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Jill Bergeron

Cultivating Healthy Teams in Schools | Edutopia - 0 views

www.edutopia.org/...hy-teams-schools-elena-aguilar

maker team building admin mission pd professional development

shared by Jill Bergeron on 20 Jul 15 - No Cached
  • Team members can identify the component of their mission that they're working toward and maintain a laser-like focus on it.
    • Jill Bergeron
      Jill Bergeron on 20 Jul 15
       
      Are Chandler's teachers easily able to identify what part of the mission they are working on? Have they been given an opportunity to participate in the crafting of this mission?
  • A team that operates within a school should be aligned to that school's vision, mission, goals, and strategic plans. This could be considered vertical alignment of efforts. Teams also need to align horizontally -- what one team does needs to complement another team's work.
  • What piece of our school's vision are we working toward? Which components of our mission are we upholding? Which of our long-term or annual goals are we contributing to? What specifically will this team need to do in order to move our school forward on its vision and goals?
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  • Team members need these connections laid out. When the intersections of purpose and work become clear, team members are more likely to feel energized, motivated, and valued.
  • The most important resource for a team is time -- time for the facilitator to prepare as well as time for teams to collaborate. Teams must meet consistently and focus their time on what matters: implementing a work plan, learning together, and building strong relationships with each other.
  • A team's potential for greatness depends on many factors, including the emotional intelligence of team members and the organizational conditions in the school or district that houses the team.
  • The most effective schools and organizations have a mission and vision that motivates, unifies, and guides all stakeholders in their day-to-day operations. Short- and long-term goals for the school align to the mission and vision and are regularly reflected on.
Jill Bergeron

Mission US | THIRTEEN - 0 views

www.mission-us.org

games game_based_learning history socialstudies interactive simulation

shared by Jill Bergeron on 23 Oct 15 - No Cached
  • Jill Bergeron on 23 Oct 15
     
    Simulations-games-interactives for teachers of US history.
Jill Bergeron

The Marshall Memo Admin - Issues - 0 views

www.marshallmemo.com/issue.php

BTSN boys new ideas instructional coaching dress code mediation difficult conversations grit character

shared by Jill Bergeron on 06 Sep 16 - No Cached
  • 1. True grit 2. Successfully educating boys: what works 3. Teacher-student mediation in action 4. How to work with an opinionated colleague (who is wrong) 5. Should schools continue to teach cursive handwriting? 6. Do students’ appearance and grooming affect achievement? 7. Key elements of an effective open house 8. I wish my teacher knew…
  • A lot of what we take to be toughness of the past was really just callousness.
  • There was a greater tendency in years gone by to wall off emotions, to put on a thick skin – for some men to be stone-like and uncommunicative and for some women to be brittle, brassy, and untouchable. And then many people turned to alcohol to help them feel anything at all.”
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  • A more helpful way to think of toughness is resilience, says Brooks. “The people we admire for being resilient are not hard; they are ardent. They have a fervent commitment to some cause, some ideal, or some relationship. That higher yearning enables them to withstand setbacks, pain, and betrayal.
  • strategies that build connections with boys.
  • “In every school I have visited, social competition and hierarchy, bullying and maltreatment, peer policing, and the marginalization of less-preferred types of boys characterize cultures that even wonderfully committed faculty and staff cannot control.”
  • These teachers report that, “contrary to the stereotypes of young men as diffident, disruptive, or dangerous, most boys care deeply about being successful and simply long for instructors… capable of connecting personally with them and believing in them, even when they may not believe in themselves and struggle with behavior, effort, or attention problems… Relationship is the very medium through which successful teaching and learning is performed with boys.”
  • If people today are less tough or resilient, Brooks concludes, it may be because they lack purpose. “If you really want people to be tough,” he says, “make them idealistic for some cause, make them tender for some other person, make them committed to some worldview that puts today’s temporary pain in the context of a larger hope
  • Acknowledge a common characteristic.
  • Maintain high standards.
  • Respond to a student’s personal interest or talent.
  • Share a common interest.
  • Accommodate a measure of opposition.
  • Change should be collective.
  • Be willing to reveal vulnerability.
  • “Mediation provides teacher and student with ways to listen and understand each other’s perspectives, restore goodwill, and develop positive plans to move forward,” she says. “The process boosts social, problem-solving and communication skills – all of which are important for students’ resourcefulness should problems arise in the future.”
  • the characteristics of an ideal academic team: -   There is frequent, easy communication. -   Assessment is an integral part of the culture. -   Changes are identified and readily implemented. -   New ideas are frequently discussed. -   Limitations in professional knowledge and skills are recognized and addressed. -   Professional development is seen as essential and it happens regularly. -   Improvement is continuous.
  • Don’t just tell them they’re wrong.
  • People with incorrect beliefs can become even more entrenched when presented with facts that contradict their beliefs. To change people, you have to reach their hearts, and you can do that only by building relationships.
  • Evidence alone won’t work.
  • Listen
  • If you want to effectively address forces that resist positive change, you need to genuinely listen first.”
  • Be indirect. Use suggestive rather than declarative language. Let your colleagues come to their own conclusion and, better yet, think it’s their own idea.
  • Have one-to-one conversations.
  • Identify your allies.
  • Demonstrate mastery of subject matter.
  • Identify the mission.
  • Choose your battles.
  • Focus on your personal goals.
  • Be patient, hopeful, and persistent.
  • If change happens, expect things to get worse before they get better.
  • “Research suggests that individuals are prone to automatically make assessments about the competence and social status of others based on features of their physical appearance. These features may include facial cues, ethnicity, clothes, and body language… [I]ndividuals are likely to base their impression of others on limited information and then fill in the rest accordingly.”
  • “Children described by teachers more negatively in terms of their appearance had worse academic adjustment… Students described by teachers as appearing poorly dressed, tired, sleepy, or hungry were rated by teachers as being less competent academically, less engaged, and as having a poorer relationship with these teachers.
  • “These results suggest that some students may be experiencing difficulties in school because they appear inadequately physically prepared for the classroom,”
  • As a staff, if we said, ‘Here’s our first chance to engage parents,’ then surely open houses… would be a much warmer, much more collaborative event and linked to learning.”
  • Consider having a general orientation for parents before the beginning of school – more of a mini-fair, with fun activities and a chance to get to know school staff. This is distinct from the open house in mid-September, which is more academically focused. -   Encourage teachers to make a positive phone call to each family early in the year so that calls on behavior problems are not the first time parents hear from the school.
  •   Give parents and guardians name tags and a chance to socialize with family members of other students.
  • Have students be leaders of the open house at the classroom level: students prepare a PowerPoint presentation on what they are learning and what the plan is going forward.
  • Include actual learning activities for parents.
  • The bottom line: family members should leave the open house excited about the school year, clear about three or four things their child will know by the end of the year, and feeling part of a team that will help students accomplish those key learnings.
  • Jill Bergeron on 06 Sep 16
     
    "In This Issue: 1. True grit 2. Successfully educating boys: what works 3. Teacher-student mediation in action 4. How to work with an opinionated colleague (who is wrong) 5. Should schools continue to teach cursive handwriting? 6. Do students' appearance and grooming affect achievement? 7. Key elements of an effective open house 8. I wish my teacher knew…"
Jill Bergeron

The Art of Facilitating Teacher Teams | Edutopia - 0 views

www.edutopia.org/...ng-teacher-teams-elena-aguilar

facilitation meetings edutopia

shared by Jill Bergeron on 24 Nov 14 - No Cached
  • Note that I'm using the term "facilitator" to mean the person who plans and designs agendas as well as who guides a team through processes outlined on an agenda
  • a variety of structures or protocols to meet the desired outcomes.
  • The purpose of the meeting and desired outcomes are articulated and connected to the school's vision, mission, and big goals
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  • we know that great attention must be paid to how a meeting is designed.
  • Frame the purpose and desired outcomes for the meeting and review agenda.
  • planning reflects an awareness of how power dynamics and systemic oppression may manifest in this group and seeks to interrupt these dynamics
  • We want to ensure that all will voices will be heard and will have equal access to decision-making and input.
  • Use a variety of questioning strategies to probe thinking and elicit new ideas
  • Articulate the role participants will play in the meeting
  • Name any decision-making points and processes that will be used Identify the structures or activities that will be used in this meeting and how they'll connect to the desired outcomes
  • Articulate expectations for behavior or procedures
  • anticipates the emotional, cognitive and energy needs of the participants
  • Use a variety of listening strategies including paraphrasing and active listening
  • Determine structures to hold members accountable (self-monitoring and reflection, use of process observer, use of a team process rubric)
  • encourage conflict about ideas verses interpersonal or inter-team conflict)
  • Use data gathered in the moment to modify and inform facilitation
  • Protect time for reflection and feedback within the established time
  • use various strategies to help a group a recover from a breakdown
  • Hold team members accountable to agreements, goals, structures, and protocols
  • Read the group's emotional and energetic state and adjust accordingly
  • Hold the expectation that members will learn, think creatively, and push each others' thinking
  • Show up as a grounded, calm presence that believes in the capacity of team members
  • Jill Bergeron on 24 Nov 14
     
    Three domains mentioned about how to facilitate teacher team meetings.
Jill Bergeron

Tips for Coaching Teacher Teams | Edutopia - 0 views

www.edutopia.org/...ng-teacher-teams-elena-aguilar

teacher teams edutopia coaching facilitation

shared by Jill Bergeron on 24 Nov 14 - No Cached
  • It can be very, very, painfully slow to build trust in a group of adults -- but it can be done, and you as the facilitator have to believe it can be done.
  • As a facilitator, it's our job to clarify purpose and raise it, integrate it, and reference it all the time.
  • When we do things together that are new and challenging (but within our zone of proximal development), our brains actually produce hormones that make us feel good and feel closer to each other.
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  • even if we trust and like each other, we need to know why we're there.
  • Trust grows in tiny little ways when people are open and authentic, when they ask real questions and listen to each other, when they share their stories and others hold space for those stories, and when they do things together and those things go well. So create space for speaking and listening, ensure that everyone is participating, and then give them something to do.
  • Purpose needs to be connected to a school's mission, vision, and goals. When there isn't alignment and correlation, again, we can get lost.
  • while you can have a lot of power in a team, you may not have had the skill development to do so.
  • And then it happened! They opened up and started sharing their fears and concerns, they asked meaningful questions, and they started learning together
Jill Bergeron

NAIS - The Truth About Making Real Change for Racial Justice - 0 views

www.nais.org/...real-change-for-racial-justice

DEI social justice diversity racial justice

shared by Jill Bergeron on 02 Jan 21 - No Cached
  • To look at ourselves honestly means to ask: Why are our schools here? The raison d’être of independent schools has been, and continues to be, that of advancing the interests of those who already have privilege—to provide a return on investment (ROI) to those who have sufficient disposable income to afford independent school. To put it differently, our main job is to preserve the social status quo or reproduce the elite; this class-bound purpose results in a hierarchical view of the world in which our students are destined for leadership. In our mission statements, the idea that we are creating leaders is almost universal. On their face, these statements provide a binary and hierarchical understanding of society, one in which there are leaders and followers, and we are teaching the leaders.
  • noblesse oblige, a worldview that accepts and perpetuates existing social hierarchies while promoting social good.
  • When we look at our schools’ service programs, the idea of “giving back” is ubiquitous. Yet we fail to discuss or even question how much taking is appropriate.
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  • Families send their kids to our schools, and we must prove that we are better than local public or other school options. In other words, we ask the majority of our families to give us financial support so that their kids can get more—not necessarily different—than what their taxes pay for; the “more” is the ROI.
  • Furthermore, this hierarchical worldview permeates our practices—from grading to sports, we promote hierarchies cemented on ability, access, and popularity, among other things. By viewing race problems in our schools in purely cultural terms, we are articulating our hope that we will promote some hierarchies while erasing other hierarchies based on race, gender, and sexual orientation. But as we know, hierarchies intersect and sustain each other.
  • the demand that our teachers get better or different professional development, that we hire and admit more people of color, and that we collectively become culturally competent is a way to deal with the symptoms of racism, not with a system of racism.
  • Why would those who have privilege, and want to keep it by paying for a special pathway for their children, want to give it up? Anyone familiar with the college admission process knows the tensions that emerge around race and class. If our students and families are happy to embrace the language of inclusion, such superficial pretense often evaporates when college admission lists appear. It is then that we see the hard limits of our inclusivity.   The families in our communities are essentially good people who want to share, but they don’t want to be left out.
  • They like the idea of “giving back” but do not want to take less.
  • many of our enrollment challenges derive from the fact that millennial families are looking for meaning and value—not access. We need to stop worrying about providing an illusory ROI and ensure that we help our students develop lives of meaning and purpose; we need to stop worrying exclusively about leadership and prepare them for ethical and active citizenship. It is only when we can talk to our students about the need to take less so that others can have their fair share that we will be able to honestly talk about race.
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