Designing engaging and rigorous learning experiences

Yesterday I led an online workshop for Toddle at the Inquiry Educators Summit (TIES).  It was amazing, even though there was a Zoom outage in the UK and eastern USA during the time of my presentation.  Thanks to the amazing support in India, I was still able to deliver my presentation - and it was really odd because I could not see either my slides or the audience.  Although my intention is to provide a fuller account of this workshop, including a downloadable resource that Toddle can add to their Learning Library, I'm going to give a few brief reflections here.  First of all here were the intentions of the workshop:

• Learn how to incorporate higher order thinking skills into student learning experiences and assessments
• Consider how to get students to think and dive deep into their inquiries
• Understand the importance of giving students voice, choice and ownership in how they show their understanding

I'm always amazed at the wonderful notes that participants take using sketches.  It's a really creative way of taking notes and I'd like to share a couple that were made during my presentation and then shared on Twitter.  Obviously Sketchnotes done live over an hour's presentation cannot cover everything, but for me looking at these later it was interesting to see the main points that were seen as important during my session.  This first one is from Lucy Elliott, a PYP Coordinator in China.

Looking at this one I can see the message that comes up clearly is that teachers are the designers of learning.  I can see references to Bloom's taxonomy and the importance of designing so that students are using higher level thinking skills.  In particular that creating involves new and original work/thinking.  I can also see the reference to the SAMR model.  Again I see lots of verbs being used to provoke higher level thinking and reference to the importance of asking open-ended questions.

This one is from Shailja Datt, a PYP Coordinator in India.  This also mentions Bloom's and the SAMR models, and the verbs that can raise thinking.  This one also includes the other "R"s that I feel are important:  rigour, redefining the task and return on learning.

I'm very grateful to both these that were shared on Twitter as it helps me to reflect on my presentation.  I hope to receive the chat (which I also couldn't see) later and at that point I will write a blog post to answer any outstanding questions.

Artificial intelligence -v- intelligence augmentation

A couple of days ago a video was released on the AFP news agency channel about how some Swedish people are having microchips implanted into their hands which allows them to do things (so far only things like access a gym, get into their apartments, and purchase train tickets).  Looking at this video it struck me that we have already moved from using technology, to wearing technology, to implanting it.  The claims are that implantables makes life more convenient.  Of course the other side of this is that there could be more privacy and security issues.  We have seen that connecting devices has already led to large scale DDOS attacks and data hijacking.  Next we will be facing implant hijacking.  I watched an interview with Ben Libberton from the Karolinska Institute who claims:

It's relatively uncertain how they will be used or what kind of information will be transferred from these chips and where it will be going, so I think that it's important to consider these implications to make sure every step along the way of this technology development that the security and ethical implications are considered fully.

These videos reminded me of another video from last year where futurist and technology expert Scott Klososky talks about augmented intelligence and claims it won't be long before implantables are very normal and where schools may have to have classes for augmented kids (with a brain computer interface and retinal projection) and non-augmented kids.  Scott claims we will be the last generation to be un-augmented.  He talked about this when he came to ASB Un-Plugged earlier this year as well - personally I find this very scary, especially when you consider what will happen when students leave school and go for jobs.  Clearly if some people are augmented, then those people will get the best jobs and the highest salaries - increasing inequalities.  If you start to think about the consequences it's really frightening!

I've been thinking about data and student achievement recently.  I was reading about soft data in Daniel Sobel's book Narrowing the Attainment Gap: A Handbook for Schools where Daniel argues that the attainment gap is mostly to do with soft data (motivations and barriers for students).   At the same time I'm seeing more and more schools focusing on big data.  A couple of weeks ago I was talking to Consilience's data scientist, Sujoy, who claims that in fact the power is in "small data" looking at individuals and what helps each child to progress.  And as Tricia Wang says, "Relying on big data alone increases the chance we'll miss something, while giving us the illusion we know everything." (She recently did a TEDtalk about the human insights missing from big data that is worth watching.)

Let's pull these thoughts together.  Currently many details of our lives are captured and traded by data-mining companies.  You only have to pause a little over someone's Facebook post, and related ads seem to flow into your email and messages.  For example a couple of days ago I paused over an ad for microblading (I didn't have a clue what it was) and suddenly I'm getting ads all the time about beautiful eyebrows!  Data is collected from the websites we browse, what we buy, social media posts, loyalty cards, the music we listen to, the movies we watch online and so on.  I've stopped giving out my real phone number when asked while making purchases as I'm flooded with spam messages afterwards, with companies targeting me in marketing their products and services.

But can "big data" really be useful in education?  Does it allow schools to better understand how students learn and how best to support them?  Around 6 months ago the IB published an article about data entitled Big Data, Big Problems?  The question this article addresses is this:  do the numbers tell the whole story?  I was interested to read a comment by Allison Littlejohn, Professor of Learning Technology at the Open University in the UK who claims "We can look at trends ... and connect that with employment within countries.  Depending on what the future job opportunities might be, schools can then adapt the curriculum."  Really?  Good lord, I'd have thought it would take a little longer than this to adapt, write and implement a new curriculum!  However I do agree with something else she writes, "We need to be sure that students are properly prepared so that when they do leave school, they're able to aim for jobs that still exist, and later change careers, which they're very likely to do throughout their lives."  I think it is true that schools may be able to target support that students' need when everything is more transparent, but perhaps the question then is what is being measured (is it just what is easy to measure in schools?  What about the environmental factors outside of school that motivate students?)  Littlejohn argues further that the success of collecting the data depends on how well coders, teachers and people who understand learning can work together.  She states, "It's very difficult to actually gather the data that you need to come to the conclusions that you want to reach ... a lot of what we measure and analyse is an approximation of what people's actually ability is."

At school I work closely with our iCommons teacher/librarian and recently we've been having a big push with our Grade 4s about bias.  In fact we came across a great online resource called Checkology, though a bit old for our Grade 4s, but I'm sharing it here because it provoked interesting discussions about bias in media.  At the same time we are aware (and letting students know) that Google's autocomplete feature can produce a biased result while searching, perpetuating gender and racial biases which reinforce rather than eliminate discrimination, and which ultimately can negatively affect development.  I'm thinking about this now in terms of smart speakers as well, such as Echo and Google Home who are "always listening" to us, and which pretty soon are going to start talking to each other.  What information are they giving us - knowing what we want to hear?  And here is a question that Scott left us with in one of his Un-Plugged presentations:  When machines can learn faster than humans, what will be the most valuable areas of learning for humans?  Something to think about as teachers right?

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Fire bullets before cannonballs

On Sundays I meet up with a group of teachers from a number of different institutions for Cognitive Coaching.  Yesterday we were talking about why some school initiatives don't stick.  For example when I first came to India huge numbers of people were being trained in the Data Wise approach.  I even blogged about this back in September 2012, and I was excited by this approach.  However I didn't use it much myself and though there seems to be a revised interest in data this year (we are currently doing data inquiry cycles) compared to the huge amount invested in training, there's not much current impact (most of the teachers trained have already left).  The following year it was Critical Friends.  Again I was part of a group, lots of people were trained, but now there are no critical friends groups left at school, and again this initiative has died a death.  Following on from that we've had Responsive Classroom, Adaptive Schools and Cognitive Coaching.  As one of our group said yesterday, "seems like every time another bandwagon comes along, we jump off the old one and onto the new one".  And what a waste - of human talent, of PD money, of the potential for making a true difference by integrating one of these deeply into the culture of the school.

So then one of us asked a question:  why do we do this?  What's the purpose of all this new innovation?  Of new initiatives that are invested in heavily but which are not implemented long enough to have teachers reflect, iterate and really make a difference.  All of these initiatives are very worthy - all have the potential to make a huge difference to student learning - so why aren't they sustained?  We talked about the fact that some people just want to make their mark by bringing in something new (good for adding on a CV as well).  We talked about the fact that this could be a marketing policy (see how many things we are involved in), or a way of attracting new teachers.  Certainly our PD is second to none.

And then one of us talked about Jim Collin's advice to fire bullets before cannonballs.  This concept comes from Collin's book Great by Choice.  He writes that first you fire bullets (low-cost, low-risk) to figure out what will work - basically you take small shots.  Then once you know you have hit your target fire a few more - just to make sure this is not a coincidence - and then finally bring in the cannonballs: concentrate your resources into one big bet to get huge results.  The ability to turn small proven ideas (bullets) into huge hits (cannonballs) counts more than the sheer amount of pure innovation.

So then I started to think about this business idea in terms of schools.  The fire bullets before cannonballs concept can also be applied to looking at innovation in schools.  Collins writes that innovation is not what distinguishes companies that thrive in tough times from companies that fail.  In fact he noticed that companies that survived tough times were often less innovative than their competitors that failed.  Basically, you shouldn't embark on a large, risky project until you have proven you can hit the target with smaller, less risky projects, that let you figure out what works and what doesn't.

This was the beauty of having an R&D department.  Should we have the students bring in any mobile device for BYOD?  We did a study in 2 classes to determine which was the best device for student learning (it was the laptop).  Should we have students use a second mobile device?  We did a year-long study on that as well in just 3 classes.  What we learned from R&D was this:  we need to try something out and then evaluate it when it's over.  We need to ask the tough questions:

• What worked?
• What didn't work?
• What was too expensive, even if it worked?

But even more important in a school we need to ask what is the impact on student learning?

This post has been some time in the making.  I've been thinking this idea through constantly since last month when a former R&D member shared this quote from Carl Glickman with me (and which I'm sharing again now because all of my thinking around this issue was stimulated by this one quote):

It is irresponsible for a school to mobilize, initiate, and act without any conscious way of determining whether such expenditures of time and energy are having a desirable effect. This sounds obvious, but most schools move from innovation to innovation, expending great amounts of time developing new curricula, learning new practices, and acquiring new material and equipment. Then, after initial enthusiasm has passed, they have no sense of whether these efforts helped students. 

I think we have to be brave and ask the tough questions about what we are doing in schools.  Are we firing bullets or cannonballs?  Because if we are firing cannonballs and they are not hitting their target then we will run out of gunpowder quickly, and then we will die.  Our students don't get a second chance when we make the wrong decisions or jump on the wrong bandwagon.  It's their future we are talking about, and their future is precious.

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Renewal and innovation

Yesterday I read a blog post  that Tom Barrett wrote a few days ago about innovation.  One thing that struck me about this was that he explained that the word innovation comes from the Latin word "innovare" which means renewal.  Tom writes:

Any teacher will understand the constant questioning and reflection on what more can we do, how else can we explore these ideas, how might we approach this in a more accessible way or where can I continue to challenge these students?

What this questioning leads to, Tom writes, is creativity and taking action.  And because of this curiosity teachers become innovators, applying new ideas to improve student learning.

I think it's also important to recognise that renewal will be different from school to school.  In his post, Tom writes about how having many students working on one Google Docs was very innovative when he introduced it to his classroom over 10 years ago, and that in his role as a consultant, he finds it is still an innovation with other classes today.  What is new for one teacher or school is not necessarily the same for another.  This reminded me of the Derek Sivers video, which I'll add at the end of this post.  I shared this video recently with some teachers at school to encourage them to present what they are doing at ASB Un-Plugged in February.  They said to me "I don't think I'm doing anything new" - but again this is a great example of the fact that what might not be new to you could be really innovative for others - and therefore it is worth sharing.

It's a good reminder to me too.  As I come to the end of my time at ASB I'm thinking about all my learning over the past 6 years and how this can be shared with other teachers and schools.  I need to remind myself that this may well be innovative for them, and that this sharing can help them to renew their own schools.

Click here to read Tom's post

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Innovative leadership

Over the past few weeks I've been involved in a design thinking project at school aimed at coming up with a new model for tech integration.  It was interesting to see the approach that was taken, with candidates focusing on different things - either the logistics, or the learning, or some new technology.  As a result of this process, it was interesting to read Scott McLeod's blog post today entitled 18 things that leaders of innovative schools do differently.  In this post Scott writes about the TIES conference and how at the Leadership Seminar they looked at a variety of innovative schools from around the world to see what the leaders of these schools are doing differently.  He asked - which of these are most important, which are being done well and which need more attention?  The interesting thing, something that I was really heartened to read, is that this list does not include a focus on the new technologies.  The focus is much more on things that empower students and teachers.  So to answer the question which on the list are most important, here are my thoughts:

• Creating an atmosphere of safety and trust so that teachers can take risk with support.
• Leaders being willing to take risks themselves.
• Empowering student choice, building on intrinsic motivation.
• Personalising academic pathways that take account of students' interests, skills and talents.
• Reducing the number of things on everyone's plate by focusing on the few things that are really important - tied in to the mission and purpose of the school.
• Time for meaningful collaboration, including protocols for making decisions.
• Distributed leadership.
• Not just being concerned with the "spark" of innovation, but also having the depth of knowledge to tie this to student learning.
• Getting rid of "tall poppy" environments.

One of Scott's 18 things is in bold - he has added the emphasis showing what he feels is most important:  innovative leaders are able to help teachers translate big ideas from mission and vision statements into day-to-day instructional practice.  I like this statement a lot as well.  It makes me think of Malcolm Gladwell's 10,000 hours to become an expert (outlier), and although the notion that anyone can become an expert after a certain number of hours of practice has now been debunked, innovative leaders do need that knowledge and understanding of the day-to-day of teaching (which translates into about 10 years of teaching experience to get to the 10,000 hours).  In addition, to be that innovative leader an educator is required to be a reflective practitioner with a passion for excellence, someone with strong values, in particular integrity, and someone who demonstrates empathy.  Without these last two, in my opinion, someone may try to lead innovation, but will anyone follow?

I'm looking forward to working with Scott at ASB Un-Plugged in February.  Scott will be leading a pre-conference institute on building schools of the future.

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Less is more

For the past 3 weeks I have been with my mother in England.  Readers of my blog will know that my mother suffers from dementia and needs a lot of support.  She doesn't have wifi at home, and even the telephone connection is quite sporadic as she lives out in the country.  Apart from looking after her,  I've done very little "work",  though I've had lots of time to think and read.  As I'm interested in moving forward into more of an innovation position, I've been reading George's Couros's book The Innovator's Mindset, and reflecting on this and how it relates to my life and the schools where I have worked.  Every day, sometimes twice a day, I have taken a break to walk around the grounds where my mother lives.  I've been enjoying the autumn sun, wind and colours.  The photos and questions in this post are all from my daily "thinking walks", and the quotes are all from George's book.

How can we focus on and support deep learning?

Less is More

• More so than ever before, educational organizations need to focus more on depth than breadth.  Quality should always override quantity.  But that isn't what happens in schools where teachers feel inundated by new initiatives and a myriad of organizational objectives.
• As leaders we must recognize, as we're adding what's important and removing what's unnecessary from our staff members' "plates" that every single person's plate size is different.
• How would your staff members and students respond if someone asked, "What are the 3 big things your school is exploring?"  Would they all say the same 3 things, or would you have double-digit objectives being shared?
• As a school, when we limit our initiatives, we give ourselves time to discover what deep learning can really look and feel like.  Focusing on a few key things promotes innovation in teaching and learning.

How far away is our "horizon"?  What will we need to learn for the next 4 years and for the next 40?

The tyranny of choice

• When people have no choice, life is almost unbearable ... but as the number of choices keeps growing negative aspects of having a multitude of options begin to escalate until we become overloaded.  At this point choice no longer liberates but debilitates.  It might even be said to tyrannize.
• Although offering too many choices can lead to feelings of being overwhelmed, it is imperative that leaders are careful not to constrain those we serve by only allowing them to explore designated tools or resources.  If you do not model constant exploration, teaching practices can become stagnant.  Trial and error, even if they are messy, is where powerful learning happens.

How can we get out of our educational silos and connect with others?

Creativity and innovation

• Creativity is where we start to think differently and innovation is where creativity comes to life.
• A focus on doing less allows us the time to go beyond surface level learning and to really explore so we can build a knowledge that enables us to move forward and innovate.  Time to explore is paramount in being successful at creating something new.
• True innovation in education will only happen when a new structure is created: one that nurtures critical thinkers, supports risk-takers and encourages ongoing transformation, and that places a high value on creative and insightful learning.
• We can think more creatively if we open our minds to the many connected environments that make creativity possible.  As educational leaders we must promote and capitalize on open, connected learning.  If we want to accelerate our own growth we must actively participate in the sharing of ideas.

What is the best way to create and support an "innovation ripple"?

Tough questions for tech departments

Back in September I wrote a post entitled Is the role of tech director dead?  It's interesting that today I've been reading on in George Couros's book The Innovator's Mindset, and I've come across a section that refers to the role of a school district technology director as obsolete because it inhibits learning.  George asks 4 questions that can frame the work of IT departments:

1. What's best for kids?  Should we block social media sites or should we educate students to navigate these as we give them the skills to understand how to stay safe online, digital citizenship and the impact of their digital footprint?
2. How does this improve learning?  Is the software that the school subscribes to designed for learning, or is it simply a business application that comes with a site licence?
3. What is the balance of risk -v- reward?  Many tech departments want to work in a low or zero risk environment, hence various websites are blocked.  Can the message that we trust students bring its own reward?  Teachers need to be able to articulate the rewards of technology.
4. Is this serving the few or the majority?  When we decide on a policy, is this for the many who use technology wisely, or for the few who may misuse the technology?

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Teaching -v- learning

I've often used the expression "teachers need to be the biggest learners" but only today did I consider how this relates to curriculum.  When I read the following quote from Seymour Papert it really made me think:

We don't allow the kids to have the experience of learning with the teacher because that's incompatible with the concept of the curriculum where what is being taught is what's already known.

The important word here for me is the word "with".  Many teachers don't see themselves as learners, they are delivering a body of knowledge, a set of standards, therefore their students are simply receiving the knowledge that is already there.  Once we reframe teachers as learners, alongside the students, it not only gives more agency to the students, it also gives more agency to the teachers, and it encourages the sort of shifts in thinking that can promote innovation.

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Moving from engaged to empowered: learning first, technology second

As regular readers will know,  I've been reading and blogging about innovation for a couple of months now, spurred on by reading The Innovator's Mindset by George Couros.  This week I've been focusing on the transformative power of technology.  Like George, I often get irritated when I hear the words "technology is just a tool" and like George I believe that the power of technology should go way beyond engagement and enhancement - however for this to happen teachers need to be providing the opportunities for students to create, not just consume.  As George writes,

Throwing a bunch of high-tech devices into a classroom, with no shift in mindset on teaching and learning, is cosmetic.  There's no depth, no real change.

 In order for technology to be transformational (and basically this was the entire reason I started a blog called Tech Transformation back in 2009), it needs to provide opportunities that didn't exist before.  I have written a lot about the SAMR model and how technology can be used to redefine learning.  Back in 2011, when considering the "top" 2 levels of the SAMR model I wrote:

Modification involves giving a different kind of assignment - for example using multimedia - adding sound, video etc. The question to be asked is does the media enhance the message?
Redefinition - doing something that was inconceivable without technology, giving students a stage for example posting on the web so that the audience is the world and there is a feedback loop.
These 2 levels lead to TRANSFORMATION.

I think that the other thing that is important to consider here is that technology provides different opportunities for each individual.  George writes,

Technology should personalize, not standardize.

 What this means in terms of SAMR is that students should have agency in the way that they express their understanding.  Some students are very happy to speak up in class, but for those who are not, technology can provide a different medium for them as they can use videos, blogs or podcasts to express themselves.  Other students who don't feel comfortable creating things such as models with their hands, can create online and make animations, 3D models and so on.  Basically what I'm saying here is put the learning first, and then decide what technology can be used to make this happen, or as George writes, "If educators can't answer "Why?" then they will never get to the "How?" and "What?".

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Creating a culture of innovation

More thoughts from The Innovator's Mindset:

George Couros writes that to create a culture of innovation you first have to focus on learning and growth, and he has a list of 8 things to look for in today's classroom that will help schools to achieve a culture of innovation:

1. Voice - learning is social and co-constructing knowledge empowers learners
2. Choice - students need input into how they learn and what they learn
3. Reflection - it's important for learners to take the time to think about and understand what they are learning
4. Opportunities for innovation - innovation shouldn't be a one-off or special event, but should become the norm
5. Critical thinking - encouraging students to ask questions both about the information they are finding and also so that they are empowered to challenge the ideas of others to help everyone move forward
6. Problem solvers/finders - students who find problems gain a sense of purpose in solving something authentic
7. Self assessment - this can provide another opportunity for reflection, as students can assess themselves.  George writes, "I think we spend too much time documenting what students know and not enough time empowering them to invest in their own learning and helping them understand their strengths and areas of growth."
8. Connecting - with experts and with an authentic audience.

Some more thoughts on innovation and leadership

My Grade 6 class in 1996

I'm now in Part II of The Innovator's Mindset and am thinking about innovation and leadership based on the following quote:

As leaders in education, our job is not to control those whom we serve but to unleash their talent.

As I read this it reminded me of  the reasons why I moved to my school 6 years ago.  Before moving to India I was not in a school that was much interested in innovation, and so the thing that really attracted me to ASB was its "can do" attitude.  I'd never been in a school before that had an R&D department, and I was amazed by the culture of yes.  To this end, George Couros writes:

The problem is that when you say "no" to innovation for any reason - people feel reluctant to attempt trying new things in the future.  Their thinking is, "If I am not allowed to do something that could impact learning in my classroom or other classrooms, what purpose do I have in serving the needs of the school as a whole?"  In other words they think, "My ideas don't matter."

My 5th Grade students and their families
at our first student-led conference in 1999

When teachers feel like this they really have just 2 options - not to bother to try anything new, or to go ahead and try it and then ask for forgiveness.  Many, many years ago, when I was a 5th Grade teacher, my teaching partner and I decided it would be really useful to have students at the parent-teacher conferences.  We felt that it would be good for students to be part of the discussions (after all it was their learning) and we felt that they could best demonstrate and articulate their own progress and goals they would like to set for the future.  We knew we were on shaky ground - nobody had ever had students at the parent-teacher conferences before - but we ploughed ahead anyway.  Now having 3-way or student led conferences is commonplace, but it was sad that we had to do it in the way we did, as we feared we would not get the permission to go ahead if we asked for it upfront.  George Couros writes about this in the following way:

If we've established a culture in which educators feel their only option is to ask forgiveness for trying new things, this is not an educator issue, it's a leadership issue ... squashing the ambitions of those who want to go above and beyond to try something new will ensure schools have only "pockets of innovation" at best, and, at worse, no innovation.

Looking back now, I'm aware that my colleague and I did some really wild things.  For example we went and dug up the paving stones in the school playground and then gave students the task of trying to use simple machines to bring the stones up to the 2nd floor of the school through the windows in order to try to demonstrate the technology that the ancient Egyptians used in building the pyramids.  Another time we dug up the school playground and each class buried a set of artefacts, which the other class then dug up, taking on the roles of archaeologists and trying to work out what culture we represented.  I remember this was the first time we had students video and document the whole process and then we posted this on a class website - and this was at a time when our school didn't even have an internet connection back in 1996!  And yet I'm aware that we were just one of those "pockets of innovation" that George referred to.  Personally I think we did really great things in Grade 6 - and over 20 years later I'm still friends on Facebook with some of those 6th Grade students - as well as with my teaching colleague - but I'm also aware that Grade 6 was seen as being a bit "out there" and that although we had a class website we didn't really have a way of interacting with other educators around the world.  I know that change can happen one person at a time - but it could have happened much quicker and had more impact if we had been more connected.  I have to say though that I very much appreciated that school for tolerating the "crazy" ideas of two 6th Grade teachers!

(By the way I just checked to see if that old 6th Grade website is still there - it is!  Amazing!  The photo above is this 6th Grade class in 1996 - my first class who ever published their work on the internet.  Were we innovators?  Yes, I think we were!)

George Couros's 8 characteristics of the innovator's mindset

Here are some of my highlights based on reading George Couros's book The Innovator's Mindset, along with some of my own thoughts.  As more tech positions in schools are morphing into innovation and coaching positions, I'm interested to see how much of what George identifies is applicable to myself and my own future in education.

• Empathetic:  empathetic teachers think about the classroom environment and learning opportunities from the point of view of the student, not the teacher.  George's question is, "Would you want to be a learner in your own classroom?"
• Problem finders/solvers: traditional schools pose questions/problems to students but in real life there is often no step by step way of finding the answer.  George writes "Sometimes it takes several attempts and iterations to solve real-life problems, and, sometimes, there are several correct answers ... Ewan McIntosh notes that finding the problem is an essential part of learning - one that students miss out on when we pose the problems to them first ... Sometimes teachers need to lead from the front.  Other times, our students' learning experiences are improved when we move alongside them or simply get out of the way."
• Risk takers: as teachers we know that not everything we try will work with every learner, yet George writes, "Risk is necessary to ensure that we are meeting the needs of each unique student.  Some respond well to one way of learning, while others need a different method or format.  Not taking the risk to find the best approach for each student might seem less daunting than trying new things, but maintaining the status quo may have dire consequences for our students."
• Networked: for years bloggers such as George have argued that being in spaces where people actively share ideas makes us smarter - and social media provides the place for ideas to spread.
• Observant: this ties in with the last point as George writes that "sometimes the most valuable thing you get from the network isn't an idea, but the inspiration or courage to try something new."
• Creators: anyone can consume information but that doesn't equate to learning - learning is creation not consumption ... knowledge is something a learner creates.
• Resilient: for me this is a really important one - certainly in my time in tech I've noticed that anything new and different can see threatening.  George writes, "for those with an innovator's mindset, the reality is that their work will constantly be questions simply because it is something new ... innovators must be prepared to move forward, even when the risk of rejection is involved."
• Reflective: we need to be asking ourselves what worked and what didn't, what we would change and what questions we have as we continue to move forward.

So here is the crux of the matter:  as leaders we cannot tell others they should be innovative while we continue to do the same thing.  As I reflect on the 8 characteristics outlined by George, there are some I know I'm strong at (being networked, risk-taking, resilient and reflective) and others that I could do with more work on (creating, being observant, empathetic - actually I think I am empathetic to students, what I need is to become more empathetic to the challenges my colleagues are facing - and being a problem-finder).  

I'm at the end of Part I of the book.  It's been really useful to me to reflect on some of the questions that have been posed and to think about where I am today.  Now it's time for Part II which focuses on creating the conditions that empower a culture of learning and innovation.

If you want to purchase The Innovator's Mindset you can find it on Amazon.

Creating our own education: voice, choice and ownership

I have been reading on in George's Couros's book The Innovator's Mindset, and at the start of Chapter 2 I have come across a quote from Stephen Downes:

We need to move beyond the idea that an education is something that is provided for us and towards the idea that an education is something that we create for ourselves.

The reason this struck me as being so important is because I've recently finished Cognitive Coaching Days 5-8 (again) where I was able to again think about the concept of efficacy and the belief in the ability to succeed or to make a difference, and more recently I've been considering the changes that will come to the PYP with greater emphasis on learner agency.  As Downes alludes to, people with agency take responsibility and ownership of their own education/learning.  Dispositions that we want to promote in both students and adults who have agency include critical and creative thinking, perseverance, independence and confidence.  This idea of perseverence is built upon by George Couros in Chapter 2 of his book when he writes:

Having the freedom to fail is important to innovation.  But even more important to the process are the traits of resilience and grit.  Resiliency is the ability to come back after a defeat or unsuccessful attempt.  Grit is resolve or strength of character.  These two characteristics need to be continuously developed as we look for new and better ways to serve our students.

I think the word "serve" is important here.  I've come across this again recently in my reading around coaching - a coach is there to serve the coachee, to help the coachee tap into his or her inner resources, to help convey a person to where he or she wants to go.   In the same way that a coach needs to give up his or her own agenda, teachers need to be mindful of the diverse needs and interests of the students they serve.  George suggests some questions that will help teachers focus on the students (as opposed to the curriculum, standards etc), for example

• What is best for this student?
• What is this student's passion?

He is a real advocate of developing empathy for our students and of pursuing our desire as educators of giving our students the best that we can.  An innovator's mindset, therefore, is focused on the desire to create something better - and to do that we need to continually ask the question "is there a better way of doing this?"

Back to the quote at the start of this post, if education is something that we create then both teachers and students are partners in the process.  As teachers we need to work alongside the students, to monitor their learning and to provide feedback and feedforward to help the learning process.  We need to listen to their wonderings, and help them to explore their interests through open-ended tasks and we need to involve students in making decisions about what and how they learn - which means as teachers we often need to co-learn with our students.  In these inquiry-based classrooms, our teaching should be "just in time" and not "just in case".

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Future Forwards Volume 7: Exploring frontiers in education

Today ASB published the final volume of Future Forwards. The online edition is available at this link. Future Forwards is a collection of thoughts, hypotheses, discussions, and reflections on practices, research and ideas that are relevant to emerging new paradigms of teaching and learning. The focus of this volume is on prototyping.  This fits in nicely with my current reading on innovation, as in the introduction Shabbi and Scot write:
Prototyping results in new tangible innovations that educators, schools and school systems can see, try, evaluate and learn from as they focus on creating something new and better to meet the needs of their students in their schools.

In Volume 7 of Future Forwards you will read about a prototype in elementary school to address the gender achievement gap in maths, developing "glocal" mindsets based on the ISTE standard Global Collaborator, self motivated learning projects in a middle school, ASB's teacher training programme for local educational institutions (my joy - probably the most rewarding thing I've done over the past 6 years), closing the gender gap in STEM in the high school, and developing mobile apps in the middle school.

In his book The Innovator's Mindset, George Couros asks the question "Would I want to be a learner in my own classroom?" I think with our R&D task forces we asked ourselves "How can I be a learner in my own classroom?"  As George writes, "the innovator's mindset starts with empathy for our students ... but equally important is the desire to create something better."  What we have done on R&D is to ask "Is there a better way?"  George also points out that many teachers who want to change lack clear guidance and support to make the desired change.  Prototyping through our R&D teams has given us that guidance and support.  He also writes that "being in spaces where people actively share ideas makes us smarter" and that social media provides a place for ideas to spread.  He writes, "sometimes the most valuable thing you get from the network isn't an idea, but the inspiration or courage to try something new."  It is with great pleasure therefore that I share the links to prototypes we have been conducting at ASB since 2011.

If you missed the earlier volumes, here are the links:

Future Forwards Volume 1
Future Forwards Volume 2
Future Forwards Volume 3
Future Forwards Volume 4
Future Forwards Volume 5

Future Forwards Volume 6

These eBooks are completely free - enjoy and please consider sharing them with others in your professional network.

Learning and innovation: 3 quotations

In Chapter 1 of The Innovator's Mindset by George Couros there is a section entitled New Opportunities which starts with the following quotation from William Pollard:

Learning and innovation go hand in hand.  The arrogance of success is to think what you did yesterday will be sufficient for tomorrow.

This struck a chord with me because I've been asking myself for some time now whether we are looking backwards or looking forwards.  It also reminded me of our Visioning Task Force, where several members of my group expressed some anxiety about changes that might be coming to education in the future.  It also reminded me about the need for constantly moving forward, not resting on our laurels and thinking "we're a good school" and so continuing to do what worked in the past.  Times are changing, and in a big city such as Mumbai, change also means competition from other schools that are opening huge campuses.  And while it's very flattering that some of these schools appear to be copying our approach to designing spaces, curriculum and so on, my question is do we now need a new approach that will take us towards the future?  When we talk about innovation, we need to be clear what this means - and it doesn't just mean doing things differently from others!  It also means building a culture when innovation is seen as being normal - what we would call at ASB "part of our DNA".  For many years teachers on our R&D core team have been innovative and trying out new things - but how far did this permeate across the whole school?  More and more I've come to see that anyone can be innovative given the right environment - one where it is not seen as a problem to try something that maybe ends up not working that well (because that is a learning experience).  We need to move away from compliance, the cookie cutter approach, where everyone is doing the same thing at the same time!

Just as Sir Ken Robinson defines creativity as "the process of having original ideas that have value" - and which includes both imagination and innovation, George Couros defines innovation as "a way of thinking that creates something new and better"  This can also include iteration, which means changing something that already exists.  However it goes further than just having a new idea: Sir Ken writes "innovation is putting new ideas into practice."  And let's be clear about this, as George points out, "it is a way of considering concepts, processes and potential outcomes; it is not a thing, task fo even technology".  And this brings me back to my previous post - should schools be employing tech directors, or has the time for this now passed - should they be employing directors of innovation?  Of course technology can have a role to play, but clearly innovation is not about the what, it's about the how - and the how is all about empowerment.

In the past I worked at a school where questioning was not seen as critical thinking but as criticism.  Since that time I've always argued that questioning what we are doing and why is essential for moving forward and growing.  Another quotation that jumped of the page at me was this one by John Maxwell:

Change is inevitable.  Growth is optional

But should it be optional?  If we know what the trends are for the future (and at my school we have spent a long time exploring these trends) then can we make a choice NOT to grow?  Certainly this does not seem a responsible choice to make when we consider our students' futures.   And I really disagree with my colleagues that change can be scary and unsettling - in my opinion NOT changing is even scarier.  Change should not be left to chance!

Here's the final quote from this post - again from Chapter 1 of The Innovator's Mindset - this one is by Seth Godin:

Change almost never fails because it is too early.  It almost always fails because it's too late. 

As an educator in a school that has always been seen as "cutting edge", I'm hoping that we are not already too late.

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Is the role of tech director dead?

This is a question I've been asking myself over the past 2 days.  Do schools need tech directors, or do they simply need someone to be responsible for tech support while the job of educational technology morphs into something more like a director of innovation and learning?  As I was pondering this thought, I started to recall one of the biggest shifts in my professional life - when I stopped thinking that all my PD had to come from within my school, but instead started to connect  with others via Twitter and by reading blogs of educators all around the world.  One of these was George Couros.  As I thought more about this question yesterday, I decided to get the Kindle version of George's latest book, which is focused on an innovator's mindset, change and moving forwards.  And wow - I'm glad I did!  So far today I've only managed to read through the introduction but here are some brief bullet points of the things that most struck me and helped me to consider my question again:

Dhobi Ghat, Mumbai - traditional open air laundry. Not much has changed here despite the city growing up around it

Change (or not?) in schools

• Change is an opportunity to do something amazing, yet within the institution of education there is often a reluctance to embrace new opportunities.  Even in schools that have the latest technology, teachers and administrators use that advanced equipment to do the same things they did before.
• If we don't really think about the way we teach, and, more importantly, how both educators and students learn, we will all miss out on the opportunities that lie in front of us - right now we have many 21st century schools with 20th century learning.
• The world is changing and if you don't change with it, the world will decide that it doesn't need you anymore.

Fort area of Mumbai

Our role as educators 

• Our job as educators is to provide new and better opportunities for our students.
• Students remember great teachers, not because of the test scores they received but because their lives were touched.
• Kids walk into schools full of wonder and questions, yet we often ask them to hold their questions for later so we can "get through" the curriculum.  If students leave school less curious than when they started, we have failed them.
• Compliance does not foster innovation.  In fact demanding conformity does quite the opposite. In a world where new challenges constantly arise, students must be taught to think critically about what they are facing.  They must learn to collaborate with others from around the world to develop solutions for problems.  Even more importantly, our students must learn how to ask the right questions - questions that will challenge old systems and inspire growth.

Worli fishing village - with the Sealink and new skyscrapers being built in the background.  Here the traditional way of life is under threat - can the people adapt to change?

Learning and growing

• If we want innovative students we will need innovative educators.  Teachers want to be innovative but instead of connecting and learning from others around the world .... they spend their time in staff meetings that often seem irrelevant to the heart of teaching.  They are constantly told that if they want to be innovative they are going to have to find time to do it. As leaders, if we ask teachers to use their own time to do anything, what we're  really telling them is: it's not important.  We must make time for our teachers to learn and grow.
• Leaders of the most innovative organisations in the world know there is no end to growth and learning.  Schools, more than any other organisation, need to embrace a commitment to continuous learning.

So as I was thinking about my original question and framing it in the light of the above main headings, I'm considering this:  as a tech director am I encouraging the use of technology to do new things in new ways, or simply letting teachers digitize what they are already doing?  Do we still have 20th century learning and in that case should the role of a tech director be redundant?  Does our current focus on standards get in the way of inquiry and curiosity, and how can I encourage the use of technology to have students reach out more to experts in the global community?  How can we use technology to help students ask and find the answers to deeper questions than just those demanded by standards (most of which could be Googled)?  How do we find time for our teachers to "play" and so learn in the same way that we encourage our young students to do?  Does having the word "tech" in the job description limit me too much?

By the way the photos that I've included in this post are from my walk today around the Worli Fishing Village and South Mumbai where I was contemplating change.  A lot of the images show the traditional life in the foreground, and change that is threatening this life in the background.  

Creating a culture of innovation

If you've been a regular reader you will know I'm thinking about teams. Next year I'll be coaching all the tech integration coaches, 5 in the elementary school, 3 in the middle and 3 in the high school.  We have 2 campuses - elementary and secondary - so the tech coaches almost never meet together - and I'm wondering how viable it is to consider them as a team.  I want to - but I don't want to force extra meetings on everyone.  One thing I am determined to do, however, is to run Cognitive Coaching sessions every Monday for all to attend, basically for practice and honing their skills as coaches, as well as perhaps sharing some new ideas, since all our coaches are at different stages of their training.  Anyway, with all this on my mind, it was great to get this week's Dialogic Learning newsletter from Tom Barrett, where he shared a link to an article about the 7 most important hires for creating a culture of innovation.  I like articles like this because it makes me reflect on what role I'm playing in the team - as well as what role I could potentially play.

The article is basically about workplace culture, which is something I was also mulling over this week.  A great culture is important for job satisfaction, and building a great culture depends on employing the right people - or more importantly the right combination of people.  Here are the roles that are important for creating this culture:

1. The Gardener - this is the person who takes on the role of seeding, nurturing, inspiring and cultivating ideas.  At ASB I'm thinking this was largely the role of the members of the R&D department.
2. The Sage - described as a wise veteran who has been through the trenches before.  In a school context I'm thinking this could be an administrator, for example an assistant principal, who is still very connected with the actual classroom experience that teachers are living every day.  It's the job of the sage to remind the rest of the admin to focus on the culture.
3. The Empathizer - someone who understands and is in-tune with the (classroom) experience and  whose role is to help people to make it better.  I'm thinking this role is actually vital if you are a tech coach, and I'm guessing that in a school context this person would not be a member of the admin whose role it is to evaluate.
4. The Talent Guru - this role is described as "reinventing the company’s policies to match the company’s cultural values and employees’ personal values. Most importantly, talent gurus create the narrative that defines how a company aligns its actions (the what) with its values (the how)."  I'm thinking about this role holistically, not just in terms of our tech team here, but more in terms of a school's mission and values - and how they are actually brought to life, recognised and celebrated within a school.  I think teachers are also be talent gurus within their own classrooms.
5. The Dean - this is the person who is responsible for professional development to keep the talent within the school learning and growing.  I'd say this was a vital role that is taken on by our Teaching and Learning Coordinator, but also on a smaller scale by all of our tech integration coaches as they foster collaboration and creativity.
6. The Storyteller - all of us can be storytellers, sharing what we do with the world.  There are many ways to do this, of course, such as through the school website, newsletters, publications and so on.  Many of the R&D team have published their stories in the various Future Forwards (see previous posts about our Future Forwards publications here).
7. The Questioner - creativity and innovation are more likely to happen when a school or organisation values diversity.  Rather than hiring people who are similar to current employees, it's useful to seek out those who think differently or who have had different experiences.  In my opinion, a school that encourages people to ask questions about what they are doing, how they are doing it and why they are doing it, is likely to foster a culture of innovation.

I've written before about the projected growth of international schools worldwide, and how great schools need to attract, develop and retain excellent teachers.  Clearly one way to do this is to focus on the culture.  Some of these roles did resonate with me as being important in schools.  For myself I think I take on all these roles at various times, but the role of questioner really struck a chord:  I'm constantly asking myself and others "Is this the best way?  Can we do this better?"  Do any of these roles resonate with you as well?  Are there other roles that are equally important for fostering creativity and innovation at your school?

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People on the edge

In our R&D Meeting today we continued to discuss the diffusion of innovation, this time focusing on opinion leadership.  Last month I blogged about innovators and early adopters,   It's the early adopters who are often highly respected as opinion leaders.  When the early adopters endorse an innovation this is what gets the innovation out to the majority.  There could be many reasons for this, for example they could have greater exposure to mass media or social media.  Today we were talking about how these opinion leaders are often people on the edge - bringing new ideas from outside their social group to its members.  They are not the people at the top, not the leaders of groups, but instead they are the people who move between groups, as they have extensive interpersonal network links. The role of the innovation leader in a social system is to reduce uncertainly abut the innovation - therefore these people must be seen by others as having good judgement about adopting new ideas - and after the opinion leaders in a system adopt an innovation, it may be impossible to stop its further spread.  We talked about how school leaders will often want to get the opinion leaders onboard in order to role out a new initiative, and about the people in school who could be seen as early adopters.

Are you an opinion leader - someone on the edge?

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The diffusion of innovation

Last month I made a presentation to the Vietnam Technology Conference about sustainable innovation.  I shared the YouTube video below and asked those who were in my session where their school as a whole (not individual teachers) would fall on the innovation curve.

At our last R&D meeting last month we also did some reading about the diffusion of innovation.  We talked about how some innovations such as smartphones take only a few years to reach widespread diffusion, whereas others take so much longer.  Examples I can think of from my daily life include the fact that almost nobody in India travelling in the rear seat of a car uses a seatbelt (I have a daily fight with my Uber drivers about how I want to use it and make them push the clip through the back seat where they have "hidden" it), and using imperial measurements which still crop up in our maths teaching despite the fact that there are only 3 countries worldwide that have not adopted the metric system.

Here are some other factors that affect the rate at which an innovation is adopted:

• Relative advantage - the innovation is seen as being better.  This perception may be in terms of economics, social prestige, convenience or satisfaction, which are important factors even when the innovation isn't really that much better than what it is replacing.  The greater the perceived relative advantage, the quicker the adoption will be.
• Compatibility with existing values, past experiences and needs.
• Complexity - anything that is difficult to understand or that involves developing new skills will be adopted more slowly.
• Trialability - if an innovation can be trialled then there will be more willingness to adopt it.
• Observability - now visible the results of the innovation are visible to others.  The easier it is for people to see this, the more likely they will be to adopt it.

I'm thinking about how these factors relate to schools and to new ideas that get adopted there too.  This ranges from the idea of BYOD, mobile devices, MakerSpaces and so on, all the way through to things like new forms of assessment and reporting, or what tool to use for ePortfolios.  What other examples can you think of?  Do you agree that the 5 factors listed above are the ones most important when considering innovation in schools?

A meeting in Bahrain

I was really excited to be invited to be part of the NESA (Near East and South Asia) Ed Tech Leadership collaborative.  This 5 person team from Dubai, Abu Dhabi, Saudi Arabia, Israel and India met in Bahrain last Sunday.  Our task to was to plan and lead professional learning for the NESA community.  Although this was only our first meeting I felt we got a lot done.  Below you will find our purpose statement along with the strands we identified as priorities for professional learning.  I felt a great rapport with the other members of this collaborative and look forward to working with them all again as we move forward.

Purpose Statement
The Ed Tech Leadership collaborative is designed to meet the needs of educational leaders by:

• Providing a variety of sustainable professional learning opportunities; 
• Nurturing innovative leadership; 
• Fostering collaborative partnerships; 
• Identifying and sharing best practices; 
• Aligning and contextualizing policies and procedures; 
• Defining areas and direction for professional growth;
• Inspiring purposeful pedagogical change. 
• areas of professional learning will your plan focus on?

Strands (the areas of professional learning we will focus on):
1. Technology leadership and coaching
2. Using data
3. Innovation and change
4. Personalizing learning
5. Technology and standards
6. Digital citizenship

I will be attending the NESA Spring Conference in Bangkok in March to be presenting on coaching and using data to personalize PD for self-directed learning.  I'm really looking forward to this!

Photo taken at the Bu Maher Fort, Bahrain