Innovation

"Your task [as a principal] is to create the conditions where teachers can learn from one another."

This is the first of I am sure many thoughts that will resonate with me as I dive into Launching Innovation in School,  the current course I am taking through EdX, facilitated by Dr. Justin Reich and Dr. Peter Senge from MIT.

Relationships are the crux of innovation. And school leaders need to be willing to, "...focus their attention on creating the conditions where teachers have the resources, courage and support to experiment with improving their practice, and then the space to share what they are learning with other educators." (Dr. Justin Reich)

In this video, Dr. Reich explains how administrators can facilitate innovation in their buildings.

Moving back to the U.S.

Having recently repatriated back to the U.S. after a number of years living overseas, there are a
number of daily tasks that I have been lightly stumbling over.

Here are ten things that come to mind as I am going through this repatriation process:

• No more summer binge shopping... I can go to Target anytime I want, it is under 10 minutes from me.
• No more summer binge get togethers... I can meet up with friends at my leasure.
• Leaves will change on trees... my kids have never seen that
• Snow will fall... again, my kids have never seen that
• Celebrating Labor Day... remind me what that is again??
• The need for two cars for our family... we are operating with only one for now, but I am sure it maybe only a matter of time until we need a second car
• 110V electronics... I guess this gives me an excuse to buy some new electronics
• Customer service phone trees... and they d=sort of make sense
• No more watching [american] sporting events in the middle of the night
• Choices, choices, and more choices

Classroom Design

There is so much literature on the benefits of classrooms designed with the learner in mind. My first
real go at this was sixteen years ago. That school year, I had a very diverse group of students. And even with five years of teaching under my belt, I was in no way really prepared to handle, let alone meet the needs of all the learners in my classroom.

Enter into the picture, two amazing intervention specialist, who helped me drastically change my whole room set up. With no budget, we turned the room "up side down" with some very simple, but extremely effective changes to the physical space of my classroom. The short term changes to how students went about learning were huge, and the long term impact on student learning that year was awesome for students.

Looking back, these simple changes created spaces for collaboration, creation, reflection, and just plain old fun. As I move forward into administration, and continue to go into classes, it constantly amazes me the ingenuity I see with teachers and their students in creating spaces for optimal learning to take place.

To learn more about classroom spaces...

• A starter guide from edutopia
• Teachthought's 20 Things Educators Need To Know About Learning Spaces
• How a Moveable Space Can Ignite Creativity in the Classroom from Mind Shift

Why did I become an administrator?

This was a question that appeared on a web-based recruitment system that I recently was filling out.
The question gave me pause to think back. Here is what I said:

I became an administrator because I felt I could continue to impact student learning, but in a broader context. First and foremost, as an educator my priority is working with students and supporting their learning. As a teacher, I realized that in order to have a sustainable impact on student learning, I needed to foster relationships with parents, administrators, and other teachers, something that is key for a leader. This realization led me down the path toward administration.

Of course, there is so much more that went into this decision, one that bubbled within me for a number of years and was influenced by some really awesome leaders. However, when I read again what I wrote, it makes me wonder why other administrators went down this path as well.

 

From a place of strengths

When your values are clear to you, making decisions becomes easier. - Roy Disney

I came across this quote the other day and it made me think about my first year in a leadership position. 

There are key words that come to mind when I think about values. However, I realized one thing I value most of all when I work with students, teachers, other administrators, and parents, is that we start our work together with our strengths in mind. That is what we focus on first and foremost, our strengths. If we start with strengths, we can then move our thinking and learning forward. 

If we take in consideration someone's strengths first, the decisions we need to make from that point on do become a lot easier.

Staying in Quadrant 2 improves student learning

So I am attending my third Principals' Training Conference (PTC). The opportunity for deep learning always amazes me. The course I am in now, The Effective Principal, is steeped in both thought provoking and practical ideas around the Principalship.

One practical idea presented is around Steven Covey's Four Quadrants for Time Management. This time management grid separates tasks into was is important and urgent. Quadrant 2 (Q2) is where tasks deemed important, but not urgent lie.

Q2 is where reflection, planning, and relationship building occurs. It is where big ideas are generated, planned and implemented. If a leader (and leadership team) can spend more time in Q2, then more of the really important work that has a real impact on student learning will take place.

A thought on the first year as a leader

Building relationships and communicating clearly creates trust. And trust is what is needed to do the work a leader needs to do.