Sharing is Caring
In TED Talks, The Way We Work series Robert Reffkin gives viewers suggestions to stay connected with their co-workers. He claims that "technology has made it easier to communicate. But it hasn't made it easier to connect with other human beings" (2020). How evident is this now? I can only imagine being a part of a new school right now. Making meaningful connections at present require more time, creativity, and effort amidst all the other challenges that face educators today; a special type of brew.
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The three that I really appreciated are:
👍 show gratitude - be thankful for your peers' abilities, skills, talents, and willingness to share them.
👍 share and inquire - share resources/ideas/your point of view and be open to receiving others'
👍 be honest - go beyond the "niceties" of small talk and really get to know the people you are working with.
At the moment, I am co-teaching the Seven Sacred Teachings (this is a full unit plan if anyone may be interested) with our school indigenous support worker. Some of the ideas that Reffkin offers tie in with the teachings:
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Just to use as an example, the grade 3 curriculum is focused entirely on indigenous studies. I am quite aware that I am not an expert in the field, however, I do know there are many in the district that are trained to support my students' learning in this subject area. Instructors from the district have come to the school to explicitly teach peace/sharing circles. To promote awareness and understanding of indigenous cultures, the Aboriginal Program offers classroom presentations, for example in grade 3, Ms. Gabriel teaches students about Sto:lo tools past and present.
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Who knows what hidden talents, skills, and professional development your colleagues have? I worked with an intermediate teacher and I would like to think I was friendly enough with him, but I had no idea that he was opera trained! He never volunteered for the Christmas concerts and just by chance our friendly conversations turned into this little treasure revealed.
How can we best respond to the needs of our staff, in their wide spectrum of abilities and experiences, with the most appropriate and useful professional development?
We need to know what the actual needs are of our staff: being a part of school based team meetings, school goal committees, action plans, and other groups within the school that focus on student needs and improvements will give us a more thorough understanding of what professional development would be appropriate and useful for fellow staff members.
In our district, we use Microsoft Teams, and the TL having a channel of his/her own would help teachers look back at any staff meeting presentations available for viewing later, instructions for using tech tools in the learning commons, link to book TL/llearning commons facility, etc. Because it is a program that each teacher in the school has to use on a regular basis, it is easy access for peers.
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How can we, as educators and TLs share what we've learned with our wider communities of practices?
As we all have experienced, in order for learners to engage, there has to be a "buy in". I believe the same goes with adult learners. Canvasing co-workers, be it personal drop-ins or an inquiry note in their mailbox,, noticing frequently checked out teacher resources and print material for the classroom, observing what teachers are attending for professional development days, or using online surveys to gather intel. Most administrators will give their TLs time during staff meetings to up to date everyone on what is happening in the learning commons, so I feel that is a great start - something short, sweet, and enticing. I have seen TLs use SWAY, Bitmoji Classroom, Prezi, and Keynote.
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What tools and strategies are best implemented to meet the professional development of staff?
As the professional development representative at my school level, I have found that scheduling presenters to come into the school for Pro D days have been more meaningful and has created team-building opportunities. BCTF offers quite an array of speakers on various topics. We have had speakers come in for conflict resolution, self-regulation, mindfulness, and balance. Understanding where our co-workers are coming from and taking common professional development has been quite nurturing.
Caskey and Carpenter's article on Building Teacher Collaboration provides an explicit organizational model that promotes teacher collaboration within a school. The biggest take away has been that collaboration must be meaningful - teachers that are working together share the same vision for their students on their focused topic. Educators are willing and voluntarily carve time out to work, professional develop, gather data, and discuss students' needs, then put it into practice.
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As a TL, providing mini-workshops to familiarize teachers with programs within the learning commons and resources has created an on-going professional development for teachers and EAs within the school. Our previous TL held a "Tech Tuesday" after school for anyone and for any topic regarding technology that wouldn't be appropriate for the district IT team to problem solve.
What about the stakeholders? TLs should be making a regular appearance in PAC meetings; there is a beneficial reciprocal relationship in the rough here. As well, making connections with the local public library and their programs could support the school learning commons. For example, if the public library is using coding tools like this one here: Spheros at FVRL and Ozobots at FVRL perhaps co-teaching and collaborating with teachers in the school to use these could also create on-going professional development and lead to new technology discoveries.
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Works Cited
Caskey, M. M., & Carpenter, J. (2014). Building Teacher Collaboration School-wide. Retrieved October 22, 2020, from https://www.amle.org/BrowsebyTopic/WhatsNew/WNDet/TabId/270/ArtMID/888/ArticleID/446/Building-Teacher-Collaboration-School-wide.aspx
Coalition, O. (Ed.). (2020). Teachings of the Seven Sacred/Seven Grandfathers. Retrieved October 20, 2020, from https://onlc.ca/wp-content/uploads/2014/06/7-Grandfathers-Student-Manual1.pdf
Reffkin, R. (2020). 5 ways to create stronger connections. Retrieved October 21, 2020, from https://www.ted.com/talks/robert_reffkin_5_ways_to_create_stronger_connections
I love how you shared the three points of appreciation and the pictorials are always a welcome addition. It is a wonderful treat to find hidden talent as you mentioned about the trained opera singer. Thank you for sharing the Seven Sacred Teachings and fantastic that you are co-teaching with the school indigenous support worker. I have been very blessed to have an Aboriginal Education Department in the district in which we can organize a role model to speak on specific topics: cedar, crests and drumming.
ReplyDeleteThanks for sharing the idea about having a TL/LLC Microsoft Team available with your staff as members. What a great idea! This would be a fantastic place to have resources and information quickly accessible to staff. I am just brainstorming on the types of channels or tabs I would create. I am finding that this year there is no way I am getting to every class, so this idea of yours would be a great resource for teachers to grab quick lessons on Digital Citizenship, information literacy, book recommendations, whole-school literacy program resources and details. Hmm. You've got my wheels turning for sure!
ReplyDeleteI am wondering though, would you/ do you have a separate channel for students to access the Team and engage with the LLC online?
(Jenny K)
DeleteThank you for sharing your post. I really appreciate how you acknowledge that now more than ever, we need to go out of our way, and perhaps even try something different, to connect with our colleagues. I am interested in the Robert Reffkin Ted Talk you mentioned too. I think that right now, it is easy to stay in our classrooms, work with both our classroom students and transitional ones, eat lunch alone at our desks, and then head home, exhausted, sometimes unable to give anymore of our energy to our loved ones. But... as you point out, to go beyond the day to day niceties with our co-workers, to really get to know them, may not only teach us about one another but also teach us something that can positively effect our teaching. We may learn a new skill or share one. Helping each other benefits the greater good of our students!
ReplyDeleteLuisa T.
This is a thoughtful, well-researched, reflective and comprehensive post. I appreciate your comment about the importance of connecting with each other and how that can help reveal other’s hidden talents. This is one of the many reasons I love the TL role. There are more opportunities to see these hidden talents and help showcase and share these. A couple of suggestions for next time - I found your font was quite small and hard to read. Additionally, embedding the YouTube you mentioned would be been a good takeaway for your reader.
ReplyDelete