Friday 24 June 2016

Ms. Apter, future principal

I can see myself as a principal of a school. I think of the principals that I have worked for and I see many of their leadership qualities in myself.  They were/are encouraging, motivating, influential, organized, good public speakers, calm, and the list goes on. I would just need to upgrade my wardrobe to a more professional look i.e. pant suits and blazers as I don’t think my capri pants and cotton t-shirts would work at network meetings.

When I think of my school and how we incorporate technology into our teaching, I think that my vice-principal and principal have had great involvement in making this happen. According to an article by Schrumm & Levin (2015), to develop Technology for Education in school the Principal must get involved at the very early stages and have: 

1. A compelling vision of how Technology will benefit the learning process 
2. Sell that vision to the larger community 
3. Collaborate with and get commitment from the Teacher leaders in the school 
4. Secure ongoing funding to ensure up to date Tech for Ed 
5. Providing ongoing professional development. 
6. Changing the school culture (make risk taking safe) 
7. Revising the curriculum (becoming student focused - to use ICT 24-7) 
8. Cultivating partnerships with key stakeholders such as: 
a. Industry 
b. Higher Ed 
c. Funders 
d. Parents (in the case of School Tech for Ed)

Let’s break those down a bit more.
1)    Having a compelling vision is knowing your end goal.  Why are you doing this?  What do you hope to accomplish?  There is no point of buying some new technology and it just sits in the storage room.  The technology needs to be purchased for a purpose and the purpose is to benefit the students’ learning.
2)    Sell your vision to the community.  At our school, the larger communities that need to be sold on the idea are the teachers who can see benefit in having this technology and the parent council who will provide us with some funds to purchase the technology.  When selling your vision, you need to be able to explain why this technology is this one is the one that will best benefit the students.  
3)    Collaborate with the Teacher Leaders.  This is where the school’s leadership team gets involved.

Let’s skip ahead…

5)    Providing professional development.  This is key!  Technology leaders must provide professional development in order to get the technology incorporated fully and appropriately into the classroom.  P.D. must be hands-on, interactive and engaging.  The technology needs to be present and teachers must receive the step-by-step training on how to do the basics. As we saw in the video about Longfield School (2011), teachers do not need to know the nitty-gritty right from the get-go.  This would be too overwhelming.  Further P.D. can be provided as teachers start exploring and discovering new things themselves and then they can teach others.

It is difficult to get all staff on board. In my school, it seems that the same teachers always resist and fear change. When hearing about a new initiative, they have already made up their minds without giving it a chance.  As a Teacher Leader delivering these initiatives and supporting the change, it becomes very frustrating.  How do we get all staff on board?  I attended a workshop this year and one thing the key note said was that you can’t make someone have fun.  You just can’t.  I have been in my role as PC4L lead long enough with many of the same colleagues that I know, before even presenting my ideas to my staff, who I will get push back from, who will participate fully and who will throw it to the side and not even try it.  Sad no?


One of my goals for next year as PC4L lead is to change that.  I have a plan…get those less than interested teachers involved! Will it work? I will let you know!

Me? A leader?

I knew that I always wanted to be a teacher.  At a young age, I gathered my stuffed animals, sat them in rows and used my chalkboard to teach my daily lesson. When my brother, parents or neighbours wanted to play school with me, I was always so excited to have human interaction and I remember assigning homework.  I was a true teacher from the start! 

I have been teaching now for 7 years, 2 as a French Immersion kindergarten teacher in Calgary, 2 as a prep-coverage teacher in Vaughan and the last 3 as a French Immersion grade 2 teacher in Vaughan. Even though I love being in the classroom, I know that one day I will want more.  So I seized the moment and in my unmarried, child-less life  signed up to complete a Master's degree as now I have the "time."  I have come to the conclusion that one day I want to be a principal and lead a school and I thought that a Master's degree is the only way I could get there.  I later learnt that that indeed this is not true but that's okay- I'm invested in this degree and I am actually enjoying the courses and the learning.  I have always said that teachers are forever learning but I didn't realize how much I missed this kind of learning!  Formal learning! 

I am a leader in the making; well I like to think that I am!  I always jump at leadership opportunities and not to pad my resume but instead to gain experience and knowledge.  For the last three years I have been an active member of my school’s leadership team.  As a team, we provide the professional development to the teachers during staff meetings, professional activity days and divisional meetings.  I love the moments when I get to stand up in front of adults and share my learning with them. It is for the reason that I have also been a guest speaker at a few educational conferences…but this story is for another time.

Being part of my leadership team at school is a form of leadership that can be referred to as “teacher leaders” (Martin, 2007). Martin continues to explain that these leaders:
* Influence the school culture.
            - In my role as Positive Climates for Learning (and Teaching) Lead, I have a big responsibility to maintain and improve school culture. I plan whole- school initiatives working with our school theme for the year, our school improvement plan and within an area that we see a need.

* Build and maintain a successful team.
            - I work with a team of teachers on the PC4L committee and many return year after year as they have had a positive experience and want to contribute to the school culture in a positive way. As well, I have initiate some staff appreciation projects to help create a successful team of teachers that work together towards common goals.

* Equip other potential teacher leaders.
            - Within my PC4L committee, I give other teachers opportunities to show their leadership either by leading an initiative or project or presenting at a staff meeting. I always work with a potential teacher leader before a staff meeting to prepare their presentation just so that they feel comfortable with their material and presenting to their colleagues, as it is different than talking to students.  

* Enhance or improve student achievement.

            - This quality of a teacher leader is one our leadership team works on as a whole. By developing our school improvement plan and our challenge of practice, we are always working towards improving student achievement. We collect data and monitor their improvement and then determine our areas of need and plan for them.  We collect data throughout the year to see if growth has occurred. 

So as I said earlier, I am a leader in the making. Being a teacher leader has provided me with great growth and I look forward to being a part of the leadership team next year to continue with the initiatives I've started. 

Reference:
Martin, B. (2007). Teacher leaders: qualities and roles.The Journal for Quality and Participation. 30 (4).

Thursday 23 June 2016

Mic check

Check one, two, two. Mic check! Testing, testing...is this thing on? Can anyone out there hear me?

I've never written a blog post before but I will give it my best try!

Stay tuned!