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Jim Tiffin Jr

Innovation vs Circulasticity | EdCan Network - 0 views

  • Circulasticity. A combination of the words circular and elasticity, it is an organizational condition that generates contexts or situations in which high levels of activity are noted, but any discernible long-term change is not.
  • Because of the elasticity of circulasticity, “innovation” stretches the core environment, but is eventually brought back to the central traditional core and becomes more of an “improvement” than a change catalyst.
  • In my opinion, true innovation in education will only happen when a new structure is created: one that nurtures critical thinkers, supports risk-takers and encourages ongoing transformation, and that places a high value on creative and insightful learning / teaching in classrooms.
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  • As Martin Hays wrote in his analysis of organizational wisdom, “Organizational wisdom transcends organizational learning in its commitment to doing the right things over doing things right.”
  • At the current time, educational organizations are mired in structures that have significant “blind spots” for innovation or creativity. These blind spots are the structures themselves, since they were designed along an industrial model that favours uniformity and compliance and has no explicit place or mechanism for including creativity and innovation. Hence they simply don’t allow for innovation to be replicated or made systemic.
    • Jim Tiffin Jr
       
      Again, the industrial model spoils our work...
  • As John Kotter eloquently describes in his book Buy-In: Saving your good idea from getting shot down, there are four main change impediments that people use: 1) Fear Mongering, 2) Death by Delay, 3) Confusion, 4) Ridicule.[2] In education, these four elements can be translated into: 1) Need Research, 2) Need Results, 3) Need Support, 4) Need Financing. The irony is that even if all four parts of this requirement are met, it still doesn’t serve to create innovative practices.
  • Where everything seems to bog down is in the implementation component.
  • What we need is a work environment that openly values creativity, risk-taking and courage; its lack remains the single greatest impediment to innovation in education.
  • And so, innovation, as traditionally defined, remains more of an elusive objective in education than an emerging reality. We debate the issue; we define the issue; and we design the issue. But moving the innovation agenda forward is an entirely different issue.
  • “The quality of a question is not judged by its complexity but by the complexity of the thinking that it provokes.”
  • True transformation will ultimately have to begin with a courageous act from an individual or individuals to enact the deep structural changes that are so needed.
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    "Circulasticity. A combination of the words circular and elasticity, it is an organizational condition that generates contexts or situations in which high levels of activity are noted, but any discernible long-term change is not."
Bo Adams

8 EduWins of 2013 | Edutopia - 0 views

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    "We're always hearing about how education is so messed up -- so often, the conversation focuses on all the negatives. But there are also plenty of "EduWins," too -- awesome ideas, videos, people, programs, practices, products, Tweeters, teachers, and technologies that are making a difference and changing the lives of real students on a global scale. Indeed, as technology continues to quietly revolutionize learning, and models like project-based learning become more broadly accepted, and neuroscience deepens our understanding of how our miraculous brains actually work, it is no surprise that so much is changing in education. And -- as with any change -- there is the good and the bad. So we asked our intrepid team of bloggers to reflect on this year's biggest eduwins, and here are their thoughts."
Jim Tiffin Jr

What's it like to change grading and reporting practices that have been around for over... - 0 views

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    The start of the journey that the faculty and administration took at Graded to rethink, and redo, grading practices at their high school. It includes an excellent list of reasons for the change, and the list of new expectations initiated by the change.
Bo Adams

How Dissecting a Pencil Can Ignite Curiosity and Wonderment | MindShift - 2 views

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    Very powerful read about how VTR and design thinking can empower learners as agents of change. HT @Deacs84
Bo Adams

Transforming Education: The One Thing I'd Change in 2014 | Edutopia - 1 views

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    "Learning to listen doesn't mean that we stop all other work. It doesn't mean that the principal ceases to lead from a collaboratively built, living vision; it doesn't mean that teachers stop offering challenging texts or allow their classrooms to become unruly. It would mean that we'd pay much more attention to how we communicate with each other, to how we listen to each other. Authentic dialogue could lead to stronger communities, to deeper understandings across difference, and to finding creative solutions to the problems that exist in our schools and country. That's my hope for 2014: that we learn how to slow down, listen, and effectively communicate with each other."
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    We need to remember this when we create parent questionnaires in August. This is a great read for Eileen and my Project Zero presentation too. Listen!!
Bo Adams

American Schools Are Training Kids for a World That Doesn't Exist | WIRED - 0 views

  • We “learn,” and after this we “do.” We go to school and then we go to work. This approach does not map very well to personal and professional success in America today. Learning and doing have become inseparable in the face of conditions that invite us to discover.
  • In such conditions the futures of law, medicine, philosophy, engineering, and agriculture – with just about every other field – are to be rediscovered.
    • Bo Adams
       
      In this paragraph there are so many "project starters" that one could design an entire "curriculum" to weave them into an advanced problem solving component to school!
  • Americans need to learn how to discover.
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  • Against this arresting background, an exciting new kind of learning is taking place in America. Alternatively framed as maker classes, after-school innovation programs, and innovation prizes, these programs are frequently not framed as learning at all.
  • Failing to create a new way of learning adapted to contemporary circumstances might be a national disaster.
  • Discovery has always provoked interest, but how one discovers may today interest us even more.
  • in the course I teach, How to Create Things and Have Them Matter, students are asked to look, listen, and discover, using their own creative genius, while observing contemporary phenomena that matter today.
  • Learning by an original and personal process of discovery is a trend on many US university campuses
  • Success brings not just a good grade, or the financial reward of a prize. It brings the satisfaction that one can realize dreams, and thrive, in a world framed by major dramatic questions. And this fans the kind of passion that propels an innovator along a long creative career.
  • Culture labs conduct or invite experiments in art and design to explore contemporary questions that seem hard or even impossible to address in more conventional science and engineering labs.
  • The culture lab is the latest indication that learning is changing in America. It cannot happen too fast.
  • we need to get smarter in ways that match the challenges we now face.
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    "Our kids learn within a system of education devised for a world that increasingly does not exist." HT @MeghanCureton & Greg Todd Jones (two colleagues in significantly different worlds who sent me the link at exactly the same time.)
Jim Tiffin Jr

When Grading Harms Student Learning | Edutopia - 1 views

  • Is grading the focus, or is learning the focus?
    • Jim Tiffin Jr
       
      A simple, straightforward reminder of what assessment is for.
  • Zeros do not reflect student learning. They reflect compliance.
    • Jim Tiffin Jr
       
      Exactly.
  • a deduction in points. Not only didn't this correct the behavior, but it also meant that behavioral issues were clouding the overall grade report. Instead of reflecting that students had learned, the grade served as an inaccurate reflection of the learning goal.
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  • Students should learn the responsibility of turning in work on time, but not at the cost of a grade that doesn't actually represent learning.
    • Jim Tiffin Jr
       
      I completely agree with this point. But admittedly, I still am not sure how it would work in practice... I totally realize that the grades we give as teachers are completely under the school's control - we can go back and change grades even after the course has ended if we need to. But at the core of my question is, "What is the leverage (if that is the right word) that we can use to help students learn that responsibility?" Sports and pulling privileges come to mind, but what else is there. I wonder what other teachers have used for this situation? 
  • Many of our assignments are "practice," assigned for students to build fluency and practice a content or skill. Students are often "coming to know" rather than truly knowing.
  • Practice assignments and homework can be assessed, but they shouldn't be graded.
    • Jim Tiffin Jr
       
      An excellent distinction!
  • we should formatively assess our students and give everyone access to the "photo album" of learning rather than a single "snapshot."
  • We've all been in a situation where grading piles up, and so we put the class on a task to make time for grading.
    • Jim Tiffin Jr
       
      Guilty :-(
  • Teaching and learning should take precedence over grading and entering grades into grade books. If educators are spending an inordinate amount of time grading rather than teaching and assessing students, then something needs to change.
  • Our work as educators is providing hope to our students. If I use zeros, points off for late work, and the like as tools for compliance, I don't create hope. Instead, I create fear of failure and anxiety in learning. If we truly want our classrooms to be places for hope, then our grading practices must align with that mission.
    • Jim Tiffin Jr
       
      +1!
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    A right-to-the-point article on how teacher grading practices can interfere with the learning philosophy of a classroom.
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    A right-to-the-point article on how teacher grading practices can interfere with the learning philosophy of a classroom.
Jim Tiffin Jr

9 Elephants in the (Class)Room That Should "Unsettle" Us | The Creativity Post - 0 views

  • there are a number of practices in our current systems of schooling that “unsettle” us, primarily because they don’t comport with what Seymour Papert calls our “stock of intuitive, empathic, common sense knowledge about learning.”
  • Yet we continue to focus our efforts primarily on content knowledge, as is evidenced by the focus of our assessments.
    • Jim Tiffin Jr
       
      Again, assessment is the most powerful lever for changing teacher practice.
  • in many cases, these practices are attempting to do “the wrong thing right” rather than “do the right thing” in the first place.
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  • the new contexts for modern learning forged by the networked world in which we now live are creating an imperative for new ways of thinking about our work in schools.
  • notes, “For more than 75 years, studies have consistently found that only a small fraction of what is learned in the classroom is retained even a year after learning.” That’s primarily because the curriculum and classroom work they experience has little or no relevance to students’ real lives.
  • The reality in K-12 schooling today is that the majority of what we assess, content, knowledge, and basic skills, is the easiest to assess, not the most important.
  • by the way, let’s stop pretending that we can solve the engagement problem by handing kids iPads or other technologies. Hand them more agency over their own learning instead.
  • When we look at the things that each of us has learned most deeply in our lives, the same certain conditions almost always apply: Among other things, we had an interest and a passion for the topic, we had a real, authentic purpose in learning it, we had agency and choice, deciding what, when, where, and with whom we learned it, and we had fun learning it even if some of it was “hard fun.”
  • But in the vast majority of curriculum driven schools, however, students sit and wait to be told what to learn, when to learn it, how to learn it, and how they’ll be assessed on it. Rarely do they get to choose, and just as rarely does the learning they do in class have any impact beyond the classroom walls.
    • Jim Tiffin Jr
       
      I especially like this last part about "impact beyond the classroom walls."
  • But what’s also notable about those practices is that we rarely want to discuss them aloud, content instead to let them hover silently in the background of our work.
  • It’s much more difficult to assess the literacies, skills, and dispositions that are required to succeed and lead a healthy, happy life, especially in a world where answers are everywhere via the technologies we carry in our pockets. In that world, creativity, curiosity, a change mindset, the ability to create, connect, and participate in networks…all of those are now required, yet few of those are currently assessed at all.
    • Jim Tiffin Jr
       
      This reminds me of the quote by Alvin Toffle: "The illiterate of the 21st century will not be those who cannot read and write, but those who cannot learn, unlearn, and relearn."
  • We need to stop training students for exams that computers can pass.”
    • Jim Tiffin Jr
       
      **************DING DING DING DING****************** Winner!!! :-)
  • We know that grades, not learning, are the outcomes that students and parents are most interested in.
    • Jim Tiffin Jr
       
      This makes me so sad...
  • antidisciplinary thinking and doing
    • Jim Tiffin Jr
       
      Curious what this means...
  • To quote Mitch Resnick* again,
    • Jim Tiffin Jr
       
      More props from Mitch Resnick again. So many people here that have been square in the radar of Gary Stager, CMK, and MIT. Also, in order to open this PDF link from the post: (*Use the password "reviewer" to open the pdf.)
  • we know that much of what every student in 1894 was supposed to learn isn’t really what every student in 2015 needs to learn. Yet we seem loathe to mess with the recipe. And as Seymour Papert so famously asks, now that we have access to pretty much all there is to know, “what one-billionth of one percent” are we going to choose to teach in school?
    • Jim Tiffin Jr
       
      More props to Seymour Papert in this article.
  • there is a strong argument building that we have reached “peak education” as we continue to do try to do the wrong thing right and get “wronger” in the process.
  • tacit knowledge and the ability to learn from others, in the moment, both face to face and in networks is vastly more important and effective.
  • Those that will flourish in the modern world will be those who can learn what they need to learn “just in time” from a variety of networks and sources and experiences.
  • put these unsettling truths front and center in our conversations about education
    • Jim Tiffin Jr
       
      Who should be having these conversations?
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    An article that calls to mind many of the ideas discusses in David Perkins' 'Futurewise". The idea that sticks in my mind the most is after reading this article is: "It's not about just in case, it's about just in time" which is a reference to #9 A list of things that we don't really want to talk about in education. 1. We know that most of our students will forget most of the content that they "learn" in school. 2. We know that most of our students are bored and disengaged in school. 3. We know that deep, lasting learning requires conditions that schools and classrooms simply were not built for. 4. We know that we're not assessing many of the things that really matter for future success. 5. We know that grades, not learning, are the outcomes that students and parents are most interested in. 6. We know that curriculum is just a guess. 7. We know that separating learning into discrete subjects and time blocks is not the best way to prepare kids for the real world. 8. We know (I think) that the system of education as currently constructed is not adequately preparing kids for what follows if and when they graduate. 9. And finally, we know that learning that sticks is usually learned informally, that explicit knowledge accounts for very little of our success in most professions.
Jim Tiffin Jr

Good Morning! -- A.M. Announcements Build School Community | Education World - 0 views

  • morning announcements are a proven way to set the tone for the day and build morale and a sense of school "community."
  • there is something very comforting about having a routine format for the morning announcements of each school day.
    • Jim Tiffin Jr
       
      Even if part of the routine, is the "routine surprise" #havefun
  • After Kostick's wake-up call, members of the school's student council take over the daily routine
    • Jim Tiffin Jr
       
      Love that students are involved in the announcements.
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  • "We use student council representatives to relay these messages because we think the student body might listen more closely and buy into messages more readily when they come from their peers,"
    • Jim Tiffin Jr
       
      Wonder how this sort of student leadership could be gathered in an elementary setting?
  • a good-morning "America" sing-along
    • Jim Tiffin Jr
       
      Love the song idea! A tune that all student would know, and could bond with at school-wide events. Who could write one?
  • a special "Guest of the Day."
    • Jim Tiffin Jr
       
      A tremendous idea! Students hearing from different people in the school community about important and timely messages.
  • "He adds many special twists to the school's daily P.A. announcements. In addition to fade-ins and fade-outs, he uses music that the students appreciate, special sound effects that he makes with his mouth or with studio equipment, and background cheers for the sports report"
    • Jim Tiffin Jr
       
      FX!! :-)
  • include a positive character-education message. "After I share the message, I always ask the children to 'Pass it on!'"
    • Jim Tiffin Jr
       
      Great way to make Ethical Decision Maker more than just a monthly focus.
  • the students' bulletin
    • Jim Tiffin Jr
       
      Another neat idea... bulletins specifically for the students. HMW use this as part of the reading and writing work that students do already?
  • A small book with blank pages is always available next to the P.A. microphone. "Any staff member who would like an announcement made simply pens it in that book,"
    • Jim Tiffin Jr
       
      This is "High Touch" in my opinion.
  • "The quote relates to our character education trait of the month,"
    • Jim Tiffin Jr
       
      HMW tie our announcements to our mindsets?
  • 'Failure is the path of least persistence,'"
    • Jim Tiffin Jr
       
      Stealing this :-)
  • Students who are members of our Student School Life Committee sign up to present a weekly announcement on Monday mornings,
    • Jim Tiffin Jr
       
      Maybe this answers the question of how to get elementary students more involved in leadership.
  • he always, always makes a special point of thanking the school's cafeteria workers, the custodial staff, the parents volunteers, and secretaries,
    • Jim Tiffin Jr
       
      Another good idea. Thank the people that we too often take for granted.
  • "This term, I've extended the theme by asking students to let me know if they've noticed their peers 'passing on something good.' I share those 'good news' stories the next morning. It is amazing how many stories have been generated Small steps lead to big journeys!"
    • Jim Tiffin Jr
       
      Imagine students write these kinds of messages as part of their free writing, or as part of an end of the day through some kinds of all school reflection time! Stories from teachers and students would be accepted!
  • Larry Davis has been kind enough to share a year's worth of questions for use across the elementary grades. You'll find those questions in Education World's Morning Math feature
    • Jim Tiffin Jr
       
      Jackpot!! A link to lots of possible math questions for the announcements!!
  • A Riddle of the Week
    • Jim Tiffin Jr
       
      Not really riddles, but funny (and punny) things to make kids laugh, or groan. Either response is good when you are building a #havefun community!
  • "We usually do the National Anthem the first nine weeks of school," Roebuck told Education World. "Then we change songs for each of the other 9-week sessions. It's a good way for students to learn the words to a variety of patriotic songs."
  • Briarcrest also is proud of the school's Brag Board. "Each week, every teacher sends me one piece of student work to display on our big centrally located bulletin board,"
    • Jim Tiffin Jr
       
      YES!!!
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    Ideas from various principals around morning announcement routines that help build school culture.
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    Ideas from various principals around morning announcement routines that help build school culture.
Bo Adams

What Would Be a Radically Different Vision of School? | MindShift - 1 views

  • “We’re a place that can get kids into college.” Now families clamor to get their students into the school, but they didn’t trust the idea at the outset.
  • “Modern learning is about the ability to self-organize your education, to create meaning for things that have value in the world and not answer to this institution,”
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    ""Modern learning is about the ability to self-organize your education, to create meaning for things that have value in the world and not answer to this institution," Richardson said."
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    I hear you, but I don't know how to do that much less lead an effort to do that school-wide.
Nicole Martin

Why some schools are giving letter grades a fail - The Globe and Mail - 1 views

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    We don't give grades... because we give more descriptive feedback. I think it would be interesting to see of we notice any increase in learning since we switched - or if kids' attitudes/beliefs about learning changed. I think standards-based grading has increased teacher understanding of learning outcomes and allowed more flexibility in designing learning experiences and assessment.
Shelley Clifford

32 Habits That Make Thinkers - 1 views

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    by Terry Heick The difference between students and learners is something we've discussed before. On the surface it's a matter of tone and compliance, but it also has to do with purpose-why are they learning? How much of themselves are invested in the process? And does it lead to personal change, or mere performance?
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