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He kōrerorero, he whakaaro

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He kōrerorero, he whakaaro
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He kōrerorero, he whakaaro
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the evolution of why

The evolution of why…

Posted on June 28, 2016 by James Hopkins

the evolution of why

There’s no doubt in my mind, Simon Sinek’s Golden Circle and his philosophy behind ‘Starting with the why is one of the most genuinely powerful theories I have ever come across. Its simplicity and ease to understand, but complexity in its personalisation is nothing short of incredible. I have continued to use and model establishing a clear ‘why’ for over twelve months, revisiting it with people, discussing elements that may have changed as they continue on their journey, underpinned by strong modern learning practice. As the workload builds and the general busyness of school life begins to take over, how often do we really stop, take a minute and remind ourselves why we do what we do?

Just last week, I invited a staff to begin thinking and sharing their why. Using The Golden Circle and Sinek’s amazing TED Talk we began to explore people’s motivations and drivers. Some sat patiently listening and digesting the views of their peers; others launched into questioning why they got out of bed that morning, what they wanted to bring to their classroom, and what they wanted their students to aspire to. And quickly they fell into the ‘what’ trap: What they wanted as outcomes, what they believed their purpose and role was. Of course, they could see that the role of the educator has evolved away from the knowledge brokering sage on the stage and one of a guide on the side, but their underpinning elements still revolved around what they wanted their students to achieve. So we stopped. And, I asked them the question again, ‘Why do you get out of bed in the morning?’ I followed it up with, ‘Do you think the why has changed, and is that okay?’ The silence was breathtaking. A room of highly-skilled educators reflecting on why they chose to teach as a profession and then asking whether it was the same reason as they continued, some into their third decade. And it struck them. Like a firework that lights up a cold winter night… Our why can evolve!

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armchair

Pay attention to the task

Posted on June 23, 2016 by Dr Lachlan McLaren

Last time I wrote about how we focus our attention — what we pay attention to. This time let’s talk about the intensity part of attention — how much attention we pay.

So, what determines how much attention we pay to a task? Well, some of it is related to the type of task. Some activities require us to pay more attention than others. So, when we are designing them as part of a learning experience, it helps to design something that is both worthy of attention, and requires attention to complete.

To illustrate the impact that a task has on how much attention you pay, try this “armchair experiment” from Daniel Kahneman’s (1973) book Attention and Effort:

armchair

 

“First, try to mentally multiply 83 by 27. Having completed this task, imagine that you are going to be given four numbers, and that your life depends on your ability to retain them for ten seconds. The numbers are seven, two, five, nine. Having completed the second task, it may appear believable that, even to save one's life, one cannot work as hard in retaining four digits as one must work to complete a mental multiplication of two-digit numbers pg.15.”

 

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pasifika in waitangi

Pasifika in Waitangi

Posted on June 20, 2016 by Aiono Manu Faaea-Semeatu

Pasifika in Waitangi
Māori Navigators
L-R: Jason Ruakere, Teanau Tuiono, Anaru White, Shannon Vulu

The one and only time I had previously seen Waitangi was in a passing drive-by. Moana Timoko, a fellow CORE facilitator, showed me what Waitangi looked like under the cover of darkness. We drove past the night before a professional learning event at Te Kura Kaupapa Māori o Kaikohe. I would later find out that we had driven past Te Ti Marae and Tau Rangatira, before approaching the bridge on the other side.

When I actually set foot on Waitangi Treaty Grounds, it was for the last whānau hui with Wharehoka Wano before assuming his new role as iwi manager in Taranaki for Te Atiawa. I guess, in some small part, this blog post serves as a tribute to him for his inspiration to me as a contemporary Māori leader who now returns to his community to serve the needs of his people. He will be missed at Tātai Aho Rau — CORE Education.

I have written about Pasifika connections with Māori in two previous blog posts — Pasifika in Parihaka and Pasifika’s position in honouring the bi-cultural Te Tiriti partnership. I see this blog post as a culmination of the learning from these previous posts, reflecting on my understandings of Pasifika connections in the context of actually visiting Waitangi in the flesh. As a Pasifika person in Aotearoa, because I am conscious of being staunch in my own Samoan culture, it helps me to understand and value what it means to be Māori in Aotearoa. The events that have unfolded since the signing of Te Tiriti o Waitangi have leaned itself more to Pākeha benefitting from the agreement, whereas Māori have continually tried to regain tino rangatiratanga.

russell - hell-hole of the pasificBefore we went to Waitangi, a group of us visited Russell Kororareka, ‘the hell hole of the Pacific’ (the catch phrase plastered all over the island) to take note of the settlement. The Māori settlement quickly gained notoriety when prostitution arrived in the area, together with the whaling trade and new settlers. Busby had originally planned to have the town of Victoria built, but these plans were later scrapped when the capital city was moved.

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Syllabus –Lynda Barry – Notes from an accidental professor

My dream learning environment — a flexible space that supports creative endeavour

Posted on June 17, 2016 by Chrissie Butler

Syllabus –Lynda Barry – Notes from an accidental professor

What spaces makes your brain hum? Who is your dream teacher and how do they teach? What kind of learning space supports your creativity? I asked myself these questions in the podcast My dream learning environment. Here’s the transcript. Take a look:

Q: Kia ora, Chrissie — and thanks for agreeing to be interviewed.

A: No worries. It’s a pleasure.

Q: OK, so let’s start with the question we ask each guest as an opener: If you could study anywhere in the world right now, where would you go?

A: University of Wisconsin — to study with Lynda Barry.

Q: Woah, no hesitation there! Why Wisconsin?

A: Because Lynda Barry is there and she works in a way that would totally make my brain hum. I would be camping outside the door to get in each day.

Q: That’s quite an endorsement.

A: Yep, she’s a total inspiration and a mentor. A maker and a teacher and a wonderful rule breaker and explorer. Best of all, she only gives feedback by saying “good” and laughing uproariously, and for me that is the perfect fit.

Q: I think you might need to tell us a bit more.

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baking ideas

Five tips for holding ideas lightly

Posted on June 15, 2016 by Karen Spencer

“One should never bring a knife to a gun fight, nor a cookie cutter to a complex adaptive system.” — Jarche, (2013)

Educators are designers of learning. Architects of experiences. Creators of discovery. We spend our careers searching for the best way to solve the wonderful problem of how to help young people learn and grow and thrive. It is second nature to seek solutions and to do so at a fair clip! Building planes while they fly is our speciality.

ingredients for a creationAnd therein lies the fundamental conundrum for the modern educator.

For, what we are increasingly coming to understand, through contemporary educational research related to learner-centred experiences, is that there are no swift solutions, no silver bullets and no quick-fix solutions.

And there never will be.

Darn it.

To be adaptive is ‘future-focused’

adaptabilityGilbert and Bull (2015) remind us that if we want to create learner-responsive experiences, and also foster flexibility and ‘processing power’ so our young people can generate their own solutions, we also need to be ready to work in this way: … a future-oriented education system must be led by teachers who are adaptive, intellectual adults, not “consumers” of ideas, or followers of models and templates developed by others’ (p. 3).

The ability to adapt our expertise is one of the capabilities that defines educational fluency. Such educators ‘…tend to spend a greater proportion of their solution time trying to understand the problem to be solved as opposed to trying out different solutions” (Hattie, 2011, p. 6).

As educators, when we identify unexpected anomalies in our data, or when we hear that something is not working, we rush to solve the problem with what we believe is our best solution. It is likely to be based on our own considerable experience — and the best will in the world.

Even when we know that we do this, we still find ourselves falling back to solution seeking. It is challenging when we are surrounded by stories of other educators who appear to have found the solution (particularly the answer to ‘the future’!). In a recent professional session with a large group of principals, we identified a plethora of ‘solutions’ happening across our schools — coding, open classrooms, inquiry learning, BYOD, beanbags — all introduced with the absolute best of intentions, based on what we could see others doing across the sector.

Think ‘theories’, not ‘solutions’

flying highAnd yet — what we must remind ourselves continually is that each and every one of these ideas is just a theory; an informed idea based on our own experiences and the experiences of others. But, because education — indeed, knowledge itself —  is mutable and complex, we must hold these ideas lightly, understand that what worked today may not work tomorrow; what worked for one school or student may not work for us. The minute we become wedded to a certain idea, we fail to adapt to the urgent and changing needs in our community.

As professionals, it is important to not only hold ideas lightly, but also hold the line around what is most likely to make a difference for our own learners and their communities. We need to adopt a robust approach to innovation and inquiry so that the introduction of new ideas is done in ways that help us stay curious about their impact. This approach might be termed ‘adaptive design’ (Bernstein & Linsky, 2016), and it offers us a way to combine deep, rigorous change leadership and innovative design processes.

So, I offer the following five notions or steps as a way to help us all hold our ideas lightly:

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