Category Archives: leadership

Connected Educator Month 2014

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I read a post by Bron Stuckey on Facebook advertising Connected Educator month 2014. I feel like I have been thrown another challenge because I am not sure how “Connected” an educator I really have become. Not being a Twitter fanatic I am going to look at the ways in which “a connected educator” works. I just downloaded the Starter Kit for Connected Educator month – I will follow the guide! One page for each day! And I will participate and look for badges. Looking through the Connected Educator’s Guide for Day 1 I have realized that I have a few more purchases to make but was reassured that I am already on the right track with some of the titles I have recently acquired which are recommendations from Sheryl Nussbaum-Beach – Mindset has been one of the main drivers of my recent wish for change for students. I will definitely be looking back at these. The really great thing about this Connected Educator month is that it all starts at the same time as the ACEC 2014 Conference!

Alec Couros kicked off the conference on October 1 with a keynote entitled “Beyond Selfies, Likes and Pokes.” Alec made several really important points in his well-structured narrative which centred around three key concepts: Identity, Intimacy and Imagination. Identity online is an issue for students, in fact it is an issue for all of us. As educators we become part of global networks – Alec mentioned the way in which the open source movement has expanded through community connections which all related to the concept of making something useful to everyone. The issue for educators is the blurring of the lines between personal and public networks. The maintenance of identity across all networks becomes a significant factor once an educator has an online presence. Generally those networks we develop, our PLN’s (Personal Learning Networks) are built through connections with individuals and groups who have specialised interests. We tend to gravitate towards those who have similar ideas about how things can and should work and extend our personal narratives through conversations with our PLN members so that we eventually become cognizant of what it is we are trying to verbalise and how it can be brought into being in Real Life terms. Basically, Alec tells us that kids don’t need to wait to learn anymore – in fact nobody needs to wait to learn any more if they know who to ask or how to search and how to look for answers! An interesting needs hierarchy diagram he showed us had the whole hierarchy with WIFI underpinning it! His main point here was that the presence of tools changes the environment in which we learn. Another point I picked up from Alec was that it is more evident in this day and age that the tools we now have at our disposal are allowing us to match the constructivist style pedagogy promoted via the work of Vygotsky. I went back to have another look at the Vygotsky theory and how it has been compared with Piaget’s work and there are four main differences as can be read from the link. The social factors and the existence of the “more knowledgeable other” are significant aspects which I can relate back to the games in education journey I have recently travelled. Again it is the existence of the ability to connect and learn within situated contexts which is more available to students and learners of all ages today.

Alec gave some ideas for Capturing participatory networks through Twitter such as Hootsuite and Tweetdeck. He also recommended the power of teachers modelling the use of the technology, for example a Twitter account for a class is one way of teaching kids about how Twitter works and what are appropriate tweets. If kids are responsible for weekly school tweets or reports they are making the critical selection of information to pass on. The early work of Marshall McLuhan was also cited by Alec, particularly in terms of the power of media. As presented to us in Wikipedia, McLuhan is known for coining the expressions the medium is the message and the global village, and for predicting the World Wide Web almost thirty years before it was invented. Due to the explosion of content on the internet these days, Alec recommended some curation tools such as Feedly for news. He also mention The Slow Web Movement. I have seen tools like Scoopit used as curation tools, and have tried LiveBinder as well. Pearltrees is a social curation tool which creates a taxonomy for how we structure knowledge and allows the user to share collections with others.

On the subject of Imagination, Alec told us that there are ideas out there such as 50+ ways to tell a story but in reality, because we digest so much information and consider this through our PLN’s, everything is a remix of things we have heard or read. What we are creating are digital essays about things that matter.

In wrapping up his keynote, Alec reminded us that we are trying to cultivate and develop positive digital identities, remembering that cultural contexts are very different, but we can debate and discuss the issues. We can have a situation for students whereby portfolios can be developed about their learning experiences through their own individual domain over which they have control. In this way they are being allowed to develop their own identity which they want to present to the world. Another thing he reminded us about is that actions speak louder than like buttons. An example of this was the videos he showed of second language learners being connected with older community members who had volunteered to be mentors who would allow these students to practise their learning through making a connection. Alec mentioned the work of Shirky and how the simple act of connection permits us to humanise the technology. He closed his keynote reminding us : I am part of all I have met.

On October 1 I also connected Face to Face with a few people I have “met” previously through online spaces. Joyce Seitzinger and Chris Betcher ran the two workshops I attended at ACEC that day (posts to come soon). I have made connections by messaging on Facebook and following on Twitter and had further conversations with both of these people during the remainder of the conference. I reconnected with two members of my professional association ECAWA and discussed future staff development opportunities through ECAWA in our education district. I also connected with Bhavneet Singh and will have further conversations with her regarding TeachMeets in 2014.

Another conversation I had today was with a teacher from another primary school in my region who bewailed the loss of use of technology in her classroom and the school’s following of a particular philosophy which, although developing capable academic students, did not espouse the idea of independent problem finders and solvers. This is a phenomenon of which I have previously stated I am very wary. I am firmly decided on the opinion that in primary school we need to have Literacy Block, Numeracy Block and Inquiry Block as major blocks within each teaching day. This would give students the opportunity to become independent thinkers and enable them to begin to make choices and find innovative ways of working – something we will need to remember and develop because:

We are currently preparing students for jobs that don’t yet exist, using technologies that haven’t yet been invented in order to solve problems we don’t yet know exist! — Richard Riley

So many ideas and so little time!

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I promised myself I would read John Fleming’s section of the book “Towards a Moving School” during the holidays. I spent a few hours this morning doing just that and digesting the content of his way of improving a school. What I can say is that what he is proposing is actually nothing new to me. Every school has recently been through the development of School Review processes wherein staff members are required to become more assessment literate so that progress of students is made more accountable. Any school wanting to put these improvements into place requires the establishment of a collegial working community in which teams operate to collaboratively develop programs across and between year levels. Fleming mentions the movement of students between P-3 so that programs can be pitched at their level. The lock step approach for skills development is very important so that basics can be developmentally scaffolded.

For the Years F-2 (Australian Curriculum based classroom structures) I agree wholeheartedly with the establishment of Literacy and Numeracy blocks in order that students are monitored through progressive levels in their reading and mathematics understandings. What concerns me, however, is that where students already have the basics, how are they being given the support and time to become creative problem finders and solvers. For me this is where the Thinking Block or Inquiry Process Block would have to come into play. This is also where project based and play based learning processes can be implemented, as well as the development of student choice of tools and also, most importantly, the development of particular talents such as creative outlets in the arts and even science, cooking, ICT and other practical skill sets. The development of friendship and passion groups and targeted groups for supportive interventions could also happen during these sessions. In short – following the fundamentals of the EYLF and allowing students to learn through play, experimentation and practice at point of need.

Further up the school (3-6) focused instruction still needs to occur so that students are further developing their skills base across the disciplines. Targeted interventions within Literacy and Numeracy Blocks can continue here alongside the use of theme based texts and content so that a deeper understanding of the specific subject matter can be utilised in project based learning which will, in the first instance, be necessarily structured and scaffolded by the teacher – with student choice being taken into account and supported – but also with the expectation that students begin to expand their repertoire of choices made when presenting their findings to a variety of audiences – local and global, familiar and unfamiliar.

Supporting teachers in their understanding of these processes is an important factor to consider. The use of Pirozzo’s planning matrices allows teachers to focus on the full repertoire of required Blooms thinking skills and allows for the further development of multiple ways of working with content (thus supporting the expansion of student repertoires for presentation and learning). Add technology into the mix and this supports the inclusion of an aspect of collaboration and audience. It also adds to the choices students can make in the way they develop their workflow processes and the ways in which they organise information so it makes sense to them and to the teacher.

Blooms Digital Taxonomy and the Blooms Quick Sheets are useful tools to help teachers move towards implementing technology in the classroom through the SAMR model. In my opinion it doesn’t matter which devices are incorporated into the model – the apps which do what is required to have students achieve the General Capabilities in ICT are the key facets of this model. There are infographics based on the hierarchy of skills in Blooms for iPads and for Android devices as well as web based tools. One school has published several infographics here and another has produced this document with several iterations. There are similar apps across a variety of devices but the key ones would include :
1. capability for recording text
2. Paint program
3. presentation sequence program
4. mind or concept mapping
5. chat
6. collaborate document use between peers
7. digital photography
8. sound recording
9. video recording
10. document readers (pdf, .txt, word .doc)
11. browser capability
12. LMS and email through browser for forums and bulletin boards, submission of work, etc.

I believe that if students can learn to use these tools in their project work, alongside the development of specific student skills at point of need, then the range of outcomes they can achieve is magnified significantly and the students will be more engaged in what they are doing because it matters to them!

The new leadership buzz word “FOCUS”

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I just received a copy of Douglas Reeves’ book Finding Your Leadership Focus: What Matters Most for Student Results and started flicking and scanning through the pages to get an idea of what this book is about. One or two sections caught my eye straight away. All the research pointing to immediate feedback and what follows from the giving of feedback and the scaffolding of student learning experiences was one of the most obvious aspects of helping teachers to improve the education of students. Pastoral care – leaders in the school knowing students and how they are traveling – actually teaching some of the students and following their progress also helps leaders keep their fingers on the pulse of improvments and progress within the school.  Another aspect discussed was the idea of Power Standards. These are the non-negotiables – the skills and standards required of students which have endured all changes in curriculum – and believe me I’ve been through many of those since the 1980s! Reeves argues that the best way to focus energies for student learning and progress is to ask the teacher in the year level above “What will these students really need to be able to do to have a hope of experiencing success in the next year level?” The way to test whether these power standards will save teachers time is to compare what is the content of an end of year test and how much of that test is covered by what the teachers in the year above have stated are their basic requrements. Reeves sums up by saying that “…power standards represent the essence of focus at the classroom level.”  Further to this focus on skills in the curriculum,  moderation in the marking of student work is key to collegial understanding of the standards required.  This also provides a way to leverage teacher professional learning through discourse regarding assessment with colleagues and those who are more specialised in their focus on particular curriculum areas.

Suffice it to say, the main message I have taken from this book is “Only by having leadership focus will we be able to work through the mire of documents in order to discern what is appropriate for our school context at any given time.”

Day 1 ACEL 2013 Thoughts

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As I sat and listened to Tony Cook presenting his keynote today, I was reliving where we are currently moving along the educational spectrum as regards my school being an independent government school. The key messages we hear are about improving teacher quality and the quality of leaders in the system. The emphasis is on results of the inputs and not on the actual inputs themselves. Kirsti Lonka hit the nail on the head with her revelation that in Finland, the focus is on the inputs – each child is considered on their educational journey and teachers often stay with the students for several years, which means that they know the students well and can cater for their development as a whole person. Tony Cook realises that what we are trying to do is produce global citizens but I believe in order to do that we need to do a few things a bit differently. Kirsti Lonka’s group’s research focus is currently on how to engage students so they are working within the FLOW as much as possible. What this means is finding out what students are interested in, engaging their hearts and minds so that they are ready to learn and scaffolding their learning experiences so that the level of anxiety is lessened and the experience becomes more positive.

What I have learned from listening to Kirsti Lonka’s presentation is that our educational system is trying to travel along the same path as Finland’s but I have concluded that there are some major differences.

Firstly, not all of our teachers have Masters Degrees, and many do not – for one reason or another – continue their academic education during their careers. Instead they are supported in a number of ways with in-service courses on specific things in which they are interested or which schools dictate their staff need to complete. While this can be costly, it can serve to inject a level of enthusiasm for some people for a short while. I believe that what actually helps teachers more is to have a collegial atmosphere within the individual school or cluster of schools in which everyone firstly tries to “get on the same page” and secondly, where ideas are shared and discussed, even debated, so that they can be improved and refined through action research. This action and reflection process is what ultimately helps people to improve their pedagogy and also the engagement of students – a step in the right direction for further developing the standards we expect of our students.

Secondly, the amount of funding for the youngest students in Finland is higher than that for the older students. This allows every child to have a decent start to their education which is tailored to suit the developmental pathway the child is taking. It was interesting to note that parental leave was 10 months. From the age of 5-6 children attend pre-school programs provided free. The focus in these programs is play. I had a burning question as to whether it was all free play – I should have asked that question. I suspect that there would have been a mix of structured play and free play as there was also a heavy arts and handcrafts component mentioned. What was really important was that parents and teachers meet to make personalised plans for the students. Read more about a Finnish pre-school here. I found this article really interesting too!

Thirdly, and what is rather interesting to note, the focus on accountability is not foremost in the mind of anyone within the school system in Finland. Yes, they have ways of checking how things are going but, they don’t have the heavy testing focus such as that which exists in the USA, United Kingdom and, to a lesser extent, Australia. I would have to agree that cutting down the testing regime might upset those who develop our policies and who use the test results to keep track of what outcomes are being produced via the public injection of funding for schools, however, I also think that if all we are testing is multiple choice questioning of specific ranges of question types and text types or maths problems, we are seriously limiting those students who are more than capable of hitting the test ceiling. (Though it was hinted by Tony Cook that NAPLAN online testing will be here by 2016 and it will be adaptive to the answers students give to the questions – therefore giving students who need harder questions the ability to complete them at a higher and higher level.) We are also not allowing students to express their deep knowledge and understanding which can be gained through the use of inquiry approaches – something which we desperately need if we are going to fulfil every child’s potential and allow them to become the connected 21st Century global citizens we want them to become.

I look forward to hearing more in Day 2!