Read and comment on this post at the new Pair-a-Dimes location here: http://pairadimes.davidtruss.com/you-cant-go-back-now/

It's the old allegory of the cave.

    Last Friday I was leaving the school and I popped into my VP's office. Among other things, Anthony and I often talk about technology in the classroom. One thing led to another and I showed him the YouTube video that was the subject of my last post: iPhone tutorial from a two-year-old. It was shortly after this, while I was saying something, that Anthony interrupted me:

        "You can't go back now, can you?"
    "What?"
        "You could never be able to go back to teaching without technology, could you?
    "No."

    Driving home after our conversation it occurred to me what a transformation my teaching has gone through in the past couple years. Could I go back to a classroom and teach void of blogs, wikis, & online networks? Well, of course I could, but I just wouldn't want to!

    Not only do I never want to go back, but I have become an evangelist.
However I've noticed a bit of a backlash among teachers. Comments like "We can do that without technology" miss the point about what students have the potential to do. "Every time I get them in the computer room all they do is Facebook" recognizes that technology is a tool, not an answer, but comments such as these are used as excuses rather than challenges.

    In the past few weeks I've heard more than one teacher say, "What is Facebook", and "What is a wiki?". This I can handle. But then I hear about how technology is evil; about what a distraction it is. Well here is a little news flash... IT ISN'T GOING ANYWHERE!

    There are times I just want to put my head down, improve what I am doing as a teacher, and forget that there is 'work to be done'. I can't. Not only can't I return to life in Plato's cave, but I am also compelled to 'share the true light'. I now realize that at times I am destined to be seen as 'blinded', such will be the lot in life for many of us.

Can you go back now?

You can go to the K12Online page or to Chris' wiki page.

To put it simply... there is something here for everyone!

Description
This presentation takes participants along my journey into integrating 2.0 applications and “21st Century Learning” into my pedagogy. The presentation will show how teacher driven assignments and projects teach students some of the skills they need to use these new technologies to enhance their learning. Scribe Posts, Growing Posts and E-Portfolios will provide participants with three different activities to do with their students. The final part of my presentation takes participants into “unprojects”. Participants will learn how to create “unprojects”. For the veteran teacher who is using 2.0 in their classroom this is for you. See how students are more creative and show more enthusiasm towards assignments when they are in charge of their learning.

 This is where the future of education should be heading... Kudos to Chris Harbeck!

- - - - -

Unfortunately I will not be participating in the CUEBC Conference with Will Richardson. He comes all the way to my neighbourhood and I have to miss him! Fortunately I am missing this so that I can help out at a Student Leadership Retreat with my school. I have run these camps for many years (and have resources to share). This year I am helping out rather than leading. I look forward to this, and I hope to learn a lot with the advantage of a different (less stressful) perspective. Joni, is a great leader who truly lives by the mantra I borrowed from Dave Sands, "I teach leadership not followship". I wish I could do both events, but at least I am doing something that I will enjoy and learn from. You can do the same by heading to one of Chris' links above.

Spring brings new beginnings just as a school year comes to an end. As a teacher it is difficult not to be reflective in June.

Special moments remembered, peppered lightly with what could have been, and never transpired. The nostalgia seems to loom more so this year as I contemplate a move after my nine-year career in a single school. 

Two things I have come to realize: I have been fortunate to have worked with some amazing people in an amazing school, and it is time to move on.

My stint has not been without changes:

• the school changed from a 7-9 Junior High, to a 6-8 Middle School

• 2 principals and 6 different vice principals

• only 3 teachers have been there longer than I have

• I have taught in 6 different classrooms

• I've taught 2 different grades

• I've been both a Humanities and a Math/Science teacher

• I've only repeated my same course load twice in 9 years

My stint has not been without challenges: With a wonderful student dying in her sleep days after she finished Grade 9, and job action (twice), being two of the more emotionally draining experiences.

 Yet my stint at this school has been wonderful in so many ways. Imagine being hired right out of the education program and put into a school with 13 other brand new teachers - about half the teaching staff! We had an unbelievable year of learning from each other. Every time you walked into another teacher's room you were 'wow-ed' by what you saw... and in the spirit of learning, there wasn't a sense of one-ups-man-ship that can happen in such a situation, but rather a desire to offer an equally engaging experience in your own classroom. The people I shared those early teaching experiences with are now my closest friends.

And now it is time to move on. I said that four, three, two years ago, and last year too, and still find myself at the same school because it has offered me so much, and yet this time I am sure that I will find another 'home'.

 

I have posted on a few very different High School jobs, including English/Socials in a Gifted Program, a Math 9/10 position, a Planning 10 and Graduation Transition Coordination position, and a Leadership/PE/Student Services position... each one desirable for many differing, but equally intriguing reasons. I already know that I won't be offered the first one, thankfully as it will also be taught with Grade 12 English, (which I have no desire to teach). I was encouraged to apply for that job by a parent of a gifted student in my class going into the program, that in itself was a wonderful compliment. I have just spent some time preparing for interviews, happening tomorrow, for the next two jobs I posted for. I have a passion for Math, and know that I would enjoy focusing all of my attention into one subject area... (hopefully with some access to technology:-) I would also love the opportunity to contribute to the developing Graduation Transitions Program in a school, and perhaps use wikis to coordinate some of the large scale school-wide events organized in order to meet the graduation requirements of every student. Also, I would be interested in implementing an e-portfolio into the Planning 10 course. The final posting would include teaching Leadership at a High School, a position I have wanted to do for years, and something that would make my Grade 5 Leadership/Transition Retreats easier to expand into a district initiative next year.

It is a bit boggling that my interests could take me in so many different directions, and yet I feel ready for which ever path I have the opportunity to follow.

---

I have also been reflecting on this blog over the past while. It has been wonderful documenting my trials, tribulations, and triumphs over the past few months, and the cathartic nature of blogging is one that I can no longer do without. I teach, therefore I blog. However, I have slowly realized that I am a slow-blogger who creates posts in a crock pot, not a pressure cooker. Recently, I have found it hard to write, and for that matter hard to engage in reading blogs. I have had a few tabs open for days now, with great posts  half-read. For this reason, I will be taking a small hiatus, probably fully unplugging for a while in early July. As I near that break, I can't help but wonder how my blog will change, depending on which job I have the opportunity to hold next year?

 

  Images by Roman Edirisinghe on Flickr.

 

Students of all ages have the capacity to lead.

For a few years now I have taken a group of Grade 7 and 8 students to our feeder schools to teach the incoming Grade 5's the "Seven Secrets of Leadership", but really it is about so much more than that!

This is from the e-mail I send to our feeder schools:

What you get: 12-15 of our Leadership Students and a teacher running sessions on “The 7 Secrets to Leadership”. An opportunity for your grade 5 teachers to meet and/or work with the grade 4 students in their classes. (Your teachers do not need to be in the gym, although they are invited to see what we are doing, and stay as they wish.) A reflective journal written by all the students to use as a discussion starter or as feedback for what the students have learned. A positive experience to help make transition to grade 6 less stressful for your Grade 5’s. What your students get: A carousel of 5 activity based lessons run by our Leadership students. -In one activity students all Grade 5’s learn to open combination locks. A few group activities that teach students about leadership. A reflective journal to keep after the session is done. A chance to see grade 7 and 8 students as positive role models. A positive experience the helps students with the transition to Middle School. What we get: An authentic leadership experience for our grade 7 and 8 students. Grade 6 students entering the school next year with positive expectations about what Middles School students are like. (Also, no tears from the stress of opening a combination lock as well as the stress of dealing with everything else that can overwhelm a new student on their first few days of Middle School). We require the use of your gym for 2 to 2.5 hours. All grade 5 students are invited, even if they will be going to another Middle School- the program is not specific to our school.

The Agenda looks like this:

---

12:30        Arrive at feeder school and set up

1:00    Grade 5 Teachers brings students to gym.
        -introductions

Truss     -Journal, 'Secrets' intro.
Journal Entry – "What makes a good leader?"     -Truss

Ice Breaker 2- Leadership Games – 1 or 2 groups
    - Alphabetical by name    - Tyler
    - Birthday                - Sarah
    Continue games but no talking anymore
    - Height                - Deighton
    - Hair Colour            - Callie
    - Shoe Size            - (optional)

Journal Entry –Truss
SECRET #1 – TREAT OTHERS WELL

12:20        Split into 5 groups and move them to the stations
Truss "Get a secret - keep a secret" - Don't talk about the stations.
'Don't you hate it when someone tells you how a movie ends?'

5 Sessions run 5 times by our student leaders:
 12:30        Session 1    ::    12:45        Session 2    ::    1:00     Session 3   
1:15        -Break from the rotation–
Read 'The Butterfly Story '         - Sara
SECRET #2 – THINK BEFORE YOU ACT   
Journal Entry, then rotate to next station
1:30        Session 4    ::    1:45        Session 5

Station # A      -     Balloon Challenge     SECRET #3 WORK TOGETHER            
Station # B      -     Maze            SECRET #4 BE POSITIVE   (Cooperation)
Station # C      -     Blanket Fold     SECRET #5 EVERYONE MATTERS      
Station # D      -     Locks            SECRET #6 ACCEPT NEW CHALLENGES      
Station # E      -     Human Knot       SECRET #7 LISTEN FIRST, THEN TALK
 
1:55    QUICK Synthesis: What Secret to Leading by Example did we learn from…  

The final secret
SECRET TO SUCCESS IN GRADE 6  (A bonus secret) -Truss
When you can’t solve a problem by yourself…        ASK FOR HELP

-Homework (3 questions in the middle of the journal)
- - - - -
10 min. Debrief for our Crew

---

I will be building a resource package to explain the events soon (with the help of my students).
If things work out with funding, I will be helping to implement this program with a number of Middle School Student Leadership teams in our district next near. [Update: I did a Pro-D session in January, though I am not aware of any additional schools doing this to end off '08. I think there was enough interest from a teacher here at my new school, (even before I got here), that these sessions will happen in the '08-'09 school year.]

One important note is that the lessons, 'the secrets', are decided upon by my students. This year students continued on with 4 of the 5 activities that we did last year, but one (the Balloon Challenge) is new, and one of the older activities has a different lesson, as was decided by the group that is running that activity this year. Two years ago, one of the Leadership Lessons was "Take a Risk". I wasn't a fan of this initially, but the group did a fantastic job of running a related activity and explaining how leaders take smart risks rather than poor chances. I am glad I trusted them and didn't try to change their idea because of my bias.

For me, the best part of the retreat is seeing my students improve their ability to communicate their instructions clearly and lead a group of students with enthusiasm and intent.

An excellent learning experience happened this year when students running the blanket fold were over-explaining/demonstrating their activity. The blanket fold instructions were given such that not only did Grade 5 participants understand that the blanket was to be folded, as small as possible, while everyone stood on it (no one can step off or touch the ground), but they also got a demonstration on how to fold the blanket. I told my students, "you are cutting open their cocoons", in reference to the The Butterfly Story and my students fully understood my message... let them figure out how to fold the blanket on their own - don't do it for them!

---

Last week Monday I took a few of my leaders and we ran our activities with some Grade 3's & 4's at a Peer Helper retreat organized by two great principals, Dave Sands and Mark Clay. Their combined effort involved students from two very different Elementary Schools, one that could be classified as 'Inner City' and the other from a very upper-middle class neighbourhood, both out of my school's catchment area.

When we arrived at 5pm the Peer Helpers had already had a full day of training so we took the distinct 'lessons' out of our activities and made the activities much more focussed on fun. We started out with a game of Rock-Paper-Scissors for candy, with my students making sure that everyone always had candy to participate, (a chance for them to lead by example). Then my students ran their activities at 5 stations around the gym. Next, I did an activity for the Grade 3's and 4's to 'put together the pieces' and relate what we did to their Peer Helper programs. But in the end it was these Grade 3's and 4's who help me put some ideas together and taught me something...

We should be teaching Grade 5's at the start of the year to help them become leaders in their school, rather than just at the end of the year to help them transition to Middle School. Later in the week, in talking with two other Elementary Principals when we did the Seven Secrets Retreat at their school, they too thought this would be a great idea. One of them, Perry, suggested that we train Grade 4's at the end of the year and come back and do more with them at the start of the next year. The challenge for us would be getting our program up and running at the start of the year. A lot to think about!

The simple fact is that students of all ages have the capacity to lead... they just need to be provided with the opportunity, along with a little training and support.

...more on Empathy. 

Friday night I camped out at the school with 49 students, each raising a minimum of $50- to earn the opportunity to sleep over at the school. We hosted a 24 hour famine to raise money for our Me to We Club... we are fundraising to build a school in Sierra Leone.

It was fun, and it was exhausting! Three and a half hours of broken sleep... and totally worth it! Some things didn't quite go as planned, but overall it was a huge success. I've done many 30 Hour Famine's for World Vision, but this year I wanted the fundraiser to coincide with our school goal of $15,000.00 to build and help supply the Sierra Leone school. The famine itself is a great way to give the students an experience that many kids around the world are 'inflicted' with: Hunger!

So, I could go on about the kids that snuck junk food in, and indulged... or how these same girls were disrespectful to the female teacher that helped me out, (something I still have to follow up on Monday), but instead, I want to highlight empathy and compassion.  So, enjoy a few tales of the next generation doing good.

Callie: She didn't collect any money. I saw her leaving the school on Friday and said to her, "I thought this would be something that you would want to do?" Her response: "I wanted to Mr. Truss but I just couldn't ask anyone else for money." You see, we just finished a fundraiser selling boxes of chocolate bars - 15 bars in a box, $30 a box. My class sold 16 boxes, Callie on her own sold 22. I gave her a permission slip and where it said 'you must collect a minimum of $50-' I added "^ or sell 22 boxes of chocolates... Wow!" You should have been there to see the smile on her face. 

Reed: (He sold two boxes of chocolates) "Mr. Truss,  I can't ask anyone else for a donation, I'm just going to donate $50 myself so that I can come. I can afford it." He ended up donating $85... basically he got $35 in pledges but kept his personal donation at 50.

Sadey and Misha: For the second year in a row they raised $150 each. While some students just got their parents to write a cheque for $50, these girls collected money 1, 2 or 5 dollars at a time.

Braden: As he handed me his required $50 on Wednesday, "I don't get paid until the weekend, can I donate more after the famine?"

Nicole and Ian: They couldn't sleep over at the school, but still chose to collect money anyway.

Alexandra: We only had one grade 6 girl in attendance. I saw Alexandra from my (Grade 8) class talking to her when everyone was arriving. I asked her if she new the girl and she said yes. I said do you mind making sure this girl feels included? Her response, "Oh, of course!"

Andy & Carleigh: They are the backbone to our Me to We club. They both plan to go to the Leaders Today Take Action! Academy this summer run by Free the Children.  They are two young kids who are thoughtful and compassionate. They are, and they will continue, making the world a better place!

Empathy may not be part of the curriculum, but it certainly can be encouraged in school... by teachers and students alike! 

 

 

 

A well-known scientist once gave a public lecture on astronomy. He described how the Earth orbits around the sun and how the sun, in turn, orbits around the centre of a vast collection of stars called our galaxy.
At the end of the lecture, a little old lady at the back of the room got up and said: "What you have told us is rubbish. The world is really a flat plate supported on the back of a giant tortoise."
The scientist gave a superior smile before replying, "What is the tortoise standing on?"
"You're very clever, young man, very clever," said the old lady. "But it's turtles all the way down!"

---

Yesterday, I was in a meeting with a parent and one of my students, (why do teachers have parent meetings about a teenage student's education and not have the student there too?)

The parent observantly noted that although her son could be physically in a room, he could often 'disconnect' and be elsewhere in his mind. For him to be more successful, he would need to engage more in what was going on. I told him, with all honesty, that I too had that problem to the point that my parents worried that I might have been on drugs (I wasn't). It took until my Grade 13 year (Ontario, Canada) to recognize that I needed to be a participant in the classroom in order to 'stay connected'.

As I was talking my student interrupted and said, "I just had a flash of insight, I'm a mop not a sponge!"

He got it! And today he proved it. He was a fully engaged participant in my Math lesson. I can hear myself in upcoming classes, "Remember to be the mop".

"Metaphors may create realities for us, especially social relations. A metaphor may thus be the guide for future actions." George Lakoff & Mark Johnson "The more we understand metaphor, the more we understand ourselves." Dan Pink

We try to get 'all the way down' to the bottom of things when really what we need is insight into things. [Uhhhg! A perfect case-in-point: I just finished deleting an overdone, unnecessary paragraph describing this.]

We don't need to 'fix' as much as we need to understand... (deeply, not literally).

We must dance to the music, not count the bars, or get to the final note.

Metaphors are the foundation of our thoughts. They assemble ideas, they construct meaning, they build understanding. They create learning.

Metaphors teach.

---

Some Metaphor Resources:

Tick-Tack-Treat (This leadership lesson plan is a favorite from my retreat!)
This includes an introduction to the use of Metaphors and Stories in Leadership Education taken from my Masters Paper.

Teaching Metaphors : Great stories that warm the heart, and teach the soul.

My del.icio.us tagged with 'metaphor'.

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Credits: Turtles all the way down, story and image are from Wikipedia. 'Magic mop' image by Chris Hogg on Flickr. George Lakoff and Mark Johnson quote, 'Metaphors We Live By', University of Chicago Press, 1980, pg. 156. Dan Pink quote, 'A Whole New Mind', Penguin Group, 2006, pg. 140. 'We must dance to the music' video link written by Alan Watt.

An honest look at my blog.

The Good: • This site, elgg.net, is not going to be called EduFilter (seems my e-mail wasn't the only complaint). Elgg is now EduSpaces, a name a number of us recommended - though I bear no claim to my voice being listened to since I also offered a dozen other alternatives.

The Bad: • All my links to the site need changing, this isn't necessary since elgg rather than eduspaces in the address still works, but I would rather that my Flickr, Curriki, LinkedIn, & other blogs etc. all had my updated links.

The (I wish I was) Indifferent: • My Technorati URL needs to change. THE BIG QUESTION: Why did this bother me?

There are two reasons that I can think of: TIMING and EGO.

Timing:
My blog is getting more attention than it ever has. Some noted bloggers: Stephen Downes, Scott McLeod, Wesley Freyer, Miguel Guhlin, and Vicki Davis (on EdTech Talk ) have all given my Web2.0 Prophecy: an Adventure a plug and linked to it with my old elgg address. This attention has doubled traffic to my site and I thank them for this! Yet I sit here pretending it didn't bother me that they are linked to my old Technorati address rather than the new one. This leads to the main reason the URL change bothered me...

Ego:
I while back I e-mailed Scott McLeod in response to his top edublogs? post and wrote this:

Here comes the honest part: I like to go to my sitemeter and see where people visit me from. I like seeing the dots grow, in number and in size, on my clustrmap... and I like when I see new links in Technorati. Why?

The fact is, that I want to be well read, and I want my blog to be recognized. Scott McLeod says it best at the end of his 'top edublogs?' post:

---

So, not only have I mulled over the change in URL, I have also reflected on this blog quite a bit.
After having this blog for almost a year, this is what I know...
Besides my Web2.0 Prophecy post, the posts that get attention are:

1. Square Peg, Round Hole - a collection of other people's ideas around schools not fitting kids that I have been adding to until recently, now a second post is in the works.

2. Portal Needed to Connect Classrooms to the World: Global Citizens can Share Talents and Skills with Students and the accompanying wiki fieldfindr, (yesterday fieldfindr had more hits than my blog... almost a month after I created it as a mock-up to go along with the post). When will someone make this a reality?

3. The digital native, the digital naive, and the digital divide - among other things, the idea that maybe students of this generation aren't fully at the digital native stage... yet.

4. Leadership Lesson Plans - found in my files rather than my blog. Thanks mostly to Curriki, these get visited and downloaded a number of times daily. I am glad I can offer these resourses that I have found useful in teaching Leadership.

And in my opinion, the most under-rated post: School 2.0 Participant's Manifesto - Manifesto's are big in education and schools2.0 but they mostly focus on the changes needed to the system. Here, I look at the responsibilities of the learner- remember them?... the people we are 'doing this stuff to'. (ok, that was a bit cheeky!)

To anyone reading my blog for the first time, Learning Conversations is a post that quotes a lot of my other posts and gives a sense for what this blog is about, and what it means to me.

---

The Good:
  •Quality. I take pride in my posts and although I still do them primarily for myself, I am keenly aware that I have an audience. This has made me a much better writer... (and it can do the same for students!)
  •Recognition. My site is slowly growing in readership. Fear not 'A list' bloggers your position is safe, I'm not tilting the blogosphere on its' head here, but I do consider myself an agent of change, and I will make my world a better place!
  •Meaningful dialogue. I have enjoyed the learning conversations that I have had online. I have not been this excited about learning- ever! Was it like this in school for anyone? Not me.

The Bad:
  •In-click/Out-click. I am amazed at how ridiculous some of the Google Searches are that lead to my site. For example I have the phrase 'Webkinz-dot-com' in a post that happens to touch an image of a (totally unrelated) bridge. 2-5 times a week I get hits from Webkinz (stuffed animal) image searches - Hardly what I would call a meaningful hit.
  •Time. I spend too much time on the computer. I can't keep up with my feedreader. Both reading and writing are slow processes for me. I started highlighting 'New Voices' but have stopped recently because I haven't read any recently. I resolve this by sleeping less, but I can't keep this up much longer. Who is doing all this well? And what is your secret???
  •Comments. I spend a bit of time each week commenting on blogs... continuing the conversation. But I seem to generate very few commenters on my blog. This might be a result of my next point.
  •Post length. I am long-winded. Most of my posts are lengthy. Are readers even getting to the end of them? I think it was Vicki Davis who wrote 'write it, then cut it in half.' I have to learn to do this... it won't be easy for me. Even this post is probably too long!

The Indifferent:
  •Technorati. It took a few days but I'm over it. I really don't mind that I am starting over. I will enjoy watching the links grow again. I have never gone to Technorati to see someone else's ranking and judged their site as a result. In fact, in a comment on Christian Long's post Stop Blogging Because You're An Educator I state: "...Warlick and Richardson seem to be more about post-cards than edu-posts." I've noticed that many of the really meaningful posts that I have read recently have not come from the 'big boys' but rather the boys and girls- like me - that are in the trenches, trying to make sense of where schools are now, and where they need to be.

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Speaking of the trenches, here is a new voice for you (#5 of 7): Read Claudia Ceraso's The Price of Evolution in your Teaching Practice.

Images: Foster City Reflections and Under The Bridge 2 are both by Peter Kaminski on Flickr.

- - - - - 

Introduction
I have just spent my 2nd of 3 days with Bruce Wellman of Mira Via in a Pro-D session tittled Developing & Facilitating Collaborative Groups. The first session had a focus on facilitating groups and my personal learning focus centered around two main ideas:

1. Being deliberate about when we use Discussion and when we use Dialogue.

• Discussion is most effective when a decision needs to be made.
• Dialogue is most effective when we have a Change Initiative.

2. Effective paraphrasing with two powerful concepts: 1. Identifying the 'baskets', the key themes, and not getting lost in the 'noise', the content, that people get stuck talking about without meaningfully moving the conversation forward; and, 2. Shifting the Level of Abstraction. Either shifting down to concrete points or examples, or shifting up to Values, Beliefs, Goals, Assumptions, Concepts, Categories, or Intentions.

An example for this second form of paraphrasing given was a student in a VP's office going on-and-on about his car troubles being the reason he keeps coming to school late. A shift down would be to figure out the specific problem, brakes or alternator, that needs to solved. A shift up would be, "Oh, so what you are saying is that you have transportation problems. We need to sort out if walking, a bus pass, or friends picking you up will be the best possible solution until issues with your car are solved." (This could also be considered 'identifying the basket' in the first form of paraphrasing mentioned).
The idea is to use paraphrasing as a means to direct the conversation towards meaningful discussion.

In the second session the emphasis was more on ways to Promote Inquiry.  Each of the sub headings below have specific skills that can be practiced, and focused on, in order to be more effective at promoting inquiry.

Inviting Thinking
"We are wired to detect threat in the communication of others."

Think about our language:
Decision has the same root as Incision, Precision, Recision... Cutting Away
    Decide other ‘cide’s… suicide, pesticide, herbicide  …killing [ideas]
(note: coincide- co-incident- these have a different root than above.)

So… We can not confuse People with Ideas – kill ideas not people!
Separate People from ideas… Neutralize it linguistically
‘The Idea’ not ‘Dave’s Idea’,     'The key point is' not 'Your point is'

We are wired for psychological safety – so HOW we inquire is as important as the topic of inquiry. We need to reduce the potential for threat in our questions.

The following Elements of Invitation aid in promoting the spirit of inquiry.

Attending Fully
The idea here is congruence... both our physical and our verbal elements of communication demonstrate full presence.
How many times do we have conversations with people while trying to pay attention elsewhere? I am horrible at talking on the phone with my computer in front of me, whereas I am pretty good at having students wait a moment while I complete a task so that I can turn and face them and fully engage in helping them.
I am reminded here of the SOFTEN Model I use with students at the beginning of each year: Smile, Open posture, Forward lean, Touch, Eye contact, Nod.

Approachable Voice

An interesting parallel to this is the universality of our body language across cultures...

'Palms down' is authoritative and controlling "Settle Down/ Listen here/ You need to know...".

Whereas 'palms up' is inviting, "What do you think?/ Tell me.../ In what ways...". Here are some Approachable Invitations:

How might...
What would...
What are some...
What might be some...
In what ways...
How might you...
What seems...

We spent some time looking at how we might use these Invitations with Cognitions, (predict, recall, select, describe, sequence, compare/contrast, analyze, prioritize, summarize, conclude, generalize, connect, apply), in order to inquire, and promote meaningful discussion on specific topics. (These all work well when  paraphrasing as described above).

"How might you summarize the results from the grade-wide assessment?"

"Given these issues around student behavior, what are some generalizations that we can make?

When asking such questions an Approachable Voice will invite much better responses than a Credible Voice.

The 'gift' is to bounce between these two voices, and use them to your advantage.
Think of a new teacher telling the students in a questioning, approachable voice, "Today we are going to ...[?]." -Credible Voice is important too!
Not enough of this is focussed on with student teachers!
A pet peeve of mine is when people use uptalk and make statements sound like a question?

Use Plural Forms  
...to invite better inquiry.
-observations
-options
'The' is singular, 'Some' is plural. (See below)

Exploratory Language
...is psychologically safer.
These promote more meaningful responses. They reduce the need for confidence/surety and the need to evaluate and sort ideas, until after several ideas are fully developed.
Switch:
The...    to    Some   "What are some key ideas here? (Plural Form)
Could...    to    Might
Is...    to    Seems
Why...    to   What    "What are some of your thoughts about that?"
Can anyone tell me...    to    What are

Positive Presuppositions
Finding and focusing on the positive aspects of the message being communicated... it encourages an "on-going willingness to engage with each other and with ideas". This reminds me again of paraphrasing by shifting up- with the purpose of finding a positive belief or assumption.
Example:
Statement: "Our students just can't do the work."
Facilitator/Group member: "So, you're concerned about helping all of these students be successful."

Non-dichotomous Questions
Ask question that can not be answered by Yes or No.
"Did you notice..." becomes "What are some interesting or unusual things that you noticed..."
Avoid these dichotomous question starters:
Did you...   Will you... Have you...

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I used information from both of my Pro-D sessions with Bruce Wellman to create the post above, with most of the information coming from notes on a page that was:
Adapted with permission from: B. Wellman & L. Lipton, (2004). Data-Driven Dialogue: A Facilitator's Guide to Collaborative Inquiry. Sherman, CT: Mira Via LLC.
Thanks to Bruce for allowing me to share this information... please cite appropriately.

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My thoughts:
What happens to most Professional Development (Pro-D) resources? For me it often gets tucked in a drawer, or piled onto a filing cabinet for later reference... and then it is forgotten! This is part of an on-going attempt to make the learning more meaningful. By reviewing and synthesizing the session for this post, I start to 'own' the material, or the concepts taught.
There is actually quite a lot of very useful information here not just for facilitators of groups, but for any member of a group. Things I can immediately work on:
• Effective paraphrasing in order to move the conversation forward, rather than just to summarize.
• Being a little more deliberate/aware of when to use my Credible vs my Approachable voice.
• Making questions more inviting, exploratory, and positively framed.

Depending on what the third session is like, I might write another post, or I might just add to this one.
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Photo Credits:
untitled by gregw,
渴望：DESIRE by ah BOB lee -- the JiuHuKia,
and Katie by me.

 

On Tuesday I got to hear Chris Kennedy speak. He is a principal, teacher and somewhat of an unofficial district technology guru. His main message: "It isn't about the Technology!" Good teaching practice transcends the use of technology. What technology can do is: create new ways to use and improve your skills as a teacher; engage and interest students in ways that you could not before; prepare students for a world very different than the one we grew up in. 

 

It was the 'side trips' in the talk that I really appreciated. Here are two that hit a chord with me.

 

1. Mentorship: Chris weaved into his talk, time and again, how much he appreciated his mentors at the school - teachers whom he learns from. He seems to have created a real learning community at his school (with a voluntary book club, and an open invitation for any teacher to come to Team Leader/ Department Heads Meetings).

“Teachers want to be more than independent contractors that share a parking lot.”

 

Chris also mentioned how important it is to be in an environment where "I can screw up and it is ok," and he notes that critical friends are needed as well as mentors.

 

In my exploration of web2.0 I have not done a good job of seeking out mentors... the result has been hours of forging my own trail, trial and error, and in many cases a very steep learning curve. Chris spoke humbly of his digital immigrant status, and that he counts on friends, teachers, students and mentors to show him new things that he then plays around with, until he too can take ownership of the new skills or tools. It is interesting that in the past couple of days I have had two friends request some time with me to 'show them the ropes' with some of the tools that I use. All these people seeking mentors and here is stubborn Dave slogging away at it on his own... This I will [am] change [ing]!

 

2. Not Obstacles but Opportunities: Before I begin this section I need to give a little background to my day, before Chris' talk. I started the day at a team leader meeting where it was decided that we are banning mp3 players from our classes. Students are free to use them outside of class on breaks, but not in the classroom. I voiced my desire not to do this, but I didn't have the benefit of hearing Chris talk before this decision, and I guess that I was less than convincing.

Here are my notes from Chris' talk:

Kids are going to text message.
How are we going to make that work in our school?

When someone wants to ban something,
I ask myself,
how can we use this to help us in education?
‘It is a new tool’.
Not obstacles but opportunities.

I like mp3's in my Math class. Students know that when I talk, headphones are to be removed from their ears. In my experience students appreciate, and are respectful of, the opportunity to listen to music in class. However, I also know how important it is on a staff to have teachers support and show respect for school rules (and each other). I have already made the rule clear to my students... I just happen to think that this is something that teachers should have autonomy over.

Now here is the thing… Am I using mp3’s in my class for any kind of educational purpose? No, not specifically... and until I do, it really isn't something I should be terribly upset about.

What it comes down to is qualifying the kind of questions we are going to ask ourselves when considering (new or ubiquitous) technology use in the classroom.

“How can we use this?” Seems to be a much better question than, “Should we?”

 

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Photos: 'Helping Hand' by popofatticus/Barrett Hall, 'What Dragon?' by wjklos/William Klos.

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