Group items tagged

If organizations are to develop a capacity to work with mental models then it will be necessary for people to learn new skills and develop new orientations, and for their to be institutional changes that foster such change. ‘Entrenched mental models… thwart changes that could come from systems thinking’ (ibid.: 203). Moving the organization in the right direction entails working to transcend the sorts of internal politics and game playing that dominate traditional organizations. In other words it means fostering openness (Senge 1990: 273-286). It also involves seeking to distribute business responsibly far more widely while retaining coordination and control. Learning organizations are localized organizations (ibid.: 287-301).

it’s the capacity to hold a share picture of the future we seek to create’ (1990: 9). Such a vision has the power to be uplifting – and to encourage experimentation and innovation. Crucially, it is argued, it can also foster a sense of the long-term, something that is fundamental to the ‘fifth discipline’.

When there is a genuine vision (as opposed to the all-to-familiar ‘vision statement’), people excel and learn, not because they are told to, but because they want to. But many leaders have personal visions that never get translated into shared visions that galvanize an organization… What has been lacking is a discipline for translating vision into shared vision – not a ‘cookbook’ but a set of principles and guiding practices. The practice of shared vision involves the skills of unearthing shared ‘pictures of the future’ that foster genuine commitment and enrolment rather than compliance. In mastering this discipline, leaders learn the counter-productiveness of trying to dictate a vision, no matter how heartfelt. (Senge 1990: 9)

By attending to purpose, leaders can cultivate an understanding of what the organization (and its members) are seeking to become. One of the issues here is that leaders often have strengths in one or two of the areas but are unable, for example, to develop systemic understanding. A key to success is being able to conceptualize insights so that they become public knowledge, ‘open to challenge and further improvement’ (ibid.: 356).

In a learning organization, leaders are designers, stewards and teachers. They are responsible for building organizations were people continually expand their capabilities to understand complexity, clarify vision, and improve shared mental models – that is they are responsible for learning…. Learning organizations will remain a ‘good idea’… until people take a stand for building such organizations. Taking this stand is the first leadership act, the start of inspiring (literally ‘to breathe life into’) the vision of the learning organization. (Senge 1990: 340)

In essence, ‘the leaders’ task is designing the learning processes whereby people throughout the organization can deal productively with the critical issues they face, and develop their mastery in the learning disciplines’ (ibid.: 345).

One of the important things to grasp here is that stewardship involves a commitment to, and responsibility for the vision, but it does not mean that the leader owns it. It is not their possession. Leaders are stewards of the vision, their task is to manage it for the benefit of others (hence the subtitle of Block’s book – ‘Choosing service over self-interest’). Leaders learn to see their vision as part of something larger. Purpose stories evolve as they are being told, ‘in fact, they are as a result of being told’ (Senge 1990: 351). Leaders have to learn to listen to other people’s vision and to change their own where necessary. Telling the story in this way allows others to be involved and to help develop a vision that is both individual and shared.

People need to be able to act together. When teams learn together, Peter Senge suggests, not only can there be good results for the organization, members will grow more rapidly than could have occurred otherwise.

It is about fostering learning, for everyone. Such leaders help people throughout the organization develop systemic understandings. Accepting this responsibility is the antidote to one of the most common downfalls of otherwise gifted teachers – losing their commitment to the truth. (Senge 1990: 356)

busy students

flexibility

work ahead

work ahead

she did not miss any of the content in that class

science,

. Students are helping each other learn

s in a flipped classroom for

we spend most of our class walking around helping the students who struggle most

science

Giving students the ability to pause their teachers is truly revolutionary.

We often move too fast for some students and too slowly for others

overall interaction increases: teacher-to-student, and student-to-student. Because the role of the teacher has changed from presenter of content to learning coach,

students with special needs can watch the videos as many times as they need to learn the materia

carry out meaningful activities instead of completing busywork.

Because we were not just standing and talking at kids, many of the classroom management problems evaporated.

. Because students are coming with the primary focus on learning, there are two real questions now: Is each student learning? If not, what can we do to help them learn? These are much more profound questions, and when we discuss them with parents, we move the focus to a place that will help parents understand how their students can become better learners.

As it turns out, many of them were watching right alongside their children and learning science

flipping opens the doors to our classrooms and allows the public in

prerecord a lesson for our students ahead of time when we knew we were going to be gone

in which students move through the material at their own pace.

flipped-mastery mode

Our journey has been a process that has occurred over several years, and we recommend that those interested in flipping make the change gradually.

students don't have access to technology at home

That solution has two fundamental underpinnings: the first is that information literacy is an issue for every college and university; and the second is that librarians should occupy a position in attempts to define and achieve campus-wide information literacy.

While it is legitimate to use some of the information available on the web, students need to learn how to evaluate that information.

A study conducted by two researchers at the Manchester Metropolitan University in the United Kingdom found that 75% of the students surveyed used Google as their first port of call when locating information, with the university library catalogue used by only 10%.

In general, faculty members involved in the process were willing to collaborate with librarians who served as consultants, as instructors, and as team players in designing, teaching and implementing course assignmen

One particular model which has proven to be effective is course integrated instruction. With this model, librarians and teaching faculty co-design a course, and make sure that information literacy is incorporated in the course.

They not only sought to build short-term programmatic partnerships but more importantly, formal long-term working relationships with campus units, groups, departments and administrators.

“Integrating Literacy into the Liberal Arts College Curriculum.

launched a campaign to recruit faculty as partners in the process

took advantage of the liaison system already in place

Symposiums were organized for faculty and librarians to focus on assessment and science disciplines.

offered a workshop

More and more course-related or integrated instruction sessions have come to play a bigger role in making students more information literate.

Changing fee structures, student experience and access to digitized information on the internet, librarians have had to rethink their approach to teaching IL skills

McGuinness (2007) argues that librarians tend to act in a reactive manner to the needs of academics, rather than proactively to promote IL skills.

eads to ad hoc, short-term solutions designed only to address one or two issues.

dds that librarians should align their own goals of incorporating IL skills into the curriculum with the goals of academics and institutions to influence the power structures within institutions and help shape educational content.

highlights both the ambiguity around how IL should be taught, and the important role faculty awareness of IL and integration of library staff plays in integrating IL

unpack the “culture clash” between librarians and academics

cGuinness (2006) found that academics expected students to “learn by doing” through collaborative projects with peers and dissertation reports with occasional support from staff, without a clear sense of how students would develop critical and analytical IL skills

aculty also tended to believe that a student’s ability to gain IL skills were driven by the student’s own motivation, interests and innate abilities, rather than the quality and format of the available instructional opportunities

Multiple literacies, including digital, visual, textual, and technological, have now joined information literacy as crucial skills for this century”

These collaborative efforts have enabled librarians to encourage and support faculty in establishing learning priorities which will ensure that students be equipped with the competencies to become effective lifelong learners.

Only by establishing a successful partnership between librarians and faculty, can the goal of mastery of information literacy by students be accomplished.

The goal of librarian-faculty collaboration in integrating information literacy into the curriculum is to enable students to learn the skills and competencies needed for success during their life time

To make sure that everyone is able to become an educated, skilled, and information-literate person, librarians and faculty at institutions of higher education throughout the world will need to work together as partners to provide the education