Getting the conversations right

Are we getting the conversations about education right? Are we even having the right conversations?

A recent Twitter post from Greg Whitby struck a strong chord with me. For a number of years now I have had a problem with the gap between school improvement and improving learning. Part of my concern has been the focus on the institutional and organisational aspects of schooling.

In more recent times here in Australia this concern has been reinforced by a legislative, policy and compliance agenda. For example, the National implementation of A-E Reporting and the recent proposed policy direction of creating League Tables based on national Literacy and Numeracy tests. Much has been said elsewhere critiquing the limitations and detrimental effects of such simplistic solutions to complex problems (Geoff Masters on A-E Reporting, Ken Boston on National Testing and Reporting, Brian Caldwell on League Tables and the need for the profession to agitate).

The key to moving forward is quality teaching linked to quality learning. The institution of schooling and approaches to improving the institution of school often miss the mark and lead to the wrong conversations.

The conversations should be focused on improving learning, not on merely on improving limited measurements of achievement.

The teaching profession needs to claim the space as the learning profession - the profession that has deep and informed conversations about learning, based on deep and informed understandings of learning. These seem to be the right conversations for the teaching profession.

It makes sense to me that improved learning must lead to improved schools. However, improved schools do not always result in better learning in every classroom.

Are we having the right converations? Do we know how to have these conversations?

Images:

Wall: https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgu9__IDLOKsLDyhlNgZvepySe6fewK9oZZrWOToLGZ4MdqUvuXFdqxa75wBZ90X4deQgDIZPzDg-jqjxQ-7eMEic2V5Y9yxyR5izyAh5bYEhgDrekbKCQcEedWQmLRQaHa1_7N/s1600-h/1.jpg

Startingconversations: http://www.r-p.com/template/images/upload/startingconversations.gif

Sign: http://thelearningconversation.standards.dfes.gov.uk/MasterPages/thelearningconversation_standards_dfes_gov_uk/assets/sign.gif

What would be a real revolution in education?

Here in Australia there is a show on the ABC called QandA, Adventures in Democracy.

The show’s format essentially is to have a panel of 5 people consisting of politicians, activists, community group representation moderated by a journalist. Questions are put to the panellists.

The ABC saw that recent show (Thursday 6th August 2009)

"was a special episode of Q&A in which the leaders of the present discussed the issues of the day with the leaders of tomorrow. The entire audience and three of the panel members were in the 16-25 age bracket….” (from transcript accessed 8th August 2009).

The panellists on the show were Julia Gillard (Deputy Prime Minister), Malcolm Turnbull (Leader of the Opposition), Sara Haghoodsti (climate change activist), Mitchell Grady (law student) and Linden Brownley (indigenous advocate).

The following question was put to the panel by Jono Leonard:

"I would like to ask a question in regard to the Labor party's 'Education revolution'. Should the government be focusing more of the $14.7 billion away from infrastructure and more towards productive means of education such as smaller class sizes, and better trained teachers? Shouldn't all teachers be 'superteachers'?"

The discussion was interesting, but at times I found a little irritating.

So what irritated me?

Reference to quality teachers, rather than quality of teaching. This resonated with a discussion I was part of at a recent forum I attended where it was noted that discussions around health care don’t focus on Quality Doctors; discussions about the legal system doesn’t focus on Quality Lawyers, Barristers and Judges.

In talking about quality teachers it is implied that there is a pervasive lack of quality teachers.

Greg Whitby recently tweeted about this:

Can any one explain what a quality teacher is? Mustn't all teachers be doing quality work or they shouldn't be teaching?

Statements from that panelists that the solution lies in “a) the curriculum; and b) having quality teachers to interpret and teach that curriculum” over simplifies the complexity of the work of teachers.

Further statements that “our numeracy rates are lowering. Our literacy standards are lowering. We're not going to fix that with a new gymnasium. We're going to fix that with better teachers teaching better curriculum” create a crisis that doesn’t exist by all accounts from international testing.

Such understandings can lead to attempts to teacher-proof the curriculum which lead us nowhere.

"Putting disinfectant right through the system"

Discussion moved into the publishing of schools' results publicly to allow for comparisons of "like schools". Publishing results to allow for comparisons of like-schools may well serve parent choice (though probably not those in disadvantaged communities). It does not however serve learning. The example of league tables in the UK and policies such as No child left behind in the US, that purported transparency and public accountability, have actually compounded the problem.

Julia Gillard, in response to a question in relation to disadvantage and publication of school performance data stated

“We can make a difference to that disadvantage if we focus on it.

That's what the transparency I was asked about [publishing performace data] is all about - putting disinfectant right through the system, every school, putting their results up so we can see where the problems are.”

An interesting analogy – “putting disinfectant right through the system.” Does it presuppose an infected system in need of cleansing, or at least prevention against possible infection?

World's best school systems

The McKinsey Report (2007), How the world’s best-performing school systems come out on top, studied 25 of the world's school systems, inlcuding 10 of the top performers. This study, conducted by Barber and Mourshed , identified that

“The experience of these top schools systems suggests that three things matter most: 1) getting the right people to become teachers, 2) developing them into effective instructors and, 3) ensuring that the system is able to deliver the best possible instruction for every child.”

This involves society, including politicians, appreciating the complex work of teachers and valuing that work and what it does contribute to society in terms that are broader than the predominant economic ones.

The issues are complex and require well thought out and whole system solutions. This, I think, requires smarter policies with a view to the long term and the future, not a short term political cycle.

It requires a view that says that our students need basic skills as well as skills and capabilities for an uncertain future. Our students need to understand oppression, patriarchy and discrimination to create a civil society – not just learn to spell these words; and indeed they can understand the concepts without necessarily being able to spell them!

They will require skills and capabilities to engage in and solve the problems they will face them: global warming, the water crisis, learning to live with diversity in a globalised world.

They also require teachers who can teach for uncertain futures. Teachers who understand learning and how today's world shapes how young people learn. Teachers that understands digital natives; but also understand that not all students use digital technology the same way or are in fact digital natives.

This requires time and space for teachers to learn. It has been argued by Professor Brian Caldwell that teachers should spend 20 days a year in professional learning.

The Australian Education Revolution, whilst well intentioned may not move us that much forward.

It seems to me that schooling, as presently experienced in disadvantaged communities, isn’t working well for those communities. Maybe there needs to be less emphasis on the business of schooling and being concerned with how to do school, and a stronger focus on learning and how learning is mediated, of which school maybe a part. This requires structural and institutional changes, not just “quality teachers”.

The Building Education Revolution doesn’t seem to be paying attention to creating spaces for learning, but rather seems to be replicating what has been – halls, gymnasiums, rooms for classes.

The Digital Education Revolution doesn’t appear to be paying much attention to emerging technologies. Laptops for every student may be superseded but more flexible, mobile technologies that can achieve the same. Maybe this is because those that design the policies don't engage with the technologies.

Understand learning

For me part of the solution lies in teachers better understanding learning and how to support the learning of a diverse group of students and engage them in learning. There is no one size fits all. The “cookie cutter” or “production-line” approach to schooling doesn’t serve us well today.

• What if the focus were on learning and not schooling?
  
• What if the profession of teaching were charged with the responsibility for ensuring the quality of teaching?
  
• What if every backbencher worked in spaces with teachers for a week every year?
• What if teachers had professional learning that focused on solving the complex problems of ensuring learning for all?

Great educational experiences depend on great teaching that takes place in great spaces (virtual and real), supported by great professional learning with great valuing of the complexity and significance of educators by the community.

I am left wondering, “What would be a real revolution in education?”

Images:

http://www.portablecontent.com/static/files/assets/5d49d0f2/teacherstech.jpg

http://farm1.static.flickr.com/4/4272852_fa4b4a45f4.jpg

http://cafnr.missouri.edu/images/news/iphone-radar.jpg

http://warwick.creativeblogs.net/files/2008/02/ss850258.JPG

Education systems - too narrow and backward looking

During the last week Sir Ken Robinson was interviewed on ABC's 7:30 Report.

I've always liked Sir Ken Robinson since I first saw his TEDTalk, Do schools kill creativity.

The interviews we're shown in two 15 minutes sessions over two nights.

He raises a number of interesting points (as is usual) which caught my imagination.

How can you educate for productive future?

This is a challenge that many schools are trying to address in exploring 21st Century learning. Recently I was working with a Principal who was preparing a submission for a National Quality Teaching Award. At the heart of the schools innovation was the desire to provide learning experiences that prepare the students with skills and understandings to engage with issues facing us today that will shape the future.

We have the power of imagination and capacity to solve the problems that face us.

Kids that start school in Kindergarten this year will be retiring in 2070.

No one knows what 2070 will look like.

Robinson argues that most education reforms are backwards-looking. They are trying to address existing systems that are the result of the Industrial Revolution.

There are some real challenges for the future. Robinson believes that politicians should stop trying to teacher-proof the education system through the curriculum and testing regimes. Teachers need to be given the room to breath and do their jobs.

It was interesting that the same day Greg Whitby (Executive Director, Catholic Education, Diocese of Parramatta) had tweeted:

anyone else frustrated with latest fed govt partnerships model for supporting learning and teaching. No explicit principles underpinning them

He is right (I think). The National Partnerships that form part of the "National Education Revolution" here in Australia lack any real principles of learning and are another political attempt at teacher proofing. The way forward may lie in the National Partnership: Teacher Quality - but I fear not, unless the profession, through organisations such as the Australian College of Educators, takes some leadership over this agenda

The same is true to some extent with the Building Education Revolution that is largely replicating school buildings from last century; or the Digital Education Revolution which is seeing a roll out of laptops in secondary schools. Why not handheld devices?

There is a need for robust conversations around what education should be and could be; and what schools and schooling will look like within that.

The interviews are below:

Part 1 (13 minutes)

Part 2 (12 minutes)

Freeing up working lives

As I was sifting through some video clips I came across this one from Greg Whitby in which he talks about the development of 2 schools designed to deliver learning in today's world. It's a few years old now.

About 2:30 minutes into the video Greg states:

What we are actually on about is freeing up the working lives of staff. The current model of schooling actually enslaves teachers I believe. We tell them what time to start and when to finish….

What I'm saying is forget all that. You negotiate all that. I want you to be able to show to me that you've improved the learning outcomes for these kids through your interaction. How you do it, in what time and in what space, I don't care….

If you can do that in a more relaxed environment, that's fine by me. What we're doing is providing them and recognising them as professionals in their own right. Allowing them to make intelligent decisions. And that's been missing for so long. We've actually, through the schooling process, deskilled our teachers for far too long.

In my previous entry on "Does schooling kill creativity?" I wondered with schooling can kill the creativity of teachers to innovate.

As someone who has spent most of his career working at the system level I have been wondering whether, in seeking to deliver on learning in today's world, school systems adopt 19th and 20th Century approaches to professional learning and to managing staff that, in turn, deskills and deprofessionalises the professionals as leaders of learning.

Is there a danger that systems focus on managing the what and how of professional learning in the absence of systems to manage professional knowledge that is created?

Can school systems be as flexible and responsive to contemporary professional learning as is being asked of schools today?

Or have education systems, as we understand them, had their time?

The death of education ... the dawn of learning

This is a wonderful and inspiring clip (sponsored by the Pearson Foundation for CosN) that is doing the rounds at the moment.
It opens up thinking about what is and what could be and should be in education, schooling and learning.

At the 2008 ICSEI conference, Susan Rona, a Hungarian-born Canadian who has worked on a project to achieve basic educational opportunities for the Roma (gypsy) children in four countries in Central Europe, put forward the proposition that education is important, but also put the question as to whether school is important.

Stephen Heppell was stronger in the clip in saying, "It's the death of education but the dawn of learning; and that makes me very happy!"

Imagine if schools were the "nearly now spaces".
Imagine if we did view schools as community sytems rather than a classroom systems.
Imagine if teachers had opportunities for global connecting.

Enabling factors for robust frameworks to develop teacher agency, creativity and innovation

Recently Greg Whitby had a reflection on his blog Bluyonder titled Bogged down by accountabilities. This caused me to revisit my thinking from my Churchill Fellowship. A strong motivation for the trip was a concern that I had that accountabilities were stiffling creativity, innovation and the profession.

I share Greg's view that too often accountability is about blame rather than responsibility. I believe that teaching needs to become the learning profession. This means that teachers need to be the key decision-makers, but that decisions need to be made from a position of informed professionalism. Elsewhere in this blog I have expressed a concern with an emphasis on measuring and reviewing schools, and less of a focus on improvement.

Greg indictates that schools need robust frameworks from which good decisions about learning and teaching are made. I believe that these frameworks require teacher agency, creativity and innovation.

SOME ENABLING FACTORS
These enabling factors are not always recognisable in large scale reforms of schools and public accountability agendas. Further information on each of these enabling factors can be found in the ACSA paper I presented in 2007 and in my Churchill Report (see links).

What might be some enabling factors that allow for the creation of these robust frameworks?

1. Trust the professionals.
2. Build flexibility and adaptive capacity within and between schools.
3. Create a culture of professional authority.
4. Develop teacher agency and leadership.
5. Develop informed professionalism.
6. Strengthen collaboration across the profession.
7. Foster networks for learning.
8. Evolve communities of learning.
9. Promote disciplined innovation.
10. Harvest intellect and capture new knowledge.
11. Build professional knowledge.
12. Build capacity across the profession.
13. Develop next practice.
    

FACTORS THAT APPEAR TO LIMIT
A number of factors were identified that appeared to limit the development of robust frameworks that promote teacher agency, creativity and innovation . These include:

• A political cycle and motivation that is focused on short-term reforms and lacks authentic engagement of the profession as well as the community;
• An absence of incentives, rewards and acknowledgements for teachers engaging in improving the profession;
• Focusing on the tools and processes of school improvement rather than the profession and people;
• Over-emphasising the importance of positional leadership to bring about school improvement and under-valuing teacher leadership;
• Emerging managerialism at the expense of leadership;
• Focusing on reforming schools rather than transforming systems of learning;
• Bureaucratic inertia and linear policy thinking that prevents the evolution of systems of learning;
• Assumptions that education systems do have a strong focus on learning and have a learning culture;
• Innovation fatigue with a few involved in doing the work.
  

New Position

I'm excited! I have been offered a position with Parramatta CEO as one of the newly appointed Team Leaders. Parramatta CEO's Executive Director, Greg Whitby was recently announced as one of The Bulletin magazine's Top 100 Thinkers. It is a great opportunity to be part of a venture that is focused on transformation of learning and teaching - to move from the industrial models and approaches.

For me this is an opportunity to put into practice my own thinking and understandings as reflected in my Churchill Fellowship. The focus on innovation, collaboration, networking and capacity building has great potential in transforming learning and teaching.