From Bad to Better to Good to Great to Greater to Master

I just started reading “Never Underestimate Your Teachers” by Robyn Jackson, and through the first chapter I’ve made several notes that led to further reflection and thinking. The highlights of those highlights with my expanded thoughts are below. The central theme of the book thus far is that there are actions and mindsets any leader can adopt to help any teacher reach mastery.

1. “Why shouldn’t masterful teaching be the goal - the attainable goal - of every teacher in the profession?... Great instructional leadership means rejecting the idea of masterful teaching as a gift endowed to a select few.” - Page 3

If we as school leaders relegate great teaching to nature, then we unintentionally undermine our own position and duties; if we fancy ourselves as leaders dedicated to the concept of every student learning and making progress, then we must assume that every teacher has the capability of improving and reaching mastery with our supports. Just as it’s wrong for a math teacher to justify poor student performance by saying they just have a bunch of students who are bad at math, a school leader cannot justify poor teaching with the same logic.

2. “Our biggest leadership challenge if not that we don’t know what to do to increase student success; our biggest challenge is that we must get our teachers to do it.” - Page 5

Knowing what to do is not enough. Knowing how to communicate what you know is not enough. We need to know a lot, how to best communicate what we know depending on the audience and circumstances, and how to follow up on that communication in an infinite number of ways depending on how the initial communication is received.

 

 

 

3. “...help bad ones become good, good ones become great, and great ones become even greater.” -Page 6

I’ve been thinking about this quote for a couple of days now since I read it, and I’m thinking that it will become part of my personal mission statement. If I’m not helping people get better no matter where they are, then what am I doing? Why am I here?

4. “It is critical to provide teachers with differentiated leadership as it is to provide students with differentiated instruction.” - Page 19

Don’t just throw darts at the board and hope one hits; be intentional with what you’re doing. Know who you’re working with, and diagnose what’s needed before trying to remedy it. Know strengths and weaknesses in order to get the most return on whatever investment you’re going to make. One size fits all never lives up to its billing whether its baseball hats, leadership strategies, or learning of any kind.

Advice: Do Your Reading

It seemed endless at first, but it was the best investment I could've made

 

Photo Courtesy of Tom Belte

I’m feeling strong two weeks into my new assistant principal position at my new school largely because I’ve completed all my reading - every student file, the Program of Studies, the Collective Bargaining Agreement, the student handbook, the progressive discipline guide, School Committee policies, and pretty much every page/link on the school’s website; I’m excited to come back Monday to start week 3, and I'm ready to use my new knowledge of the school’s policies, practices, and offerings in conjunction with every else I already knew.

Doing the reading never gets the attention it deserves, but isn’t that one of the clear differences between the successful and unsuccessful? I know the laws, I know how to work with and lead people, I know about blended learning and essential questions, but how much influence would I wield or how much good would I be to the organization if I don’t know what we do and don’t do/offer? Sitting down and doing the reading is the first time administrator in July's equivalent of walking the walk; it isn't glamourous and it surely won't be what I hang my hat on, but it was the critical step I needed to take to insure my own effectiveness moving forward.

Some of it was dry and some of it became redundant, but the difference between seeing myself as an outsider on Monday compared to an insider on Friday validates all the highlighter marks on the side of my left hand and time spent secluded in quiet this week. I feel prepared to take my pre-existing skills, beliefs, and knowledge and apply them in the specific context of my new school.

Before I did my reading that application would not have been possible, and as we all know it’s the application and implementation of knowledge & ideas that determines success and impact. I'm striving for both.

3 Steps to More Support

Monday’s visions don’t become Friday’s realities without the help of those around us; the status quo is built with good ideas that are never seen through because nobody else buys in, helps make it happen, and/or takes the necessary actions.

I've seen 3 steps any leader of any organization can take to better insure their envisioned outcome. If you cannot or will not do any of the 3, then the likelihood it’s going to happen diminishes rapidly.

1. Start with WHY - make it clear that the work and effort required will produce necessary and beneficial change by explaining WHY it’s happening. If you can’t, then go back to the drawing board before asking others to help you make it happen.

2. Roll up your sleeves - make it clear that you’re not above doing any task necessary to make the vision a reality; people always respond better when they’re working with you instead of for you.

3. Acknowledge & thank - start working on your next initiative by saying thank you for the work just done. A little praise and appreciation goes a long way.

Simple yet profound; these three easy steps are often overlooked at the expense of what’s trying to be done.

Lesson #3: Show Them

Photo Credit

I’ve been reflecting a lot on my first year in school leadership; the third lesson from this year is SHOW THEM.

I’ve received a lot of validation this year for the theory that modeling the outcomes and initiatives you wish to see gets the best results; from a school leadership position this practice can generate the organic growth and development we want students and staff alike to demonstrate.

1. I made a bunch of tutorial and promotional screencasts this year, and some teachers throughout the year began sharing ones they made after seeing mine. I didn’t have to pontificate about the merits of making videos; people saw what I was doing, realized the value, and took the initiative to pursue it. Awesome.

2. We had a staff workshop on UBD that didn’t go very well, but for the rest of the year I planned and published my meeting agendas using a UBD template with all of our district indicators. As we close up school this week and I prepare to move on to another district there are still teachers approaching me about UBD and writing goals for next year regarding curriculum design. A little modeling went a long way.

3. Like many districts we’re integrating Common Core standards into our curriculum, and we’re also implementing the use of school-wide rubrics to assess school learning expectations. I used my part-time status in the classroom to create a hoist of CCSS / common rubric aligned activities, and my part-time status as an administrator to promote and share them with everybody. More and more throughout the year I saw teachers using and improving the templates I created for their purposes; I saw less and less anxiety and fear surrounding both initiatives as more and more people saw easy and effective ways to integrate them. Creating resources and showing how to use them gets results.

The bottom line is the degree to which you’re visible affects people’s perception of you. More so than being physically visible in halls, classes, etc, there are ways beyond that for school leaders to be a visible part of the initiatives and desired direction of the school. If it’s clear that it’s important enough to you to model, then it becomes more important to everyone. Show them how it can be done.

Lesson #2 - Everything Is An Opportunity to Build or Burn a Bridge

I’ve been reflecting a lot on my first year in school leadership; the second lesson from this year is EVERYTHING IS AN OPPORTUNITY TO BUILD OR BURN A BRIDGE.

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Too often we forget that people need to be listened to. It was two months ago that an irate parent was telling me she was putting me on the front page of the newspaper for being terrible at what I do, and it was two hours ago that the same parent was telling me she was thankful for how much help I offered her son throughout the school year. My conduct and professionalism throughout the prior hostile exchange built a bridge; had I focused my attention during that meeting on retorting or debating the parent rather than listening to what the concerns really were I probably would have burned the bridge. Had my behavior and response to the hostility been reciprocal I doubt the second exchange would have happened as it did. Even hostility can move us toward where we’re trying to go. Everything is an opportunity to build a bridge.

Too often we act solely in the short-term; we just want issues to go away. A student was being referred to the office by the same teacher for same type of behavior and poor academics over and over and over again, and I was growing tired of it. So badly I wanted to suspend the student and reprimand the teacher for not managing the classroom well, but what would the long-term impact of that be? So instead I wedged in another appointment in the day, got the teacher coverage for a face to face group meeting, and got everybody together for as long as it took. In the short-term it created a hectic day, and meant that I was spending another hour on an ongoing issue; in the long-term it set the student up for 3 consecutive months of success in a required class following the conference and established for the teacher a network of allies in me and the parents. Everything is an opportunity to build a bridge.

Too often we get too busy to realize how busy others are and how hard the people around us are working. Teachers are doing awesome things in classrooms that can easily go unnoticed if we let them; making time to visit shows appreciation for what they’re doing; appreciation empowers others. Replying to emails matters. Being on time and keeping meetings within the scripted time frame matters. Only have meetings that you’re prepared to hold matters. Everything is an opportunity to build a bridge.

Lesson #1 - Give Them Something to Make

As it comes to a close this week, I’ve been reflecting a lot on my first year in school leadership; the first lesson from this year is groups and committees need something to produce.

Our Principal’s Advisory Council, a group of 8-10 students grades 9-12, designed two meaningful programs this year that should have a long-lasting positive impact. The school’s participation in Project Purple in January and the crafting of a Class of the Month program for this September are both the handiwork of the PAC; their efforts were efficient and high-quality.

Monthly meetings were productive and outcome oriented; we never had one of those awkward sessions where someone was on a rant or nobody has anything to do or talk about. We always had something that needed our attention and cooperation, and we needed all of the limited amount of time we had together.

It was always the committees and meetings where all we did was talk about problems that I dreaded the most. It’s the groups that create solutions and products that people want to be a part again next year; that’s what benefits school communities. When leading committees in the future I ought to apply the lessons learned from leading the PAC this past year.

Responding to Bad Staff PD As A School Leader

We had some bad PD last week on an important school matter - writing curriculum with UBD. It lacked for 3 key reasons

• The presenter did little to engage the group
• The examples and documents had little alignment with district vocabulary & direction
• The presenter had difficulty answering any questions teachers had

Writing curriculum is too important to allow a bad presentation be the excuse why it doesn’t happen, and from this I learned a couple of lessons about how to respond to bad PD from a leadership position moving forward.

1. Roll Up Your Sleeves - The PD wasn’t aligned to any of our district vocabulary, curricular categories, etc so I made some templates and design tools to distribute to the staff. I’ll share them with everyone in the school via Google Drive, and they’ll be there when folks need them. The presentation being poor doesn’t change the importance of UBD in the eyes of the district and school; if the speaker didn’t get it done, then it’s up to the leadership team to help staff get better. Leaving the result to chance and allowing bad PD be the reason folks don’t improve isn’t an option.

2. Find Authentic & Convenient Ways to Do It - People need to be able to conceptualize how they’re going to do whatever is being asked of them; I’ve found in my brief leadership stint that modeling pays huge dividends. I needed to plan for our next Staff Tech Club meeting, and I needed to make use of the bad PD on UBD; I did both. It takes care of multiple birds with one stone. To promote it further, I screencasted my efforts and put in the staff resources section of my school website
   
   
   
   

3. Make Staff Sharing Easy - I set up a community on Google + for our teachers earlier this year when we moved to Gmail, and it’s worth it’s weight in gold. During the PD one of our science teachers posted from his tablet that we should create a discussion category regarding UBD. Since Friday’s “PD” we’ve seen resources, articles, and commentary regarding UBD posted from teachers in various departments. There hasn’t been any talk of the performance of the speaker; even though the speaker performed poorly the community is keeping the discussion about UBD and professional learning alive and on point. Creating the community was a low effort / high reward idea that gets better with every new request to join and resource shared.

4. A Little Goes A Long Way - Maybe only a few people will even click on the documents I created at first. As of now, only a small sampling of faculty is engaged on Google+. But, there’s more talk and action happening in regards to UBD and other edu topics than there would have been otherwise, and all of those resources and perspectives already shared will be there forever; someone may not look at it for a few months, but it’ll be there. I reckon folks simply seeing leadership working to salvage a poor PD session through creation and community has an impact even without specific engagement; people respond to effort.

The lessons I learned here can easily be applied to the inevitability of more lackluster professional learning engagements over the years; even if I’m using outside speakers to facilitate the session, I still have multiple opportunities to insure the outcomes and changes in practice I wish to see.