@L_Hilt Encourages Tech Savy School Admin

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I have never met Lyn Hilt in person. We only know each other through blogging and Twitter. In the past half year, though, she has greatly influenced my thinking and professional practice. So have the authors and books she mentions in this superb post.

http://plpnetwork.com/2011/07/11/all-principals-should-be-tech-savvy/

For at least the past seven years (I have just completed my eighth year as a principal), I have tried to live by the philosophy and practice that @L_Hilt articulates and advocates in this most recent post. I have so much more to learn still, and I make a number of mistakes and fall short of that vision. Yet, I do have a lot of bright spots, too, relative to that vision. And I will keep striving to be the best instructional leader that I can be – partnering for learning!

Many thanks to all my partners – those I’ve met, as well as those I have yet to meet. So many great people to learn from and to learn with…if we will only be open, curious, reflective, and persistent. After all…It’s about learning.

A 007 Principal’s Ride and Making Films

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This week, my family and I saw Cars 2, the sequel to the fabulous, animated story of Lightening McQueen and his learnings of humility with his new-found family in Radiator Springs. In Cars 2, McQueen finds himself in a new racing and life-learning challenge, and Mater, his best friend the rusty, ol’ tow truck, finds himself a secret agent who doesn’t realize his own creative intelligence and unique sense of problem solving. During much of the film, Mater is paired with Finn McMissile, an Aston Martin who serves in Her Majesty’s Secret Service…like James Bond. In addition to just loving the story and the time with my family, the movie got me thinking on two tracks…

What Would My 007 Principal Ride Be Like?
As for me, I was raised on James Bond, 007. I loved (still love) the gadgets, especially the cool cars with the special-agent features. In Cars 2, like in the 007 series, Finn McMissile and Mater deploy their gadgetry to stop the bad guys, solve high-speed dilemmas, and save the day from the forces of evil. You know…stuff like smoke screens and oil slicks and machine guns in the fenders – all controlled from a panel in the car. Well, that got me thinking what “gadgets” my 007 Principal Ride might contain. (Note: I am NOT talking about being a “sneak” in school.) Perhaps my “smoke screen” would be a “truth telling cloud” that would promote some people telling me what they really think rather than what they think I might want to hear. Perhaps my “oil slick” would be a meeting-canceler so that I could spend more time in classrooms and other learning spaces with the students and teachers. Perhaps my “machine gun fenders” would be quick-fire assessment tools to help me and others see what is being learned and where we need to go next in instruction and project guidance.

What would be some gadgets on your 007 Principal Ride? Or 007 Teacher Ride? Or 007 Parent Ride? Or 007 Student Ride? I hope you’ll add some ideas in the comments.

Making Animated Films as Character-Ed, Integrated Studies, PBL
As a father of six-year-old and four-year-old sons, I see my fair share of animated films. Some, owned on DVD, we watch many times! I am amazed by the best films – they tell a great story that can be enjoyed by anyone ages 3 to 103, AND they provide great life insight and messages of deep character. They are creatively funny, humanely serious, and technologically and aesthetically artistic. A solid core of animated films are simply brilliant!

So why couldn’t our middle school students make such films? Wouldn’t the project-based learning required to do so provide deep lessons in cross-curricular, integrated studies? Wouldn’t the students – film makers – have to delve deeply into concepts we typically separate and classify into English, math, science, social studies, history, foreign language (think Toy Story 3!), visual arts, performance arts (think sound tracks, etc.) advisement, etc. Talk about transliteracy development…and FUN! I imagine embarking on such a complex endeavor would pose unforeseen problems to confront and solve. I imagine PIXAR Studios could tell some stories about authentic problem solving and collaborative creation.

As a culminating activity/assessment, we could have a series of film festivals for elementary schools, and even larger audiences. We could invite some PIXAR execs and film makers who use their craft to make a positive difference in this world. Other real-audience possibilities seem endless, as do the opportunities to do something meaningful with the final results and any resulting proceeds.

So why don’t we do such a thing? Maybe other schools do…but I don’t know of any. Maybe we should try it as an experiment and learn by doing. Anyone want to give it a try? The green flag is waving, as far as I can see. Perhaps it’s time for us to start our engines!

Staying Connected on Vacation #cpchat @ConPrin

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While I am on vacation, I continue my routine of blog and Twitter reading. I even try to write and post a bit myself. I cannot help it. It’s not about work to me. It’s about learning, and I love to learn.

In my RSS reader, I have a “Connected Principals” folder, which essentially creates a “daily” for me of superb writing about education. Among the great posts awaiting my time this morning, these two rose to the top for me. I just had to share them. They communicate richly about the attitude and practices needed to continue professionalizing the profession of teaching.

Chris Wejr: http://www.connectedprincipals.com/archives/3971

Gerald Aungst: http://www.connectedprincipals.com/archives/3964

Readicide, Springboards, and PBL

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Thanks to the Westminster English Department and chair Bart Griffith, Kelly Gallagher’s Readicide was on my summer reading list. The short, compact read is full of summarized research and practical advice about how to end readicide in schools and to promote more engaged joy with reading for a lifetime. In addition to describing teaching in a “sweet spot” – neither under-teaching nor over-teaching – Gallagher provides a monumental “duh” (one of those grand aha moments!) for me in chapter three:

“In my first book, Reading Reasons (Gallagher 2003), I discuss the work of philosopher Kenneth Burke, who says the reason young people should read books is that it provides them with ‘imaginative rehearsals’ for the real world. When children read books, Burke argues, they are not just reading stories. They are being given an opportunity to understand the complex world they live in (1968). Books enable adolescents to begin wrestling with those issues that remain universal in all our lives” (66).

Later, Gallagher states that “The value comes when we use this great book as a springboard to examine issues in today’s world” (67).

With the examples that Gallagher provides, he is not merely advocating for in-class, passive imaginative rehearsal. Rather he is advocating and advancing the practice of student learners interacting ACTIVELY with their current world as citizens who are springboarding into issues through great literature and the guidance of a lead learner (teacher).

For teachers getting more comfortable or even more deeply immersed in PBL (project/problem-based learning), I believe this advice and advocacy from Gallagher provides the ideal bridge from a long-taught classic to authentic, “do-something-real-in-the-community” PBL. Gallagher gives a number of examples that would apply directly where I teach, as the books named are novels that we include in our school canon. Additionally, such books and the issues they raise could provide the threads and links that tie together curricula for integrated studies.

A great reminder about RELEVANCY…thanks Kelly Gallagher!

Gallagher, Kelly. Readicide: How Schools Are Killing Reading and What You Can Do About It. Stenhouse Publishers, Portland, Maine: 2009.

#Learnopolis and INMAX

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Today, Westminster is hosting INMAX – a Benchmark Research membership group of large, independent schools in the U.S. The topic of focus is leadership and innovation, and the agenda appears quite intriguing as a whole.

At 11:30 a.m., Jill Gough (@jgough) and I (@boadams1) will be sharing a story about tearing down walls and connecting dots. We will be sharing the story of our school’s multi-year journey to become a PLC – a professional learning community. The official title of our session is “Learnopolis: Tearing Down Walls with PLC.” We plan to use the Twitter hashtag #learnopolis for tweeters, and a PDF of our slide deck is embedded below (the iMovie in slide #9 is inserted below, too, as a YouTube video).

In short, we are trying to communicate the following:

  • “School” hasn’t changed very much in the last century – maybe longer. [We need to adapt and evolve!]
  • Schools exist in a bit of an “egg-crate culture” (Kathy Boles), as we have generally organized with individual teachers and rows and columns of students. For the most part, teachers are relatively isolated as professionals.
  • In the 21st c., we can capitalize on the notion of social networks by rethinking and rebuilding the critical infrastructure of schools – the human infrastructure. [New basic building block should be learning teams.]
  • While we cannot rebuild the physical plant, we can rebuild the way we work within the physical plant. We can build a learnopolis!
  • By shifting our central paradigm from “teaching” to “learning,” and by providing regular, job-embedded, structured time for teachers to collaborate, we can build the schools that 21st c. learners desire and deserve.

We are looking forward to learning together with our colleague schools at INMAX today! And we are looking forward to building a learnopolis! After all…it’s about learning!