By Travis
It has been 15 years since I started teaching and I have taught in a number of schools, spending the most time in three. Each time I move to a new school, I see an environment for greatness and it fills me with excitement. Over time, the greatness never comes. It appears that each school gets close but always falls short.
The impulse is to find an error, a single negative to explain why the school cannot reach greatness. However, there is no single issue that, if solved, could move the school to greatness. Each of the three schools has well trained educators, has strong principal leaders, and has students are eager to work. So why is greatness elusive?
For schools to become great, two concepts have to be adopted: (1) there is no packaged way for school improvement that works for every school in the same way. (2) In the world of education, to make significant improvements will take more than one person. A critical mass is needed.
The unique needs of a school can be developed through collegial conversations. Educators need to discuss, dialogue, and plan on how to impact student learning.
The answer is so easy, but the implementation is tough. Educators are working all day. Dialogue is not part of that work day. PLCs are commonplace, as well as a number of other well-meaning initialisms, but they often fail to produce changes to great. Thirty minutes at the end of the day, once a week, is not enough. Educators have so many commitments that pull them away from dialogue.
Everywhere I teach, educators want to meet, but a physical meeting, at a single time, is nigh-impossible.
The solution for nigh-impossibility is to use online collaboration. Here is how it works. Let’s say the freshman wing of the school wants to strengthen the freshman experience by having consistent and clear routines. These educators want to meet, and have tried to for several years, but lunch meetings and PLCs do not work. It is time to take to the Internet. Online discussions are not bound by time or location, so everyone can dialogue when the time is available. For me, it is usually at 11 pm.
I use online discussion groups for various projects outside of education. I am building a national online web site for a niche audience using the various talents and ideas of my friends. As individuals, none of us could do this. As a group, it is easy.
But before you run to your computer, take heed—every school has different needs. Online dialogue is not THE answer; it is A WAY to solve the need to meet for organic dialogue to find the unique solutions. You will experience two barriers to online dialogue: (a) comfort level with technology and the navigation of social networks and (b) perceived effectiveness (enjoyment) of the user for online dialogue.
Yes, fill out that SIP, but know that organic dialogue will be what changes your school.
Ready to get started? Check out Google Docs, Back Pack, and Edmodo. One of these formats may work for your needs. If you have another suggestion, please share it in the comments and why you like it.
Annette, online agriculture conversations from across the nation…that is super. Take a niche community and join together another niche community and pretty soon you have a large voice. I hope that my school’s online discussion will grow to across the (nation) school. It has started out slow. I think staff is hesitant to embrace the group, seeing it as another thing piled on their plate, or not serious because it is online. I hope those change. I am hopeful, but then again, like I have always felt, it is up to the staff to become the vision they want. If the staff does nothing, then they are, indeed, achieving the vision they want. Not much of a vision, but there you have it.
Travis, great ideas! A number of years ago the Executive Director for the National Association of Agriculture Educators began an online forum called communities of practice. This forum has been a great way for the agriculture community to collaborate nationwide as you mention in your post. We have discussions, share lessons and support each other in ways that weren’t possible before. I hope that your online community will be as successful.
Kristin, the “wrap around” concept is a good addition to the conversation. Parents and students benefit from online communication. I can have worthwhile conversations with parents, dozens, each week which I never could when using a phone.
And the great thing is that Stories from School, in ways, is an online discussion group for education. Hearing your words and thinking about them, knowing you, pushes how I see my own ideas. We are dialoguing.
I agree with so many things you write, Travis. There’s no one answer, teachers are too busy for this packed schedule of meetings, and online communication can solve a lot of problems.
When I started teaching, we had tiny little Mac Classics – no internet. After about two years, we had in-building communication. Remember that? We could suddenly instant message a teacher across the building. It was great! Now I spend time in my homeroom looking up a child’s grades online, checking the websites of other teachers to see what’s missing, downloading assignments from their pages, emailing parents to alert them that missing work’s coming home, and emailing the teachers to know Johnny’s going to work hard this weekend to get caught up.
I think online communication and sharing of materials has made us better equipped to do that whole “wrap around” thing for kids.
But your main point is that it can provide a more efficient way for educators to collaborate, and I agree. I’d love to network with educators in another school, one that was doing a great job with the students my school is struggling to reach.
Mark, great point. The face-to-face could be for starting the process which will create comfort and collegiality. The teachers with which I eat lunch, I could team with any; happily have them visit my classroom; or work with them in any capacity.
Face-to-face is still needed. So at the beginning, yes. At the end as well to polish the ideas in real time.
I’d add an amendment: we still have the face-to-face meetings, but they are required to be purely social (I bet attendance will go up!). If we don’t have connections with our peers, the facelessness of online meetings might mean less valuable relationships and therefore less effective collaboration. I know I’m far less likely to respond to emails from certain colleagues, simply because I feel less connected to them. Read the comments after any article on a local newspaper website and you’ll see how electronic communication with no sense of community can result in a downward spiral.