3 2nd Place Sucks, But...

So, I'll be the first to admit it.  I've had a pretty sucky year this past school year.  That's part of the reason my blog was quiet for so long.  While I am not writing this for a dose of Internet pity, I am writing it to offer a reason why I've been in such deep contemplation and what the result of that thinking is so far.

It started around this time last year after I was inspired by ISTE13 and all that I had learned.  I realised that I needed to get out there, be involved, and do some more learning, so I set a goal to apply to a doctoral program.  But, I didn't just reach for the stars, I jettisoned myself out into educational outerspace to boldly go where I've never gone before!  I decided to apply to only free doctoral programs which paid for me to study there with a student stipend.  (In case you didn't know, there's about 7 in all of the United States and they are some of the most HIGHLY COMPETITIVE schools in the nation.  What was I thinking?!)

I worked tirelessly to get amazing scores on my GRE (I kicked butt on the Verbal and sank like a stone in Math. Ugh!).  When the scores didn't go in my favor I worked harder on my Personal Statement and response to application questions in order to wow the reviewers right past my mediocre math scores.  Sadly, it didn't work and I was denied at all the schools where I applied.  While sad, I was proud for putting myself out there and reaching higher than I thought I could.  I was a role-model for my kids and that certainly counted.  What made me sad, as I wallowed in my "second place" finish, was that I didn't know WHY I didn't get in.  A little feedback would have gone a long way.  However, I was not deterred and pushed forward to find another goal to achieve.

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3 EdCamp Santiago... Professional Learning in Practice!

Well, I've been a big fan of the edcamp movement for some time and have even had the courage to contact a few edcampers in the last few months (thanks @dancalahan !) for some advice.  But, I didn't have the "guts" yet to pull the trigger and get it started.  Thankfully, there are other members of my PLN out there who do have the "guts" (or fill in any other word you prefer) to get out there and go for it.  Thanks to @profesortbaker we've now gotten the ball rolling!

Do I have any idea what I am doing ? NO. Do I know if this will work in Santiago? NO. Do we even know how to get this started? NO. But, as with all things in the PYP framework and 21st Century learning, we're going to inquire, collaborate virtually and in person, search for resources, ask for help from our PLNs and create a product that will be amazing, even to us!  

There are only a few of us in the movement thus far but it is slowly picking up speed.  To get to know each other and for others to get to know us, a website has been created to promote our edcamp:  Edcamp Santiago  I've also put my interview below so that those of you who read this blog can know more about me and what I've been involved in. 

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9 Lifelong Learners: A Dangerous Assumption

"Teachers are lifelong learners, that's why they teach students to learn."

Have you heard this before? Have you thought this before? Have you said this before?

I have...and now I realise that it's a dangerous assumption to make; in fact, one that may be getting many of us in trouble without realising it.  You see, all this time I've been thinking that the majority of the teachers in the world WANT to improve education and WANT to be up to date and relevant in their professional practice but don't have access to the resources that they need to implement the change.  I've been angry at districts and school boards for not giving teachers the resources needed to make change happen.  Unfortunately, I never stopped to ask myself if the teachers really WANTED to learn anything new or LIKED learning new things to make the change happen.  I had assumed, as I mentioned above, that they were inherently lifelong learners who were just in a situation that didn't allow them access to resources.

The realisation that this is a dangerous assumption hit me after a number of recent surveys with teachers alluded to the fact that they didn't have extra personal time, didn't want to give their personal time or thought it was inappropriate to give their personal time to learn anything new for work outside their contract hours.  In addition, I had a few teacher comments indirectly imply that "at their age they couldn't learn anything new, or at least it would be a lot more difficult and probably not worth the time."  I was disappointed when it finally occurred to me that what these survey results were really saying was that these teachers weren't interested in being professional learners.  For these teachers, no amount of curated internet resources, professional articles, personal learning networks or free webinars are going to make a difference since their inherent desire to learn as a professional is diminished.

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0 Inquiry is Alive, and Without Rules!

I had to take a break.  It was all too amazing and I needed time to process the event and give it space to breathe inside my head.  I've taken a week to process and now all I want to do is celebrate and shout from every roof top around the world!

Yes! We finished our PYP grade 5 exhibition for this year! (To see the whole affair documented from start to finish check out our blog here) As many of you know, I am a strong advocate for the PYP and I believe that the exhibition is one of the best aspects of the program.  At the end of their 7 years of study in elementary school the students are encouraged to lead and inquire on their own in groups.  It is an inspiring and amazing process that has been documented beautifully by @whatedsaid in her post here about her (just completed!) exhibition this year.  I've been fortunate enough to be a part of 11 exhibitions in three different schools over the years and all have been astounding.

I am celebrating many things with this exhibition.  Of course the usual litany of student educational milestones such as:

• Working on social skills through collaborative team work
• Identifying and writing a line of inquiry to focus their investigations
• Discussing, posing and refining key questions to guide research skills with primary and secondary sources
• Embracing the joy of learning, overcoming struggles with cooperation and reflecting on successes of oneself and a group

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1 Dear Teacher who is afraid...

I've been back to school now for three weeks and have been trying to implement what I learned over the summer about change from @willrich45 @angelamaiers and Chip Heath.  The number one message that I received from these thinkers in change is that you need to change the situation if you want anything inspiring to happen.

So, from the beginning of the year I've been changing how we do professional development (which I am now moving toward using professional learning) opportunities.  The change has been small but I'm reflecting now on if it has been effective after 6 months.  I implemented small group learning, personal learning networks and choice in which small group to attend for professional development sessions.  While I haven't had any negative feedback, I haven't really had any.  While I saw lots of people taking notes, I haven't really seen any implementation.  While I have decreased the amount of information meetings, I haven't seen any increase in people using the new information sites provided.  Okay, it's early days still, but why are the roots of change not taking hold yet?

I got to thinking that maybe they are afraid.  Afraid of change; afraid of the possibilities that are out there. But as the video above explains, its happening all over the world and it cannot be stopped.  So, what do we do, those of us who are asked to be at the helm of the professional learning boat, when none of the people on board want to know what the direction is that you are going?  At times I feel like there are so many anchors holding us down that we will never set free into the wide open ocean of amazing education opportunities that are out there in the world.

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9 IB PYP: "Yeah, We Do That"

Change and reform have been on my mind lately (see previous blog post) and it will probably continue to be a recurring theme here.  As I've been reading articles about change and ed reform lately, something has repeatedly come to my attention.  After reading article after article and post after post listing the things that the US education system needs to include to improve, I find myself saying "Yeah, we do that!" when thinking about the IB PYP curriculum at my school.


Consider this post from @angelamaiers who is well known for her approach to "passion based" education.  She mentions using relevant experiences to build knowledge outside school, allowing student negotiation of the curriculum, and teachers being balanced models for their students as some of the tenets for her approach.  Thinking of the IB PYP framework, I can say "yeah, we do that!"  We use relevant topics, constructivist approaches and negotiate learning experiences with students keeping them at the center of our instructional approaches.  We also believe that all people involved in the learning community are models of the profiles of the program from teachers to students to school staff.

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3 Stanford Needs IB Students

I read an article yesterday that has been rattling around inside my head all day today.  I read about a family who is receiving legal assistance from the Mills Legal Clinic which is a part of Standford University's School of Law. While the case itself is interesting and I encourage you to read it (especially if you are interested in special education), what caught my attention was a quote from Stanford Law Professor Lawrence C. Marshall, associate dean for clinical education.  Regarding the skills that law students need to have to succeed as lawyers, he responded "Part of what we need to do is to get them into the habit [of reflective lawyering] and develop the skills to be able to look back on a day of practice and figure out what they can learn from what happened that day."


This struck a chord with me because my first reaction was 'Well then he should find IB graduates!' I found it interesting that he mentioned that he needs to teach that skill to his law students so that they can be successful lawyers in the future.  Imagine my excitement when I realised that we, at my IB PYP school, are already teaching our students these skills starting from kindergarten! Our entire curriculum is based on the idea that learning requires reflection.  Peer, self, group, class, teacher, and school reflection.  What I wouldn't give to find out if the students that are the most successful at the Mills Legal Clinic are students from schools that have simliar curriculums to the IB; Curriculums based on skills and 21st century practices and not just content or tests.

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0 Great (Education) Expectations

Lately, I've been thinking a lot about expectations.  There are a number of reasons why this has been occurring, but most likely it's because I actually have time to take a moment and reflect now that I have a few weeks off for my winter holidays (or North American summer holidays however you like to view it!).  With all of this reflecting, I've come a few conclusions about expectations and their implications in my professional contexts.  I've realised that it boils down to three types of problems that occur with expectations: too low, not clear, or too high.

Too low- I've been doing a lot of reflecting and thinking about change and how to encourage change in my work context (see my previous post on change here).  I've come to realise that we as educators have our expectations TOO LOW for our profession.  I cannot count the number of times that I have discussed WHY education doesn't seem to be changing to help our students gain the needed 21st century skills for the future and the answer I almost always receive is "change is slow in education."  I disagree. I don't think change is slow in education; I think we have our expectations too low for what we can do as a profession.  Plenty of other professions, business, health, marketing for example, change to accomodate the needs of their clients and customers in a timely manner... why can't we? It's not impossible.... I think "education" just accepts the status-quo that has been passed along for far too long.  We can change.  We should change.  We need to raise our expectations and expect that change to happen. Now.

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