I hope you find it interesting. I would welcome observations. PS this is
a typical day.
Friday 23 May
Systems thinking: I met TC (visiting compuiting studies lecturer) this
morning. We only had 30 minutes but managed to cover a lot of ground. We
focused on the enculturation role which schools serve and how it would be
an abdication of our moral responsibility to ignore the Internet because
it might have some dubious elements. I will look forward to meeting him
again. Personal mastery/ mental models: He also met with the Modern
Languages dept. to discuss the Internet with them. They have arranged to
visit Moray House next week to have a look at some materials etc. This is
very exciting and shows how a suggestion to a PT can lead to a significant
change in attitude and dept. direction. It is a matter of planting the
seed. Either by a threatening view of the future or a positive vision of
the future. I think the latter approach is more successful but it may be
that different people need different strategies. The staff development
group met at lunchtime.
Once again the meeting was successful. The strategy document is very good
and should clearly state why and how the budget is to be spent. I
anticipate some resistance but it should focus teachers minds on the
notion of personal development and value for money. The only point of
disagreement was in relation to an objective which stated that staff
development should be of benefit to pupils' education. T is concerned
that this will be a bone of contention amongst staff and that it would be
better to leave it out. I argued for it to stay in and it was passed on a
vote. Interestingly I agree with T but I think that by including it on the
list of objectives it once again raises the profile of what we are about
in the school Even if eventually we take the objective out it will still
challenge the thinking of some teachers even if only very slightly.
(shared vision?)
Team thinking: I went round all the PTs to have a chat about the P7
induction evening. I think it may provide a good opportunity for depts.
to realise that they are all working to the same end. I will also use my
presentation to share and reinforce that message with parents and staff.
Systems thinking: I had a long meeting with TK. We touched on a many
issues and I find the whole experience very cathartic. The dilemma of
leading from the front and empowering teachers to do things for themselves
came up again and it seems to me that the initial stages of change demand
a strong leadership role where the change agent is high profile and
directly involved. I think teachers like to feel someone is interested in
what they are doing. The move to an empowering culture comes more slowly
as peoples' personal confidence grows and they realise that the can make
changes for themselves. TK asked me to describe my planning process for
each days work. It was an interesting question but it forced me to
reflect on the process. I suggested that the process is something akin to
writing a poem. You know what the topic of the poem is and you have an
idea of the form the poem is to take but you cannot describe the poem
before hand as it does not exist. Similarly you want the poem to be good
and have meaning for other people. When you are working on a poem that
idea is with you all the time and during the day you can have ideas which
come into your mind. This shaping process can take quite some time. But
there are no established targets or rules. There is no equation which
exists which you must conform to write a poem. I think the process of
change in school is much the same as writing a poem except you are working
on a whole series of poems at the same time and that many of the poems are
inter-connected. You know where you want to finish up but the process of
getting there is the complete antithesis of a mechanistic approach. Which
way is correct? I don't really know, it probably depends on what type of
person you are. Richard Branson said "have an idea in the bath in the
morning and put it into action in the afternoon". This is impossible in
the rigid form of development planning which exists in most schools. We
are anti-entrepreneurial in schools. Yet much of modern management systems
in schools is supposed to be based upon business thinking. Yet this
thinking has changed but schools are locked into one particular view of
the process.
--Learning-org -- An Internet Dialog on Learning Organizations For info: <rkarash@karash.com> -or- <http://world.std.com/~lo/>