joeteft

August 29, 2016

Shaping our class

I was just talking to one of my colleagues about this lately. How can we shape our classroom, and our classroom culture differently.

I was mentioning Lakoff, and how metaphors help shape our reality. Today reading Creating Cultures of Thinking I came across the same idea. Often we refer to school as work, especially for students. How does this shape how they go about their day?

I remember Sir Ken Robinson talking about teachers as gardeners.

How powerful can we be if we start changing our metaphors? How do we start this?

When we think about vision of a school and the places we want to go, we don’t often address how we shape our school through language. When we think about brands and story telling and the whole image of school, we as teachers need to start shaping it through our daily interactions, the metaphors we create and the language we use.

I’m not sure gardening is the best metaphor (although it fits nicely with my environmental beliefs) but the idea that growth is always possible and that there are seasons of better growth really resonates with me (actually now I wonder if this is something we have to differentiate as well).

August 27, 2016

Unity and standards: What are we aiming for?

Some rights reserved by Chris Devers

Thanks again to the Place Being Resonance book I’ve been stuck in a world of wondering. I apologize in advance. I know at times I am not clear in my writing, and this thought isn’t fully formed, so it might not make the most sense.

While reading it talked about what our destruction of the world looks like, and it looks like progress, parts look like sustainable development, parts look like social justice. It looks like we are supposed to be doing the things we are doing because that’s how people develop. In order for humans to be unified (economically, socially, etc.) other things have to (and do) suffer. So, when we are looking at unity, we are often just taking an anthropocentric view of what we need (and people would argue why wouldn’t we think of humans first) and we forget about what our system (The Earth) needs. While we are going for unity, I’m not really sure we know who we are unifying with, and who (or what I suppose) we are excluding.

It’s really difficult for anyone to step back from themselves, deconstruct what they think, challenge the dominant culture and make a difference. Where do those ideas even come from? So how can we expect people to actually protect our planet when we don’t even know what we don’t know.

While I was pondering this, I started thinking about school, and how we are trying to hit standards and go through curriculums, and just race through to show progress. My mind kind of paused for a second, what and who are we progressing and for what end? Place Being and Resonance wants us to challenge how we teach, why are we moving towards more data? What is growth? Who benefits from our current system of education, and who suffers? I think deep down we know the answers to these questions, but it is difficult to challenge a system that wants to engage and enlighten our learners. When we have public school systems that want to bring up literacy are we focusing too much on a specific type of reading? So much was flying through my head.

I’m not really sure where to take it from there. I know I have to listen more (not just to humans, but I need to be aware of the voices not being heard or acknowledged). I know I have to slow things down and encourage actual thinking, and actual listening in my students. I know I have to encourage students to be aware of a multi-vocal, eco-centric (as in not just anthropocentric) view of our planet.

I guess the real question is how can we see the system we are in and try to fight for that system, while being aware of the multi-faceted aspects of our world. How we can honestly unify through diversity?

August 5, 2016

Checking out the back end

Some rights reserved by Umang Dutt

Orientation week is always interesting when you have been at the same school for awhile. You get a sense of what people will be stressed out about, you kind of understand what might help them, but for the most part you just are there to respond to specific stresses and develop and manage relationships.

This week has been reconnecting with some team leaders and admin and has been really good. I’ve worked with some of my new teachers which has been great and I’ve been diving into the backend of our learning management system.

So far it’s alright, making some sites, working on my.cis and trying to get things sorted for the upcoming year. It’s interesting to see how (well a limited how because I’m not into code or anything yet) something works. It is great when working with teachers and having to break things down, it really reinforces some good teaching practice. You have to respond to a knowledge gap, fill things in at their level and try to support them as they make sense of a new world. Also it’s interesting to work with some higher level people and say, well here is how I’d work through it. I don’t fully know your answer, but here’s how I would find out. I think I’m going to adapt this with more of my students this academic year.

It’s also interesting to see a lot of technostress, some teachers are so stressed out about not understanding. Not knowing is such a huge part of my world, so it’s strange why people would be stressed out about it.

July 28, 2016

Diving into a new year

Some rights reserved by AdamCohn

I’m pretty excited about this new year. A lot of things will be going on. Some of my grade three teachers will be going one to one with ipads, really going to focus on cognitive coaching with (so far) six teachers (I’m hoping to build on that) and bringing a new fishbowl type model of PD to school.

All of this goes towards a more personalized style of development. At times I wonder about how beneficial or damaging personalized learning can be. I guess it’s important not to totally enable enable a learner to dictate everything, but rather create situations where as individuals they can succeed. Specifically I’m thinking about teachers, and how we need to engage them where they need it most, without offering overly involved amounts of people.

Hopefully our fishbowl model will address these issues, smaller groups focused on things they need to know (school directed) but build up relationships so we can work on what the teachers want to know and hopefully add in some cognitive coaching as well.

I start seeing new teachers next week, looking forward to seeing the new teachers and reuniting with the old.

July 14, 2016May 26, 2017

How do we create wonder?

Pancho wondering

In part of Place * Being * Resonance it discusses the power of technology. The worry presented is that when we use technology we attack a problem from one point of view, and using one solution in mind. Regardless of the multitude of options technologically we are still thinking from a technological standpoint, and therefore think about an anthropocentric solution.

How can we as teachers use technology to enhance education without limiting our options? The more I think about it the more I wonder if this is what the Redefinition aspect of SAMR could be all about. How can we really redefine our thinking regardless of the tools we use?

Derby posits that we must always be open to other ways of thinking and listening to other ways of being without being focused solely on humans and how we interact with the world. We need to listen to language that isn’t always our own (maybe coding) and learn to create, and use metaphor to embody other living things.

Anyway, I wonder about the power of ipads in situations like this, we can use them to create (always movies or books) that can use examples of this other-mindedness. One of my goals this year is to really try for this. Capture images (although there is some argument that just looking at images negates the importance of actually being outdoors) create stories that bring about other points of view. I want my students to really strive to be open-minded and other-minded, and I think using the iPad can help.

The base of this (I think) is to wonder, actually wonder, critically wonder, Derby would say ironically wonder I think, but really question what we are thinking and why we are thinking it, and wonder about what other voices are being missed. As always going outside and actually seeing other things is the first step.

May 19, 2016May 26, 2017

Using questions to dig deeper

This is the second year I’ve done this particular “sharing the planet unit” with grade 1 students. Last year the focus (their focus, not mine) was on butterflies, we had seen a lot. This year, we are focusing a lot on millipedes. Through questioning we are able to help the students use online resources to identify and figure out what these living things are about.

I want to start changing (drastically at times) how my questioning skills can dig deep fast. I’ve been working all year on structuring questions, my co-teachers think it’s a natural skill of mine, but I’ve worked very hard on it. However, I’m not yet where I want to be.

I’ve been reading coaching books to help develop questions that will make my teachers more effective, and I’m hoping I can transfer these questions, or these questioning techniques to students. How can we go deep fast though? Is it possible, recommended?

These are the thoughts that are running through me right now. How do I become the most effective questioner?

May 11, 2016

Changing our language

Some rights reserved by autumnal_hedge

Rarely do I think about poetry and it’s opportunity to create relationships by making metaphors. I’ve been slowly (but diligently and thoughtfully) reading this book.

you can buy it here

It continues to change the way I think, and how I want to grow as an educator. The whole idea of slowing doing, and really creating those deep connections is so important. This book calls for a change in approach to how we view aspects of environmental education. Specifically I enjoy the opportunity to engage more in poetry (which is something very new for me).

The argument is, in order to create connections we have to foster a feeling (which I have read so many other places and firmly believe). Before we actually get to know something, we need to feel something about it, and this is where poetry and metaphor come into play. Instead of learning about a plant scientifically first, we have to create that awe, and that connection. Here is where we use poetry.

For the past week and a half I’ve been talking the grade 1 teachers and students out to the garden. First we look at something and draw it, then we listen to the world around us, and then (we don’t label) we write some poetry. Try to fully describe our thing beautifully. We don’t have to know the correct names, we don’t label the parts or explain what it is or does (this will all come later in the unit) we just write about it, how it looks, feels, smells, sounds and how it makes us feel.

It’s been a really interesting exercise so far. Everyone enjoys being outside (even if it is a little hot from time to time). The focus on the change in language has made learning more accessible for the younger students. They aren’t as worried about being right, they just need to talk about how they feel, so it’s easy for them to start. Once we’ve made some connections then we start the deeper understanding (which will be easier because we actually care).

It’s a great start so far.

May 3, 2016

Why so slow?

https://www.flickr.com/photos/befuddledsenses/

The end of the year is quickly approaching, and this is a time I find when teachers are definitely trying to speed things up. We want to get all of the content in before the students go to their next great, before they try to get things presentable to parents, and before we rush off to our summer vacations.

At our school at least half of the grade levels I work with are finishing the year with sharing the planet, so I’m pushing for a go slow movement for the next six or seven weeks. We need time to fully experience what it’s like outside in order to actually make those connections (something I feel I talk about all the time). I now have four classes I take outside every week. It’s a start (one class is trying to move to everyday next year), but we are moving forward which is great!

We are taking the time to wonder and think, something that is difficult for some teachers. We have to talk about connections and thinking deeply about how things work together (which is the central idea for most of our units, but never really adressed this way).

All in all, in just one week I’ve seen more excitement about the unit. Students are actively engaged and posing good questions. This week we are trying to “look closely” to see how things work and what things look like.

Going slow is great for us right now, hopefully I can convince some teachers to keep it up after these seven weeks.

April 20, 2016

Frustration then Faith

Some rights reserved by sarahgb(theoriginal)

Wow, these last couple weeks have been really frustrating. Working with teachers and coaching one on one, a lot of them feel frustrated that they haven’t met the particular outcomes they felt they needed to meet. We’ve talked a lot about content vs concepts, and moving towards changing our thinking with our culture of thinking model.

However, what struck me recently was how important documentation can be to bring faith back into the teachers. Too often when we are in the classroom we are seeing the students as they are, not where they were. At the beginning of the year, it required so much faith in our students in order to believe they could get as far as they did, now that they are here, we can’t be frustrated, we need to know they can get to the next level.

In teacher’s college we talked about the importance of high expectations, and I think this is very similar. We need to have faith that students will get there, they will understand, they’ll be successful in our classes. If we are only looking at the things the students can not do, we foster that kind of thinking, we need to help the students believe that all things in learning are possible.

Reports are coming up, working with some teachers on how to create more evidence for next year. It’s been really exciting so far. I’m glad I’ve started coaching more than just being in an edtech role. It has got me outside a lot more, had me more meaningfully involved in planning meetings, and teachers are now asking me a broader range of questions.

Happy days.