Learning and innovating at the IBAC

I haven’t been to the IB Asia Pacific Conference since I went to Invacargill in NZ in 2004. It was the bleakest, flattest, coldest place in the world; we walked the black ice to the conference in the morning and walked back in the dark at the end of the day. 

Besides the cold weather and the warm welcome of the locals I remember two things from that conference very strongly: the wooden dinghy in the hotel foyer filled with icy NZ beer, and the enthusiasm of the teachers for the IB curriculum.  I’d only been to VCE conferences before, and they were characterised more by teeth-gnashing and more or less outright hostility than the (almost) universal positivity I encountered in NZ.

But it wasn’t the cold that’s kept me away all these years. I don’t personally teach in the IB program and my role is around the teacher development, aligning the teaching and learning approaches to our VCE teaching, and having an understanding of where it’s all heading. Which leads me here this week,to Kuala Lumpur, a place that couldn’t be any more different to Invacargill if it tried. It should be an interesting few days, and I’ll be posting some of my session notes later on.

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The trouble with VIT (continued)

I haven’t railed mercilessly against the Victorian Institute of Teaching (VIT) for a while. Only a couple of times, in fact, in the last couple of years, including my original ‘Whats the matter with VIT?’ post ages ago.

But, boy was I encouraged again to consider the value of our professional voice when I opened up the current issue of Professional Practice, which arrived this week. Printed back to back on a bit of folded A3, VIT isn’t even trying any more. The lead story was a puff piece for Apple loosely based around ‘World Teacher’s Day’, followed up by a couple of pieces talking up VIT’s own professional guidelines around teacher induction and professional ethics. It’s not even glossy any more!   Read my original post linked above about what we thought VIT might have been (a real voice for the profession) and consider what it’s become (a regulatory tax on the profession) and sigh.

Oh, and I forgot the big news. A new portal is coming which will contain ‘many forms and applications’ relating to fee waiver, application for renewal of registration and application to move from provisional to full registration!! (gasps).

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Superintendent Power

I’ve had a bit of trouble figuring out just what a superintendent is; one presenter described his as the ‘king’; I think it’s a cross between a Principal and a District overseer?

Anyway, I attended a session on ‘Empowering the 21st Century Superintendent’ which was about empowering, re-engaging and equipping leaders to be ‘tech-savvy’ leaders.  They’ve even put a ‘toolkit’ for superintendents online at superintendentempower.org

The basic idea, that school leaders need to be confident enough about new technologies to make the right decisions for their schools, is a good one, but the questions around the room at the end of the session were unsettling: ‘how can we use these tools to drive instruction?’, ‘what tools did you use to know this stuff works? and ‘If you upload software you could  jam up the system and bring in a virus couldn’t you?’.

And, an emerging thread that resonates with my thoughts on Australian directions: too much from Central Office!

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Scott McLeod blogging about leadership

One of the magazines that makes its my way to the giant pile on my desk that I actually look forward to is the American magazine Learning and Leading with Technology, published by the International Society for Technology in Education (ISTE).

In the November 2007 issue which just made it to the top of the pile, Dr Scott McLeod explains why he blogs about educational leadership including:

I blog about leadership because someone has to bang the drum and say “Pay attention to the leaders! Pay attention to the leaders!”

McLeod (pictured above with a pile of gadgets that looks remarkably like my desk!) is the director of the UCEA Center for the Advanced Study of Technology Leadership in Education (CASTLE) (nice acronym but perhaps not totally suitable to the model of leadership I’m after!)  The short article points to three interesting websites: the CASTLE site at Iowa State University and two of McLeod’s own blogs, Dangerously Irrelevant and Leader Talk. All three sites are worth checking out; I’m even going to add one to my Bloglines subscription; that’s commitment for you!

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Teaching and leading

Not always earth-shattering in it’s revelations but it’s good to see an attempt to sum up some of the research based knowledge in the recent document from the Australian Institute for Teaching and School Leadership called, Teaching and Leading for Quality Australian Schools. The full document is 55 pages and contains findings like:

Quality Teachers

Quality teaching involves content that is rigorous, integrated and relevant. Content of high intellectual quality helps students develop stronger critical and creative thinking capabilities. Students in classes that regularly provided tasks of high intellectual quality showed marked improvement on standardised assessment tasks regardless of their previous achievement levels. Quality teachers integrate content, tasks and technologies across disciplines making explicit links among subjects and highlighting socially relevant connections. These connections are more powerful when they respect students’ diverse cultural identities. Activities based on intellectual and real-world problems were found to be effective in engaging students. Other effective strategies included integrating multiple tasks and knowledge; using pedagogical scaffolding and feedback; allowing appropriate time for student learning; linking pedagogies to curriculum goals and the needs of individual students; and minimising teaching disruptions.

Control over curriculum and its design

In light of current debate about curriculum and assessment across Australia, it is important to note both positive and negative outcomes from centralised curriculum. Some research suggests that centrally mandated curricula are less responsive to local needs and student diversity, offering fewer opportunities for teacher autonomy, creativity and professional engagement. Other studies found that decentralised curriculum can result in stress and work intensification for teachers.

Educational leader or manager?

In the past few decades principals have had to spend an increasing proportion of their time on managerial responsibilities and accountability. There is agreement in the research that management and administration are core responsibilities of successful school leaders, necessary to ensure the smooth operation of a school.

It is educational leadership that is central to the improvement of students’ social and academic outcomes. Effective school leaders are committed to improving the quality of teaching, encouraging and equipping staff to focus on student learning outcomes. The school principal does not necessarily have to be an exemplary teacher, but should ensure that the school’s main focus is an educative one.

Attributes and capabilities of effective leaders

Successful school leaders possess a range of personal, relational, organisational and professional attributes, plus the capacity to employ these effectively in complex and changing circumstances. It is not clear to what extent the practices, attributes and capabilities of quality school leaders can be learned, particularly given the strong value-base of many of these attributes, such as caring, innate goodness, fairness, consideration for others and honesty. On the other hand, qualities such as being a good communicator, having an inclusive style with high expectations, being hands-on and being a good decision-maker are skill-based attributes that might be more readily learned.

The personal attributes of effective school leaders include passion and commitment (particularly a desire for students’ success), and a capacity for personal reflection. Values of social justice and equity usually underpin the passion, enthusiasm, persistence and optimism of successful leaders

Teaching Australia

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