Leading Schools

This New Tech school has the right idea. "Students Set Their Own Rules at New Technology High School ...: Students Set Their Own Rules at New Technology H...

 

If our focus is on students and learning. When observing classrooms, why not pause and ask students the following questions:

 

1. What are you learning?

 

2. Why are you learning it?

 

3. How will you use what you are learning?

 

4. How are you doing? Are you learning and how well are you learning it? Hint: Most under-performing students have no idea where they stand in the process? Ask them about their current letter grade.

This article reads as though it could come from any city in the U.S. However, it appears that U.S. teachers have a lot in common with their counterparts in the UK.

 

Nearly 2,000 teachers responded to a Guardian  (UK) Teacher Network survey asking how they feel about their jobs.

 

Disrespected, often bullied, fed up with governments that don't trust them and despairing of the decline in parenting skills, you'd think teachers would be scouring the jobs columns for other careers, but, according to the Guardian Teacher Network survey published today, the reason they aren't in larger numbers is because so many of them still love teaching.

 

If there is a single message that sings out loud and clear, it is a plea from teachers to be treated as professionals, rather than infantilised by short-termist governments and political philosophies.

 

Teachers who have come from other professions wonder openly about the lack of trust in their professionalism.

Author Laura Goodrich is always Seeing Red Cars.

 

"Here's the metaphor: You buy your dream car and it happens to be red. Suddenly you see red cars everywhere you look. Why? Becuase you're focusing on red cars... (RT @LauraGoodrich: You get more of whatever you focus on!"

 

Seeing Red Cars has two important messages for school leaders:

 

1. We get more of what we focus. Why? Because we are "teleological" beings--we move toward and become like that which we think about and focus on. The problem is that most school leaders don't have a clear vision of what they do want, in part because they spend so much time putting out fires in the present that they don't have time to think about the future.

 

2. Most people spend more time focusing on what they don't want as opposed to what they do want and as Wayne Dyer says, "We never get enough of what we don't want." The sad truth is that most school leaders have a lot of detail about what they don't want. In other words, they have a clear vision of what they want to avoid. So, if we are focusing on what we don't want, we are moving inexorably toward it. That's precisely how we get stuck in a rut.

 

Don't believe me. Check it out for yourself. Begin asking people about "what they want." Most will immediately begin telling you what they don't want, which is a clear sign that they are in a "stuck state." 

 

Action Step: Instead, begin talking with your staff about what you do want and the things that you can control. Begin today to develop your vision for every aspect of your school from the cafeteria and hallways to classroom instruction. If you can't picture it, you won't see it!

 

Mel Riddile, The Principal Difference

 

 

In The Wall Street Journal's Cross Country column, Micheal Flaherty writes that school districts hire special investigators to follow kids home in order to verify their true residences.

An initiative’s success is refueling a debate over whether cash bonuses can coax improved performance from teachers and students.

 

"South High students said Mr. Nystrom and his colleagues had transformed the culture of a tough urban school, making it cool for boys with low-slung jeans who idolize rappers like Lil Wayne to take the hardest classes.

They were helped by the National Math and Science Initiative, a nonprofit network that provided laboratory equipment and special training for teachers and organized afternoon tutoring and Saturday sessions. It also paid $100 each to students who scored a 3 or above on the A.P. exam — and to their teachers, who can also earn additional rewards. Because 43 of his students passed the exam this year, far above his target, Mr. Nystrom will add a $7,300 check to his $72,000 salary."

A modified special education assessment has inflated gains on the standard achievement test by about 25 percent statewide since 2007, according to a Sacramento Bee analysis.

Daniel Goleman Q&A on #emotionalintelligence http://t.co/VIvmo8wu #cpchat

 

"Emotional intelligence": consists of leadership competencies that can be learned and (of EI) includes:

1. Self-mastery (self-awareness and self-regulation), plus

2. Social intelligence (empathy and social skill).

 

Both are essential: you have to lead yourself before you can lead others.

 

There are sets of leadership competencies that set the best-performers apart from average, that build on these basics – e.g., self-regulation is the basis for the discipline to achieve goals, to be adaptable, and to remain calm and clear under pressure. These leadership competencies are learned – and learnable."