Who are you really serving? How far does your reach extend? Why did you become a teacher in the first place?

On changing schools (again), moving away from Ed Tech (not completely), moving back into the classroom (why would I do that?!?), and bringing this blog to a close (perhaps) . . . 

The title poses some very good questions that I have been pondering over the last few weeks and months of this turbulent school year.  Going back to just over a year ago, having major cardiac surgery (in a foreign country none-the-less) certainly made me pause and think.  Add to that moving house/country/schools/continents brings everything into sharp focus and scrutiny.  There have been a number of ups and downs, and complete turn-arounds in the last 12 months which have culminated in a whole lot of change for me.  All of these changes were planned (in one way or another) and initiated by me and my family - we just didn't plan on doing everything at the same time.  That's just how it all worked out.  Now that we are a year down the track, I am making another big change with moving schools again, moving away from ed tech and returning to the classroom.  Why would I do that, you might ask?  The more that I think about it, the more I come back to the three questions in the title of this post . . .

What lies on the road ahead?  Are you on the right path?

Who are you really serving?
In my current role as an ed tech coach, I have really examined this question this year.  At my previous school, my role meant serving the entire student body (directly in classrooms, through technology tools and systems, and through various interactions with student leadership, clubs and the school community), the entire HS faculty (through developing teaching and learning with ed tech integration, through PD/training/support, and through building a school culture of professional sharing and collaboration), and the school as a whole (through my role as a co-director of digital learning, and through the development of school systems/procedures/organisation for school growth and innovation).  This year has been really difficult as these avenues for growth and development are in their infancy here, and out of my sphere of influence - which is just not a good fit for me.  Leadership here thinks my time is best spent acting as a technician (which we have enough of in IT Services), working as a substitute (wait, what?!?) or covering the ugly jobs of others (like planning the sub coverage for the day, very early in the morning).  My role here seems to be serving administration, as they simply do not understand what my role is, what my strengths and abilities are, or how I can help the school to grow and develop.  Am I serving the school community as a whole here - not really.  Am I doing what I thought I was brought here to do - definitely not.  Am I working in an environment which is conducive to school growth and innovation, as well as providing a platform for my continued learning and development - nope.  Which leads to the second question . . .

How far does your reach extend?
I can't help but compare my previous school to the current one when I consider this question.  The visual that pops into my mind is having my arms blown off by a grenade that has been handed to me . . . not a pretty image.  In my previous school, I contributed to school growth everyday in many different areas across the school.  Over the years, I helped to change the school timetable and master schedule, moved the entire school to become a Mac school and use Google Apps for Education, bring in external collaboration and certification programs for teachers like Google Certified Educators and GEG Poland, create flexible classroom environments, and update and evolve the courses and programs on offer.  Here, I have not been allowed to contribute to many of the bigger projects around the school such as building and outfitting the new campus, selecting school systems (LMS, SIS, SIMS), considering platform change for the laptop program, or bringing in/back Google Suite.  Everything has been relegated to "not now", "maybe next year", or "there is a team working on that already."  Disappointing, frustrating and again, not a good fit for me.  Not being able to contribute to school growth is demoralising, and does not help to build a sense of collegiality or ownership in the school.  Working in a strictly "top-down" environment where you have no voice and certainly am not heard, is not for me.  Looking back, I wish I had a better way to evaluate this aspect of a school from far away, before uprooting the family and making the jump.  In terms of evaluating where a school is at with its approach to educational technology, I think this is a very important question when considering a move that can only be answered truthfully by going there and seeing it for yourself.  What people say is so different from the realities of the environment, as everything is coloured by their own perceptions, attitudes and how they want to portray themselves, the faculty, the school or teaching and learning in general.

Why did you become a teacher in the first place?
This is the big question that I think all teachers should think about from time to time.  I first started thinking about becoming a teacher when I was halfway through my 3rd year of university.  I realised that my love for programming and computer science, and the kind of work that I was doing for my university courses, was not reflected in real-life and industry after graduation.  I had the benefit of an older brother who was already working in the software industry of the late-80's, and I could see the kind of work that he was doing was not for me.  When I started asking my friends and family what I should do, they all said that I had been a teacher all of my life - first as a school tutor, then as a lab tech in uni, and teaching assistant during the school year and over the summers.  Working with people, whether they be adults or students, is what I thrive on.  Seeing the lights go on, making connections, expanding someone's thinking and pushing their boundaries - these are the things which make going to school everyday worthwhile.  I have been doing this for 28 years now, and this is the first time that I have been in a school environment where much of this is lacking on a day-to-day basis for me in my current role.  If that is not a signal that I need a change, then I don't know what is?!  If what you are doing does not bring you some level of fulfilment and joy, then I suggest that you really think about the path you are on.  I have realised that I really need to get back into the classroom, to get back to teaching students who want to learn rather than adults who do not.  I have realised that I have been teaching CS in one way or another for my entire career, and I miss having my own classroom and students.  I need to work with the Growth Minded and problem-seekers, not try to change the very Fixed Minded and those who set in their ways.  Time for a change.  Time to look for a "better fit".

Does everything fit together?  Are you in the right place?

So, what am I going to do?
I am almost finished this school year, and this may be my last blog post for awhile.  It has served its purpose - to record my thinking and reflections on ed tech, to help me process everything, and to share it with anyone who cares to look.  Each of my posts has averaged well over 100 clicks/reads so they have at least been seen (I just don't know how many of those clicks were from bots trolling the internet ;-).  But I really started writing this blog for myself and it has run its course for the time being.  If you are reading this post and it is well past June 2017, then perhaps I have not come back to it in my new role back in the classroom.

I have come to realise that right now, I am not reaching very many students.  Being a coach and working with the faculty means reaching the entire student body through the faculty.  But the culture of the school has to be in alignment with this path, and school leadership must support building the path and setting a course for the faculty to follow.  Without this roadmap/vision/direction and without the authority to create them, the school simply remains in stasis, frozen in place.  My thinking now is that I can affect more change and reach more students by returning to the CS classroom . . . and a lot more fun along the way.

I can't wait for next year - going back to teaching Computer Science full time is complete serendipity!  They say "timing is everything", and in this case the timing was perfect for a change.  I have never had the opportunity to go to a new school with an established CS program that is growing, and never had another teacher to work with and share classes.  Moving to one of the top few international schools in the world is a great opportunity that could not be passed up.  Returning to the classroom, going back to my roots in CS, rejoining the AP community and (hopefully) getting back to the APCS exam reading next year, leading school trips and coaching school teams . . . it's all happening next year!  I know that I am a geek at heart - returning to my true geeky self just feels right!

Big Takeaways
Despite the frustrations and "poor fit" of the school this year, there are some big takeaways (as there always are things to learn), such as:

• Taking the opportunity to return to Asia (which we missed so much), and getting out of Europe at an opportune time (it seems to devolving and becoming unsafe in many places) have been good for us as a family
• Moving the school forward with ed tech and integration (even if some of the steps have been baby-steps, the faculty are at least moving), and being able to shift some people's thinking to "we are all technology teachers" has been important for future change here
• Moving a school towards innovation and updating teacher's pedagogy is a massive job, and it cannot be done without the support/endorsement/realisation of the school leadership as a whole - leadership's understanding and acknowledgement of ed tech role in school development is key, and has to happen before any real, deep and meaningful change can occur in the school
• Chip and Dan Heath's book Switch has been very helpful for me to frame my thinking and understanding of the very Fixed Minded (it has to do with the associated identity of the person involved, and their particular environment, rather than their personality or disposition), and my reflection on the how/why some particular initiatives have failed here
• Reconnecting with the international Ed Tech community in Singapore and Asia (and I will continue to work with Apple, Google and the international schools community as I transition back to the classroom)
• Concentrating on my recovery and health (the change of environment, climate and diet have been great for me ;-) plus being in Singapore where we all "just fit in" (for a mixed race family, living in Turkey, China and Poland has been challenging at times) has been a true revelation

So, this is the plan for next year and the foreseeable future . . . and it feels like I am going home!  Wish me luck!

FeedForward instead of FeedBack for Positive Change

In this article by Joe Hirsch for Edutopia, he talks about a change in teacher evaluation from top-down assessments of effectiveness and performance, to more of a self-guided and self-assessed reflective process.  Hirsch also connects this movement to:

Marshall Goldsmith's highly acclaimed feedforward concept in which employees are asked to suggest ideas for their own improvement in the future.    . . .   Feedback, by its very definition, is focused on the past, which can't be changed. Feedforward looks ahead at future possibilities that still fall under our control. Feedback tends to reinforce personal stereotypes or negative self-fulfilling prophecies. Feedforward looks beyond what is in favor of what can be.

I think the colours of the cans are reversed . . . Recycling should be Green!  

Working in an international school, I can see elements of the feedforward idea taking shape in my school, both for me as a technology coach and for the faculty that I work with everyday.  Hirsch breaks down the feedforward idea and offers three models for achieving it in your school or for your own professional development, which are receiving Instructional Coaching, conducting Peer Observations and Instructional Rounds, and developing your own Professional Learning Communities.  My current school is still coming to grips with educational technology, integrating technology into the classroom, having a laptop program, and what that all means for teaching and learning.  Many of the teaching faculty still have a bad taste in their mouths from what has happened here in the previous years before me, and from ongoing problems with IT that never seem to get sorted.  There are struggles with leadership as well, who really do not know "what ed tech does all day" and want to use the coaches as subs, technicians or secretaries.  As with any school, there are people who get it, and who are actively looking to shape the future rather than dwell on the past.

I think too much time and energy is wasted dissecting the past, and trying to prevent all of the problems and mistakes of history from appearing again.  Aren't we supposed to learn from our mistakes, even if they belonged to someone else?  Isn't that a primary component of a Growth Mindset?  Constantly looking at the past and thinking "things will not change" and not learning from it are hallmarks of a Fixed Mindset.  So how do we move school leadership forward?  How do we flip their mindset?  How do we shift from feedback mode (dissecting the past) to feedforward (looking to the future and what could be)?

As an ed tech coach, how all of this connects to tech integration, teacher evaluation, professional development/growth/sharing is part of my daily work life.  It's all interconnected and intertwined, so much so that each piece cannot be developed without considering the impact and parallel development of the other aspects.  I think this might be the crux of the problem, the bigger picture that leadership perhaps does not realise.  They don't see how ed tech integration is enmeshed with PD, teacher evaluation/appraisal, goal setting, collaboration, creating a professional culture of sharing and growth, and changing pedagogy.  Perhaps this is why we are treated as ready-made subs to cover classes, glorified technicians who can actually communicate with teachers and students, or someone who has the "skills" to do "complex" jobs like fixing the formatting in a Word document (I kid you not).  Right now, I don't have any solutions to offer here, except to keep fighting the "good fight" and trying to get people to better understand your role through articles like the one above.

"We are all technology teachers" is something that I have been repeating a lot this year.  I just hope that it is starting to sink in, especially in the places where it really needs to be part of the thinking and culture of the school.

Coaches = Givers

Have you watched this recent TEDTalks by Adam Grant which defined Givers and Takers (and Matchers)?  As an educational technology coach, I watched this with great interest and reflected upon Grant's model as applied to my work as a coach.  If you haven't watched it yet, then here it is . . . definitely worth the 18 minutes of your time!



Here are the key moments that I picked out from his talk . . .

• 3:40 - Givers make organisations better . . . Schools need to recognise and acknowledge this.  My previous principal always said that I was a problem finder and would immediately start working on a solution without being asked - something that was greatly appreciated.  But the work of Givers is not always appreciated - please see a previous post about what I call "guilty by competence".
• 5:30 - Protect Givers from burnout . . . As a self-identified Giver, the environment and school culture that I work in has a profound effect on me.  The act of changing schools has forced me to reflect upon this a lot this year.  How school leadership values our role as coaches and change-agents within the school, makes all of the difference with how our day-to-day work progresses and how quickly (or slowly) we "feel the burn".
• 6:30 - Encourage help-seeking behaviours . . . Get more people to act as Givers by creating/building a culture of giving, providing help, and sharing.  Again, this is all about changing the culture of the school, which comes from top through leadership and from the grassroots movements which encourage collaboration, professional sharing and growth.  Without the support for such bottom-up shifts in culture, the Takers dominate the culture of the school and the Givers get burned out.
• 7:50 - Get the right people on the bus . . . To me, this speaks about hiring practices and considering people's Mindset (in my case, mindset towards educational technology).  One way school leadership can address and build a positive school culture is through effective management of hiring practices for faculty and staff.
• 8:50 - Weed out the Takers . . . This is an inherently difficult thing to do in schools, but entirely necessary and vital for school development.  As a teacher for almost 3 decades, I have seen the ineffective/disgruntled/unmotivated/coasting/bully teacher at every school that I have worked in across 3 continents.  Admit it, this is a problem at every school in the world no matter how big or small, how affluent or inner-city, how well resourced or under-funded.  School leadership needs to be able to move someone on who is detrimental to the organisation as a whole.  More easily said then done, I know . . . but just because it is difficult doesn't mean that it isn't necessary.
• 9:10 - Characteristic of Agreeableness . . . I only bring this part up because I am Canadian, eh?! ;-)  Sorry about that . . . 

My takeaways from this?  Coaches are generally Givers by nature (there are a few that I have met who I would classify more as a Matcher though) and they are not the only ones in the building.  As such, schools need to protect them and cultivate a culture of giving/helping which will benefit school growth and development through building a positive school culture.  Would you classify yourself as a Giver?  Have you ever worked in a school where the Takers stand out and dominate the school culture?  If so, how did you survive in that kind of environment?  Or did you hit burnout and move on, as changing the school culture is just too hard or too long of a process?

Reflecting About Tech PD at My School

I recently read this article from eSchool News about 4 common mistakes made when delivering tech PD, which made me reflect on how these 4 mistakes happen in my school.  Have a read through this article and see if anything in it strikes home with you - http://www.eschoolnews.com/2016/11/30/tech-based-pd/?all.

In summary, the 4 mistakes (as I interpret them for my reality here at my school, particularly in the secondary school where I work) should be addressed or considered in the following ways:

1. There is not enough support of Ed Tech to do our jobs most effectively, when teacher's priorities are focussed on their classes/students/curriculum.  In my school, Ed Tech is relatively new and has not had a very positive history/track record over the past two years so it seems to be way down on the list of priorities.  We need help from senior admin and through the strategic plan of the school to make tech integration a long-term priority.  Time and resources need to be dedicated to Ed Tech in order to make change, which involves changing the culture of the school as a whole.  And we all know that changing a school culture can be a long and difficult process.  Without the full support and backing of school leadership, this becomes an almost impossible job.  We are all in this together!
2. Offering tech PD outside of the school day just doesn’t work.  I have experienced this in my previous 3 schools and it still applies here.  When I completed my Action Research project for my masters program in my last school, much of the research supported teacher efficacy is directly linked to training/PD being conducted within the regular school day.  PD that is relegated to after school, on weekends, or optionally during lunch/break times might have some initial success but eventually will fail due lack of teacher engagement.  The common argument of “not enough time to do this” will always be there, and we can’t take away planning time or “free” time (like lunch) to do this.  Training and PD has to be regularly planned/scheduled, and preferably differentiated too.  That is why I have found Speed-Geeking activities to be more effective, well received, and showed greater overall growth across the faculty than traditional "coffee mornings" or "tech lunches".  
3. Do not rely on online or video-based self-guided training – it will fail over time as it falls into disuse and becomes out-of-date.  There is a time and place for its use, but it should not be the only means of delivery of training/pd across the school.  I created a bank of "how to" MacOSX videos when we went through the platform change process with the entire faculty and student body.  Initially, I used these videos to differentiate learning and transitioning to the Mac for faculty depending on their experience with OSX.  This appealed to some of the teachers with some experience and who wanted to learn on their own, and to most of the more advanced users who really only needed to fill in some details of the set up of our school machines.  When the rollout moved to the entire student body the following August, I again used the same bank of videos to differentiate student-led training workshops for about 100 of 300 students.  Since then, the videos have been used repeatedly with new students coming into the school laptop program as part of their tech orientation.  Now that some years have passed, I would be surprised if these same videos are still being used as they would be very out-of-date.  Video training definitely has its uses, so my takeaway here is not to rely on it as the sole means of delivering PD.
4. Forcing the integration of technology into the curriculum also does not work – many teachers (especially in the HS who teach content heavy curriculum/courses) need to see the “value added” or the benefits of doing something with technology first, before they will engage with it. The same argument of “I don't have the time” will always come up and can be properly translated into “it's not a high priority”.  So how do you change this mindset?  How can you change the priority level for teachers?  Part of the answer relates back to #1 above where Ed Tech integration needs to be a school-wide priority which is ongoing.  But be careful here - do not connect integration to teacher evaluation or offering contracts as this will undermine why teachers are doing anything with integration at all (it will be seen as just jumping through hoops or checking off boxes as part of the job).  Instead, integration should be directly connected to professional learning, growth, sharing and collaboration through connecting training/PD to professional goal setting, professional learning communities, and support/coaching/training in and outside of the school.

How do you think these 4 common mistakes apply to your school and your personal/professional reality and perspective?  Did the article make you think about PD in a different way?

Can Shared Leadership Really Work?

Note - this post was originally written back in June (over 6 months ago, so all references to dates are for the 2015-16 school year) but never was published for a variety of complex and personal reasons which I won't get into here . . . but I found the text in my notes and thought it needs to be published.  So here goes, with a few small tweaks and updates . . .

This year, I became a "director" for the first time in my career. Now that the school year is almost finished, I would have to say that this social experiment in shared school leadership is partially successful and partially a failure. Just to back up for a moment, the school director had no intent to explore shared leadership for educational technology - he wanted to either continue with the traditional leadership structure with a Tech Director, or split off educational technology from technology services and support.  In discussing this latter option and what that would look like, I was asked to draft a job description for an Ed Tech Director. Some of you reading this now will remember me asking for copies of your job descriptions and a structural breakdown of technology at your school (BTW - everything that I collected from you back in the fall was greatly appreciated).  As the job description started to take shape, it became apparent that out of our team of 4 tech coaches, more than one of us would be interested in the director of ed tech position. With the potential for terminal discord and a fracturing of our working relationship as a team, we jointly decided to propose a shared leadership model.

After about a month of planning how we would work together to co-lead educational technology across the school, the four of us (tech coaches) were appointed to be Co-Directors of Digital Learning. Our proposal separated ed tech from tech services, and a new person would be hired to manage and lead IT which includes hardware, infrastructure and tech support. The four tech coaches (2x ES, 1x MS and 1x HS) would have dual roles supporting tech integration in our school division (or assigned grades), plus collectively leading educational technology across the school.  

With shared leadership - is everyone looking/moving in the same direction?  Is there a clear, shared and articulated vision?

We have been working with this model since about November of this school year, and I have really mixed feelings about how successful it has been.  In general, we have been able to move forward with a number of initiatives and projects which probably would not have happened or have progressed as far in a short time if we had stuck with a traditional Tech Director model. As there are four of us Co-Directors, we could divide up the work and push forward with projects which interested us or were important to us. For example, some of the bigger projects that I led were:

• promoting and organizing the third annual Hour of Code, which featured events spread across the entire school
• formally adopting the ISTE Standards for Students (through embedding the standards in our PYP and MYP planners), Teachers (currently working on adding the standards into our new teacher appraisal process), Coaches (which we adopted as tech coaches a few years ago) and Administrators (which we adopted as Co-Directors of Digital Learning)
• writing and formalizing our job descriptions as tech coaches and as Co-Directors, to make them into usable documents which accurately describe both of these roles and what they truly entail
• bringing Learning2Europe to Warsaw, taking on the role of conference chair and forming a team of teachers and staff who will form the core of the organizing committee and support team 
• initiating an exploration and testing of Google Expeditions Beta along with Google Cardboard for use in the classroom
• proposing a new project to put iPad Pro's into the hands of teachers (as an interactive whiteboard replacement and to facilitate teachers being able to annotate, comment, sketch/draw/graph on the fly in class) through a two stage approval program

So what were the challenges and problematic areas?

1) With a group of four individuals who are given "carte blanche" to initiate new ed tech projects, there is no single decision maker to say whether it is the right time and/or place to start each project, or to oversee how it all fits into the overall vision for the school. As a result, what we end up with is a collection of projects all in various stages of development, which may be disjointed, out of alignment and sometimes even at odds with each other. Without a single decision maker, everything moves forward on their own pathways, but sometimes in different directions.  

With shared leadership - are everyone's views of a similar hue, or completely different colours?

2) How well the group functions together really depends on the different personalities involved, their individual styles, and how well they mesh together. Any friction or lack of trust creates disharmony in the group and the team breaks down immediately. We all know how hard it is to regain trust once it is lost, and how quickly trust can disappear entirely. Given #1 above, trust will always be eroded as friction builds from differing opinions on direction and vision. Conflict will also come from the simplest of things, like how the group interacts with each other, talks to one another, and is inclusive or exclusive. In fact, the team started off with a feeling is distrust due to how we came to even brooch the subject of shared leadership. As the school director favoured a business approach to leadership, he pitted the four of us "against" one another and was looking to appoint one of us to the director role. This approach forced us all into feeling distrust for one another, which we had to address as a team before anything productive could be done as a group. 

3) Following on from #2 above, I think that the current school organization with two coaches in the ES, but only one each in the MS and HS created an imbalance, as two of the Co-Directors work very closely together and tend to have a unified position on any issue. Not that this is a bad thing - having at least part of the group working closely together is better than not having any of the group at all.  However, this made making decisions about the whole school difficult with four "votes" in total, but an internal coalition of two in place. This last point is key if shared leadership is to work smoothly. Instead of having each member of the shared leadership team be all things to their constituency (their school division), they should all represent the entire community at all times. Or perhaps it could be divided up by school division, but in a more balanced way such as two for elementary and two for the secondary school.  

Epilogue on this last point - this re-organisation of the tech coaches has actually happened for this school year, but not for the co-directors role (I think the school just kept three co-directors now that I have moved on and changed schools).  I think shared leadership would have a better chance of succeeding with a smaller group than 4.  I can think of many dual partnerships which were spectacular (Lennon and McCartney, Jobs and Wozniak . . . you can add to the list), but it becomes harder to think of some great examples of groups of 3 or 4.  Too many chiefs or chefs in the kitchen perhaps? 

In retrospect, I am happy to have had the opportunity to work in a shared leadership environment as it provided a unique learning experience and collaborative work at the highest levels. If another shared leadership opportunity comes up in the future then I will be better prepared and so much wiser about what the pitfalls are and try to address them up front.  Can it work productively and smoothly?  I am sure that it can, and I wonder if it is happening anywhere out there?  Have you ever worked in a shared leadership role? Did it/Does it work? What was your experience like?  What were/are the challenges?

Takeaways and Reflections from Learning 2 Africa

Every year, I get recharged from attending Learning 2.0 - I just want to keep going back.  There's something about the energy, connection and the learning that happens there and beyond that draws me to L2 events, whether they be in Asia or Africa.  Last year, I was very fortunate to be invited to be part of the organising committee for the first L2Africa in Addis Ababa, and also attended (and helped out) with L2Asia in Bangkok.  This year, I continued to help out with L2Africa in Johannesburg (specifically with organising the Cohorts) and will also be working with the crew to launch the first L2Europe in Milan (spring of 2016).  On the first day in Jo'burg, Jeff Utecht called me a Learning2 "junkie" which I don't mind . . . I think it's an apt description of getting my annual (or bi-annual ;-) "fix" for all things ed tech.  Learning 2.0 really make me expand my thinking and makes me hit the reset button every time . . . it gives me the time and space to find balance between my teaching and learning, between work and play, between high tech and low/no tech, and between what's happening at my school and everyone else's.

So what are my takeaways from the second L2Africa?  Here's some of my thoughts:

• Size does matter - this year's L2Africa was almost half the size as last years (or at least it really felt that way).  Part of the reason it felt so much smaller was the enormity of the AISJ campus - beautiful and spread out across a hilltop . . . it offered lots of open spaces for everyone to find their own space (but that impacted on the connections you could build during the breaks, lunches and even the Unconference times).  A secondary reason is due to the higher concentration of AISJ faculty who attended the conference.  Having a higher number of local participants "watered down" the opportunities to connect and share with other teachers from across the region, plus the local faculty often did not participate in the social gatherings and dinners for the conference.  Working and collaborating with other teachers from around the world is a big part of Learning 2.0 - future conferences really need to keep this in mind.
• Having a smaller conference impacts on the conference experience as a whole - a number of tweaks and changes were made to the conference structure and organisation as a result of the lower registration numbers.  The two areas which really stuck out for me were the reduction of Cohort meetings (from 3 down to just 2) and the organisation of the Workshops (increasing the Workshop time slots to 3, but having workshop leaders present twice in order to fill up the time slots).  With the Cohort meetings, only having two of them meant that the first meeting was occupied with getting to know everyone in the Cohort, and getting into some of the group's "burning questions".  The second/final meeting was entirely filled up with "other business" and completing the conference feedback, so it was a bust.  Most of my Cohort were experienced Learning2 folks, so we bonded pretty fast and were able to get down to connecting and sharing - but I know that other Cohorts never really bonded as they did not have the time to do so.  Also, many of the members in my Cohort lamented the missing Cohort meeting on the Friday evening as they got so much out of it last year.  My recommendations here are to keep the three Cohort meetings and lengthen the last one by 30 minutes to provide the extra time needed for completing the conference feedback, while not taking time away from the Cohorts.

• Getting back to the basics of Search - a really started thinking about this while sitting in Jeff Utecht's extended session focussing on teaching students in this age of information overload.  For the last few years, I have been delivering lessons to all G9 students (connected to an English 9 research project) on how search engines and ranking work, how to do more effective searches, and techniques for refining your search.  What became apparent to me sitting in the workshop, is that I really need to go back to the faculty and do all of this work once again with them.  "We are all technology teachers" and effective search techniques is something that we should all be teaching/using/demonstrating/continually reinforcing every year at all grade levels.  "Oh duh!", right?
• Recruiting 2.0 - sitting and talking with Maggie Hos-McGrane from ASBombay about the Global Recruitment Collaborative was enlightening and inspired.  The work that has gone into creating this collaborative and cooperative option which connects the top schools in the world is something that my school needs to tap into.  My school meets all of the qualifications to join the GRC (we offer at least one IB Program, have a 1:1 laptop program, and are looking for innovative international teachers each year) but we have not done so . . . I really need to talk to our new director about this, and Maggie has sent another invitation out already.  This can only benefit the school in the long run by attracting the type of quality and experienced faculty without any additional cost to the school.  Win for the school, and win for the faculty.

• Making a Maker Space - this is a project that has already been started here, which I am not really involved in.  But that doesn't mean that I'm not interested and can't build my knowledge about it.  From my second extended session of the conference, I got a huge insight into how a Maker Space can be built and resourced with simple tools, equipment, and donated stuff (like old children's toys and building blocks or Lego).  All of these resources can make for exciting building/design projects which are open ended yet closed in scope.  In a very short time, our group built a collaborative Rube Goldberg machine in sections, which had to integrate and connect with the other sections to form a working machine with a specific goal.  Not only was this a great collaborative learning and building experience, but it all about the bonding and working as a team (even if we had never met each other before).  All down with simple stuff in hand - no robotics, motors, or digital anything.
• Using Wikipedia - Jeff Utrecht had some great information and writing projects (for HS students) linked to using Wikipedia with students.  Wikipedia is the world's largest collection of data/information, yet many teachers refrain from using it personally and for education.  This anti-wikipedia culture has to change, beginning with educating faculty about how wikipedia is curated and rated for accuracy.  Delving into the rubrics for accuracy and relevance of information is closely tied to citations and authority of sources - aren't these precisely the topics and skills that we want to our students to know and use intimately?  Adding to and correcting Wikipedia entries and using the rubrics provided are great writing exercises which have a world-wide audience, is authentic and meaningful, can be linked to a student's CV and university applications (through their Wikipedia profile and account).  Imagine if you can show on your application that you have contributed to a number of Wikipedia entries on a variety of topics which have been accepted and approved by the world at large and the expert curators?  How powerful would that be?  Instructing my faculty about using Wikipedia in the classroom has always been something that I have done in the past, but now I have more ammunition for moving this forward across the school.

Although this year's version of L2Africa was smaller than the first edition in Addis, it still had its moments and takeaways for me.  The MS/HS Technology Leaders Cohort was great and jumped right into sharing and collaborating - I hope this group keeps in touch through Google+ in the future.  There was a lot of experience in the room, which I hope we can all leverage in the future.  There are a number of takeaways listed above which I need to get working on to implement in the HS here this year . . . so I had better get to work!  Did you attend L2Africa?  Are you planning on going to the first L2Europe in April?  What are your takeaways from Jo'burg or your "burning questions" going into Milan?

Coaching with Mindsets in Mind - Big Takeaways for the Start of a New School Year

Big Takeaways for the Start of a New School Year

Well, the new school year has already gotten underway, but it seems that I am just now coming out of the fog and swirl of activity from the "boom" that marks the first day of classes.  With fall trips behind us, laptop rollouts and MAP testing done and dusted, and classes finally settling into a rhythm, it is time to reflect upon coaching from last year with an eye towards the future . . .

Here are my takeaways and thoughts/extensions for each:

• From my end of year coaching survey, I believe that you can have someone who is a capable or even advanced user/facilitator/integrator of technology in the classroom, who is still in a Fixed Mindset when it comes to educational technology.  They are using/integrating a number of technologies effectively in their classroom, but are very comfortable with what tools they employ and are not open to looking at or experimenting with new tools.  With the train analogy from an earlier post - they are in the lead car but are doing nothing to help move the train forward as a whole, or to lead those in the front of the middle car into the lead car.  They remain siloed and comfortable in what they are doing in their classroom.  Sidebar - this is where the train analogy starts to break down, as the cars represent where a teacher is on the ed tech scale of integration, rather than incorporating their mindset as well (which is perhaps, more important).  So what's the way forward?  Screening for mindset and nudging these types of faculty forward into a Growth mindset through conversations and exposure to new tools which can be specifically employed in their classroom/subject area/discipline can help to shift them into a more collaborative and open stance.  These faculty members might be shifted through an individual conversation or through a conversation with a peer or in their own Personal Learning Network (PLN).  Or perhaps the shift will occur through some "just in time" training that comes up, or through exposure to a new tool or idea during a PD workshop, conference or Speed-Geeking session.  It's hard to identify when or where a shift in mindset will occur with these folks, but seize the opportunity when it arises and turn these folks into teacher-leaders with ed tech.

• Again, from my end of year coaching survey, there are some faculty members who take a passive role when it comes to coaching.  Their stance is that they do not have time to consider new tools or to connect with other teachers in their discipline.  They expect everything to be brought to them for their consumption/consideration where they will passively decide whether it is something worth their time (usually not, or it will be "deferred" until a later time). These faculty members do not engage in the coaching process, are not very self-reflective and are therefore in a Fixed mindset.  They are notoriously hard to reach and to work with, as they would truly rather ignore you as a coach, then actually engage with you to improve teaching and learning.  These folks need to be nudged into a Growth Mindset to engage in the coaching process, which is hard to do.  If they are part of a team (teach a shared course, or are part of a grade level or subject team), then perhaps reaching this particular faculty member is best done through the team.  If their team decides to move forward with a new tool or approach, then they will have to follow along.  The toughest "nut to crack" is the stand-alone teacher who does their own thing and does not really belong to a team (they typically teach all stand-alone classes).  So how do you reach them?  By engaging them in conversation about their classes at every opportunity that presents itself, and by exposing them to new tools along the way.  The Walk-through/Check-ins that I regularly conduct also help with reaching these teachers, as it brings coaching and the conversation directly to them individually and personally.  All of these points of contact will help to nudge them forward, some faster than others of course.

• Working directly with a team of Growth Minded faculty has been very fulfilling professionally for me, as well as for members of the group/team.  This is what I do with the HS Tech Collective, which has grown out of what started as a decision making tech committee, into a collaborative think tank for professional sharing around educational technology.  It is not composed of the most technologically adept or switched on faculty.  The group composition changes each year (there is one only member who goes back to the first year committee, and another who has drifted in and out of the group over the years) and they self-nominate/apply to join the Collective.  The short application acts to screen for mindset, rather than looking at their tech skills or abilities.  By focusing on what people want to learn about and experiment with in their own classrooms, I look for people who are expressly not experts in a particular tool, but are Growth minded towards trying something new and different that they are interested in.  These faculty members have already reflected on their own teaching practice and have self-identified their own need or gap or problem of practice that they want to work on.  Bringing Growth Minded faculty members together around ed tech, to share, collaborate and simply converse with no meeting agenda is transformational for everyone involved, which in turn gets spread back to their departments or co-teachers of shared courses.  Working with and developing the Tech Collective each year has been a game-changer for me as a coach, and is influencing the overall culture of the school as it matures and spreads.  So my takeaway here is simple - keep the Tech Collective going, moving forward, developing and changing the school culture in positive ways.

Reflections on being part of the Learning 2 Africa Organising Committee

Being asked by John Iglar to be part of the Learning 2.014 Africa Organising Committee about a year ago, after it was announced in Singapore, has been both an honour and a curiosity to me. My immediate response to him at the time was "you know that I am not in the Africa region" to which he replied "I know, and I still want you to help with putting the conference together." Now that the first ever Learning2Africa is complete, we could talk a little more about the process and how he had to defend his decision to include me on the committee with both his own staff and the Learning 2 Advisory.  Which is fair enough, as I pointed that out from the beginning. John later told me that he wanted my enthusiasm and experience with Learning2Asia to set up the conference in Addis Ababa, as only a few others on the committee have been to an L2 conference before.

Working on the conference from afar was not a problem at all. Sometimes the Skype on GHangouts connections would get dropped during our weekly meetings, but other than that, everything was communicated asynchronously through email and shared GDocs. I suggested that I work on the Cohorts, Cohort Facilitators and Workshops remotely and to keep John and the committee in the loop as things progressed. 

As the cohort set up with Learning 2 conferences is so unique and important to the success of the conference, I decided to take my own approach to setting up the cohorts. My plan from the start was to align good leaders with each cohort, to have an innovative and effective leader embedded in each cohort. With this goal in mind, started contacting people at I know who would make good cohort facilitators who are either in the region, or nearby and who might want to come take part. This proved to be a really successful approach as it served to pre-advertise the conference, and provided the selected people with a little more leverage with their schools in order to attend the conference in a leadership role. I was only able to pre-select about half of the facilitators roles in the end, but this gave us a good base of people in these important roles. It also encouraged these schools to send more faculty to this new, unknown conference.

As the conference neared, some other advancements that I wanted to introduce into the process included:

• provide each cohort facilitator with a list of the members, schools they are coming from, and their roles/positions there
• having the cohort facilitators contact their cohort members in advance to front-load them with information to connect them and to start the networking process
• have the cohorts start thinking about their own "burning questions" , big take-aways and goals for attending the conference
• build in an orientation meeting for all of the facilitators prior to the conference opening, to form them into a team and to come to a common understanding of the philosophy of Learning 2 (which is new to most of the conference participants)
• daily check-in meetings with the facilitators to set them up for the cohort sessions later that day)
• daily debrief meetings with the facilitators to see how their cohort sessions went and to gather feedback from the cohorts; interestingly, these immediately became joint Learning 2 Leaders and Cohort Facilitators debriefs 

#baboon - Other than #Learning2 and #buses, #baboon was a trending hashtag during the conference (but we never did have a school baboon alarm)

As the conference got underway, the Learning 2 Leaders were asked to attach themselves to a cohort of their choice which was wonderful. Not only did the Cohort Facilitators enjoy having the Leaders present and participating in their cohorts, but the Leaders really connected with the participants through the cohorts. In the debrief meetings, the feedback that came out of the cohorts was inspiring and exhilarating - participants were connecting, sharing, collaborating and networking which are all the main goals of the conference and what distinguishes Learning 2 from other conferences (which have typical job-alike meetings). The best feedback came out of the second cohort session where each group is cussed their "burning questions" using a simple protocol based on the Final Word - Critical Friends. Having the chance to discuss issues, problems of practice, challenges and open "how to" questions with a group of peers in a non-threatening/judgemental environment (through the protocol) was fulfilling, enlightening and productive. Many of the Cohort Facilitators came away from that session raving about their group and how they really came together as a team. At the end of the conference, some were talking about how they would like to continue having cohort meetings online every day - surely this is the best possible outcome for the conference which is all about sharing and collaboration, especially beyond the conference.

To me, the cohort experience has been the most important part of the Learning 2 Asia conferences that I've attended. To bring this experience and connection to Africa for the first time is very satisfying and fulfilling for me. To take this another step or two forward, I have now been tasked by the Learning 2 Advisory to collaborate with L2Bangkok to help organize their cohorts, embed my additions to the process for setting up the cohorts, and to rewrite the "playbook" for future L2 conferences. And to take my own participation in Learning 2 a step further - I will be facilitating the Curriculum Leaders cohort at L2Asia in Bangkok. 

The Case of the Blue Chinese Teapot

Accidents happen . . . we all know that.  Some accidents are more dire than others, some have little or no consequences, and some make you take pause and think.  This morning, my son accidentally broke our old Chinese teapot.  It wasn't particularly special, expensive, or irreplaceable.  We can get a new one from Chinatown back home in the summer without a problem.  However, it was used everyday by my family for about 30 years . . . now that I think about it, it's something that I have had my entire adult life since university days when I was first on my own.  Same old teapot, new handles, many new lids, new tea cosy . . . but the same old teapot filled with stories and memories.  One in particular that I am fond of involves having my Tech Director and officemate over for dinner when we were living in Istanbul.  When Colin went to pour himself a cup of tea, he stopped and remarked that such a great old teapot must hold a lot of stories.  Which it does . . . or rather, did.

The exact Chinese blue teapot that I had before it went for a tumble,
with a simple blue and white pattern and translucent rice grains
embedded in the porcelain.  Apparently available online for $30.
<http://www.laurelleaffarm.com/pages/kitchen&table/vintage-
rice-china-teapot-large-blue-white-Chinese-porcelain-tea-pot-
Laurel-Leaf-Farm-item-no-u71532.htm#.U0PeOBa-aJU>

Which got me thinking about this whole accident this morning and relating it to ed tech and coaching . . . bear with me for a minute.  In a round about way, this accident relates to working with the reluctant tech teacher with my work as a tech coach.  I don't blame my son at all for what happened.  Instead, I am upset with my wife who put the teapot in a precarious place on the little kitchen island rather than on the side counter.  She has been doing this since we moved into this house in Poland, just out of convenience and ease.  You see, the kitchen island is right there, directly in front of the door into the kitchen.  It's been 5 years of me moving the teapot to the side counter, me saying please don't put the teapot there, and me saving the teapot from being swept off of the island a few times.  It's not that the side counter is any farther away from the kitchen door.  What it really comes down to is convenience, comfort levels, and old habits.  Which is where I made the connections with ed tech and coaching.

Still with me?  In a previous posting (Some thoughts on working with the "reluctant tech teacher") I commented on some strategies for working with that teacher who just does not want to engage with technology in their teaching practice.  In that posting, I identified "fear of change" as being a major factor in a teacher's resistance to change.  After this morning's accident, I also think that comfort and convenience is another factor that needs to be considered.

Now, I'm not talking about someone being lazy or complacent.  What I see is someone who has become comfortable with their teaching practice, where their "go to", "tried and true" classroom practices are right there in their mind . . . comfortable, convenient, and ready to go.  So why change, despite being shown a different technique or tool?  Why do something different, despite being warned of possible negative outcomes or consequences?  Why change when it is much easier not to?  Do you see the connection?  My wife has continued to place the teapot on the kitchen island, despite my interventions, despite my warnings, despite my constant/repeated demonstrations of where the teapot should go.  In the end, it was a simple and easy solution (placing the teapot on the side counter), but it was never adopted.

In my other posting, I said that "a person will only undergo a process of change if it is easier for them to make the change, rather than to keep with the status quo".  I think this still applies in this case, but the motivation to keep with the status quo is comfort and convenience, rather than fear of change.  Now that the teapot is gone to the rubbish heap, change of habit has become forced and must happen.  With respect to ed tech and coaching the reluctant teacher who is stuck in their comfort zone, how do you "break their teapot"?  In my other posting, all of the strategies that I outlined there have not worked on this kind of teacher, save for the last one.  To break this reluctant teacher out of their comfort zone, perhaps a stronger course of action needs to take place like connecting technology integration to teacher evaluation.  This is what my school is currently in the process of formulating.  The school is already bringing in a new evaluation system for implementation over the next two school years, and the group of tech coaches is working on embedding the ISTE Standards for Teachers (formerly called the NETS-T Standards) into the new system.  For some, this will be no big deal at all - they are already meeting these standards everyday.  For others, it will simply be a case of tweaking their classroom practice in places, to meet all of the standards.  But for some, the reluctant teachers with technology, they will be forced to change their practice to meet the standards for tech integration . . . which they never have been forced to do before.  This one change will effectively "break their teapot".

Will this really work?  Well, give it a year or two and I will let you know what happens.  And we should have a new teapot by then . . . I wonder if the new one will last another 30 years or more?

Why Tech Coaching is kind of like riding the Tour de Pologne

 . . . year after year after year . . .

Over the summer, as I caught some glimpses of the Tour de France on tv, I couldn't help thinking about the similarities (and differences) between Tech Coaching and operating/coaching a cycling team.  At first, the similarities were obvious and plentiful, but as the analogy grew in my mind, the many differences became apparent and a little bit amusing.  So let me explain my thinking . . .

This is my "fifth running of the Tour de Pologne", and it has been a frustrating yet adventurous, tantalizing but in some ways disappointing race over the years.  Each year, e results have improved, and in some respects the team has been completely victorious, but the race never ends, there is always another race to run, and sometimes the team results are middling at best.  Sounds pretty strange, right? Well, being a Tech Coach is like being a cycling team coach in many ways, and traversing the school year is like running a team on a major tour event like Giro or the big one - the Tour de France. But my school is not the biggest fish in the big pond of international schools, so I thought that I should not compare it with the most prestigious cycling race in the world.  As we are in Poland, which hosts one of the bigger cycling tours in Europe, I felt the analogy is a little cleaner with the Tour de Pologne . . . the obvious choice in the end.

As I prepare for this coming school year, and reflect on the previous one, I have been thinking about how it must feel to be a cycling team coach . . . and how it is so similar to my role as a Tech Coach working with the faculty at my school.  My role as a coach allows me to work with a group of professionals to improve and move forward as a team over the course of the year.  During a race, the coach would ride in the support vehicle day after day, running in front/behind/beside the riders on your team.  When something breaks down you have to stop and help to fix it.  You have to continually communicate with your team as the overall strategy changes throughout the stages of the race, as accidents happen along the way, or as fatigue and injuries disrupt the team.  As a coach, you have to help manage the team members to work together effectively and efficiently or they will never finish.  In the end, the glory goes to the winner, but they will never even finish the race without the complete support of their team.

On a cycling team, you would have all manner of riders, including front runners and break-away artists, hill climbing specialists, sprinters, supporting team members and others who like to ride in the pack, seasoned veterans and young up-and-comers with lots of potential.  As team coach, you have to encourage and support everyone on the spectrum as they are all on your team and you are going to finish as a team.  Can you see where I am going with this?  My team of faculty still has a wide range of talents, interests and abilities with educational technology, much like the specialists on a cycling team.  There are the sprinters - who will tackle any new technology quickly and efficiently.  There are the hill climbers - who will take on the heavy lifting and the big jobs without complaint, methodically moving forward and upwards.  There are the support members - happy to follow the pack and help the whole team move forward.  And there are the front-runners - who are always pushing the pace and driving everyone ahead.  On first glance, Tech Coaching is just like coaching a cycling team through the Tour de Pologne, but with some huge differences . . . and frustrating complications.  

 

Keeping with the bike racing analogy, imagine if you had to deal with some of the following problems during the course of a race:

• having members on your team who do not want to ride or even look at a bike
• giving everyone on your new team new equipment for the upcoming race, but they give it back to you because they don't know how to use it . . . and people say fill in the blank is just like riding a bike?!?
• breakaway artists who just want to go out hard right from the start, but have no idea where the course is (so they end up hopelessly lost or out of touch with the rest of the team)
• riders who are quite content to be pulled along in the peloton day after day, never really contributing to the success or failure of the team . . . they are just content to be there
• team members who seem to always be distracted by the equipment that the other teams are using, or are continually focused on any new bike technology that is being developed/used somewhere else
• stragglers who are happy to be left behind in the race and just want to left alone, never to finish any stage of the tour

If working with a group of faculty were as easy as coaching and managing a cycling team, then things would be golden. You see, in my annual race, I do not have control over the makeup of the team that I work with, nor do I have any input into the breakdown of the "specialists" on the team. The problem areas mentioned above are real and always present, in my current school, in my pasts schools, in any school.  With the natural turnover of faculty in international schools, there will always be a wide range of talent, abilities and interests when it comes to educational technology.  It's just part of the job.  It's the nature of the beast.  Unless leading the ed tech race is the primary goal of the senior leadership of the school, then we will always have varied results each year.  Again, it's the nature of the beast.  The race never ends and you never actually win (or lose) the race . . . it just goes on.  So I do not mean to whine or complain here - this is just my thoughts and observations.  I can be the best coach in the world, but unless everyone is on the same page with the same goal in mind (year after year) then the results will never be truly great . . . just good or satisfactory . . . or worse!  If you want lasting change, then it all comes down to school culture, which we all know is very difficult and slow to change, especially when you are not in a position of senior leadership.

So my challenge is how to help guide the breakaway artist, to staying on the course.  Or getting the reluctant rider back onto the bike and to the finish line (whether its their first time on e bike, or after a big crash).  Or turning the peloton support rider into a mountain climbing specialist.  Do I have all of the answers on how to accomplish all of these tasks?  Nope, not at all.  Every rider on the team is an individual work in progress.  I guess I have to take consolation in making the team just a little bit better each year.  I guess that is one of the main differences between being a faculty/peer coach, rather than my old job as a classroom teacher . . . students eventually finish your course and cross the finish line.  Being stuck on the tour just means that once this year's race is done, it's just time to start preparing for the next one.  

So are you a tech or instructional coach?  How do you deal with this difference between teaching students and coaching faculty?  How cohesive is your team, and how do you keep everyone on course?

Tech PD Calendar Idea - maybe you can get this to work in your school . . .

This time last year I was finishing my Masters degree, and was in deeply embroiled in getting my action research paper completed and handed in.  As my program was directly tied to an educational technology certification as well, and because I am a tech coach myself, I wanted to make my project to be linked to technology professional development.  I had a number of ideas at first for what my research project could focus on, but in the end I decided to once again try to implement an idea that I had about 8 years ago for a technology PD calendar.  Basically, I had formulated this idea when I was back at the Western Academy of Beijing and initially tried to implement the calendar there - it failed miserably as it never even got off of the ground.  The school was not using a viable calendaring system which could support multiple authors effectively, so I could not build the calendaring system without going down the road of building a relational database myself.  When I came to ASW, I again tried to implement this idea but again it failed miserably for a variety of reasons which I will not get into right here.  When the action research project came along, I decided to give this another try as the calendaring idea itself fit in well with the project requirements.  And it failed again - no third time lucky for me.

The idea that I have fits with a lot of research into technology professional development and teacher efficacy, which is why I keep coming back to it over the years . . . it should work!  Basically, my idea is to open teacher's doors, invite others into their classrooms to see how/what/when/why technology is being used/integrated/immersed in their classroom, get teachers who would not normally "present" to their peers to show off what they are doing in their classroom with little additional work or preparation, and to have faculty observe classes from other disciplines, grade levels or school divisions, and take away and apply whatever they have learned in their own area/context/class.  All of this through a simple calendar mechanism with very little overhead . . . but it has not worked.  Which leaves me with wondering why?

Perhaps it is school culture?  Maybe my school is simply not ready for this kind of open and self-guided peer mentorship program?  Perhaps teachers do not have the time or energy to devote to such a program, or simply are not interested?  Maybe teachers are so insecure with their teaching practices or using technology that they do not want to "put themselves out there" in front of their friends/peers/colleagues?  Or perhaps teachers are too wary of any kind of observation being somehow linked to teacher effectiveness and evaluation to get involved in the program.  For whatever reasons, my tech PD calendar idea failed again.  If any of this sounds interesting to you, then you can get all of the details about the calendaring idea, how I implemented the system (in Google Calendars), what the process was for adding events to the calendar (opening your door), or registering yourself to observe someone's class or lesson, from my action research project paper which is attached below.  Please feel free to download a copy if you want to read through the entire thing.

Has anyone else tried implementing something like this?  What happened - did it succeed or fail?  Whether it worked or not, what were the problems, challenges and things that helped?