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

#conferencechat Is #FETC on your radar? It should be…

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I am an unapologetic nerd. I love to read. To reflect. I love to grow and get better at whatever it is I am trying to do in life. As an educator, it is important to model that for not only our students but also our teachers.

It’s why one of our professional goals each year as a staff is to read a book that they feel can contribute to their growth as an educator. It’s an individual choice. One that I ask they take seriously, b/c I am also not a fan of jumping through hoops for the sake of jumping.

I’m also a huge proponent of attending conferences and growing with people and spend a considerable amount of my budget to grow our people.  Our team knows that I allocate money for them to travel and attend various conferences throughout the year. It’s even MORE fun when they find something and ask to go, but I also send what I can their way too. That also includes my more siloed campus members…art, music, pe, etc. Everyone deserves the chance to get better if they want to.

When it comes to conferences for me, I find I am much more selective these days.

I’ve been spoiled by the amazing educators I’ve gotten to see throughout the years that not only MOVE me personally, but that also push me professionally. I need both these days. I need to get better as a leader for my people, in addition to needing that personal connection to make it all come together with a big pretty bow. (like a gift! see? those love languages come up all over the place!)

Excited that FETC is first up in 2020…it checks off #allthethings on my “make it worth missing school” list. For my Texas peeps, FETC is the Florida TCEA, their state tech conference. “Tech” conferences have come a long since my days in the technology department…no longer are they just about the shiny tools and 50 apps in 50 minutes. It’s more about effective instruction in using any kind of technology, about introducing effective pedagogy and growing with your teams. Tools will come and go, but your people are yours.

Example…here are a couple of the sessions I am really excited about…

  • Dwight Carter: former principal, “Why settle for good when you can be G.R.E.A.T! In today’s high demand culture of education, it’s easy to get bogged down by initiatives, mandates, and other constraints, but there are two things we can control: our attitude and actions. You will learn five habits to shift your mindset to be G.R.E.A.T every day.”
  • Marlena Gross-Taylor, former principal, “Explore instructional strategies that can be used to create effective learning conditions to increase student success. Identify evidence-based instructional routines and tech implementation designed to maximize student interaction in classroom activities to deepen student discourse and thinking. Participants will identify a component of instructional practice they want to improve and develop a personal professional plan to support the identified goal.”
  • Marlena is also presenting on “The start-up model thrives on high-energy, innovative ideas and intentional marketing. This session will guide you as a leader in branding your school with a start-up mentality to create excitement, celebrate the creativity of students, and promote family and community involvement. Principals are the lead storytellers of their schools and must become adept in leveraging digital resources to share the amazing accomplishments of their school.”
  • Jacie Maslyk has SEVERAL sessions I can’t wait to get to:

C259 | #Connect2Lead: Using Your Learning Network to Move Your School Forward

W172$ | Challenge Accepted! 6 Engineering Design Challenges for Any Classroom

W085$ | Design in the Making: Using Creative Thinking in the Innovative Classroom

W211$ | Remake Literacy: MakerEd Meets ELA in Powerful Ways

W011$ | Unlock Creativity: 7 Keys For Every Educator

C032 | 5 Digital Tools for Every Administrator

 

Again, so much more than tools and tricks, right? I am hoping to catch sessions from Steven Anderson, Shaelyn Farmsworth, and Joe Sanfelippo..again, national voices that will be there, working with educators of all levels. Knowing that all these crazy talented educators will all be in the same space at the same time…I’m also looking forward to the conversations that I know will be taking place. I will never forget attending a conference with a group of people who attended zero sessions because “they knew all that already.” Even if that is true…

are your people at the same level/place of comfort and skill with you? If not then there is still growing to do!

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Connecting with like-minded, incredible, committed people just fills my bucket. How do YOU do that? If not at conferences, then how?

 

Come to FETC with me!

 

Inquiringly &

 

 

Ways to keep growing as a leader… #taketwo

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I’ve mentioned before that one of the things I think that impacted my leadership last year was that I put all of the “me” things on the back burner, including my own growth as a leader. In years previous, I was very active on twitter leader chats, participating in conversations, I was more involved with my local and state leadership opportunities, and would attend several conferences throughout the year. These opportunities helped me stay connected to my PLN (aka: peer friends!), helped me stay abreast of current and emergent leadership trends, and even grounded me as an administrator.

This year, more determined than ever to not lose sight of those things that I truly think help me maintain balance, that myth that we as educators all strive for, I’ve added more to my plate. Contradictory, isn’t it? Last year taught me however that when I spend too much time on the things I HAVE to do, vs the things I enjoy or WANT to do, I am not very good at anything. 

I have the privilege of having been named an ASCD Emerging Leader last year. ASCD has incredible resources to support educators overall, and in particular, those who want to GROW. They’ve been doing the ASCD Learn Teach Lead Radio podcast with BAM Radio for several months now and it’s getting extremely popular. There are great conversations with educationally centered authors on the show, and they are quick and easy to listen too. I’ve begun listening to one each Sunday as I get ready for church. All episodes can be found here. If you’re a teacher, looking for the same kinda knowledge, I can’t recommend Anglea Watson and her “Truth for Teachers“podcast enough. These are 10-15 minutes of PRACTICAL teaching advice, that both newbies and veteran educators can grow from. From genuis hour help to procrastination, she covers the #realtalk part of your world.

Professional reading can take a bad rap, but I again contend that when it’s something I WANT to read, it makes a huge difference. I blogged over the summer about what I was reading to grow, and that hasn’t stopped, even with my busy elementary fall world!

Three books you should stop and get NOW are:

  • Renegade Leadership, by Brad Gustafson. The title is enough, but Brad makes me want to be a better principal. Centered in student learning, he makes it sound SO easy to also be a renegade and push the status quo. My favorite part is that he doesn’t expect you to stop ALL the other pieces that we know being a leader means…the HR side, the finance side, the paperwork side. He shows you to be a renegade in spite of all those necessary components.
  • The Starter Guide to Makerspaces, by Nick Provenzano. Makerspaces are one of the things that I just don’t get. Thankfully, “The Nerdy Teacher” has written a book to help me! I definitely plan on leading my staff this Spring to a place where we can MAKE and MAKE confidently!
  • ROI powers ROI: The ultimate guide to think and communicate for ridiculous results, by Michael Rose. For $9 on Amazon, you can download this book. It just makes me think differently about what I try and communicate to my people. Sometimes the WHAT loses all its importance if you don’t master the HOW. Please see #thefirstyear for more on that! This book has made me pause before I speak and that is a good thing.

Last but not least…conferences. There is such power in connecting, not only myself, but also my teachers. I sent several to go hear George Couros a week or so ago, and EACH ONE OF THEM  have come in to me and asked, in different ways, how they can take a risk or lead differently. It doesn’t matter that I push them WEEKLY, it was hearing him speak that made them step up..and out. GO to a conference. SEND your people to a conference. No money? Find an #edcamp near you.  On my radar for the spring/ summer?

  • TCEA– Haven’t been in several years and am looking forward to presenting with Matt Arend on Snapchat in Schools, and also with him and Sanee Bell on Leadership through Failure.
  • ASCD– Missed last year, and won’t make that mistake again! Early Bird rates are still available!
  • ISTE- Local this year (ish!) and I’m taking a team of teachers…ISTE has come a long way with integrating academic best practices with emergent technology ideas, it’s worth attending every few years!

 

How do you maintain the “growth” part of your role as an educator?

 

Always learning,

Amber

#TXASCD Groundshaking moves for Integration Success

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I had the pleasure of presenting at the Texas ASCD conference this week with a principal here in the Wylie ISD. We were a part of an iPad roll out last year and wanted to speak to our experience. It was a lively group and we were able to get into some great conversations. Below are the challenges we discussed, and the presentation itself.

sept-challenge

October challenge!

november-tech-challenge

Speedgeeking!

And our presentation! Please let me know if you have any questions!

 

November integration,

Amber

Get organized….digitally!

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When I was student teaching, I remember having the teacher next door to me take me into her room and show me her file cabinets. I was amazed. They were, to a newbie, the mecca of experience. There was a file on anything you could think of…from PD to content to parent newsletters…all neatly labeled with the most neat, handwritten labels I have ever seen. I was in awe! It became my mission to be THAT organized…and have that many resources…I was lucky enough to call her best friend and soon learned she was that awesome in all kinds of ways!

Fast forward to 2015 and I think I have less than one drawer of files, and half of them are personnel files.  All of my resources are online now, stored on my computer. That being said, I was feeling the spring fever over the holidays so I took the time to do some “spring cleaning” on my files, pictures, and other things I have “collected” through the years.

I have the unfortunate habit of just saving things to my desktop, which is easy, but does nothing for a sense of organization. I created folders on my desktop that had generic titles but that would hold the types of files I seem to be always saving. These generically titled folders including things like data, teacher info, PLCs, and testing. As I am saving things I do my *best*  to put them into these files. Other tips?

*** Have an external backup. I have learned from switching campuses and then districts, it was really important to have an external backup that could hold all of my professional files. I didn’t have time to go through and be choosy, I wanted it all. In case of a system crash or a problem transferring accounts, I feel much safer knowing all of my resources are backed up. I have it marked in my planner as a reminder, once a month to back up everything on my home PC and my work computer, just in case.

*** Where’s your cloud storage for working files? Do you use Google Drive? Do you use Dropbox? Is there a way for you to access what you need when you aren’t near your external drive? I am a big fan of Dropbox, but with so many districts embracing google apps for education, that also has become a viable source. Google Drive makes it easy to collaborate in real time, so the storage piece there is also handy. Whichever you choose, use it consistently. 

It does no good to have your files all over the place, even if they are organized.

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*** Rename your files. Make it easy for you to remember, and search. I used to think everything needed a file folder and then everything should be in its place. But once I started naming my files very specifically, I learned it was a much quicker process to search for it by name then it was to find a file, and go through its subfolders. Instead of “math data”, I now would save it as “3rd grade math all teachers unit 4”. Again, I do still place my workable files in a generically titled file, but just searching for what I am looking for is MUCH easier.

*** Pictures and movies. My big kid is easy. All of our memories are printed out, and filed in a handy picture box. (or twelve.) In a closet. My little bit has her every moment recorded digitally. Very few of our pictures with her are printed out in a hard copy, but instead are stored in “my photos” on my mac. A very scary  “safe place”. Each summer, I back up my entire photo library to Shutterfly. It takes an entire day to batch upload each and every one….but I at least know that they are all there. Thankfully, should something ever happen, I do a fair job of uploading my favorites to Instagram and Facebook as well. Bless her little digital footprint…

 

What tips and tricks do you have to maintain an organized digital system? I also have a plethora of other organizational ideas (that I’ll get to at some point) on Pinterest. I would love to hear what you do!

File FixN,

Amber

So you want to have a class blog…

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Below is a SAMPLE first blog post…this is one that I used with my fourth graders many moons ago that started off our blogging adventure. (Feel free to use!!) During class we’d discussed the many do’s and don’t’s of our classroom blog, and also how we wanted others who read to “see” us. It was a VERY long conversation! Students knew that other adults, as well as other students, would be visiting our blog and they wanted to come across as intelligent as possible, 🙂

By setting the “tone” for what and how we wanted the blog to work, the expectations were in place before we’d even logged on. In addition to the student safety pieces we’d discussed, we also talked about web netiquette and what made a “good” comment versus a “blah” one. Also, spelling errors weren’t a focus for my classroom, I was more interested in what thoughts they were trying to convey rather than whether or not they spelled them correctly. Each teacher (and class!) can make that decision for themselves. That being said, students were way more critical of each other than I could have been about their errors on the blog.

There are so many support systems out there, like #commentsforkids. That stream on twitter will generate more traffic for your class posts to help show your students what a global audience can really look like! There are also a multitude of blogging platforms out there…blogger, kidblog, wordpress, etc. Do NOT be scared of blogging with your students!! I can’t stress this enough! You have complete autonomy of your “space”.  I always set my comments settings to where I had to go in and approve them before they could be “seen”, to ensure no personal info was shared. I used a generic title & my kids didn’t use their real names. It was a safe space!

Good luck with blogging in your classroom! I hope you see as many benefits as I did from the relationships that I was able to develop from both my students and my parents throughout the years.

________________________________________________________________________
i_love_bloggingIt’s time to get blogging! We’ve talked about the different do’s and don’ts for blogging…but I wanted to add a couple more here. Read through these and post a comment about the rule you think is MOST important and why.

1. Don’t give out any personal information like telephone numbers, home address, school name or parent’s office address.

2. Don’t use your real name as your log on name.

3. Make sure you’re not simply typing “Yeah” or “That’s right” or something equally boring.

4. Learn how to use “smileys” to show how you are saying things. Read the smileys sideways – they make a face. 🙂 or 🙂 is a smiley face. You are happy and smiling when you speak….let me see that personality!

5. Adhere to the same standards of behavior online that you follow in real life.

Be ethical. Don’t believe anyone who says, “The only ethics out there are what you can get away with.” If you encounter an ethical dilemma in cyberspace, consult the code you follow in real life. Chances are good you’ll find the answer, 🙂

OK, put these rules to the test and comment letting me know what you think!!

Bloggingly,
Mrs. Teamann