Unexamined learning can turn out to be wasted learning, while those who fail to learn from their mistakes are doomed to repeat them. Which is why wise organizations build in regular review sessions for their work groups, to help them spell out the lessons, good and bad, that they have learned from their recent experiences. The most fruitful appraisals, too, are those that focus on what has been learned during the year, rather than on grading performance. Leaders, in particular, I now believe, need to devote time and intellectual energy to reflecting on their experiences in order to crystallize what they have learned and can now add to their stack of knowledge.

I have been having interesting conversations recently with a number of people at school, in our cluster and online about appraisal and performance management. I see the two as VERY different!

Performance Management = people making changes to their practice and reflecting on what they have done so they have lessons they can imbed in their practice/s. Making practice better.

Appraisal = summative judgements about how good that practice actually is.

We all (should) learn from our practice in an ongoing way.  Few teachers simply bang their head against the brick wall of poor practice.  I don’t know any teachers, parents, principals who get out of bed each day thinking “whose life can I ruin today?”  We all do our best …

But do we learn from what we do?  The answer to that is very different for different teachers!  Some reflect deeply on their practice and endeavour to improve it step-by-step.  Others simply treat teaching as a technocratic activity where if they do the ‘right’ things kids will learn through some mystical and mysterious processes.  I want the deeply reflective ones in our school thanks.

The challenge for appraisal and pefomance management processes is capturing the learning.  What is different inside the teachers head and for their practice as a result of the professional learning that has taken place this year?  This is Teaching as Inquiry as described in the NZC …. ongoing action research about pedagogy for real.  We have developed a framework for this that is one page for any given objective/focus.

It is a cool time of the year for me having the discussions with each teacher about the things they have LEARNED.  A time to celebrate the successes and offer new challenges.  Acknowledge the challenges overcome and the learning steps taken.  What has been left behind, what has been reinforced, what has been adopted.

What professional learning is all about.

Some of my favourites:

“to err is human, to arr is pirate”

“For every action, there is an equal and opposite government program.”

“Books – the original laptop.”

“They say I have A.D.D. but they just don’t understand. Oh Look! A chicken!”

“Mirror, mirror on the wall… What the **^&%^&% happened?”

“Education bridges the gap between your ears.”

“With sufficient thrust, pigs fly just fine.”

“If swimming is so good for your figure, how do you explain whales?”

I used to keep a list like this in the back of my planbook of funny sayings, supposed report comments and things.  Just for the end of ‘those’ days.  We all need to laugh a lot more!

Life is NOT a dress rehearsal, lets make it fun while it lasts.

Have a good weekend!!

(oh and add any more gems in the comments!!)

Most of the presentations would have easily been a ULearn workshop.  Some were of a higher level than presentations I went to this year.

It is really interesting having seen the work that Cluster techers have been involved in across the country now how different the things people focus on are.  We have come a LONG way in the 10months of our Cluster.  We have seen huge growth in the personal confidence and competence of the LT group as well as the teachers in our school(s).

One interesting discussion that came out of the day for me was one about the difference between confidence and competence.  One of the teachers had done some work looking at the core computer skills her children needed to have and was surprised about the things the children didn’t know that she assumed they did.  ‘Simple’ stuff like finding your way around menus, what toolbar buttons do, basic file management and problem solving.  This led to thinking about what things children can do and how small (often) their view of the potential and functionality of technologies is.  An example would be cell phones - most teenagers and even some quite young children are confident users of this technology.  But their use is often focused on a small part of the potentional functionality.  Children can confident users of software but often only in the things they already know, not pushing the boundaries or potential.

As adults we are sometimes the same.  Confidence and competence are a bit of a chicken and egg arguement in some ways - you have to have ability to be confident; but conversely confidence leads to experimentation and hece competence.  We all know of the adults and children who are supremely confident but for whom we know the competence aspect is not where they think it is.

We all need the space, time and support to develop both in the things we are focusing on in our professional learning.

well I thought it was funny ….

Scientists are driven by their curiosity to explore and explain things that attract their attention. In this respect they have much in common with any two year old, except young people do not have the need to ensure their findings stands up to inspection.

The message is clear for educators, we must do everything to keep alive the curiosity and openness to learning of our students. We need to tap our students innate gifts,interests, talents and dreams and then to encourage them to dig deeper into what attracts their attention.

At the beginning of learning, and science, is curiosity, and with curiosity is the delight in mastery - the joy of figuring it out that is the birthright of every child. One scientist said to another ‘What we can’t tell then that it’s so so much fun’ A Nobel prizewinner said ‘We were like children playing’. It is, as another said, ‘a rage to know - the acute discomfort at incomprehension’.The so called scientific method is not as scientific as you would think and is more a process of enlightened trial and error.

If teachers were to be aware of: the importance of passion and curiosity in learning; the need to explain as best we can; and the process of science, a curriculum would ‘emerge’. As well, creative teachers can provide their students experiences with the potential to attract their student’s attention . As educationalist Jerome Bruner wrote, ‘teaching is the canny art of intellectual temptation’.

These ideals are at the heart of our vision for our school at Outram.

Our vision is a completely visual one and all about sparking the intellectual curiosity and passions in us all as learners. This means the adults AND the kids.

We have the things we already know and can do, our previous skills, our toolbox of skills, our shadow.  All very useful and indeed essential as we go for gold, aim high and jump for joy and excitement.

Cool stuff - only wish I could lay much claim to it.  Well done those who have gone before at Outram.  My role now is to facilitate revisiting it all and seeing what it all means now, including the third of us who are new (families and staff) since the initial work was done.

And thats the fun bit

v’s …. this

The Kids@Conference today was fantastic. We had a group of 5 children running the workshop we were leading using I Can Animate. Lots of excited kids learning heaps. Well done to the organising group!!

Teacher resignations have reached a five-year high, with fears that up to 1000 teachers left last year to work overseas.

The rate of principal resignations is also the highest since at least 2002, with one-in-10 school leaders leaving their posts in the past year.

10% of any group leaving a profession is a pretty sad indictment of the general ‘health’ of an organisation. With the average age of NZ principals being 55 things will not get better any time soon.
A good time for people with aspirations to step into principalship.

This video of Viviane Robinson is an interesting reflection on the changing requisite skills for principalship too: