Adrian in his session mostly encouraged us to reflect and then articulate our reflections on how much our institutions are organisations that actively seek to learn and to grow. He talked a lot about relationships within an organisation and how important it is to seek to develop every relationship and to learn something from them. I think here all of us have a very close relationship with a few individuals within the school but probably have very little idea of what is happening in the working lives of others and of what we could learn from them. For me, one very thought-provoking strand was to reflect on what we as an individual have learned recently (most of us could probably answer that question with a little thought) but also who else knows about what we've learned. If individuals are learning something, it doesn't necessarily mean that the institution is learning as a result of this. Sometimes (I think maybe always) it is necessary for this knowledge to be expressed and shared and linked with the growing knowledge of someone else in the school. How often do you feel that you are working very hard and learning a lot about teaching, but that your work is not always appreciated?
We were asked to reflect on conversations that happen within our schools and encouraged to a) start more conversations ourselves, especially with people that we didn't always have conversations with, and start them with a view to learning something. b) think after conversations about what we had learned as individuals but also about what the institution had learned b) think about the group size of a conversation and whether it was the most effective.
I'm not sure I've expressed some of my thought very well here. Adrian is somewhat more articulate than myself, and has promised to email his session notes (but I am still waiting. I shall edit this poist and add them when they arrive) Final thought from this session - do we learn through working? or do we work through learning? and shouldn't it be the second of these?
Maggie Farra's session came from something of a different angel as she is Operational Director at the National College of School Leadership and is much more involved with leadership in schools (primary and secondary) and how to develop leadership in young people. She talked a lot about ensuring that leadership is sustainable and the need to ensure that leadership is distributed in the sense that others feel empowered to lead, that the environment encourages learning of leadership, that leaders believe in the ability of all to improve.
The diagram below represents the 3 areas of individual, organisation or team, and system (for us this would definitely be bigger than the school and would represent the whole system of English language learning/teaching etc. both in this country and overseas)
The idea here is that we all operate within each of these circles. Learning occurs where 2 circles overlap with each other. For example, the individual learns from the team and also the team learns and develops through the individuals who interact with it. For leadership, all 3 circles need to overlap.
I think the key concept is that the organisation consists of every individual, that evryone needs to be taken account of, and that everyone is responsible for this. If you want the organisation to be led well (or to learn as per Adrian Underhill's talk) then everyone has things to contribute. But do we always lead when we are able to? Do we always contribute our thoughts and ideas? Do we have any idea what the thoughts and ideas of other members of staff or students are? Maggie said that she had used a system she calls the "Cloud 9 file". The rationale for this is that staff will often not come forward with thoughts about the organisation because they may find themselves with additional work as a result. Even if it isn't as cold-blooded as this, I'm sure most of us have had ideas that never go any further because they are still a bit half-baked or we aren't clear in our minds how they could be carried forward. The Cloud 9 file is literally a file that is kept in your office/staff room/wherever and people actually record these half-baked thoughts. Others can browse the file and add comments or even act on the ideas if they feel inspired to. And the file can be brought out occasionally at meetings or other forums. I liked this idea and thought it might work well in a small school like this.
Other key points that made me think:
- our conversations should be about learning (rather similar to Adrian Underhill's ideas don't you think?)
- professional speed dating. Everybody (including students) go through a kind of speed dating process where everyone spends about 5 minutes from everyone else and learns somehing from them. Try it in your classes?
- over-listen to those who tell you what you most want to hear. Don't avoid those difficult conversations because those are the ones we learn most from.
- leaders should be ambitious for their organisation , humble about themselves, and confident about the future. recognise that learning is incremental and involves mistakes. We recognise that mistakes are part of the process for our students, even within our teaching, but it's also true of leadership.
I'm aware that this is rather a stream of ideas and thoughts but I am trying to find more learning opportunities in everything I do and I guess I'm using this forum to try to share what I'm learning and will continue to try and do so. To me the important thing is to want to learn, to want the school to learn and improve, but to start with myself and hope that other people will do the same.
Comments and replies warmly welcomed.
