Why did the Chickenman cross the road?

I am still learning to lead and so you can join me in this journey once a week (ok the term got the better of me there!) where I will discuss issues to do with leadership and management in schools. It would be great to hear from you about your thoughts on all things leadership.

“It takes unwavering commitment to the worth of each teacher and each child to be an exceptional one. In the words of Margaret Wheatley, ‘Belief is the place from which change originates.’ What is it that you believe about exceptional leaders?”

After completing my first full term as Headteacher here at the International School Seychelles, not including the time spent building and repairing in July and all through the long holidays (not summer as it is actually winter here.) The last couple of days I have spent some time reflecting on the journey and reading some articles. I remember reading both of these whilst completing my NPQH.

‘From effective to exceptional’ by Kathleen Butler http://www.learnersdimension.com/About_Us_files/NCSLPaper.pdf and

Jim Clemmer ‘Feedback to see how others see me’ http://www.clemmergroup.com/feedback-to-see-how-others-see-me.php

I thought it was interesting where it said that many leaders don’t have the time to understand the effect their personal style etc influences others, I think this is a really interesting observation and I can see that at times this has happened this term. I think to a certain degree I have seen that this is the case with certain other people in leadership positions.

The key points for reflection over the holidays are:

1) As a leader know your own leadership style and the effect it can have on others

2) Try and make the management of others ‘invisible’ I know what they mean here, some people think this takes no planning or effort, that they can simply do it naturally but you do need to plan to ‘bridge’ certain personalities to ensure the team becomes more effective!

3) To keep the main thing the main thing and the main thing is learning – focus on the kids as the most important thing that drives you forward!

4) A key quote in the Clemmer article I think is this ‘I judge myself by my intentions. Others judge me by my actions’ and this part about the "SARAH process." This approach comes from grief counseling. The first letter of each stage spell "SARAH." The stages are Shock, Anger, Resentment, Acceptance, and Help.

What do you think?

Designing Education Beyond Borders

It was a good chance to catch up with Graham Brown-Martin @grahambm who I met a year or so ago see here ‘Saltash.net scoops major awards at #LWF11’ http://whydidthechickencrosstheroad.org.uk/2011/01/26/saltash-net-scoops-major-awards-at-lwf11/ 

We started off by talking about what is Design all about?

Design is what links creativity and innovation

It shapes ideas to become practical and attractive propositions for users and customers

Design may be prescribed as creativity deployed to a specific end

Who do we design classrooms for?

Some people thought the state, some thought the kids, the teachers or even the parents – what do you think?

We spend more money on prisons than schools! There are lots of similarities between the two types of institutions which is bizarre but right.

If Steve jobs designed a classroom would it be a room? For example when they designed the iPhone it changed the whole face of mobile phones, it changed everything. Imagine this kind of disruption of education with the way we designed classrooms.

What do you think?

How the brain learns to read?

Teachers know more about the workings of their car than the workings of their children’s brain! By empowering teachers to understand cognitive science can revolutionize learning.

How literacy acquisition changes the brain?

By scanning brains of children they have been able to map the areas of the brain that changes when you learn to read. Initially visual recognition of letters and the combinations of letters (learn the shape) This then passes to the visual cortex which makes sense of the coding or visual element. Next the representation of speech sounds are altered when learning to read (phonetics). Scanning can track microstructures in the brain where connections are reinforced through reading.

The brain research backs up that Phonics is superior to whole-word training – in adults reading is automatized, we no longer realise how difficult it is, we have an illusion of whole word reading when in reality we don’t actually do that. For children reading requires slow letter by letter decoding.

A lot of the rest went over my head

Early Childhood Education: Starting Off Right

First of the talk discussed an early child’s brain development. Dr Blakemore stated that Neuroscience is the key to understanding the early stages of development of humans. The brain can change in response to stimulation and passes through various periods of sensitivity to learn certain sorts of things. For example visual stimulation can make a positive impact on what the brain learns from a early age.

Through understanding more about the brain we could even redesign curriculums to enhance this.

Biggest negative impact on a humans brain is before birth during pregnancy more than the environment. However abuse and other negative impacts can have a harmful impact on learning however one of the biggest factors that have a detrimental effect on learning is social deprivation.

The most important things that a young child needs to learn is: Love, immersion in language and happiness.

Social learning and social cognition in young children is more important than formal academic learning.

Too much temptation for governments and parents to start teaching and learning far too early.

Playing and learning go hand in hand, it is important for young people to learn through play.

The most important parent/school partnership is in young children more than when they get older.

What do you think?

WISE AWARDS

Every year the WISE Awards recognise innovative education projects that are making a considerable impact and contribution to their community. These projects are often sustainable and scalable for others across the world to replicate and develop. It is hoped that by highlighting these examples of good practice innovation and collaboration can flourish across the world.

I know all about this personally when my previous school Saltash.net was shortlisted a couple of years ago

See Putting Cornwall on the Map

I took some time to look at some of this year’s finalists and award winners which are all fantastic in their own rights. The overall winner will be announced at this evenings gala dinner. My own particular favourite project is the Solar powered floating school in Bangladesh

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=u3j2K2XQz7I 

The other award winners are:

Cambodian Children’s Fund (Cambodia)

Cristo Ray Network (USA)

PSU Educarchile (Chile)

Satya Bharti School (India)

You can see more information about them all here http://www.wise-qatar.org/content/2012-wise-awards 

Or check out some of the previous winners through the web documentaries on www.wise-qatar.org

At 9am this morning Her Highness Sheikha Moza bint Nasser announced the launch of her new global education initiative that will help provide a better future for all children.

We watched a great video that was extremely powerful and emotive on the current situation. We then heard from Alek Wek a former supermodel from Sudan and representative from UNHCR and ambassador of the new project between UNHCR and Educate a child. She spoke of her own personal story of growing up in a country in conflict. She spoke about through educating a girl, you educate a family and you educate a community.

You may not be aware but there are an incredible 61 million primary age children out of school and nearly half of these children live in conflict zones. I just can’t believe this but it is true. This is why this new initiative is so important.

Her highness will be meeting with Ban Ki-Moon and others later this week to officially launch the initiative that will aim to provide an education for the 61 million children, giving them high quality teaching and a sense of citizenship for the future.

Her highness discussed many examples of where this was happening for example in Iraq, once a leader in education in the Arab word has suffered severely as a result of three decades of conflict. Literacy rates were the highest in the 1980’s where as nowadays 1/4 of Iraqis are now illiterate.

She finished by saying the following ‘Education gives us opportunity and influence. It also gives us a clear moral obligation to use those gifts to protect that right for others.

http://www.wise-qatar.org/content/launch-new-global-education-initiative-her-highness-sheikha-moza-bint-nasser

Andrew Schleicher from OECD talking about Learning in the 21st Century

This was a good presentation backed up with findings from PISA and other research. Here are some of the statements and discussions, please take into consideration that it was written as a live blog during the presentation so it may not read well.

In Finland they have progressed from providing excellence for some to excellence for all.

Different countries have a different approach which is evident in every day questions to young people. For example what students think about why they are successful in maths?

In USA – kids say depends on talent

In Japan – it depends on effort

Modern school systems need to make learning central, should be focused on qualifications but focus on creating life long learners and fully capture the learning potential of all children.

There is a necessity to have relevance to the work place and employment sector.

The quality of a school can’t exceed the quality of its teachers

Finland is highly successful in recruiting teachers, they provide an environment where teachers work in collaboration and grow and progress in their careers.

Pasi Sahlberg – Director of Education in Finland states that ‘We keep the teaching profession intellectually stimulating for teachers, we have a important role in assessment and developing curriculum for their children’

Professor Tan Onn Seng – Professor of Education, Singapore – ‘Teachers in the 21st century need to be passionate about learning and well versed in the subjects that they teach and understand how learning occurs.’

What does ‘good’ 21st century learning look like? When you ask most teachers all over the world they say student centred and student led but how many do that in the classroom?

Teachers need to reflect on their practice to improve their own learning!

In Singapore teachers are encouraged to build professional collaborative learning partnerships as as a standard thing.

Teachers have to have a good understanding of how technology can enhance and empower learning.

Teachers need to design learning spaces together – must share innovation.

State of education now in the world:

All students learn at high levels

Learning to learn, complex ways of thinking, ways of working

High level professional knowledge of teachers

Teacher accountability to peers and stakeholders

Educating and Cultures: Balancing Global and Local Links

In this presentation the panel were talking about the phrase ‘think globally act locally’ and that these days because of globalisation and the increase in technology it now should be ‘think globally act globally’.

It was interesting to have Frank Schulenberg on the panel from the Wikipedia Foundation to talk about the importance of translating information in all languages.

“The Wikimedia Foundation, Inc. is a nonprofit charitable organization dedicated to encouraging the growth, development and distribution of free, multilingual content, and to providing the full content of these wiki-based projects to the public free of charge. The Wikimedia Foundation operates some of the largest collaboratively edited reference projects in the world, including Wikipedia, a top-ten internet property.”  http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Home

The panel then spoke about the importance of preserving languages in particular English, they spoke about ‘Globish’ If you are not sure what this is then check out this link http://www.globish.com/ 

How do you promote both local and global links in your school?

WISE Learners

I was fortunate enough to catch up with some of the fantastic young people who have been working with WISE for the last couple of years. I was interested to see what the impact was…

First of all I spoke to Martha from Tanzania who I heard speak as part of a panel session earlier, she was brilliant in this. I asked her:

What impact has WISE had on you?

“Since being involved in the WISE programme I have grown massively in confidence as a person, it has given me clarity to what I want out of life and what my aspirations are. It has made me see by being inspired by the people I have met to work in community development”

I then spoke to Soloman from Sierra Leone

Would you recommend other young people getting involved?

“Yes it opens your eyes to the world, it gives you opportunities that you would never have. It makes a huge impact on your life.”

To follow what they are doing follow #WISELearners

Or read their blog at http://learnersvoice.tumblr.com

Panel Session – Education and Society: Listening to Learners

This was an interesting session around the balance between listening to learners and to being led by students.

It made me think about how do I listen to young people?

Do children at my school have a real say in how they are educated?

What about you?

There is a big focus and pressure from society and media for young people to take more control of their learning but how effective is this in schools? Some children may have a say such as through a student council but how much impact or change does this actually make?

I think there is a specific need for the leadership and management of a school to create the appropriate conditions and culture to allow true collaboration to take place between all stakeholders within a school. A integral part of this is making sure that children have the opportunities and the trust to have more involvement in how they are educated? Do we just let students take control or do we need to develop systems to empower young people?

It reminds me of something that happened last week at ISS. A small group of young junior students through the student council were unhappy with some of the waste packaging at lunch time, so they wanted to change this for the better. They went through the student council to suggest an idea to move forward which was parents providing tubberware containers for a child’s lunch, any student who provides one then they would receive discount on their lunch at school. Now this was a great idea but some of the teachers needed to ask the right questions for the young children to move the idea forward. They then approached the tuck shop manager and talked the idea through and sent a letter to parents and the scheme has started this week. This is young people taking control in ‘real time’ and rapidly happening and changing something for the better. This has been an invaluable learning experience for them. Do all young learners have their voices heard? What do you think?