

There is so much good happening right now, but it may be hard to see because we’re all teaching in our own virtual classrooms. My instructional coach and I have been attending team meetings once a week virtually for the purpose of seeing how we can support teams, but also to be able to share what other teams are up to. This has been great for sparking new ideas as well as trying new things with students. I continue to send emails to staff about the great work they are doing as well as share on social media learning happening as a result of my teachers. When parents share something positive with me about a staff member I make sure I share it with them. One of my colleagues highlights in her weekly newsletter something wonderful she’s seen in each of her team’s plans. I plan to start doing this as well. Good ideas need to be shared!

10. Continually Learn & Plan for the Future

In any situation, the best thing we can do is reflect on our experiences to plan for the future. As a staff, we are already thinking about next year, considering what teaching strategies and tools we want to make sure we continue to utilize. A strategic plan for teaching students at the beginning of the year how to use various technological tools has been a large part of this conversation. To start the year, my staff has asked that we focus our professional learning on various aspects of technology to better prepare ourselves if this were to happen again. Teams have also been brainstorming ways they will use what they have learned in their classrooms in the fall. If this happens again, (please no!) I am confident that we will be prepared because of our thoughtful reflection and planning.

At the beginning of this, I felt like my greatest role was supporting my staff and families to stay connected as a community. Six weeks later I continue to stand by this conviction. Without our regular routines and interaction, it can be easy for anyone to start to feel disconnected and alone. As leaders, our actions can either fuel that isolation, or be the antidote, bringing everyone closer. When in doubt, air on the side of empathy.

“Empathy is a strange and powerful thing. There is no script. There is no right way or wrong way to do it. It’s simply listening, holding space, withholding judgment, emotionally connecting and communicating that incredibly healing message of ‘You’re not alone.” – Brene Brown

Predictions for the Next Decade of Education

I recently read this article from the Atlantic titled, Elementary Education Has Gone Terribly Wrong. It’s an interesting read for a variety of reasons, but what stood out to me was the plethora of evidence that confirms what many of us have known for decades: the standardized testing movement simply doesn’t work. Despite our efforts to systematize learning and add more “rigor,” we continue to end up with the same results along with an ever-expanding achievement gap.

The author, Natalie Wexler poses the questions, “

“What if the medicine we have been prescribing is only making matters worse, particularly for poor children? What if the best way to boost reading comprehension is not to drill kids on discrete skills but to teach them, as early as possible, the very things we’ve marginalized—including history, science, and other content that could build the knowledge and vocabulary they need to understand both written texts and the world around them?”

She pokes holes in many common literacy practices in the U.S. as well as presents examples of teachers who are finding success in trying out different approaches. The article got me thinking about education overall, how we have tried so many new things, abandoned many ideas, gone back to the same ideas, but education has, for the most part, looked the exact same way for generations.

The start of a new decade feels like a fresh start for everything, education included. There is no guarantee of what the next 10 years will bring, but I am optimistic that this decade will bring what the past hundreds of years have not, an education system that is valuable for all. There are a plethora of amazing educators who are leading the charge and sharing their stories on social media and beyond giving me hope that we can and will create powerful educational experiences to help ALL kids succeed.

Predictions for 2020-2030

The ideas I present in this post are a result of two decades of personal experience working with students, a lot of reading, watching & learning, and most of all, connecting with amazing educators across the globe. (Thank you PLN!) You will notice that no idea is brand new. I believe that we already have the answers which we seek, it is the way that we use them with students that has the power to shift education for the better.

Less About the Right Answer & More about Great Questions

One of the chapters that stood out to me in The Innovators Mindset was the chapter where George Couros discusses the importance of students being “problem-finders.” This was sparked from the work of Ewan McIntosh. The premise is that we spend a lot of time working with students to come up with solutions to problems, but what we really need in a dynamic world is students who can find problems and innovative ways to solve these problems.

Besides the fact that solving problems with predetermined answers can be monotonous and insanely boring, (geometry proofs anyone?), if we spend all of our time giving students problems to solve with a finite answer we are giving students the impression that the purpose in life is to simply get the right answer. Students leave school thinking there is a simple methodology to life and if they follow the success formula given to them they will be successful when really the opposite is true. We need creative thinkers, students who can look at the world with a new lens and make it better.

A great way to develop this skill is by teaching students to ask great questions and giving them opportunities to explore ideas that are meaningful to them. Genius Hour or Passion Projects, QFT, TQE Method, and Socratic Seminar are just some ways that educators around the globe are working to develop the questioning ability in students. Each of these methodologies helps students to not only create questions of their own, but they encourage rich discussion among students as well which can lead to new ideas from students. It is exciting to think about what kind of learning will take place when we spend more time empowering students to question, explore & discover as opposed to encouraging them to simply find the right answer.

Experiential Learning

In the next ten years, whether virtual or in-person, learning will extend more and more beyond the four walls of the classroom. Mentioned in the Wexler article, research confirms students learn best when they have experiences and background knowledge to be able to comprehend the texts they are reading. Creativity is the number one quality that employers are currently looking for. Reeves & Reeves suggest in their book on creativity, The Myth of the Muse that one of the ways to enhance creativity is through inspiration from experiences. The Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS) recommend starting science lessons with a phenomenon so that students have a shared experience to ask questions and develop theories from. Although I still think the best experience is one in real life, Augmented and Virtual Reality makes this a daily possibility for students.

One school that is doing an amazing job at teaching from this approach is the GEMS World Academy in Chicago, Illinois. In this school, the teachers plan out larger units that explore a broad question related to an essential idea. Included in each of these are field trips to a place in the city where students can explore. From the shared experience students then create questions they have and spend the unit exploring answers to the questions they create. Each subject area is tied into this big idea including specials. The result is that students see learning as interconnected as opposed to limited to one subject area which enhances their creative ability to connect ideas and create new ones.

A More Personalized Approach to Education

If you would have asked me if this was possible ten years ago my answer would have emphatically been no. It takes too much time. It’s not necessary or realistic. It is amazing what a decade of experience can do. I now believe it is more necessary than ever. As you will hear me mention throughout this post, in the dynamic world we live in we no longer need students who can just get the right answer, we need students who are curious, think creatively and can find new problems to solve. We want students to leave school with a positive view of themselves, recognizing not only what their talents are, but how they can use them to make a positive impact on the world.

When I say a more personalized approach to education, I am not saying that every student would be doing something different in every moment of the day. Students need foundational knowledge in order to be creative, ask questions and generate new ideas. However, I think it’s a different approach to looking at the school day. Design39 Campus in California has been exploring this idea for the past five years. You can check out this link for more information, but their day is split up into Integrated Learning Time, Deep Dives & Explorations. During Integrated Learning Time is when they explore content across curriculums for purposeful application of skills. Deep Dives is time for students to explore their passions in an academic setting. Explorations give students time to explore new things they are interested in trying. I love the way they organize their day because it gives students foundational understanding as well as time to explore passions and build new ones. For more information on how the idea began and the success they are having with students, check out this podcast from Modern Learners.

Going Gradeless/Meaningful Feedback

At some point, we have to recognize that grades are just meaningless little letters that students look at and then toss. Even when we add in comments to the grade or SBR number students associate more meaning with the grade and typically ignore the feedback. Both John Hattie and Susan Brookhart have written books on the topic and the research shows that feedback is a much more effective learning tool for students over grades.

Many educators are already moving towards a feedback-heavy or gradeless classroom. (check out the #gradeless on Twitter) Instead of using grades or fear of punishment to motivate students to complete their work, they have shifted their instructional practices to have students set goals that are meaningful to them. The teacher and/or peers give them feedback on progress towards their goal to move their learning forward. Learning then becomes a continuum as opposed to an endpoint. I’ve linked a few useful resources below if you are considering making this shift.

6 Tips for Going Gradeless by Starr Sackstein

More Teachers are Going Gradeless. I Asked Them Why. EL Magazine July 2019

Teachers Going Gradeless (TG² Podcast)

Collaboration Over Competition

One of the best videos I have seen this year that has had a huge impact on the way I think about the classroom is Why School Should Be about Us Instead of Me from Trevor Muir. Besides the fact that it has a totally Hamilton-esque vibe, the premise that school sets up a culture of competition as opposed to what our world needs, a culture of collaboration, rings completely true. I’ve watched it probably 20 times.

I was definitely one of the students who groaned every time I heard it was time to work on a group project. There was always the people who did everything, a few people who did nothing, and then somehow a project evolved. It never felt to me like there was any purpose in working together. As a teacher, I tried to circumvent this issue by assigning roles to each student, but even this had uneven results with students continuing to work in silos as opposed to creating something together.

After reading a wonderful post by John Spencer about collaboration, what I realized was missing was students seeing the value in one another’s strengths and using those strengths to build something greater than what could be done alone. Instead of starting group projects by assigning roles, have students share their strengths, set goals for the project together and give them opportunities to give one another feedback along the way. This creates greater meaning for the work and also mirrors the type of work they will be doing outside of school. In the working world students will be collaborating daily, we have to increase the amount of collaboration they do throughout the day, but it also has to be done in a way that is meaningful so that it doesn’t just become another one of the dreaded group projects.

If you’re looking for ways to create this type of classroom, Trevor Muir’s new book, The Collaborative Classroom, filled with practical ideas and examples, is a great place to start.

The End of Labels

This last one I am most excited about, although I think it might take a little bit more time. I predict that gradually the labels we use in education, “gifted, special education, EL” will disappear. As we start to shift the focus of school from everyone ending up in the same exact spot to encouraging students to be curious learners who explore their passions and develop their talents, the need for labels will go away because we will see students for their greatness of whom they already are, not some arbitrary standard we want them to become.

“Logic will take you from A to B. Imagination will take you everywhere.” – Albert Einstein

We have spent the past hundred years approaching education from a logical standpoint. Students need to learn ______________ so we will teach them ___________________. We will set standards that everyone needs to reach and if they don’t reach those standards we will fix them with _____________________. This is a very logical approach if we are working with products, but hasn’t always served us well with students. We need more creativity and flexibility if we are going to reach all students.

I am optimistic about the shifts I continue to see happening in our schools. I believe that through these shifts we will have students leaving school with more creativity, empathy, equity, and curiosity than we ever have in the past. It is inspiring to think about the wonderful world that these students will create.

Empowered Learning Experiences

I recently finished, Innovate Inside the Box: Empowering Learners through UDL by George Couros and Kative Novak. Full of inspiring anecdotes as well as thought-provoking ideas, the book is split into three sections:

The Core of Innovative Teaching & Learning
Characteristics of the Innovator’s Mindset
You are the Change You Seek

One of my favorite things about the book is the reflective questions that come at the end of each chapter. Every chapter was meaningful, but the one that has felt most meaningful for me to reflect on today is Creating Empowering Learning Experiences from the Core of Innovative Teaching & Learning section. When I was in the classroom as both a teacher and instructional coach, my main focus was how to best engage learners. I thought that if I could plan highly engaging lessons then I would be fully meeting the needs of my learners.

Previous work of George’s as well as this chapter has helped me to realize, if I am not providing empowering learning experiences, I am not adequately preparing them for the world outside of school. When we engage students we are the ones who make learning meaningful and interesting to students, but when we empower them, they get to “develop the skills and motivation to solve meaningful problems.” They are learning as a result of an internal drive which creates a cycle of perpetual learning, a skill that is incredibly important in the quickly changing world we live in.

Empowered Learning involves choice, developing better questions, as well as finding & solving meaningful problems with the opportunity to create. At the end of this chapter, the following questions is asked,

What are some examples of “empowered learning” in your classrooms for students and in your school/organization as professionals? How are you empowered as an educator, and how does that empower students in learning?

It got me thinking about how I was empowering learners when I was in the classroom as well as steps I would take if I were still in the classroom to create more empowered learning experiences.

Empowered Learning Experiences

Previous Classroom Literacy Practice: When I was in the classroom I tried to offer as much choice as possible to students. In literacy, they received a weekly schedule with options that they could choose from to plan out their time that included things like read to self, blog post, meet with the teacher, responding to reading, or talk with a partner about their book. They got to choose the books they were reading as well as the order they wanted to accomplish the tasks. When we met 1:1 or in a small group, I would give them positive feedback as well as goals for their next steps in learning.

Empowered Learning Upgrade: Although I offered a lot of choice to students, the activities were dictated by me. Empowered learning involves giving students opportunities to create learning experiences that are meaningful to them. If I were in the classroom, I would also include an option for them to choose what they wanted to explore in literacy. I would also try to balance the amount of feedback I was giving to the students with the number of questions I was asking them about how they felt about their progress in literacy and the new goals they wanted to set. I would give them more opportunities to set goals for themselves as opposed to their goals being dictated by me. In elementary this would involve giving students a choice board of goals and letting them pick so that I could support them in becoming independent in goal selection.

Previous Classroom Research Practice: I used to give students a broader topic to study and let them pick which aspect they wanted to research. The students learned how to ask questions, take notes, and write a research paper with headings for each section. Usually, these research papers would involve some sort of creative expression at the end that they could choose from that ranged from making a diorama to creating some sort of video.

Empowered Learning Upgrade: Although I taught students to ask deep questions during the research process, it was limited to when we were doing research. If I went back into the classroom I would include asking questions as a part of daily practice woven throughout the day. I might start a lesson showing a picture or with a short passage or even just projecting the learning target and have students ask questions that they are curious about. We would have a Wonder Wall and I would give students opportunities to explore these wonderings. Another problem with the research I was having students do was that the end product was solely connected to me, the final product reader. If I was having students research now, I would want them to look for problems in the community, school or world around them and come up with solutions. The end product that they create would be related to solving that problem. I would provide opportunities and encourage students to connect with “experts in the field” to get more ideas. We would share our ideas beyond our classroom by putting them in a blog, inviting the community in or asking meaningful stakeholders for feedback on our ideas. I could still evaluate all the standards I was covering in this process, it would just take a different process on my part.

Previous Math Practice: I love math and have always loved teaching it. One of my frustrations as a kid was that I always had to go at the same pace as everyone else when I was ready to move on so I wanted to make sure that my students never had that frustration. When I first started teaching this looked like me assigning all of the same problems to the students after I had taught a lesson and then students could come up and check their work with myself or my assistant when they were ready and could then move on to choice activities like games or projects. In my last years of teaching, I would pretest the students on the upcoming standards on Friday. On Monday they would get a sheet with the list of standards that they had already mastered and a schedule for the week that included activities like meet with the teacher, a web-based self-paced program or more problems in our workbook. There was also a column for how they would know they had mastered the standards they hadn’t yet by the end of the week.

Empowered Learning Upgrade: Although I provided choice for my students and gave them feedback on their progress as well as expected them to monitor their understanding, a lot of the math was dictated by me or the program my district had provided for enrichment. To improve on this process I would provide students time to explore questions they have related to math. In my last years of coaching we had students explore questions like, “How is math related to gymnastics?” or “How is math related to animals?” It would be anything that students were interested in. They would have time to research and then present their findings. To make this even better I would stop teaching math as a subject on its own and look for ways to incorporate it into the questions that students were asking in class. I would give them time to explore these ideas and create meaningful products. (like mentioned above)

Instead of putting students on a web-based program, I would give them opportunities to create videos to help other students in math using applications like WeVideo or Explain Everything or Seesaw. They could create games based on the standards or I would give them opportunities to work on math projects that solved problems connected to meaningful topics. They could create problems or projects for other students to solve as well. I would give them time to explore math-related problems and see what math they could use to solve these problems.

Final Thoughts

I am in no way criticizing the teaching that I did in the past. I provided my students with many engaging as well as empowering (and even compliant) learning experiences. I am proud of the work I did and loved every minute I got to spend in the classroom with my amazing students. I am also not saying that it is possible to empower learners every minute of the day in the classroom. As discussed in this chapter, there is a time for every type of learning in the classroom: compliant, engaged or empowered.

The purpose of this reflection was to help me to be a better leader as we move to give students more empowered learning experiences in the classroom. By reflecting on what my next steps would be, I can further clarify what types of learning experiences I am looking for as I go into classrooms. This will enhance my ability to have a deep discussion and mentor anyone who is looking to empower learners. My next steps will be working on my own practice as a leader who empowers her staff. I am looking forward to talking to my teachers about their thoughts on empowered learning and to co-create our idea of best practice in learning experiences at Jefferson School.

“Empowered learning experiences should be something that we, as educators, create with our students for our schools and classrooms.” – Innovate Inside the Box, Chapter 3

Putting an End to the Meaningless Agenda

We’ve all been there.

Sitting at a meeting or a grad school class where the agenda is ten miles long, broken up into either short little choppy increments or hour-long blocks without a break in sight.

Half of the items on the list seem to come from out of nowhere or could easily have been addressed in an email.

The absolute worst? When the facilitators in no way honor the experience and talents the people at the meeting bring to the table, making everyone learn about the same things as if they have no understanding whatsoever.

When I was a teacher I loathed these experiences. It felt like meetings were “being done to me” as opposed to inviting me to bring my talents and grow my strengths.

Many of our students feel the same way. No matter how great of a student they are, they feel like they are showing up to the “school show,” expected to follow the rules and expectations set forth for them with little input as to how the day will proceed.

Can you imagine spending every day this way? I can’t.

We can and should do better.

When I became an administrator I vowed I would never bring this type of experience to my staff. Am I perfect at it yet? Definitely not, but here are a few things I try to do so that I’m not bringing a case of the meeting dreads to my staff:

Ask for feedback. Although I haven’t yet been able to start from scratch with my school leadership team in creating an agenda due to time constraints (we’re almost ahead of this), I do bring the agenda to the team and ask for feedback prior to our institute days or Wednesday late arrivals.
Build on the expertise of the team. What are they good at? What are they passionate about? What do they see as the greatest need that would make the meeting most valuable to all? Stop being the only one who presents and let teacher leaders lead. They’re the ones who know the kids the best. We need to trust them!
Tie everything back into the vision that was created as a staff. Ours this year is #unlimitedgrowthandconnection. We make sure that every agenda item is connected to this and explicitly stated.
Include breaks and don’t make people turn off their technology. We’re all adults. If we’ve made the topics of the meeting meaningful then people won’t want to distract themselves with other things. We should trust people to use their resources when they need/want to.
Include something fun. Meetings are an opportunity to build culture and camaraderie. We added in a “Walk-Up Song” activity at the beginning of each staff meeting where we asked staff members to send us the song they would have played when they walk into the classroom like they do in Major League Baseball. The rest of the staff has to guess whose song it is. We even have prizes. From the response at the last meeting, we might add in karaoke. What does your staff enjoy? Thankfully mine loves music and food, two of my favorite things so I also try to bring some sort of tasty treat.

If you’re a teacher, what might this look like in your classroom? How often do you ask for feedback or build the day around goals students have set for themselves? How can you make each learning target meaningful to the students so they see a connected purpose in the work they are doing? What would the day look like if more choice and voice were incorporated?

I love this question that George Couros poses to educators,

“Would you want to be a student in your own classroom?”

For me, this question has transitioned to, “Would you want to be a teacher in your staff meeting?” I hope as the year progresses the answer to this question becomes an emphatic yes! Let’s stop “doing school to people” and start asking for meaning from our people.

Coaching for Innovation

This post originally appeared here on the LaunchPad: Official Blog of TeachBoost.

Over the past decade, innovation has become one of the more popular buzzwords in education. Thought by many as a path to make students successful or “future ready,” innovative teaching practices are highly sought after by leadership at all levels. The problem is, when many educators hear the word “innovation,” images of technological grandeur and unimaginable teaching strategies are often conjured up, instead of something that can be as simple as a small shift in practice.

George Couros, author of The Innovator’s Mindset, defines innovation as “something that is new and better.” I love this definition because it recognizes that innovation isn’t changing things just for the sake of change. If something is to be innovative, it needs to be not only new but better for students. In order for innovation to thrive in our schools we have to build school environments that foster idea generation, collaboration, reflection, and risk-taking without fear of repudiation if something doesn’t go as planned.

So where does the role of a coach come in? To strategically enhance these key elements.

Laying the Foundation: Assessing Needs and Trends

It starts with foundational best practices for anyone in a school: build relationships, be present, and get to know those you serve. In this way a coach finds out the needs, interests, and strengths of both students and staff. Not only does this lay the foundation of a great relationship built on trust, it also gives the coach an idea of current practice around the building. If we want “new and better” practices to flourish then we have to first be experts in the great work that is currently happening with students and build from there.

One of the things that I did as a learning support coach was meet with every teacher both at the beginning of each school year and halfway through. We would discuss what they loved most about teaching, areas they were interested in, ideas they were working on, puzzles they just couldn’t figure out, what they enjoyed most outside of school, as well as areas they might want to work with me on.

In addition to meeting with them in person, I’d send out a Survey and a Needs Assessment to get to know the staff a bit better. Over the years, these tools have been modified to meet our school’s improvement plan, previous work we had done, conversations, and coaching cycles I was regularly involved in.

After my meetings, I compiled all of the information I gathered into one large document and looked for trends. From this information, I was able to personalize my coaching and create strategic groupings and partnerships based on the needs or interests of teachers, plus send them articles or videos as resources. As a result, innovative practices spread more quickly, teachers began to collaborate, and relationships built on trust flourished.

Being Vulnerable Through Modeling

An integral, and often scary, part of innovation is the possibility of failure that leads to risk-taking. In order to encourage others to take risks, we need to first model it ourselves. One way to do this is by being vulnerable and to share both your success and setbacks of a new strategy or idea you’re trying out.

In my fourth year of coaching, I found a lot of teachers asking me about the difference between compliance and engagement: “What does it look like in practice?” or “How do we know if students are truly engaged or just complying?” From these conversations the “Student Engagement Inquiry Group” was born. The purpose of this group was to define student engagement versus compliance and then explore teaching practices that would enhance student engagement during lessons. Knowing that a large part of engagement is offering choice, during the first few meetings staff members explored a hyperdoc—a master document with links to various resources.

Using Video

After creating a deeper understanding of student engagement, as well as teaching practices needed to support it, we (the student engagement inquiry group) created an observation template with student engagement “look-fors” when in a classroom.

Knowing that it’s difficult to be judged in front of one’s peers, I offered to teach and record lesson and then have the group evaluate me using our template. Afterward, we used our next meeting to evaluate how engaged the students were. This led to some great discussions and increased the learning process because teachers could focus on what the students were doing. Ultimately, the video process led our group to eventually observe and provide feedback to one another—which supported a shift in an innovative process throughout the building.

Going Further: Building Teacher Leaders

One of the greatest discoveries in my first year as a coach was that teachers who loved the work we were doing together would go back to their team and share. This would cause a ripple effect and the innovation would spread!

Coaches looking to spread innovative practices need to be adept at building up teacher leaders in their schools. Educators love learning from their peers because they’re literally “in the trenches” doing the work daily with the multitude of outside factors that might affect how successful or unsuccessful an idea might be.

Co-Presenting

There are a variety of ways to build leaders of innovation in schools. Besides selecting leaders at each grade level to work with, another great way to build leadership in innovation is to ask a staff member to co-present with you at a staff meeting or professional learning day on an idea you have worked on together in their classroom. This highlights great instruction but also takes away some of the pressure a staff member feel when they have to present by themselves.

Edcamps

Another way to build up teacher leaders is to offer an “Edcamp”-style professional learning day where teachers can learn from their peers. Teachers can present on their own or with a peer or group. The other teachers who are not presenting get to select sessions that they would like to attend. Oftentimes this results to more learning beyond the day because teachers will continue to reach out to that staff member after the event. Check out #hawthorneignites on Twitter for some examples of how this has been successful in one of the buildings I am currently an administrator at.

Making Innovation Visible

I read a recent blog post by AJ Juliani where he talked about the importance of highlighting the instruction we want to see in our schools. As a coach, I created a biweekly newsletter that I send out to staff; in this example, I organized the newsletter into different categories, all related to the practices we wanted to see in our classrooms. Additionally, I’d provide examples of the work that I was doing with staff to spark interest in new ideas as well as show cohesion in our work. Even if someone only briefly glanced at the newsletter they could see the focus of the work being done for the year.

Social media is another great way to spread innovative practices. Tweeting, or posting to Instagram, videos and pictures of instructional practices that you see in classrooms is a simple way to make practice visible. A fantastic way to enhance this is by tagging other teachers who you think might be interested in the post.

Final Thought

Innovation for the sake of doing something new is meaningless and leads to frustration by others. However, once we get to know the strengths of those we serve and connect new ideas to the needs of the building, we can truly create something new and better benefits all parties!

Making the Positives So Loud

I’ll admit it.

George Couros is one of my favourite (spelling intended) people in education. Not only is he skilled at telling a captivating story that can cause both tears and inexplicable laughter, but his ideas about education are thought-provoking and real, grounded in his own experience or ideas he has recently read about or seen.

Since being introduced to his work and hearing him speak at a conference last year, I’ve been influenced by not only his book, The Innovator’s Mindset, but also his regular blog posts, podcasts, and tweets.

When I originally encountered his popular quote, “We need to make the positives so loud so that the negatives are almost impossible to hear,” I quickly connected it, as many people do, to the context of making sure that the positive voices are heard so loudly in the school that they outweigh any negativity from the naysayers. In a year of rapid changes in my district, this quote resonated with me as a great strategy to build a positive school culture.

What I realized recently though is that although that interpretation is completely valid, it actually has a variety of meaningful contexts that relate to not only students and staff, but to education as a whole. Administrators need to regularly share the strengths of their team and teachers need to do the same with students.

In one of the studies mentioned in Paul Tough’s book, Helping Children Succeed he discusses a strategy that social workers used with parents of toddlers to improve their parenting skills. Instead of focusing on what they were doing wrong after each visit, the social worker gave feedback explicitly naming what the parents were doing correctly. The impact of this study was profound, elevating not only the overall confidence of the parents, but their parenting skills as well.

At first as an instructional coach, and now an administrator, I have tried a variety of strategies to emulate this philosophy and grow a positive culture.

Every time I visit a classroom I send an email to the staff member explicitly stating positive observations related to their instruction, interaction with students or even classroom environment.
“Bite-Sized Feedback” cycles are also an awesome way to highlight great instruction. First, we talk about something they would like me to observe and then we set up a 15-minute time slot each week for me to come into their classroom. Afterward, we talk for 10-15 minutes about the laundry list of awesome things they are doing followed by me offering a tip for how to enhance one of their strengths. I have seen more impact on instruction as a result of this practice than any traditional observation.
I regularly tweet out pictures and videos of the amazing instruction I see when I pop into classrooms. Sometimes it is a student, sometimes a staff, and sometimes me reflecting on what I saw and the impact it had on students.
This year we have started a podcast at one of my buildings where we interview one of our staff members about their instructional practices. This helps our staff to get to know one another’s strengths, and also gives us an avenue to share the amazing learning happening in our building.
Involve students in telling the positive story of the school. This year I am working with groups of students in both of my buildings to do this. At one of my buildings this developed into creating a documentary about our entire school and in the other building, the students have been creating short videos about individual classrooms.

In the book, The Multiplier Effect: Tapping The Genius Inside Our Schools, authors Wiseman, Allen & Foster agree with the importance of not only recognizing, but sharing strengths with those whom we serve.

“But if people aren’t aware of their genius, they are not in a position to deliberately utilize it. By telling people what you see, you can raise their awareness and confidence, allowing them to provide their capability more fully.”

Walking through classrooms or in conversations with students & staff, I am amazed daily in the creative genius that surrounds me. Telling them their brilliance shines a spotlight on their talents and says, “DO THIS MORE!” This builds not only confidence and a positive school culture, but causes even brighter ideas and more innovation to spread in our school.

Please know that by saying we should highlight the positive, I am not saying that we should never have reflective conversations about shifts that may need to be made in instructional practice. It has been my experience that when I focus on sharing strengths instead of telling a list of changes to be made, that we end up actually having even more of these types of conversations. This is because when people know that you see them for their unique strengths and talents as opposed to a project that needs to be fixed a greater trust is built. Staff members often come to me with ideas asking for feedback or I am able to ask reflective questions resulting in instructional shifts. When change comes from within, it is deeper and more likely to last.

Educators don’t always see the amazing strengths within themselves. As leaders, the more we recognize and celebrate the strengths of those we lead, the more we create a positive culture that drowns out negativity and grows the innate talents of our school community.