Tag Archives: brightspots

Embracing Differences

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Today, a culminating event occurred in the Junior High School – an event that is an important part of a bigger effort and critical project. Today, we experienced the “Embracing Differences” culmination. Yet, it feels wrong to call it a culmination. It is more like a new beginning, a new start, a new chance to move beyond tolerance…to move beyond acceptance…to move to embracing our differences.

For months, students in Mrs. Woods’ and Mrs. Curtis’ art classes have been engaged in producing works of art that expose student feelings about drawing the line against prejudice. Other students participated in the “Power Over Prejudice” workshops. Together, they helped open a student exhibit at Oglethorpe University.

After an advisement session last Friday, today students participated in the “Dots” activity. The advisors used the following resource to facilitate the activity.

Then, we moved into an assembly with a special visitor. I hope you can find 20 minutes to watch the video below, which captures two advisement groups during the Dots, as well as key pieces of the assembly. I am so proud of our students, our advisors, our diversity coordinators (Lalley, Reina, and Jones), our art teachers, our Glenn Institute and Ms. Schoen. What a fine example of project-based learning. More importantly, though, what a fine example of Embracing Differences!

Held Accountable

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Principals, other school admin, teachers, educators, and other learners…STOP! and READ! Bill Ferriter’s The Tempered Radical blog post “What I’d Hold YOU Accountable For.” From the perspective of this principal teacher, Bill’s tweet and post are right on the money…they certainly do NOT rub me the wrong way. May I strive to live and lead by his recommendations!

Are we creating the conditions necessary for innovation in schools? Are we leading learning innovation?

In an effort to complement Bill’s post, I offer these supports, suggestions, and examples:

  1. Tear down the walls that exist between teachers and rebuild an infrastructure that provides for a powerful community of learners. The PLC infrastructure is well-researched, well-documented, and well-utilized (in many places). At the Junior High at Westminster, we have adopted and adapted an aggressive model – replace a class in the rotating schedule with an opportunity for regular, job-embedded PLC work. Our teams meet four days per week, for 55-minutes each day…just like our student learners meet for math, English, science, etc. Additionally, we use a co-facilitator, teacher-leader model, and we rely on a PLC structure to support the facilitators of the various teams. As a facilitator PLC, we meet one day per week for face-to-face time.
  2. Tear down the walls that exist between teachers and leverage social media to provide an “anywhere, anytime” PLC/PLN. For the past month, a growing team of teachers at Westminster has been engaged in the “20 minute experiment” on Twitter. Take a look…
  3. Tear down the walls that exist between teachers and implement a faculty assessment plan that holds growth and development more dear than evaluation. Let’s conduct “physicals” rather than “autopsies.” We are several years into this process at Westminster.
  4. Tear down the walls that exist between teachers and promote innovation, creative thinking, and project-based learning. Find ways to highlight the experiments, innovations, prototypes, and trials of an amazing faculty of lifelong learners.

And, in conlusion for this post, to put the proverbial cherry on top, be sure to watch this Jay McTighe video…
http://jplgough.wordpress.com/2011/02/01/learning-habit-assumptions-experience-practice-and-empathy/

It’s about learning…and learning is all about prototyping, which is just a pretty euphemism for trying, practicing, failing, and trying again.

Finding New Places to Learn

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Recently, two blogs that I follow posted lists of other blogs to follow. Between them, they listed 125 possible new places to learn. As a result, I have discovered a number of new, regular watering holes for me. I hope you will find something for your learning thirst as well.

Jonathan E. Martin’s “A Few of my Favorite Blogs”

Alexis’ “Top 100 School Administrator Blogs”
[Alexis is working on Top 100 Teacher Blogs next.]

Synergy 8 Draft Thesis Statements

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During this final week of the Synergy 8 pilot course, students prepared a quick piece of writing about their ONE most enduring lesson learned from the experience this semester. On Tuesday, they prepared draft thesis statements from which to prototype and revise. You can view a brief slide deck of the students’ draft thesis statements on SlideShare.