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Liz Stevenson

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Liz Stevenson
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The ties that bind

Posted on August 23, 2018 by Liz Stevenson

Can Learning Circles strengthen Kāhui Ako?

learning circle
Tokomairiro Kāhui Ako’s Early Childhood, primary and secondary school teachers meet at Tokomairiro High School

Communities of Learning or Kāhui Ako bring together education providers who may have never met or shared a conversation with each other. So how can these teachers start talking together?

Harvard writers, Gratton and Erikson, in their Eight Ways to Build Collaborative Teams, tell us that it’s not an easy task to build new teams — the more experts we have in a group — the harder it is to build a community:

We found that the greater the proportion of experts a team had, the more likely it was to disintegrate into non-productive conflict or stalemate…

But they offer some hope…

Under the right conditions, large teams can achieve high levels of cooperation, but creating those conditions requires thoughtful, and sometimes significant, investments in the capacity for collaboration across the organization
(Gratton and Erikson, 2018)

So, what are the right conditions?

It might be useful to look at the Nordic countries where there is a long tradition of collaborative adult education and an established practice of lifelong learning through Learning Circles.

Sweden’s late Prime Minister, Olof Palme, often called Sweden ‘a study circle democracy’, which reflected the Swedish government’s policy around adult education. This national commitment currently sees nearly two million Swedish people annually benefitting from taking part in Learning Circles.

In small groups of 7–12 people, study groups share the knowledge and skills of their members or make use of external experts. They might be gaining new knowledge in a particular field or working to solve a problem. The most important factor at play here is that the focus for learning is decided by the participants themselves. Members choose a leader from the group, and the group’s activities are supported by a facilitator who is a representative of a learning organisation. The work of every group ends with an evaluation of results.

This enthusiasm for learning together is not surprising given the government policy on developing a love for learning. The Swedish government sees the practice of self-directed learning as essential to a healthy democracy because it:

  • supports equality and an understanding of the perspectives of others
  • starts from the individual’s voluntary, personalised search for knowledge
  • is characterised by shared values and cooperation
  • aims to strengthen individuals’ ability to gain agency and influence in their own lives and be able, together with others, to change society in accordance with their values and ideals.

Where did the idea come from?

The Swedes were by no means the first to popularise the learning circle as a mechanism for capturing the collective wisdom of the group.

The method has been central to many indigenous cultures for millennia. Early talking circles were often seen as wisdom circles, serving as more than just a place for talking together. Indigenous peoples in North America have always seen Circles as a way of life — they embody a philosophy, principles, and values that apply whether people are sitting in a circle or not.

Clearly, this powerful community process has merit, surviving over time and reaching across the cultures of the world. Civic organisations, neighbourhood communities, trade unions, churches, and social justice groups have used, and are using, learning circles to empower their members to share, make choices, and take action.

In the 1980s, The Quality Circle was a term used to describe the same practice in corporate settings. In Quality Circles, the hierarchical boundaries between workers and managers were flattened to encourage participatory management and shared team leadership.

Originally associated with Japanese management and manufacturing techniques developed in Japan after World War II, the business Quality Circle was based on the ideas of W. Edwards Deming. The goal was to encourage everyone to develop a strong sense of ownership over the process and products of their company — and the practice continues in many socially responsible businesses today.

It seems that no matter what the name — study circles, peer learning circles, talking circles, or dialogue-to-change programmes, the principles remain the same — they are spaces where learning is collaborative, participation is democratic, there’s respect for every voice, and participants learn from the collective wisdom of the group.

Back home in our Kāhui Ako, could this work?

Last year, the Lead Principal of the Tokomairiro Kāhui Ako, Tania McNamara, thought it might work, saying:

We know what we’re trying to do in terms of student learning – but we need a method to bring people together in a way that really engages everyone.

After seeing the potential of Learning Circles, Tania visited all the schools and centres in the Kāhui Ako and listened to leaders and teachers talk about their interests and passions. Getting a big-picture view of educators across the spectrum — in ECE, primary and secondary education centres — she was able to identify strong common themes of teacher interest and expertise.

The most interesting and exciting thing about mapping the educators’ passions in this way was the discovery that there were areas of common interest running across all these educators. This made for diverse, cross-level interest groups who might be able to share knowledge and collaborate in a genuine way.

The Tokomairiro Research Pods were formed with the focus areas including work on cultural responsiveness, co-teaching and collaborating in innovative learning environments, developing learner agency, integration of digital technologies, and passion for learning.

Tokomairiro Kāhui Ako is trialing the idea of Learning Circles — called Research Pods — by arranging for groups to meet together twice a term.

The initial buzz and enthusiasm as teachers make personal connections across areas of interest bodes well for this simple initiative.

To be continued…the next chapter is in process.

 

learning circle in education
Research Pod meetings at Tokomairiro Kāhui Ako

Sometimes the most important thing you get from the network isn’t an idea but the inspiration or courage to try something new
#innovatormindset George Couros

 

References:

Andrews, C. (1992). Study Circles: Schools For Life. Context Institute. https://www.context.org/iclib/ic33/andrews/

Bjerkaker, S. (2014). Changing Communities. The Study Circle – For Learning and democracy. https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1877042814045534

Dennis, L., (2010).Talking Circles: An Indigenous-centred method of determining public policy, programming and practice. (2010). https://dspace.library.uvic.ca:8443/handle/1828/8304

Gratton, L., & Erickson, T. (2018). Eight Ways to Build Collaborative Teams. https://hbr.org/2007/11/eight-ways-to-build-collaborative-teams

Larsson, S., & Nordvall, H. (2010). Study Circles in Sweden: An Overview with a Bibliography of International Literature.
http://swepub.kb.se/bib/swepub:oai:DiVA.org:liu-57887?tab2=abs&language=en

Suda, L. (2018). Learning Circles: Democratic Pools of Knowledge.
https://eric.ed.gov/?id=ED457363

 

Photo credits:

All photos by the author.

 

CORE’s Expert Partners can assist you to:

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  • Strengthen evidence gathering practices.
  • Define problems; undertake evidence-informed action planning.

 

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starfish

Every starfish story1 matters

Posted on April 1, 2016 by Liz Stevenson

starfish

Where would we be without other people’s ideas and perspectives? Without being able to see through another person’s eyes and re-see ourselves through their stories? You’re wearing Lululemon! Is it the best place to get running gear? And why (!!) are you are moving to China? Our lives are totally infused with the perspectives and patterns of others — families, friends, colleagues, and advisors. With people we value, every comment offered is a potential waypoint nudging our thinking and refreshing the way we see the world.

But, as dispensers of words, we’re often unaware of the influence they have on the receiver. Significant chains of events can stem from a passing conversation — or sometimes even from things we don’t remember we said. Pro-Vice Chancellor Māori at the University of Waikato, Professor Linda Tuhiwai Smith tells a wonderful story about the importance of kind words, as she recalls a student who unexpectedly came to visit her after an absence of nearly twenty years. It seems that the professor’s words of encouragement and vision to the then struggling student so long ago had sustained this young woman through an epic journey of academic and personal success. When the student returned to thank her, Professor Tuhiwai Smith thought back to her own wish to improve “the life chances, opportunities, and frameworks for Māori”. She was surprised to find herself achieving this with a few wise words whose particular weave had lasted through time; inspiring and protecting a learner.

Listening to stories from the heart such as this can be magic — stories speak to a very smart place in us where we tend to remember what we heard. Sometimes, as a result, we change the way we operate — not because someone told us to — but, because we ‘saw’ and discovered for ourselves something shiny and valuable in there, and we decided to have it too. In this purposeful listening, we give ourselves the space and the key to unlock our own door to empathy, intuition, and new possibilities for understanding. This is powerful learning, and very different from being in the “They’re-telling-me-what-to-do’’ space.

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conversation

Feeling you need to have that conversation?…Help is here

Posted on February 17, 2016 by Liz Stevenson

conversation
Photo: Allie Lehman

The other day I asked a scientist from a research company about what was important to him in employing new people. Unhesitatingly he replied:

“More and more, I’m finding that the way we communicate with all sorts of people is really important. This is actually what we’re looking for – people who can communicate with each other so they can collaborate and also with the ability to work with our diverse clients to ensure their needs are met. So they need to be good listeners first. We can get ten people with the knowledge background we need, but we need communicators …”

We’re hearing this everywhere. So what does this mean for our learning places? For learners in the classroom and for teachers and leaders needing to provide good role models? What does it mean for the raft of others working in schools — community workers, advisors and facilitators?

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Story Hui — a design for social good

Posted on April 14, 2015 by Liz Stevenson

Good design

Image: Sebastian Holmbäck and Ulrik Nordentoft. From Normann Cpenhagen website

Good design needs to make life better for us in some way — and that is not just about appearance. Design also needs to perform, to change our experience and fulfil its purpose.

Does the beautiful chair with its natural pine legs and elegant shape feel comfortable to sit in? Does the fancy potato peeler you bought from the kitchen shop actually work? A well-designed chair — or even your new potato peeler— needs to do the job better — and in doing so — somehow improve our lives.

As we fully engage with the new learning world, taking with us our old mishmash of broken furniture and ideas, we can see that nowhere is there more need for good design than in the ways we collaborate and think together. Impressively rising from the industrial rubble we have architecturally designed learning spaces and compelling digitally inspired pedagogies. But our ability to humanly engage in powerful dialogue — to really think together, to truly share, and to pool our intelligence not just our knowledge — this needs smart social design. As we make our own personal shifts from ‘me’ to ‘we’, ideas around the principles of social enterprise, social design, and social entrepreneurship offer us some direction.

Story Hui — designed for our 21st Century world

Story Hui has been created around a theory of social design (see MOMA Director Antonelli – Design’s positive influence on the world), and is a hand-in-glove fit with our complex 21C world of capabilities and work. The Story Hui process itself manages to elicit many of these capabilities in participants as they work together. It involves group storytelling that:

 

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Government will spend $359m on education – could this lead to a more collaborative approach for us all?

Posted on February 3, 2014 by Liz Stevenson

$359M to education

A $359m education initiative announced by the Prime Minister last week has a direct focus on raising student achievement. It involves recognising excellent educators by creating four new management roles for schools – change principals, executive principals, expert teachers and lead teachers. A major tenet of the plan will be a focus on collaboration between schools.

If National wins the election, it plans to introduce the four new roles from next year.

Change principals: tasked with turning around a struggling school. Twenty positions nationwide, each receiving a $50,000 allowance per year on top of their base salary.

Executive principals: ‘highly capable principals’ with a proven track record who will lead and mentor other principals in their community. Two hundred and fifty positions nationwide, $20,000 allowance per year.

Expert teachers: will work with the executive principals in specific areas like maths, science, technology and literacy. One thousand positions nationwide, $20,000 allowance per year.

Lead teachers: ‘highly capable’ teachers with a proven track record who will act as a role model for teachers in the wider community. They will have an open classroom to allow other teachers to observe and learn. Five thousand nationwide, $10,000 allowance per year.
 
The commitment of such a large sum of money to support what is effectively a 'culture-change' strategy for New Zealand education heralds the most significant change since the 1989 reforms of Tomorrow’s Schools which sent us along the pathway of school autonomy and competition.

PPTA President Angela Roberts says that the $359m investment, while not being a silver bullet, is a positive step and she believes that the new roles will lead to more collaborative approaches. She says that enabling schools to support each other rather than compete against each other is a good response.

Gail Gillon, pro-vice chancellor at the College of Education, University of Canterbury also welcomes the more collaborative approach and says that the government has accurately identified one of the key challenges in the schooling system.

It appears that most public response to the initiative has been cautiously optimistic. While this is a good start, as educators, we can’t afford to be uninvolved, standing back to see if it will work. Real transformation of schooling needs to involve everyone. To bridge the gap between good ideas and effective action we will need to act collectively, each one of us personally stepping outside our ‘autonomy bubbles’ and starting to make a bigger space for collaboration in our professional lives.

So how do we shift our mind frames from acting as working groups – as people acting alongside each other, to functioning as teams where collective action contributes to a whole result? History has shown that events where large numbers of people have made a powerful move together have usually been born out of an experience of difficulty or injustice. Maybe education’s current disparate impact on a large percentage of New Zealand children makes this one of those important times.

However with the best will in the world, we can’t all be executive principals and lead teachers. So where to begin? Small is Beautiful: A Study of Economics As If People Mattered by E. F. Schumacher is about small, sustainable acts and appropriate technologies. His notion of ‘smallness within bigness’ is useful in determining the value of our individual input. We can start small.

So, in partnership  with National’s initiative, what if several thousand acts of real collaboration and teamwork by New Zealand teachers were equally as powerful as an investment of $359m? Working together, could we exponentially increase this investment in our future?

Let’s not just stand back to see what happens, let’s lean in, operate within Schumacher’s ‘smallness within bigness’ notion and function as a team with this initiative. An opportunity for a ‘leg up’ has appeared – let’s take it.

For all of the officially released documentation about the initiative see http://www.minedu.govt.nz/theMinistry/EducationInitiatives/InvestingInEducationalSuccess/KeyInformation.aspx

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