A Hilly Day

Up, down, and all around. It was a hilly day. Sometimes one day can seem like a whole week in an elementary school because so much happens in the day.

Today ended on a great note with the fifth graders writing fairy tales with their kindergarten buddies--a joyful event. There was also a spring-like recess too at the very end of the day.

Before that one student completed an excellent slide show about potential and kinetic energy, we started our new science rotations with a focus on teamwork, and had a terrific reading data meeting that focused on how we can help children to read, read, read with confidence, enjoyment, and skill.

It was a very busy week all in all with the faculty meeting, report cards, and a host of other professional meetings, discussions, prep, and planning.

Next week's focus includes fraction project completion, climate change projects, Valentine's Day mailboxes, science exploration, and the start of portfolio work. It's the weekend prior to vacation so we'll want to catch up on and complete lots of work. Onward.

Five years later. . .

An idea I forwarded about five years ago occurred this year. I am grateful that the idea finally took hold. It's been a positive change for the very reasons I forwarded the idea so long ago, an idea that was met with disdain when first shared.

The tables that have made teaching and learning so much better in my classroom were requested about five years ago too. After year-after-year no's and lack of support, I finally found an avenue and funder.

The challenge is having ideas that take five years to gain a foothold. Why the long wait? Why couldn't my research, advocacy, and ideas be met with open minds, support, and positivity at the initial stages.

I realize that this is the painful birthing process for any good idea--good ideas typically take time, but that knowledge doesn't make the wait any less tiresome and frustrating. Onward.

What do my students need?

As I think about my teaching/learning direction, I am thinking about what students need and how I can be there for them. That's the center of my teaching/learning work--that's where my time and energy is focused.

My students need the following:

• continued engaging learning experiences, expert visitors, field studies, and special events. These activities are engaging, create a dynamic learning community, and educate children well.
• targeted, personal supports. All the children learn differently, and the more we can offer targeted, personal supports when needed, the greater success and confidence each child will experience.
• positive, collaborative, supportive learning community of educators, students, families, leaders, and community members--the more we work together to foster optimal teaching and learning for the children, the better our programs will be.
• deep, meaningful, timely, and research-based learning experiences. When learning eperiences are the result of good learning, apt materials, inviting spaces, and optimal student teaching/coaching, the better those learning experiences will be.
• positive, respectful, open minded relationships that invite respectful debate, diversity, and time for positive collaboration. 
• taking a personal interest in every child and their family.
• collegial support--together we can do so much for students.

Continued attention to these efforts will spell success in the school house. These are critical priorities. 

Too Many Mandates

It seems like lots of new mandates have come my way in the past few weeks. These mandates sit on top of an already full list of have-to's in the school house and like the last wooden piece added on the Jenga game before it topples, the capacity is teetering.

When a system has too many leaders and not enough educators who work with students, problems occur. As I have written about time and time again, we lose capacity when there are too many people in schools distanced from students. When you have too many bosses and not enough people doing the day-to-day work in the classrooms, in the lunchroom, and on the playground, problems arise.

What's a teacher to do?

First, this brings me back to servant leadership which I feel is the best leadership model for service organizations like schools and perhaps any organization. When we work for those who we serve, we do our best work. On the other hand if we work solely for our own ambition and success, we lose capacity with regard to what we can do for those we serve. For example if a mandate is forwarded solely for a photo op or evaluation evidence, that mandate will create more havoc than success. On the other hand, when a mandate is forwarded with collaboration, good process, and solid aim, then that mandate or initiative has the capacity to uplift an entire community.

One of the most discouraging aspects of the many mandates at my teaching doorstep, is the fact that there's little lead time or collaboration involved in these mandates. They are layered on top without good process and with little lead time. Good planning is often missing with regard to these mandates which makes their last minute dictates onerous and oppressive.

What's a teacher to do?

I guess the best direction for me is to use this experience as one more opportunity to deepen my commitment to servant leadership -- to recognize just how deadly these last minute mandates feel, and to realize that students feel the same way when we don't work with them and for them, but forward our own priorities first. The children are the reason we teach and they should be the main focus of all of our efforts.

What does this mean in real time?

It means re-looking at the way time is used in school, and directing that time in ways that elevate the experience of school for children. Real time efforts in this regard include the following:

• Extra help sessions
• Active playground and social supports
• Engaging learning experiences
• Time for student presentation, conversation, debate, and teamwork
• Targeted, personalized supports
• Advocacy for what really matters at schools rather than structures that have little positive impact on student learning and success

This realization also reminds me to steer clear of ill-directed efforts, efforts that turn us away from the good work possible including senseless meetings, committees that go nowhere, demeaning initiatives, and ambition-driven photo ops. 

Onward. 

Whose Voices are Heard?

It's important to consider the voices heard, the voices unheard and why the difference exists?

It's important to consider who you listen to, and who you don't listen to and why the difference?

It's important to consider if you listen to those who society may hold up as important and not listen to those who society may demean.

It's important to think about whose voices matter in your world, and how you listen to those voices, acknowledge their words, and regard their perspectives.

Listening is sometimes easy and sometimes very difficult for all kinds of reasons.

As I think of this tonight, I am thinking of times when I've been heard and times when I have been ignored. To be ignored is hurtful and to be listened to is affirming.

Our students are also cognizant of who is listening to them and who is not--like us, they hope to be heard, respected, and regarded.

Sometimes structures create difficult situations for listening. For example sometimes when I'm fully involved with teaching, there are some who want to stop by and talk. I can't talk then as my responsibility is with the children.

Sometimes there are some whose jobs are so cumbersome and time-consuming, that they rarely have time to talk or be listened to. They are relegated to jobs that provide them with no one to talk to and no one to listen. Those kinds of jobs are very lonely and isolating. In most cases, those kinds of jobs should not exist as they lack dignity.

Good process creates opportunities for good listening. When good process doesn't exist, voices are often not heard. Equity is integral to being heard as is honesty and ethics--in unethical, self-serving, unjust environments, there are many voices that are left unheard.

In the days ahead, I'll be thinking of this topic. I'll be thinking of it particularly as I consider the many students I teach, meetings I attend, people I collaborate with, friends, and family members.

There is much to hear in this noisy, busy lives of ours, and that means we have to be even more cognizant of the need to listen and truly hear what others have to say.