Learner-Centered Innovation: The Reflection

Sadly, my class on Learner-Centered Innovation is coming to a close! I am happy to have finished the book since I tend to buy lots of professional books with the hope and desire of reading them all and improving my teaching, but many of them end up just being skimmed. It takes more concentration for me to read a book that I'm thinking of putting to use instead of one that I'm reading just to learn about something (or just as an escape!), but it is always worth it.

This course was taught by one of my colleagues and friends: Emily Keeter, the science teacher on my team. If you have not checked out her blog yet, you're missing out! It's definitely not just for science teachers - it's for everyone who wants to learn and grow in the classroom.

Last summer, Emily also taught a course where I read The Innovator's Mindset, which piqued my interest in shifting my planning and instruction. I took this course as a follow-up to that one because I think I could have done better during the last school year, and I want to improve this upcoming year with a concrete plan for how to help students discover their strengths and work toward their goals.

This book is full of specific ideas about innovation for both students and teachers. One main thread of the text deals with school culture and the growth mindset. We cannot say that we value innovation if we also punish mistakes (on any level). When we take risks, there are bound to be mistakes or failures because that is an important part of the road to change. However, as Katie Martin writes, "We can change policies and implement new programs, but if we don't empower teachers and create school cultures where people feel valued and free to take risks, we will miss out on our greatest opportunity to change how students learn...We know that kids and adults learn better when learning has an authentic purpose, subjects are integrated, and the learner has agency and choice in the process" (75). In other words, the risks that we will take will allow our students to create for an authentic purpose that deals with multiple subjects in a way THEY decide. This will hopefully lead to more engaged and interested students!

While I enjoyed reading the book (although it is not without its flaws), the best part of this course was, hands-down, the interaction with my colleagues. I think Emily did an incredible job of differentiating the options for responding to the three books from which we could choose, and her faith in our ability to select the ways that worked best (and NOT just the easiest way!) for us made me want to try new things. This is exactly what is discussed in Learner-Centered Innovation. For example, I decided to do a video blog and create a graphic for two different weeks instead of writing a traditional blog. I am much more comfortable writing, but I knew that if I didn't try something new, I wouldn't know how my students felt when I asked them to take risks. The process of doing something that was challenging for me was eye-opening; I had to ask for help from other colleagues (hi Katie!), try different ways of saving and uploading, work with different templates, and pare down my ideas about the book to the basics. I ended up being very proud of what I did and happy that I had the experience of struggling and failing before succeeding so as to have empathy for my students.

I learned an incredible amount from my colleagues in this course. I have taken classes with several of them in the past, and I am always so impressed and excited by what they bring to our discussions. I don't think we get enough time to collaborate with our colleagues who are not part of our department, and I barely know who teaches at the elementary schools (unless they have taken other courses with me in the past). Hearing how teachers in every subject and grade would apply the same ideas in different ways was very eye-opening for me, and every time I posted an idea about how I would do something in my classroom, their comments made my idea much better. I cannot overstate the importance of continued discussion and time for working together in order to put these innovative ideas into action.

Thanks to canva.com and Katie Nelson for making me look like I know anything about creating graphics!

Big Takeaways: Graphic Edition!

Now that I've finished reading Learner-Centered Innovation, my task this week was to share (in some way) what my biggest takeaways from the book are. The easiest thing for me to do would be to write about it, but I'm trying to do things that aren't so easy for me, so I made the graphic below using Canva. I highly recommend Canva; even I was able to navigate it (with the help from a wonderfully patient colleague the first time around), and I found a lot of templates that were helpful to me as I thought about the best way to show my learning. I'm intimidated by the blank document when it comes to visuals, so being able to fill in my work instead of having to create something new really appealed to me.

(Sorry it's a little too big - it was too small to see in any other size!)

Relationships and Education: Booksnap Edition!

As a follow-up to my previous video reflection on relationships and education, here is a booksnap that distills one of my major points into one page. If you haven't tried (or heard of) booksnapping, here is a blog from Tara Martin that explains it very well. I like it a lot and find that it helps me to focus my thoughts since there's only so much that you can put in one snap - and I tend to be somewhat verbose! :) 

This particular booksnap is from page 219 of Learner-Centered Innovation. There were many parts of chapters 8-10 (which I read for this week) that I could have snapped (I was particularly interested in the radical candor section, but I'll save that for another time), but I stuck with the same thread as my video reflection for this one.

Relationships and Education

This week, I am trying video reflecting! The question I am answering is:

Why are relationships so important in innovation and education?

True to form, this video is longer than I intended it to be because I just really have a lot of thoughts about things, so I can't embed it here. Here is a link!

Additionally, I did not directly address innovation in the video, but I did talk about feedback and growth. In my mind, innovation cannot exist without those things: if you are not receptive to feedback, you will not be able to push yourself out of your comfort zone to innovate and you certainly will not be able to improve your efforts. Similarly, you will not grow if you are not receptive to feedback, and growth is essential to innovation. 

Image from http://ixd.prattsi.org/2017/04/what-are-you-really-hearing-effectively-processing-feedback/

Digital Portfolios and Beyond

Finishing The Innovator's Mindset was a great triumph for me because I am seriously bad at starting and never finishing professional books! I have a very hard time abandoning other kinds of books - I have finished terrible, awful, no-good, very-bad books in the past just because I started them - but for some reason, I get about a third of the way through professional books and then I lose steam. It's not because the books are bad; I think it's because I get overwhelmed with ideas that I want to implement in my classroom and then I can't keep up with my own thought process, so I just stop reading. I suspect it is also because I start to feel bad that I'm not doing enough or more or anything at all good in my classroom when I read these books - which I know is NOT the point of them and it's totally my own insecurities that make me feel that way - and so putting them down is a way to not think like that.

But I am also a very conscientious and still more-than-slightly anxious student, and so taking a class is the best way for me to make sure that I finish what I start. I would never dream of abandoning a book that was assigned work (even though some of my posts have been late), so this one got finished. I am so glad that this title was the focus of our group this summer because I don't think I would have picked it up otherwise. It felt like a book that would make me feel bad about my classroom.

I was so wrong. SO. WRONG. George Couros (@gcouros) has hit the perfect balance between nudging readers toward innovation and reinforcing that teachers are doing their best, that good things ARE happening in schools. His point that everything is a journey and that we never really get there manages to make me feel like I AM doing things right...and that what I'm doing right now will not be good enough next year or the next year or the next. I feel empowered and supported but also pushed (gently) to be better. 

I'm still thinking about how I know a lesson is innovative and how to measure the impact of innovative practices on education, but I believe I have had a breakthrough about how I want to at least start implementing some of the ideas that Couros talks about in this book. The idea that resonated with me the most was that of digital portfolios. He uses the term "digital portfolio" and "blog" interchangeably in the book, so for parts of it, I had the wrong idea of what he meant, but I think either way, it answers a question I have had for a while now: How do I house copies of the different iterations of my students' work (specifically writing) so they can see their growth without having to store reams of paper somewhere? And, since we are moving to more electronic versions of writing (at least with final drafts and submissions), how does that work with Google Docs? My biggest management problem this year has been with the fact that all the comments I make on drafts get "resolved" by the students, and when they make changes, they are automatically saved, so there's no way to look at each draft side by side. I know I can un-resolve the comments and re-open them, and I can also see all the changes individually, but that's a lot of clicking; having all the paper copies together was much easier.

However, it's also easier for me to comment on a typed Google Doc than it is to write everything. So...what if each kid had a digital portfolio where every copy of their writing pieces were uploaded? I've looked for apps for this for more than a year and no one has been able to help me. Couros talks about using Edublogs, which look easy enough, but I haven't looked into them too much. Just the idea of digital portfolios, however, is enough to energize me to look at the situation anew because it feels like there could be a solution to my paper management problem. Edutopia has what looks like a great list of potential tools, and since our school provides a Gmail address for every student, Google Sites might be the easiest. I'm also familiar with it, and the kids have worked on them for projects for my class. However, I've heard really good things about Evernote too, and the kids seem to be familiar with it. TeachThought also has another list of potential tools that also look great!

Whatever I end up choosing, it feels like a step in the right direction. I've known that there was a missed opportunity here for a while, and using Google Docs and Schoology more has helped me move toward the digital portfolio step. I thought that Couros' words about how to use the digital portfolios two different ways were really important, and I think that this year, my students need to use them for both ways: as a "'learning portfolio,' which shows the individual's growth over time...[and] as a showcase portfolio,' that highlights the person's best work" (208). My vision, which will hopefully become a reality, is for the "learning portfolio" to include at least the drafting and revision parts of the writing process as well as other pieces (TBD) and for the "showcase portfolio" to include whatever pieces the student thinks show his or her work the best. This doesn't have to be and shouldn't just be written pieces; they are doing great things with other formats as well.

Anyone who knows me as a teacher knows that I love writing things longhand - I love paper and pen or pencil drafts because I can see the changes in the students' thinking, and there are more and different connections made in the brain when writing by hand than there are while typing. I don't intend to completely give up the writing notebook. However, I do intend to give my students more choices about what the "final" version of their work looks like, and I think that will be a good first step on the way to encouraging innovation in the classroom. 

(thanks giphy.com!)

The Innovator's Mindset Part 1 (Chapters 1-3)

If I liked The Innovator's Mindset before, I LOVE it now. The first three chapters are useful, reflective, and show that George Couros understands what it's like to be on the receiving end of change, not just an innovator. One of the main problems that I have with educational consultants and other people who try to push their programs on schools is that they start from a place that assumes there are major flaws in the organization and that people don't really want to change. This book doesn't assume that; in fact, it assumes the opposite. I love that. It makes me WANT to change. And, with the idea that "...innovation is not about changing everything; sometimes you only need to change one thing. That experience can lead to new and better learning opportunities" (60), it makes me hopeful that I CAN and WILL change.

One thing that really resonated with me at the beginning of this book was the idea linked to Simon Sinek's "Start with Why" idea (his TED Talk is one that I have been shown by several administrators, and it's actually pretty good). I have often said that we have complicated teaching beyond all reason, and to see this idea echoed in a book that I think is very practical and important is affirming. Couros writes that "...it scares [him] to think that we have taken the most human profession, teaching, and have reduced it to simply letters and numbers" (18). Grading, standardized tests, data meetings - these have their place, but I would argue that we have elevated them beyond that place. Instead of focusing on these things, Couros says that we need to empower our students and inspire innovation instead of demanding compliance. As Katie brought up a while ago, there is a time for learning the rules and following them (as a society, we agree to rules and consequences if those rules are broken, and they have their place in school as well), but there is also a time for making sure that learners can come up with their own paths.

I like the "learner/leader" instead of "student/teacher" dichotomy because it reminds me that teachers are also learners and students are also leaders. This is something that I will try to remember as I continue to teach. Sometimes, I need to give my students information quickly and efficiently so they can do something with that information, and I have no problems with lecturing at those times. But what this section of the book made me think about was if there are times when I can change that to let them discover the information on their own. Ideas like "...translating knowledge into action is perhaps even more important than acquiring information" (34) and "Innovation starts not by providing answers, but by asking questions" (38) make it clear that the students are missing out on crucial opportunities for learning when I am the one who is posing the questions (even if I DO have them look for answers on their own). The example of the mitosis lesson that Lisa changed in chapter three was a great example of how this can be done simply but effectively. I sometimes think that "Would I want to be a learner in this classroom?" is a difficult question for me to ask myself because I'm usually the happiest in what we would call a "traditional" classroom. I like to listen, I like to take notes, and I generally don't like to be asked to work in groups or be creative with showing my learning. But I do have to be responsive to my learners, and although I'm sure there are learners like me in my room, I am equally sure that there are learners totally unlike me who need me rethink some of my techniques.  

Finally, the inclusion of empathy and reflection in this section, especially the third chapter, gave me hope and made me very happy. I think these are two essential qualities for all humans, regardless of age, career, background, etc., and the importance that is placed on them for innovation makes me think that perhaps, becoming better innovators can make us better people.

Responding to "Blogging as Reflective Practice" (Thing 3 Stretch)

In her post "Blogging as Reflective Practice", Gina Minks explains how she uses blogging as a way to reflect on and better her job performance as well as how it can create communities. I happen to agree with this on a deep level since it was blogging (in large part) that sustained my connection to my teaching practice when I took a year off to go to graduate school literally 1,000 miles away from the school where I teach.

Ms. Minks mentions that people seem to think bloggers have too much time on their hands or that blogging is superficial. While it can be a great time-waster, it can also be deeply reflective and time-consuming. She links in her blog to a 2007 study out of the University of Birmingham in the United Kingdom that concluded that blogging benefited students and encouraged reflection as well as linked the students' lives outside of the classroom to the activities that they completed inside of it. The very idea that educational blogging has occupied a prominent enough position to be the subject of an academic study says to me that we cannot dismiss it as something that bored teenagers do when they feel like no one is listening to them.  

Putting ideas into words has always helped me solidify my feelings on a subject and exposed when I do and do not understand something fully. If I can't summarize it, then I didn't get it. Both my undergraduate and graduate institutions placed a very high emphasis on reflection, and although it doesn't much matter to me whether I do that reflection on a piece of paper or online, there is no doubt that that early practice has stayed with me into my almost ten-year teaching career. I still take the time to jot a few notes after almost every lesson, and when I can take a moment to blog about them, I do it. I haven't done it much lately, but perhaps this will help jumpstart me back into the habit.

The one major benefit that blogging has over private journaling is that you can, if you so choose, open up your blog to the whole world. It is because of this access that I have confined my blogging to the professional domain; after all, I'm not sure that anyone really wants to hear my thoughts about "The Bachelor" or the latest Adele album (although I do have a lot of thoughts about both of those!). The great thing about blogging about teaching is that it immediately invites thousands of other teachers right into your classroom - if something went poorly, all of those other sets of (mostly supportive, because who really reads teacher blogs to fling mud?) experienced eyes can tell me exactly where I went wrong and how to fix it. One of the best and most fulfilling teaching experiences I have had is co-teaching. I know that some people don't like the idea of more adults in their classrooms, but I have always found that having another teacher in my room immediately lifts the caliber of my teacher. Not because I'm trying to show off, but because I have another professional whom I trust implicitly there to give me timely and specific feedback on my practice. Blogging about teaching is like having thousands of co-teachers available to me at a moment's notice.

Blogging is also one of the best practices in revision that I, as a writer and a teacher of writing, have ever experienced. Because my audience is potentially so large (not that my blogs have ever garnered a ton of attention, let's be clear about that), I'm much more careful about what I write and how I write it because I don't want to be misconstrued. I fact-check once, twice, and on the more controversial topics, three and four more times because I want to be absolutely sure I'm right. Isn't this what we want our students to do? I realized this was one of the best real-world writing exercises I could give my students as I was writing that last sentence and will now try to incorporate this into my teaching next year. We do online discussions fairly regularly, but I have never tried to use blogs because of the privacy issues. We'll see if I can make it work.

So...reflective practice in action. It was literally as I was typing those words that I realized I could make the revision point to my students with this example better than I ever could if their audience was just going to be their classmates and me. Because for better or for worse, sometimes kids in this generation care more about what the internet thinks than what I think. Why not use that to sneakily get them to use the right there/their/they're?  

Reflections on Lifelong Learning (Thing 1)

Of all the things that have changed in the education field in the last decades, I think one thing that has remained constant has been the idea of "lifelong learning." It may have looked different in different times, but I think you would be hard-pressed to find a teacher who didn't want his or her students to continue learning after they left his or her classroom.

I also think that the 7 1/2 habits outlined in the video have remained largely constant; again, the technology that was available to people has changed pretty dramatically, but the basic premise behind the habits is timeless. Setting goals, accepting responsibility for your own learning, viewing problems as challenges rather than obstacles, having confidence in yourself as a learner, creating your own learning "toolbox", using technology to your advantage, teaching/mentoring others, and playing with the knowledge you gain are teaching strategies that have been around for a long time. And if they haven't, we have been doing a disservice to our students.

Where people - educators and politicians and parents and students and almost every other "stakeholder" in education today - may differ is in their interpretations of these habits. Accepting responsibility for your own learning, for example, may look like one thing to one person and a totally different thing to another. When I post the day's activities, homework, and handouts on Schoology, it is my understanding that the students will use that resource and try to figure out what they missed if they were absent. To me, using Schoology instead of emailing me about the homework is taking responsibility for their own learning because I have set it up to help them. However, they may think that going directly to the source is more responsible and will often reach out to me before checking our course page online.

I think the most challenging habit for me will be to teach or mentor others since I am not totally comfortable with all the technology we are using yet. Teaching someone else before you have a good understanding of something usually leads to disaster (at least it has for me). I need a very strong understanding of something before I can try to explain it. However, some of the tools we have used this week have been familiar to me, so I will try to help others with those I know.

Another challenging habit - one that will be very important to me as I continue my work in this course - will be to see problems as challenges and not obstacles. I love physical books, paper, pen and pencil, post-its...and I have grudgingly accepted Google Docs and Schoology work submissions into my life because they really have made my teaching easier and more efficient. However, much of the other technology that I have tried to incorporate into my classroom has failed me or derailed my teaching. When I make the move from a paper quiz to one on Schoology and the Schoology server is down, my entire lesson plan has gone down the drain. When I forget my laptop at home or it is being worked on and I can't project something because my new Ladibug document camera is linked to my laptop, that's frustrating since my old one was not and I liked it like that. When I want my students to work on their online vocabulary through the Wordly Wise 3000 program - a program that has a paper version I have used for years and loved - but the app keeps crashing, the students are sidetracked. I tend to focus on the negative when it comes to technology in the classroom because I believe that we are, in many situations, putting the cart before the proverbial horse and trying to force technology into school without thinking about whether it actually solves more problems than it causes. However, after working with programs and tools that have been successful, my lessons do take on an extra dimension and lead to more engaged students. For them, I need to work on my attitude.

One thing that I have always been good at is creating my own learning "toolbox" - mostly in the form of finding out who knows what I don't and then going to that person for help. I learned that lesson very early in my pre-teaching career, and it has never failed me. The online teaching community is so strong, especially around reading and writing, and I feel very comfortable reaching out for help on just about anything. I'm teaching writing to elementary students this summer, and as a middle school teacher, I was pretty anxious about my interactions with younger kids. I posed some questions to Twitter and Facebook, and within an hour, I had dozens of tips and lesson ideas. Of course, I also reached out in person to my friends who were elementary teachers, and they had great ideas as well. So, technology and the online community are excellent support systems, but I don't think anything will replace the face-to-face conversations I had with my colleagues.

Admittedly, I am going into this course with pre-existing ideas about technology and education. The 7 1/2 habits presentation reinforced what I think is an unfair attitude about "old school" teaching: that there is something inherently wrong with being quiet and seated. In order to get new information, sometimes you have to be quiet and seated - look at the kids who are reading books or searching online or simply listening to a teacher (or other student) explain something. Students who do not have the ability to do this or have never been taught to do this will suffer, not just in the classroom, but in their jobs (it seems like all the videos also promoted the idea that lifelong learning was just to get ahead in the workforce, which I disagree with as well) and relationships as they grow. And sometimes students ARE tardy and need to be helped with time and materials management, whatever is stopping them from getting to class on time. Tardiness in the world beyond the schoolhouse is not tolerated or encouraged (either professionally or personally), so not holding them responsible for that would be a failure on my part. Of course, lifelong learning will not always happen in a classroom, but when they are expected to be a part of a classroom (and beyond), these "old school" skills - which I wholeheartedly believe we still need to teach - are important.