May+2013

Friday, May 24, 2013
In the rhythm of the school year, May offers a moment for reflection on the year that started last September and ends only a few short weeks away in June. Our year-end PD Session at Dakota was all about looking back over the year with a view to developing our school plan for 2013-14. About 100 of us gathered in the school library to meet in table groups, and to add our thoughts to a shared One Note page. The idea: collect data about our school plan priorities from the whole staff so that the new school plan will benefit. To this end, our PD has truly become more inclusive and participatory. We seem to have moved away from "sit & get" sessions with a brief exit slip for input. Now we tend to talk in table groups around prompts generated by the school leadership. The data is pooled and shared, and I think that most of the staff can see how their input ends up in the school plan.

On May 16th I had an opportunity to present to the staff of the Louis Riel Arts and Technology Centre. ATC is a specialized school that has a strong focus on preparing students for apprenticeship and pre-apprenticeship in a variety of trades. It was good to meet with other colleagues in the same School Division who do vastly different work, but who are also wrestling with many of the "21st Century" issues we face at Dakota. How do we deal with technology in the classroom? When is it appropriate, and does it improve education? I guided the group through two sessions in the morning; first by telling the story of Dakota from 2010 until now. A good portion of the Dakota story is traced out through the entries in this wiki. The second hour we went through the "Can Synectic" that I set up a few years back. It is a fun exercise that develops a variety of definitions of 21st Century learning, and forces a bit of sharing, creativity, leadership and collaboration. It was good to work with the ATC staff and leadership on their year-end PD morning.

As I review our journey at Dakota since 2010 the themes of transition and change keep coming up. Funny how coincidences (serendipity?) help us to find our way forward. Right now I am reading through Transitions: Making Sense of Life's Changes by William Bridges. The book was offered to me by teaching colleague Ellen Snowdon, and although it has been sitting on my shelf for a few months now, I really started to pay attention to it in May. Bridges launched a career helping others to understand thier own style and way of dealing with changes. One of our Vice-Principals at Dakota, Allie Hassin, likes to quote the band SemiSonic when it comes to transitions: "Every new beginning comes from some other beginning's end." The lyric is from the song "Closing Time", and it echoes one of William Bridges's main tenets about transition: Ending comes before beginning. I think that Allie, SemiSonic, and William Bridges all echo the idea that change begins when things end, not when something new starts. If I think very much more about this it could all devolve into a chicken and egg problem, but being able to deal with the ending of things matters for those involved in change. And we are all involved in a great educational change here at Dakota.

In one of the myriad of electronic Tweets/stories/emails/blogposts/RSS updates that I received this week the idea that education is now having its "internet moment" came up. [|MOOCs] are becoming mainstream. Salman Khan and Sugata Mitra are lauded as the Piaget and Dewey of our time, but I am not so sure. Traditional brick and mortar schools (especially public schools) are looking more old fashioned all of the time, and the international dissolution of public education seems to be upon us. In March I Tweeted out a few examplesof the international decay of public schooling systems. Then again, if William Bridges has it straight then maybe the old ways will come to an end before the new ways can really take hold. Metamorphosis can be a wonderful thought, but I do worry about the changes underway being more of an economic revolution, and I wonder about how the entire function and role of the teacher will change.

I do know that Dakota is on course to have all 1200 of our students carrying their own computers to classes starting in September of 2014. You know, that used to sound so far away, but it doesn't anymore. "Closing time" for schooling as we knew it in the 60's 70's 80's 90's and 00's here at Dakota. Every new beginning comes from some other beginning's end. I wonder if SemiSonic is aware of the Transitions book by Bridges. Hmmm. I wonder how many other schools in Manitoba will be like ours by 2020, or if we will still be one of the few, or the only one? Another maxim springs to mind (and I am starting to sound a bit like Sancho Panza, sorry Don Quixote). Maybe "Innovate or Die" is a bit harsh, but perhaps it is true as well. Maybe it should be flipped: "Die, and then innovate". Maybe endings come before beginnings. May is a good time to reflect on endings. William Bridges explains that following an ending there is an undefinable, murky, dizzy time of primordial ooze prior to a new beginning taking form. May is a good month for primordial ooze, and new things popping up out of the mud. In a final tribute to Bridges, I would like to note that he passed away this year. You can look up his obituary if you want. His end has come, and I do wonder what new beginnings will come from his absence among us. May is a good month to reflect on the past, and to consider the future. I am hopeful for the future. The future includes people like Chris Hadfield, so we need to dream big. I just hope it is more of a metamorphosis, and less of a revolution.