To answer this question I think of what we do with our colleagues in our schools to help them shift their teaching practices to more Classroom 2.0 practices. We have covered many topics in the podcast that support shifting individuals and schools but two in particular jump out at me when working with new teachers.

Risk Taking- I wrote about this in my previous post. We ended up needing to postpone that podcast discussion with John Mikton. It is now scheduled for April 30th. When working with university students, I am thinking one can start with the practices they already use in their lives for communication and learning. In most cases this will involve tapping into their everyday life experience of using cell phones, social networking tools, information literacy, etc. while guiding them to see that that already have learning networks in their lives.

Professional Learning Networks- So much to being a shifted teacher is about being a lifelong learner connected to one’s physical and digital learning networks. We again draw on the pre-service teachers’ natural proclivity to use technology to help them set up their RSS reader and to start connecting to the blogs, wikis, etc. that support shifted practices and new learning while offering examples of risk taking activities by educators from around the world.

We know the list of barriers that often affect teachers in many ways not just in not taking risks (i.e., not enough time, too much to cover in the curriculum, assigned tasks that don’t support student learning, parent expectations, etc.). Experience tells me that by talking with individual teachers, finding practices they are confident in using in their classrooms and then asking what they see as interesting in other classrooms or in their professional reading, we as learning specialists (instructional technologists, librarians, learning support, GATE facilitators, curriculum coordinators, etc.) can then help them take small first steps to try new things starting within their area of comfort.

One theme that runs through many of our podcasts about shifting practices and schools is leadership. While learning specialists can make a huge difference in supporting teachers and learning in the classroom, it is our administrators who can really help push the shift by modeling risk taking setting a tone for the school that trying new ideas is expected. By communicating to the larger community through a variety of communication avenues (e.g., blogs, email, Twitter, various presentations tools in parent meetings, etc.), the administrator takes risks with new technology while inviting parents to understand and expect risk taking as part of the school culture. Celebration of teachers and students taking risks should be central to the shift in culture. While much of the focus will be on successful risk taking, we cannot forget to highlight the times when the results didn’t quite work out and learning took place.

If we work with individuals while having the community as a whole assess the nature of our current school culture, we can gather the information needed to create an action plan to build a climate that supports risk taking. While this process might take some time, if we start right away having our learning specialists work with teachers to share their opinions about barriers and needed actions for support while having our administrators lead by example, we can start helping educators take more risks in their teaching.