How Progressive is Your School?
We just started our two weeks of time set aside to build our learning community at Hsinchu International School (HIS). On Monday morning each staff member shared photographs that represented their lives outside of school. The new educators really connected with the returning teachers as they talked about photos of family, travel, hobbies and interests. We also enjoyed learning new things about returning members of our community. It was nice not feeling rushed and having to go and DO SOMETHING.
Our seniors came in for the afternoon to meet the new staff and to answer questions. It was something to hear them talk about our student learning outcomes, student Choice period, internships, community service, our tight school community, deeper learning, expeditions, etc. They really understand what our school is about.
Tuesday morning we enjoyed a discussion about change and the transition that follows it. Rick Pierce of Rising Sun Consultants lead the discussion from Pennsylvania via Skype video. A big take away for me was that our school leaders took the time to validate the changes our new and returning staff are going (and will go) through. Rick reminds us that it is the transition after the change that we really need to be aware of and be ready to discuss within our community. He summed it up in saying:
“Research and experience has taught me that the first steps in dealing with transition is to bring it out in the open, acknowledge its impact and work deliberately at addressing any barriers which hinder your smooth journey through the change/transition process. The two most important ingredients in dealing with change and transition are information and involvement.”
Our principal, Brent Loken, had everyone do a little homework reading Alfie Cohen’s article entitled Progressive Education: Why It’s Hard to Beat, But also Hard to Find. We listed on flip charts the 8 values Alfie writes about as being essential to be a progressive school. Everyone was asked to take time to respond to specifically to each value by writing on each flip chart a reflection, a question or an example of the value from their experience. We then broke into pairs with a returning and new teacher choosing one value to discuss. They then shared ideas and worked to rank how HIS is doing on a scale of 1-10 with 10 being most progressive.
Each team then presented to the whole group their reflections and where they ranked our school. We will now look to set aside time each month to revisit one value at a time, review the gaps and look at potential action steps to take in getting us closer to 10 for each value. Our new educators really brought many new ideas and perspectives to the discussion. I am looking forward to digging down deeper with everyone as we further discuss these values and our efforts to support them at Hsinchu International School.
