Day 3: 2017 April Blog A Day Challenge - Professional Mentoring

Prompt: What role has professional mentoring played in your teaching career?

Image via Here (Also a great article!)

Today, my field supervisor for my graduate program came to observe me working with one of the teacher teams I am coaching this semester. Because half of the team was out with the flu, it was 1:1 coaching time!  It can be a double-edged sword.  Is there going to be enough to discuss with one teacher instead of two?  Is the teacher going to have enough autonomy in the pair to make decisions and keep the work moving forward? As we began the work together, all the while being watched by a field supervisor I had met only an hour earlier, the discussion flowed. We dug into thinking about the development of the new mastery skills for the upcoming unit.  The thinking the teacher was doing was exciting to experience and as a coach, it pushes my own understanding of the process of developing mastery skills for content outside my expertise.  

I share this story because it is an important reminder for me about the importance of coaching and mentoring to support the development of teacher capacity.  I have had a number of coaches and mentors over the years- Marci and Courtney have been the most pivotal in the context of teaching English.  My current administration- a team of three that have each made themselves available to me to be think partners as well as critical evaluators of my work and development as a leader. 

The Morning After- How I Had Tough Conversations With My Students

The workshop yesterday at AFSE on Restorative Justice with Erin Dunlevy was well timed.  As we participated in the morning training, I honestly didn't think I would need to be using some of the tools I learned to soon.  But last night, I along with all of you, watching the election results and America broke my heart (though not unexpectedly- as we all like a bad boy, right?)

I finally fell asleep around 2, wondering what I would say to my students in the morning.  My first period class on Wednesday is my AP Lang class.  We just spent a month thinking about language and rhetoric in politics as well as reading Thank You For Arguing. The 11th graders have begun to think critically of language and word choice and how a writer or speaker can use language to achieve a goal.  I knew that combining a content circle and keeping the discussion grounded in the content I would be able to get through a 60 minute class with out crying.

Before class started, I asked a few of the kids who arrive early to create the circle in the space, moving the desks out of the way.  I was grateful that they were willing and able.  Erin had been right- kids understand the unspoken rules of circles.   I posted the discussion norms on the board:

1. Only talk when holding the Talking Piece
2. Respect for all perspectives
3. You can pass.
4. If you aren’t sure, pose a question to the group.
5. It you want to save it for later, write put it in the parking lot.

We then did two rounds.  Round one, I asked each student to share one word that described how they were feeling in the moment.  Each student passed a small button around the circle, sharing their words with the group:

Confused. Scared. Frightened. Angry. Confounded. Lost. Why? Frustrated. Powerless.

It was clear that this had been the right move.  The tone of the room was somber, but these are kids I have built a relationship with over the last few years and they knew the room was a safe place (even for our one vocal Republican). 

In the second round I asked kids to write one question they had.  That it may not be answered, but something they wanted to pose to the group and the universe. 

Here are some of their questions: 

• How did Trump successfully get the majority of the votes?
• What did Hillary do differently than Trump?
• Why did 31% of hispanics, 38% of asians and 8% of blacks vote for Trump?
• What do you think Trump's first move as president will be?
• Why do you think the number of women that voted [for] Trump was so high?
• Do you think Hillary would have won if the people who voted for Bernie voted for Hillary?
• Are you ready to be drafted for the war?
• Will he do anything to change our educational system?
• How do you think having Trump as president and the Senate and House being Republican will affect new and past laws? 
• How did you react to all the red on the map?
• Does this mean we are living in a mostly racist world?

We can tell from looking at the list of questions where their heads are.  They are grappling with the same confusion that I watched the news commentators and analysts sort through late into the night.  They are at a loss, as are many of us.

We then came back to the language.  I had heard a commentator on the news talking about the effectiveness of "Make America Great Again" and what it did for the campaign.  I posted the following slide on the board, asking them to examine the language itself and what it did for each campaign: 

The shares were again thoughtful and insightful.  My one Trump supporter was asked to begin the share- as the first thing he said as he had stormed into my room earlier in the period was, yes, you guessed it, "Make America Great Again!"  The nice thing about the protocol is that it is not about debate, it's about sharing and being heard.  The space was safe, nonjudgmental and all voices and perspectives were able to be heard.

At the end of the hour, we had all participated in a thoughtful and reflective conversation that helped us to think about one narrow aspect of why? and to challenge our thinking and push our own understanding of the complexities of our country and it's citizens. I made it through the class with out crying.

Hours later, as I sat with my 9 advisees- all young women, all minorities, and I finally cried.  I cried because in hearing their fears, I became even more aware of my own privilege and what it allows me.  I cried because I had wanted so badly for Clinton to shatter the glass ceiling and for these 17 and 18 year old young women to see the first female president.  I cried because I want them to not fear the rest of the country, but in reality- red= danger in many of their minds. And I cried because for many of them their instinct is to protect others, to advocate and stand up for injustice, because they are all amazing young women. 

In another hour I will be sitting with my cohort of 14 peers, all aspiring school leaders who are passionate about our kids and urban education.  As educators, we are the front line- Blue state or Red.  It is our job to educate.  It is our job to teach empathy and tolerance. It is our job to continue to help in the raising of kids who will always fight injustice and not be afraid to speak up.

I know that the future is in good hands.  I hope the next generation of young people will be the change they want to see in the world.  In the mean time, I show up. I listen. I make the circle and I pass the button and ask the tough questions.

Summer Reading: Better: A Surgeon’s Notes on Performance by Atul Gawande

Image via Amazon.com

I am heading into the second year of my grad program in school leadership (read: Administration). We were asked to read Atul Gawande's Better: A Surgeon’s Notes on Performance. After everything I have been through over the last 3 years including weight loss surgery and the ensuing massive weight loss, thyroid cancer, vocal cord paralysis and surgery to help the paralysis, and surprise gall stones that led to numerous medical challenges between Thanksgiving and the end of the school year- and lots of trips to the ER and yet one more surgery...it was a difficult book for me to read. However, it left me with lots of ideas and thinking about systems, methods, and how to do things better.

There were so many moments that stood out: 

“We want doctors to push and find a way...We also want doctors to fight even in the most mundane of situations.” (160) and “At some point you have to admit that you are up against a problem you are not going to solve and that, by pushing further and harder, you might well do more harm than good.  Sometimes there is nothing you can do.” (163)

but the following is the reflection I wrote to submit for my class, reflecting on some of the more poignant ideas for me, as educator and not surgeon. 

Better: A Surgeon’s Notes on Performance by Atul Gawande took me a long time to read. Not because it was a challenging read, but because it was triggering for me on many levels.  I know “triggers” is a word that is thrown around these days, but it was a good reminder for me that many things we read bring things up for the reader, triggering emotions, memories, and thoughts about things that have happened in their lives.  The lens with which he examines practice and performance is medicine and my overabundance of medical procedures over the last three years as left me in a somewhat delicate place.  Despite all the triggers, I found many pieces of thinking and insight he offered applied to my own work and evolution as educator and leader.

To start, Gawande writes,“...diligence stands as one of the most difficult challenges facing any group of people who take on tasks of risk and consequence.” (29) There have been countless times that I stepped in front of a group-- students or adults,  and felt as if I was taking a huge risk.  The stakes are often high: trying a new teaching method or activity, presenting a way of thinking to a group to try in their own classrooms, discovering along with students instead of going in with all the answers, and in an age of high stakes testing, exams that must be passed to graduate.  Diligence is defined as, “careful and persistent work or effort” this is exactly what is needed in order to create and define a school community.  This act of diligence couples with the risk is as the forefront of what is needed for leading and running a school. Inquiry should drive understanding and thinking at multiple levels of education.  “Sometimes, however, we will be wrong...We each should then be prepared to accept the consequences.   Above all, we have to be prepared to recognize when using our abilities skilfully comes into conflict with using them rightly.” (153) and “...the hardest part of being a doctor...is to know what you have power over and what you don’t.” (154) Substitute doctor for ANYTHING.  It is true.  Knowing what we have power to control and what we don’t is a lifelong quest to understand.  As educators we often work to control all the pieces.  This is why lesson plans are often overly structured- school leaders want teachers to anticipate all the possible variables, especially early in their careers, that could happen in their classes.  I have found so much power in not knowing all the answers and being able to say to students, I am reading this with you for the first time.  Let’s see where it takes us.  There will absolutely be failures and times when we are wrong.  But, as school leaders, turning to teachers and teachers leaders to set the same example can be essential.  

Even in trying new things, working to be somewhat transparent, developing systems, asking teachers to take risks and go on the journey with you, and hoping failure isn’t inevitable, the following still holds true:

...the natural pull of conversational gravity is toward the litany of woes all around us. But resist it. It’s boring, it doesn’t solve anything, and it will get you down.  You don’t have to be sunny about everything.  Just be prepared with something else to discuss: an idea you read about, an interesting problem you came across… (253)

This is perhaps some of the best advice, especially for teacher leaders who are working with younger teachers or teacher teams. School communities can quickly become toxic, an us vs. them, or a sinking ship that sometimes schools can begin to resemble. Having the ability to steer the conversation towards a new idea, a problem of practice, or even a positive exchange with a student can make all the difference in the development of community within schools.

Finally, “...discover the unexpected.” (252) Learning is about discovery.  When we already think we know all the answers, the space for cultivating new thinking and perspectives can and will be lost.  Being open to possibility should be at the core of all that we do.

Leadership: Thinking About Support

As teachers, we often ask questions that we already know the answers to.  It is part of the planning process to anticipate what might be confusing and how we will navigate said confusion with questions to help students navigate through and ultimately come out the other side with a new sense of what they think, believe or even feel about a topic.

Next month, I begin the second year of the CLASS program at Hunter College facilitated by New Visions for Public Schools. I am studying to earn my SBL license.  As a result, I often find myself thinking about leadership and management.  Last night, I was sitting around with family.  Both my parents are now retired.  Some how we got onto the topic of: what makes a good manager.  I already knew the answer to the question I was going to ask, but I asked it any way.  What do you need from a manager in order to do your best work?

The first part of the answer I got was what I expected, because it is what I always want. It's about autonomy.  As employees, we want to be trusted to do the work we were hired to do because as managers or supervisors, we believe that you hired us because we are the best at what we do and that is why we are there to do it.  You would have hired someone else if that was not the case.  Micro-management undermines the relationship and leads to distrust and frustration, on both parts.  Employees, just like kids, need to have success and failure in order to grow and develop.  We need to be trusted to learn from our experience, reflect and evolve.

The second part of the response was a good reminder.  When I have a question, because there is something I may not know, or need clarification about, be available--as a manager, with an answer and a good one at that.  Even if the manager does not know how to do every job of every person working for them. (I am a big fan of collaboration and brining in people who are experts in their field to do the things that I can't.  This is how I learn and get better and as a teacher, how my kids learn!  This is why the arts has Professional Teaching Artists).  Being available and being a part of solving what ever the problem is ends up being good for the employee and even better for the company.

As I go into year two of thinking and learning about leadership and management, I will work to remember these two things because I already knew they were they answer, it's simply up to me to act on it.

21. When Do You Feel Most Like You Work On A Team? Reflection on what makes a successful department. #edblogaday

Source: Golspie H.S.

You have all heard it, "There is no I in TEAM."  I always tell my kids that cliches are cliches for a reason.  I have had some amazing team work experiences.  They seem to empower all the players, celebrate each person's strengths, and showcase what working together and hard can produce.  I have had experienced this trifecta of teamwork most frequently when I worked in professional theatre.  I think it is in part because each member of the team has a speciality and focus, something unique that they bring to the table and that is celebrated and capitalized on for the betterment of the production.

In schools it is the same, yet different.  Yesterday at our spring day long professional development we began the day with an exercise I have done at least three times now.  The Leadership Compass Self-Assessment (from Be The Change Consulting) You go through the list of traits for each of the compass points and then determine which direction represents you the most.  We were then directed to go and stand at that point.  I moved to the East- the "visionary".  I looked around the room and one member of our ELA department stood at each point of the compass.  This is why we work so well.  We all bring different strengths to the table and we balance one another.  

As we have interviewed new ELA teachers this spring, its been interesting to really think about what we as a group need.  What will both challenge and compliment?  What strengths does someone need to bring to the table to further build an already strong group?  I think there is a lot we could do to work better as a team.  My hope for next year is that there is more time for content specific PD for our department, to learn and grow together, not just facilitating business/administrative decimation of information. I want to see us evolve, take on different points of the compass and navigate through out first year with 9-12 grades.

18. The Reflective Practitioner and Calculated Risks #edblogaday

At the end of each of our lesson plans and unit plans is space to reflect on how it went and attach student work (digitally).  Admittedly, I seldom take the time to reflect on the lessons this way.  It has never felt authentic but rather forced.  When I began blogging for this project at the beginning of April, it didn't feel forced.  My thinking felt authentic, honest and it was true to me.  While I know blogging is the long form of reflection, what is the happy medium between nothing and blogging that still gives me time to think about my teaching in a brief yet authentic way that really does serve a purpose?

I have found of late that my reflection has centered around many WHY questions as I work to dig through the much of my craft.  As I was walking out last night, I walked along side my Principal and I was sharing with him that a teaching colleague, who had applied to another admin training program (one I applied to but did not get into) had been accepted.  It will be an intense one year program.  I applied to another program, that is 2 years, will culminate in a second Masters, give me my 30+ credits and support my development in a cohort of 24 professionals while being supported by Hunter College and our network New Visions.  My boss told me he was glad I was taking the route I was- even though he graciously wrote me recommendations for both programs.  I am too.  I think this is a better fit for me.  As we parted last night he left me with the thought- WHY am I going though the administration program?  What do I want to do at the end of 2 next two years? 

I relayed this story to my husband when I got home.  He told me that he thought the push from my principal was the right step.  He is challenging me to really begin thinking about the WHY and what this next step may mean for me.  At this point what I know is that I have begin to develop some very clear thinking about what it means to be a part of a school community and in order to really understand the HOW of educational systems, I need more training.  I need to go back to school.  

I worry that I am too emotional, too sensitive and that I could never be as removed as it seems principals feel they need to be in order to be truly effective school leaders.  This part I don't understand and I believe I need to go through this process to learn what being a school leader means to me and should look like.  What if I go though this process and decide that being a school leader is not what I want?  I think this is an ok risk.  I know it will push me to be more reflective, to be more critical of my own practice and as a result hopefully it will make me a better educator and leader.

16. Appreciation and Expectations- My Journey Through Heartbreak #Edblogaday

A friend of mine posted the above image on Facebook last week and I set it aside, knowing that it would become a blog post.  I suppose it would have made a great Teacher Appreciation Week post, but after participating in the #NYEdChat last night on Twitter, it is clear to me, now more than ever, that teachers thrive in positivity.  This does not mean that we need to inflate each others egos or provide untruths.  It means that teachers should speak up and speak out about what IS working.  This is why writing about appreciation, not just for a week in May is integral to growth, development and cultivation of community.

I, like many of us, have already had many jobs in my short 38 years. I have had great employers and I have had horrible ones.  When I saw this image, the first thought into my head was, of course I do! I want to work hard when the hard work is recognized.  I have always thought of myself as someone who does work hard.  My parents let me get my first job when I was 10, as a Mother's Helper- before I was old enough to babysit.  I worked at the local Rec Center on Saturdays, earning a paycheck for score keeping through the winter basketball season.  (Though at the time it was really just a way for me to be around the older boys from the neighborhood who I thought were cute.)  I think I filed my first Federal tax return in middle school.  I understood that hard work pays off and leads to more work, more OPPORTUNITY. 

Teaching is the first field I have worked in where appreciation is much harder to come by than punitive gestures.  It leaves teachers feeling guarded and overly cautious, and as a result, not trusting themselves to do the work they know they are trained to do.  The work they know they are good at and in most cases they love.  At the end of year 4 I was crying almost every day at work. I should have found a new job.  I felt a loyalty to my students and stayed one more year, even through it was not a good decision.  I no longer had the support of my administration (and it was unclear why this has happened) and it felt like nothing I could do was good enough.  I had tenure.  I had great test scores.  I moved students forward every year.  It didn't matter.  I didn't feel appreciated.  I felt hated and as a result I didn't want to take on any more than I needed to.  I left right at the end of the school day.  My job that I had loved more than anything was breaking my heart.

The longer I am in the system, the more stories I hear like this.  It now frames my thinking about what it means to be a leader.  I am starting an admin program this fall and I have started to build many ideas about what it means to be a school leader. I have been watching our administration more closely, noting how teachers are supported, encouraged, developed and appreciated.  It's all food for thought as I grow in my career.

Most days, I do feel appreciated. Most days I know I play an important role at my school.  I don't know that every teacher at my school feels this way but I think it's possible for appreciation to be felt by all.  Not just for one week in May.