Chapter 2- What to do First: Building a Foundation for Collaboration

       “Your team doesn’t care if you are a superstar.  They care if you are a super teammate.” – Jon Gordon

      

One of the biggest mistakes leaders make, no matter the profession, it not investing the time it takes up front to build a great team.  The military has “basic training” and most sports team participate in pre-season rituals, each of which is designed to bring teammates together and force the group to work together.  As a result, there are countless stories and examples from these groups in which individuals put their own needs behind what is good for the group and as a result, their feats far outweigh what may have been achieved otherwise.  Unfortunately, the reality is, many organizations do not follow this example.  They collect the most talented people they can find, and then expect them to be able to work together and collaborate. It doesn’t always work out that way.

Our Professional Learning Communities (PLCs) are built on the concept that all members are active participants willing to speak up and share their talents, but as Daniel Venables shares in Chapter 2 without intentional planning on the part of the leaders on the campus, PLCs focus and effectiveness can be compromised. Several key points Venables makes early in the chapter are the way schools establish their teams and their leaders.  What do the PLCs look like at your school and what are the expected outcomes?  Most secondary PLCs are compartmentalized by subject area which make sense because they are writing common assessments and looking at data, but if schools value the “whole child” and also “cross curricular” discussions Venables encourages intentional time with subject-diverse PLCs whose primary focus is looking at student work.  Teachers can learn a lot from reviewing the types of assignments other subject areas are giving as well as the way students respond.  So is there a need for both? How often?  At the elementary level, most teachers teach more than one subject and PLCs are often by grade level with some vertical discussion by subject.  It would be interesting to hear from teachers which type they find more beneficial to improving their craft.

I was also impressed with the way Venables addressed the elephant in the room that is our “elective” or “specials” teachers.  These teachers are some of the most important in the building.  They know students from a perspective that often gets overlooked and can add valuable insight into campus PLCs if they are intentionally used in this way.  I encourage all the readers (especially those charged with setting up the PLCs on a campus) to review pgs 20-21 for examples about how “related arts” teachers might be used in PLCs.

The next section in Chapter 2 discussed the importance of selecting the right leader/facilitator for the PLC and also the importance of training them.  This is imperative and could easily be modeled on a weekly basis.  Do your instructional leader meetings follow a similar agenda to what the grade level/dept. PLCs are expected to use?  Remember the objectives Venables set forth in Chapter 1 for PLCs: 1. Looking a student and teacher work; 2. Designing quality common assessments; and 3. Reviewing and responding to data.  If the leaders of the building do not spend the majority of their time  balanced between these 3 objectives, how can they expect the rest of the PLCs to do so?  In addition, the constant modeling will help all the PLC facilitators improve their skills and understand the expectations.

The author spends a great deal of time to discussing the importance and process of setting NORMS and Team Building for your PLC. As he shares, often times we set norms with good intentions, but do not follow through or revisit them nearly enough.  I believe sometimes the teams that have been together the longest may be the ones that need norms the most.  The familiarity allows for complacency if we are not careful.  While Venables shares several examples of activities to bring teams together, we will offer more examples at our District’s Leadership Academy in July.  A huge takeaway from this section for me was the intentional design of team building activities.  It is not just about “fun”…was there a purpose or a task the group had to accomplish while “bonding”.  Again, getting along and having everyone be happy is not the same thing as an authentic PLC.  It helps, but it doesn’t guarantee the end goal.

As the chapter closes, the section on pg. 31 entitled “Constructing Community Knowledge” was a perfect reminder for PLC facilitators (and all of us really).  Everyone comes to the table with different background, talents, and experiences.  The most effective PLCs find ways to bring the best out in everyone.  Thus the need for norms, protocols, etc.  A skilled facilitators will capitalize on the talents and wisdom of the group to make everyone more effective.  Building common knowledge of the group is important, but utilizing each member’s strengths is imperative.

Reflective Questions:

·       What are the many different PLCs on your campus? How were they organized?  Is there a place for everyone?

·       What have you done in the past to intentionally set norms or team building strategies? Did they have a specific purpose and were they effective?

·       When you think about the PLC in which you will spend the most time next year, what are the strengths of each member? What can you do to find out?

·       How might some of the ideas in Chapter 2 help your PLC moving forward?

Leave your comments here or on twitter #impactNISD

“If we all simply nod our heads in agreement and never ask questions or disagree, then we are wasting the wonderful ability to think.” – Justin Tarte

Chapter 1: The Business of PLC’s

"On many teams people are committed to their individual goals but on great teams they're also committed to each other." -Jon Gordon

When I started to select a book for our District’s Leadership Academy this year, it took me quite a while to decide which title would have the most impact.  There are so many wonderful books on teaching and learning that it wasn’t hard to find plenty of relevant topics, but I chose The Practice of Authentic PLCs by Daniel Venables for three very distinct reasons: 1. As we like to say in our District, “we learn best, with and through others!” 2. Last summer at the Leadership Academy and throughout the school year, we focused in on John Hattie’s research and the impact that teachers evaluating each other’s work can have on overall student learning in a school.  3. Finally, this Spring, our School Board adopted our “Profile of an NISD Educator”.  This document sets forth our not only our aspirations, but also our expectations for educators in our District.  Highlighted in the document is the key word “committed” but also throughout, it shares words like collaborate and shared responsibility.  These three reasons and countless others we will find in the book, demand that we all work together in the process of getting better.  It’s the growth mindset, so let’s get started.

Profile of an NISD Educator - Adopted 2015

In Chapter 1, Venables sets the stage by sharing some of the research behind PLCs and their purpose.   The definition on page 10 probably states the purpose of our PLC’s as well as any I have read…. “PLCs exist to improve student learning by making teachers more effective in the work of teaching.”  That is really the bottom line.  If your PLC is not making you and your teammate’s better teachers, then they are a waste of time.  How does that happen?  The author suggests that a narrow focus within a PLC that provides for specific tasks to occur will be the most effective: 

• Looking at student and teacher work; 
• Designing common formative assessments; and 
• Reviewing and responding to data.  

Later this summer, as we continue to work through the book, we will share different ways to do these things together in perhaps more effective ways than we have in the past. 

As you read through Chapter 1 this week, please pay attention the chart on page 13 and reflect on your own PLCs from this past school year.  My guess is you did many of the things the book will advocate, but as we stretch our own thinking and learning, I hope we will all work together to make ourselves a better Professional Learning Community!!!

Reflective Questions:

1.       Who is the lead facilitator in your PLC?

2.       Where did your PLC spend most of its time? What items were on the agenda on a regular basis?

3.       What training or understanding does your team need?

4.       For the good of the group, please share some of the most effective activities you do in your PLC’s?

You can share here or feel free to share at #impactNISD

A letter to NISD Teacher...Thanks!!

To all NISD teachers,

Last Friday night, I had the wonderful privilege of introducing our newest NISD Teachers of the Year at our INSPIRE Celebration.  The room was full of exemplar educators from all over our District, and the winners, Maggie Walsh from Beck Elementary and Joanna Kysar from Chisholm Trail Middle School are both well deserving of such an honor.  Besides recognizing each school’s own Teacher of the Year, we said good-bye to our retirees that have served our District so well for so long.  It was quite a night and everyone there was worthy of recognition.

On the eve of “Teacher Appreciation Week”, I can’t help but believe that everyone that was recognized at INSPIRE would tell you that there are many more back on their campus that are just as deserving, if not more.  Part of that comes from the selfless nature of so many teachers, but part of it also comes from the high quality people we work with in NISD. 

We started the year with a goal of providing “dynamic learning experiences” for our students and I believe we have succeeded greatly.  From my perspective, I get to see and hear about so many wonderful experiences and accomplishments of our students and there are great teachers behind every single one of them.  This year our students have traveled all over the country, from New York to California, because their teachers have pushed them and provided them opportunities beyond many of their wildest dreams. NISD teachers do more than a job, NISD teachers change the world! You should be appreciated!  Not just this week, but every day!

Teaching is a hard job.  One of the hardest you can find. People leave our profession at an alarming rate. I know many of you quite well and others I do not know at all, but one thing I hope we all have in common is the desire to make the daily lives of our students better. Otherwise, this would really be a thankless occupation. Many people outside of education don’t appreciate the difference you make, but as a parent with three children in NISD, I know how much you mean. The “dynamic experiences” my kids have lived this year are countless and their growth is amazing.  I believe there are 20,000 others just like them….kids that love their school and love their teachers. 

This week, as much as any other, I hope you feel appreciated.  I hope that one of those students that looks up to you everyday finds a way to let you know just how much you have meant to them.  Or maybe that parent that hasn’t quite been happy all year finally sends an email just to say “thanks”. Even if neither happens and you go through the week just as you would any other….please remember that you are making a huge impact on a future you many never see. I hope that is enough and I hope you know you are appreciated.   Thanks for all you do!

Rob

Learning Targets UPDATE: Where are you?

Last summer over 250 Learning Targets books were given out to our campus administrators and teacher leaders in NISD.  The purpose was to continue to enhance our teachers lesson planning while promoting the partnership between teachers and students.  The authors stress the fact that Learning Targets must share a common language, focus, and goal between learner and facilitator. Otherwise they are useless. 

The weekly twitter chat in our district, #nisdchat (Sunday’s at 8:30 pm) has spent a few different sessions with teachers talking about how they are using Learning Targets in their classrooms this year and more importantly, how students are responding to them.  If you missed the chat, here are the questions…leave a comment below or search the chat on twitter and join the discussion.  Pictures are welcome! 

1.     How have LTs helped you as a teacher this year?

2.     What success have you had with learning targets in your classroom?

3.     How do you work to make sure students “own their learning”?

4.     How have LTs helped you communicate expectations to parents?

5.     How might your targets change between now and the end of the year?

If you would like to see more about the Learning Targets discussion in NISD, please review the blog post below from the summer of 2014.

Are High-Stakes Tests Becoming Dinosaurs?

About a year ago on this blog, I wrote a piece  entitled 364 > 1, in which I tried to emphasize the importance of high quality instruction day in and day out rather that placing all the importance on a one day, high stakes test.  To this day, it remains my most read post.  I assume that meant that many of the educators that read it agreed with me.  However, since that time, the emphasis and pressure for students and campuses to produce on a given assessment has increased even more if that is possible.  Our state’s accountability system found a way to disregard the many other data sources available (and mandated such as House Bill 5) to recognize schools that were “perpetually underperforming”.  In some cases, “perpetual” has meant that schools with traditionally high student achievement scores that took a ONE year dip and found themselves on the state’s “most wanted” list.  There are documented cases of schools with pass rates over 90% that made the list because they didn’t make enough progress based on a complicated series of statistics.  Seriously?

My grandfather, who was about as wise a man as I have ever known, never failed to make simple points with strange analogies. He grew up poor in West Texas but became, by all measures a successful business man, husband, and father.  I will never forget him telling me, “Dinosaurs are extinct, but jackrabbits still run wild.” When I asked him what he meant, he talked about how too many people become frustrated reaching for the one “big event” that will prove they are successful that they lose sight of all the small things that mean so much.  I can’t help but think that we have somehow turned high-stakes tests into Dinosaurs….big, bad, and scary.  However, if we remain focused on the little, day to day, activities that improves student learning, we will not only survive, we will thrive…just like the jackrabbits in West Texas.

Daniel Venables, in his book “The Practice of Authentic PLCs” creates a data triangle that highlights the importance of daily lesson planning, formative assessment, and feedback that have the largest impact on student achievement.  The message is clear.  The results of an End of Course exam or STAAR tests, while important, do little to change teaching and learning.  It is the attention to daily results based on learning targets, formative assessment, and observations with feedback that have the potential to change results.   In addition, if we don’t use the daily information we gather to change and adapt our own skills, we will, like the dinosaurs, become extinct. 

From bottom to top: What a teacher and students do on a consistent basis has more impact than any high-stakes test!

Never forget why you started…..

At a training this week, the facilitator asked us to share an elevator speech on “Why you do what you do?”  It sounded simple enough, but as I fumbled through the one minute time limit I realized what a challenge that really was for me to articulate.  I’d like to believe that a bunch of baseball scouts missed the chance of a lifetime by overlooking me in high school and that is why I went into education, but the reality is that I decided to be a teacher much earlier.  When I was in second grade, in a private school in New Orleans, I can distinctly remember thinking to myself day after day, “I could teach better than Ms. ______” (name omitted to protect the guilty).  I had a few detentions and even a couple of “licks” that year to prove that she thought otherwise, but I survived.  The next three years, I had male teachers.  For me, that was the perfect scenario.  They were great teachers and role models for me. I don’t know where any of them are now, but I know they impacted my life a great deal and confirmed that I wanted to be a teacher! A series of circumstances caused us to move a great deal when I was a kid (10 schools in 12 grades), but what I always remember is that it was a teacher or a coach that made me feel comfortable and kept me on track.  How I wish I could go back and thank all of them. Later, while in college I got a job one summer working at a camp for diabetic kids. One summer turned into nine and I loved every minute of it.  Living in a cabin with 20 kids for 3 weeks at a time is only for someone that truly loves it!!  Making their lives better was my passion. When it came time to "grow up" and get a full time job, I intentionally found a place where I could teach a self-contained classroom because I wanted to have my “own” kids each and every day in hopes of helping them in the way so many helped me.  I wanted to make a difference in kids’ lives.  That is why I started! One of the most rewarding things in my career is the number of them that are now teachers themselves!!

Fast forward a few years and I find myself farther away from students than I ever dreamed. The same second grader that thought he could do better than his teacher also couldn’t keep his mouth shut about how things should be done better and was eventually asked to prove it in a series of "promotions".  If I have learned anything in my first year in a new job, it is that I don’t have all the answers.  That is humbling experience for sure, but one that has challenged me to remember even more why I started.  I have to keep that in perspective and believe that while I no longer interact with students on a daily basis, my role now is to do the best I can to support the adults that do touch their lives.

Simon Sinek, has a wonderful TED talk describing what he calls “The Golden Ring”.  (see the link below) The premise of his talk for organizations and its leaders is “People don’t buy what you do, they buy why you do it.”  My hope for teachers everywhere is that you never forget “why” you do it.  I know my story is not unique...we all had teachers that impacted our lives, but more and more, we are “selling” education to kids and parents. Today's students are more skeptical and/or curious than ever before. They must know why learning is relevant and that starts with your passion for what you do.  It shows in all your actions and impacts students and their parents.  Again, they don’t buy what you do, they buy why you do it!

Simon Sinek's TED Talk

I became an educator because I loved being with kids and because of the many teachers that helped me during my life...I figure, I owe them.  So there you have it, my elevator speech.  Why do you do what you do?

Don't Be a CRAB!!

Have you ever worked with people that go out of their way to make sure new things don’t work?  They don’t want to put in the extra effort it might take to get ahead, either because they are afraid of failure or they are content to do things the way they have always been done.  I have worked on campuses, where teachers were actually ostracized for going “above and beyond”!  Simple things like gaining praise for a great newsletter, an extra parent call, or even enthusiastically participating in professional development can sometimes make others jealous or even resentful.  In some places, this is called the “Crab Mentality”.  The crab mentality is a natural phenomenon that even scientists can’t explain, but it almost never fails.  You see, if you have a bucket of crabs, they easily have the capability to climb out of the bucket and save themselves, especially if they work together.  But they will not.  Sometimes the crabs seem almost malicious. They climb over one another and even work to pull those that appear to be making progress towards success downward to the group.  They are not interested in others success. 

We should all be on guard for the Crab Mentality. Even at schools with great culture and climate, it can creep in and pull others down.  Look around your own campus and your peers….I am willing to bet that everyone there is working hard and trying their best.  However, I am also believe that there are a few that stand out. Maybe it’s the way they teach a lesson with a smile, they make even lunch duty fun, or they have a way of getting along with that student/parent than no one else can seem to reach.  The question is, what is keeping them from falling into the crab mentality?  And more importantly are you one that is pushing them upward or pulling them down.

 The crab mentality is a reflection of the famous saying “we all like to see our friends get ahead, but not too far ahead.” Learning to recognize the crab mentality in yourself and others is a very good idea, especially in schools.  Our schools need teachers that “get out of the bucket” to seek adventure and try new things, not groups that are holding them back.  Don’t be a crab!!