my version of transparent, collaborative leadership...with a Teamann twist

New series: Ask an Admin! #Q1: What is your go to strategy for team building? #askanadmin

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I am SO excited about what I am blogging through the month of July! I have connected with some of my favorite administrators on the planet and they’ve all agreed to help me tackle questions we’ve been asked, or hear all the time. These questions will help ya get your mind right, give you differing perspectives, and hopefully, show you how very, very different a “right” answer can be! Ross Cooper wrote a great blog on how you’re not doing it wrong, you’re just doing it “different”, and that’s what this series is all about. I know many aspiring administrators and I want them to see that there are about as many different answers to questions as there are campuses. Your answers depend on you, your experiences, and your people. There is no “right” answer at times, there’s just YOUR answer. If nothing else, hopefully this will connect you again, to some of my favorite people, their blogs, and the chance to make them a part of your PLN world as well.

#askanadmin: Q1. What is your go to strategy for team building?

A1:

Katie: Peter Senge points out that the only vision that people ever commit to is their own. Without conversations about the vision and what it means, it’s impossible to build a shared vision across a community. One of my favorite strategies is called Significant Learning. This strategy not only builds community but helps foster purposeful conversations about past experiences, beliefs, and allows a team to co-create a vision for what is possible in our classrooms.

 

Here’s how it goes:

    1. Reflect on a  significant learning experience where you learned something new that has stuck with you and made an impact. This doesn’t have to be in school.  Think riding a bike, learning to snowboard, driving a car. Anything.Take a minute or two and independently jot down some thoughts about a significant learning experience. Think not only about what you learned but how you learned.
  • What was the context?  
  • Who was involved?  
  • How did you feel?
  2. In small groups of 3-5, each person takes 3 minutes to share their experience.
  3. After each person has shared, the group comes up with some common themes from each of the learning experiences.
  4. Share the themes out as a whole group and capture them on a shared document.  (Note: This can serve as a great tool for conversations about teaching and learning.)
  5. As a group, reflect about the following prompts:
    • How often are these types of experiences the core of our learning in classrooms?  
    • What might be areas of strength that you are seeing? Areas for growth?   
    • How might you collectively close to gap to create the significant learning experiences?

No matter how often I do this activity, or how diverse the crowd, the themes that surface in  significant learning experiences remain pretty consistent.

People discuss learning in ways that are purposeful and for an authentic audience.

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Typically, these experience involve a variety of opportunities to explore models, receive feedback, and reflection. There is often productive struggle and risk that requires guidance and mentorship to grow.

I love watching people engaged in these conversations because they can’t help from smiling as they conjure up memories of these experiences that impacted them. The power in this strategy is that is provides space for the team connect and create a shared understanding of what significant learning means to you as a community.Reflecting on our own learning experiences and how we traditionally learn in schools can help create the conditions that support powerful learning in our classrooms to move forward.

 

A2:

(Of course I chose to follow that fabulousness…sheesh, :))

 

One of my goals at my campus is to consistently & constantly remind everyone that we are all on the same team. Top to bottom, right to left…I want us to all know that what we do MATTER, together, collectively,  and plays a role in our campus success. All of the team building I have done the past two years has been centered around the unifying hashtag of #wearewhitt. The summer before my first year started I crowd-sourced our campus and community to develop the hashtag, one that could be used to share our learning, what is happening in our classrooms, and across all forms of social media. It’s on our bumper stickers and on our yard signs…because it’s together WE make a difference.

 

That being said, as a final activity to our professional development each year, we do a candle pass. When their rooms are ready, and their minds are full of all that we’re going to accomplish the next school year, we gather as a campus family in a big circle. I’ll play a song that ties in to our district theme and we will light each other candles one by one, around the circle. I speak a lot of “that moment” where we are gathered in the room, as one #wearewhitt family, and that we will never all be together in this way again. Every year will bring change, but at that moment, we are all one. We each bring a talent, a gift…the experiences that are going to impact all of our Wolves. There is such power in the beginning of the year, such a fresh, newness…this is a calming way to bring us together. It may be the sorority girl in me, but seeing all my faces, gathered together, with no stress & no problems…just excitement for their beginning, it fills my heart. When I think about starting our year, I can’t imagine not coming together and lighting each other’s candles…knowing that 

…we can start a blaze of learning, especially if we are working together.

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My “to don’t do”list…what’s on yours?

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Last week we had a guest speaker, Ryan Leak, at our church who spoke on the need to be real. He talked specifically about Elijah, a noted trash talker, who had no problems calling out those around him, because he knew that God had his back…but that even Elijah had moments where he doubted himself and cried out for support. He then connected that with his own struggles and the need to “hide” how he was really feeling from those who were supposed to care the most about him. It was a powerful message.

One of the things he mentioned specifically that just stuck with me the idea of the “to don’t do” list. I speak a lot about the power of a vision for leaders and how important it is to know what you stand for and what you believe in…the “to don’t do” list is similar in my mind. If you stand for nothing, what will you fall for? Knowing what you won’t do will help keep you in your lane..staying true to what you want to do.

On my “to don’t do” list?

  • Compare my insides with other’s outsides. (Love this quote from @MsMagiera  and her #ISTE17 talk today!) There is more to leadership than what someone puts on twitter. Regardless of the amount of quoteable quotes or amount of twitter followers one has…don’t fall for the notion that it’s easy for everyone else. It is hard, it is messy…for us all. And that’s what makes it so worth it!
  • Walk alone. If you’re walking alone, that’s your choice. Even going into year three, I am so thankful for my colleagues, PLN and peers that I can reach out to for help. It doesn’t do ANYONE (much less your staff/students) any good if you think you know it all. Leadership isn’t a zero sum game…by leveraging the strengths of those around you, everyone wins. Play by yourself, and only everyone loses. 
  • Forget that you can be hungry and be humble. You are where you are for a reason. Don’t ever forget that. That doesn’t mean you can’t strive for more, or to be better. Never stop wanting to grow and learn!
  • Just because you have the right to say something, doesn’t mean you should. Can you be supportive and condescending at the same time? Value the relationship over being right.

 

What’s on your “to don’t do” list?

 

Pondering,

Amber

When awards go wrong…

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One of the benefits to our downtime in the summer is that we actually HAVE downtime. I have the opportunity to dive deeper into data, start plans for next year, and spend some time deep cleaning/organizing my office. This week, I also had a reminder that even when I think I’ve covered my bases, I can still miss the obvious. Like the unintended impact of awards, or what we’ve been calling them…student celebrations.

So when I had a parent email me about needing to meet…I’m not going to lie, I may have sighed. I wasn’t in parent mode, I was in organize bunny mode!

Ya’ll. I genuinely think this was another sign from Jesus that I needed to fill my summer principal bucket. I had emailed this mother her daughter’s test results earlier in the week and they were REALLY good, so I wasn’t sure exactly what this meeting was going to be about. This sweet momma spent about an hour with me, going over her daughter’s previous year…making sure I recognized the significance of her standardized testing success. She was in RTI, they had worried about a learning disability, she had tutoring every.single.week. She told me about how her daughter suffered with low self-esteem, because of how hard her year was. She told me how she hated awards days and tried to miss school when we had our “student celebrations”. How on the last day, when we had final celebrations, her sweet daughter wouldn’t even make eye contact with her as she lined up for class. She didn’t receive an award the entire year.

I literally teared up. How could I have failed this sweet girl? How could I have missed that happening?

Don’t get me wrong. I am NOT an everyone gets a cookie kinda girl. I frequently told my students that there was only one Superbowl MVP, and that even Troy didn’t get it every year. But…this isn’t the NFL. This is elementary school. There wasn’t one way that she could be celebrated all year long? There wasn’t one opportunity to for her to have been recognized in front of her peers?

I find that hard to believe, but this year, it was apparently true.

This wasn’t even the point of this mom’s visit. No, she actually came in to tell me about how one of her daughter’s teachers had lifted her up, academically and emotionally through the year, in particularly during the testing season. She had taken her for ice cream the weekend before the big tests, and was taking her to lunch this next week to celebrate her success. She wanted to make sure I knew how much that meant to her and her family. Moving forward for the next year, she asked that her daughter be placed with someone who could meet those needs again, just in case she struggled.

Luckily,  I have a staff full of amazing teachers and could reassure her.

I knew her visit wasn’t with the intent to make me feel bad or feel guilty. But it was a heartfelt reminder that even on days where we think we’re “celebrating”, there are kids who struggle and feel left out. They notice what is going on. They are well aware of their academic inadequacies. 

We can do better. We WILL do better. 

I don’t know what the solution is, but never again do I want to look a momma in the eye and realize how I allowed something that was meant to “celebrate”,  hurt her and her student.

Chris Wejr is my go to guru on this topic and he has written a plethora  of really thought-provoking posts, should you want another perspective.

  1. Rethinking Awards Ceremonies | The Wejr Board

 

Celebration deliberating,

Amber

 

 

PS: I absolutely asked the mom if I could share this story here, 🙂 just in case you were wondering.

When connecting hurts…

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I woke up today to the heartbreaking news about a former family. There were two years in a row where I only spent one year on each campus. One might think I was there too briefly to make any connections, but of course, any educator knows that isn’t true. Each staff spent a year being a part of my family, and all of those students were who I spent my days with. It’s impossible not to build relationships. We were connected, albeit briefly.

This family, in particular, not only stood out because of her sweet 1st grader, but also b/c of her precious soon to be kindergartener. That baby girl was dressed to the 9’s each and every time I saw her, no jammy days for her! As a girl mom, 🙂 this was always so impressive to me! I left before she became a student, but I ran into the momma every now and then, and we were facebook friends, so ya know, only as far away as a picture comment. I even ordered tee shirts from her for my office staff this past Halloween. We were still connected. 

Hearing that her sweet baby girl was killed in a car accident yesterday has just devastated me. I am sad for her family. I am sad for her school. I am sad for her principal, her teacher, her classmates. I am sad that she won’t be a first grader. I am sad that that mom woke up today having to remember that news. I am sad.

What we do…it’s living life with people. It’s going to baseball games, it’s going to the hospital when they are sick. It’s sending cookies when there’s a broken limb. These are things I do, not because I want to Instagram them, but because I genuinely LOVE these Wolves. I had a parent this year thank me for loving her kids like they were mine…but they kind of are, ya’ll. My role is committing to being there, for not just their academic needs, but also their emotional ones. I want to be remembered because I cared, but more importantly I want them to FEEL that I care, now. I sent a post card last year to all 667 of them. Not because I had to, but because I want them to know I know their name, that I care about each one of them. I recognize my role in preparing students for their future, but we have to remember that our present is pretty darn important too. It fills our days with more joy than a regular “business” person could possibly imagine, but it can also bring us to our knees. I don’t know how to lead without forming these connections…and I don’t think I am supposed to, but today’s like today, hurt.

Value your connections, friends. We are blessed to spend our days seeing the present version of who they are, and dreaming about all that they can become. Of course, we all abide by the notion that once you’ve been “my student”, you’ll always be “my student”. The fragility of our relationships is never felt quite as much as in moments like this. Know that you are spending time with our communities future. You are modeling what a caring, involved, invested adult looks like in the lives of our students. You are connected. 

Hug your babies tonight. Life can change in an instant.

 

Sadly,

Amber

 

Thinking August PD? Ways to innovate for your staff!

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Summer is always a calmer time. It allows for reflection, for refocus, and time to plot your course moving forward. For us, that means thinking about what professional development we are going to offer when our staff comes back in August. Knowing that we don’t want a sit and get kind of offering I’ve been doing research on different ways we can offer what we know has to be done,  but in a manner that sets an example. Here’s what we’re contemplating:

  • Starbucks model: What’s the best part about Starbucks? the laid back, friendly vibe. Set up your room for tables of two or four and have drinks and light snacks available. Provide each table with conversation starters, campus questions, or trends that you want them to think about. Have them record their reflections via tweets with your campus hash tag. Show the tweets to the whole campus via Twitterfall or Tweetbeam.
  • Your own “Idea Smackdown”: While I’ve seen this done at Edcamps statewide sharing apps, how fun would it be to have your teachers stand up and in 30 seconds share their best classroom management idea, small group math station ideas, or guided reading template tip? Whatever your building initiative is, you can tailor this strategy to support it! Time it and go!
  • Breakout Edu: Adam Bellow not only enjoys his steak the RIGHT way, but he is also the CEO of Breakout Edu. Breakout EDU, founded in 2015 by James Sanders and Mark Hammons, provides kits to schools and districts allowing for immersive game play. Specifically, with either a wooden box kit ($119) or a plastic version ($89), a group of individuals has all of the tools required to play one of over 200 games accessed freely on the Breakout EDU website—some developed by the founders, others created by the users themselves. What better way to get your team thinking like a team, than to throw them into Breakout Edu?
  • SpeedGeeking: I’ve used speedgeeking  (similar to speed dating!) as a way to introduce teachers to new technology applications in a short amount of time. What if you took that same concept and applied to different initiatives happening on your campus? You could also use this method for getting out all of the mundane BTS to do’s, like messages from the nurse, secretary, data clerk, etc.
  • a Twitter slow chat: We read “Teach Like a Pirate” several years ago and used this twitter chat model.  Not only did it encourage them to be more active on the Twitterverse, but it allowed connections from across the nation as all kinds of educators jumped into the conversation.
  • FB book study: Create a closed group. Use Adobe Spark to create discussion questions. Schedule them to post using Postcron. Allow your teachers to answer them within a scheduled window of time. Encourage conversations by responding to posts and asking follow-up questions. We used this last year for Couros’s “Innovator’s Mindset”. 
  • Take a cruise: Set up tables (but call them “ports of call!!”) with different ideas, articles, information that you need/want to be shared. Invite your teachers to “take a cruise” and visit however many ports you want the to visit. Create a passport where they can record their thoughts/reflections. I anticipate having “ports” they must visit in addition to “fun” ones as well!

 

The most important thing about whatever you plan is to remember who you are planning it for.

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 I know of a campus that took their team to a swim park last year. Thank goodness I knew better to try something like that, 😉 but now having had my staff for two years,  I am thankful that they are willing to do some of these unconventional PD ideas with me!

 

 

PD planN,

Amber