Be of Use

What does good professional development look like? I've struggled with this question during my decade as a professional educator. Some of the questions I've asked myself or discussed with others is - Before school? During school? After school?  Compensated? Contractually compelled? Not compensated? At will participation? The better question is - how does the learning take place - not when or why. If we preach to our teachers to change how they are doing things in the classroom, it's pretty disingenuous to set up professional learning in a lecture hall/auditorium setting, or a 40 minute demo with time afterward to "give it a try." My last full day of the 2012-2013 school year, was my most proud because I think the team I worked with got professional learning right. It was a leadership retreat, rather than a data focused retreat this year. My director laid out the videos she wanted to share to get the building leadership teams to - for lack of a better ...

Like other folks, I was surprised and annoyed about the end of life announcement on Google Reader. This is something I use everyday (but I guess I'm only one of a few thousand...not several million) and I rely on it for getting a great deal of good ideas sent directly to me. Tonight I had a thought that it might be a good thing. Did Google Reader stunt my own growth and curiosity to read about what many others have to say? There's tens of thousands (if not hundreds of thousands or more...) of educators out there sharing what they're doing, what they're thinking about but don't have the bully pulpit of Larry Cuban or Will Richardson. It certainly doesn't mean they have lesser things to say. Mostly they right about their own action research they're doing right now - very useful things to read for practitioners. In the last few weeks I've divorced myself from Reader and used other avenues to get my information from. Tonight I came upon this nice post on I ...

I'm sold on personalized learning for kids. As a parent I see everyday, if you give kids the opportunity to create and explore they take off with it. Adults, that's a different story. We've already been programmed to learn a certain way. This past winter (well we're still technically in winter...) I lead a professional development day starting with a keynote on Digital Literacy. In my email to the staff a week ahead of time I listed the learning resources and clearly stated that this would be self-directed learning time. After my presentation, I go off to the library to facilitate and I have 50 teachers staring at me waiting to start. Be free my children...go off and learn. Easier said than done. How do we break people of the habits they've learned over decades of schooling K through a Master's Degree, on to professional learning events? Putting together/curating resources is easy. The adult learning...that's the hard part. I think having personal learn...

My wife is in Philadelphia right now at the American Council on the Teaching of Foreign Languages Annual Convention. Right away this morning she was texting about how inspired she felt right away in her morning workshop - seeing new things, sharing ideas with those around you in the room. A lot of goodwill all around. Education is tough. The day-to-day grind can grind people down. I commented on a message to someone on Twitter that I've seen way too many folks in my career that are checked out when they still likely have 30 years to go in their life. I wonder if those educators didn't do enough to revitalize their practice? Over the last few years I've been scoffing at conferences because first my Google Reader Feed fit my learning bill - long before I knew what a Personal Learning Network is - and now Twitter helps me to keep fresh ideas floating in. Those are the things we all need to make learning part of our everyday lives. Sure you can Email, Tweet or Post to sink y...

For the last few months when a political ad wasn't on, there have been a few different ads running from Exxon on the importance of investing in our teachers. Is it just a feel-good ad campaign from Big Oil, or is this really happening somewhere? For the last several years I've been hearing about how important Professional Learning Communities are. Outside the bubble of Lincolnshire, IL who's really doing a PLCs in a way that is deep and meaningful? The DuFours have even admitted that the term is losing its meaning. Now the concept of becoming a Connected Educator with a Personal Learning Network is becoming popular, but districts still block Twitter and Facebook. I've never heard anyone involved in education say that professional development isn't important. It's just done really poorly. Here is a portion of  Learning Forward's  proposed definition of Professional Development for the reauthorization of NCLB. primarily occurs several times per wee...

As I wrote last night, I'm all wound up about releasing of first Flipped PD  release on Tuesday. Tonight I was reading the Chief Learning Officer magazine and many of the articles focus on informal learning. The latest article I read - Unlock the Next Wave of Productivity - really drives home the importance of new shifts in what training should look like. Only by enabling informal learning will organizations meet demands for greater flexibility and more learner-driven content. While that article said what I wanted to hear (yes, you're on the right track), it also reminded me of meeting the needs of all learners. Our professionals come from different generations, have different learning styles and come with different levels of technology skills. How do we move forward and still respect the more traditional thinking folks? Hiring substitutes for teachers to go to training is an expensive non-scaleable solution, but you take advantage of it when you have it as an option....

Back in spring, I wondered via blog post how professional development might look different someday soon. After reading much about Social Learning, Personal Learning Networks and Informal learning, I knew there were ideas out there I was doing a bad job of connecting with. Plus I had come to a tipping point with professional development offerings. I was done with trying to make the 60 to 90 minutes between the end of school and picking your kids up from daycare, work. I threw it out to my fellow teaches to see what they thought. They said, what I thought they would based on seven years of experience with training teachers - after school isn't a very popular option for learning. Personally I believe your average teacher isn't going to be able to effectively jump right into Twitter and being building a strong Personal Learning Network after having only friend-to-friend interactions on social networking sites. I feel a bridge is needed to get to that place of independent, sel...

...getting used to my new digs in Germantown . I moved into an office I'll be sh aring with a soon to be hired Student Information Specialist. To be honest there were plenty of times in the last week I felt like I was going to puke - moving on from all I've known for 7 years professionally. Stomachs have settled now and great conversations are taking their place. Had a great one today with our high school media specialist Jeff Schreiber  who has done great things integrating technology, boosting circulation and getting kids reading. I know we're going to do some great things in the next few years and I look forward to the challenge of discovering what works for Germantown in terms of instructional technology. In addition to instructional technology integration, I'm also working on data and assessment analysis. This is a hot topic in Wisconsin right now, as the DPI NAEPized  (more than you care to know on this link) our standardized test scores. Students who may...

I'm wrapping up Jay Cross's Informal Learning , a book I started between semesters this winter and picked back up after wrapping up my last final at UWM. The New Social Learning   and Personal Learning Networks   started to reframe my thinking on what we need professional development to be - learner centered, flexible, online, informal...not top down, large group, "formal" classes or sessions. I think that this change is obvious, especially in light of the push for Professional Learning Communities that help create job-embedded learning opportunities for staff. But it's not an easy sell, at least for me, to the powers that be. They seem to not know anything else, other than the tried and true after school session, workshop or mashed together credit-worthy professional development class. Development opportunities, some think, need to have a date on the calendar or event, with a stopwatch keeping track of the time. Could their be a more top-down approach to lear...

On Doug Johnson's Blue Skunk Blog, he shared two excellent posts. One on mobile learning  from Mind/Shift, the other on change  in schools by Larry Cuban. The realist in me knows that big shifts in practice, no matter what the institution takes time. The visionary and parent in me wants change now. Others people's kids and my kids shouldn't have to wait. If we wait, we may just be behind again once we're"caught up"...always a few steps (or much more) behind. The realist in me knows that what some consider "real change" is more just rhetoric that faces an up hill battle no matter the philosophy - like over in Oconomowoc . Something hit me the other day while training on the basics of SMART Board software. I had a nice group of teachers who were trying very hard to improve, but I couldn't help but wonder "are they already too far behind?" Am I training them on decades old software that we should be moving beyond? Did we fail as a tech ...

I don't go to conferences often anymore. It's not because there is absolutely no money, I don't find it all that useful in the land of hyper connectivity. There is a great deal you can get out of a Google Reader and a Twitter Feed. Times is also an issue. Online if something isn't useful, you can scan it and move on. At a conference you're liable to sink 20 minutes into a session before you cut bait and by then it hardly pays to just into another session, because it's likely half-way done by that point in time. I want to want to go back to conferences, but what I want to hear is what you are doing with it in your school?  Let me give you some examples. Two years ago, I went to a conference called SLATE here in Wisconsin. The conference was fine, but one annoyance was I watched Scott McLeod's Did You Know: Shift Happens  video at every session. Really? There were two sessions that stick out in my head from that day, one incredibly useful because it was abou...