One Tip for Making Changes

For two years, I was the principal at a high school in a suburb of Birmingham. In the south, football is a big deal, especially Fridays in southern high schools. The pep rallies at this school happened every game day, and the first year of my principalship I learned one of the school’s “traditions.”

Our biggest rival was a neighboring school, one that was part of a community that had split away from the one in which I was working. On a warm Friday morning, I walked through the gym and out the side door to the parking lot. I was shocked by what I saw! Our female students were getting out of their cars and walking across the parking lot to school, and they were dressed up in blue, the other school’s colors.

Our students said they were trying to look “redneck” in the other school’s colors, jerseys, and t-shirts. I was shocked and disappointed to see so much blue at our school on a day when our school colors were red and white. So I talked to the kids that day… in my office, in the hallway, in the lunchroom... wherever I saw them. If they had something offensive on (a few had on t-shirts with offensive phrases on them), I had them to change. If they just had on the opposing school’s colors, I talked them about focus. 

As a player I was taught, and as a coach I taught my players, to “focus on US” not the opponent. Sure, we wanted to scout the other team and know what to expect in terms of plays they would run, key players, and tendencies, but our FOCUS would be on US. We would focus on what we could control. 

Because of my experiences, when I saw the girls dressed up in our rival’s colors I saw it as misdirected focus. I thought we should have been celebrating OUR team and school, instead of dressing up in our opponent’s colors. (Focus changer: After that day, I encouraged everyone to wear red on Fridays.)

Sometimes in life, we tend to focus on others instead of ourselves. Trying to make a change? Feel like you’re sitting in neutral without moving forward? You can change gears by changing your focus. 

Make a change in your life by changing your focus.

  

Click the Tweet button to tweet the quote.

What changes in focus are you trying to make?
How do you maintain your focus?

I would love to hear your story in the comments!

Teachers' Expectations, High or Low, are Always Met

In our teacher training, we're taught the concept of the Pygmalion effect. We learn that students will live up to the expectations that are placed upon them. When teachers have high expectations for students, the teachers unconsciously give more positive attention, feedback, and learning opportunities to students. 

Learning information like this prepares teachers for the day when they walk into the classroom and stand in front of 25 students and make a first impression. That first impression that is made will come from the teacher's belief about the students prior to that moment. And what about the subsequent days. Over time, the longer a teacher is in the classroom, do the teacher's beliefs about students fade, get higher, or even change completely? Each day, the teacher's expectations will be communicated through body language, tone of voice, inflections, and word choice.

Invariably, in the classroom a teacher's expectations will be met. 

• If a teacher expects students not to do their homework, they won't. 
• If a teacher expects he or she will have to raise his or her voice to get students to behave, he will.
• If a teacher expects students to try their best, they will.
• If a teacher expects students to misbehave, they will. 
• If a teacher expects that he or she will enjoy learning about the students - as people - while helping them to learn, he or she will.

In your classroom, what if you find that your students and the classroom are not meeting your expectations? What can you do?

Here are some questions for self-reflection:

• Do I separate the student from the behavior?
• If I can't change the students, how can I change my view of them?
• Can I do anything to improve the outcome?
• Am I teachable?

What's been your experience with teacher expectations?

Work is Love Made Visible

I've attended many parent and IEP meetings for students. When I was in the classroom, I always taught (and asked for) inclusion classes. I also wanted to attend IEP meetings so that I could meet the parents and share my input there. As a grade level administrator, I’ve attended many parent and IEP meetings for ninth graders over the last four years.

In a recent meeting, a special education teacher who was conducting the meeting told the parent about the student, her child, 

“He wants to do his work; he wants to make us happy.” 

In other words, the work was about behavior. It was about compliance.

It got me thinking.

About the work that kids do, and the work that we do.

Work is important. It teaches discipline. It brings satisfaction and pride. I learned from a great coach early in my career that self-esteem doesn’t come from telling someone positive things. It comes from completing tasks successfully. Give a person tasks that he can complete with success, and gradually give him increasingly challenging tasks. Praise and recognition of completing the tasks will a positively to a person’s self-esteem.

When the teacher is the only audience for student work, it’s easier for the work to be about compliance. It’s personal. It can become more about “Do this because I said so,” than “Do this because ________ (it will help you learn/process content, you will be able to demonstrate what you know, it will help to make your thinking visible…)

While we all have tasks that we are required to do and may not enjoy or see a bigger purpose in doing them, we are more motivated to do the tasks when we understand the reasons behind doing them. We are also motivated to complete tasks when the audience is authentic. Think about the posters hanging in the hallway for all to see, or the presentation done for a live or online audience. What about the blog post that’s read by a global audience or the athletic skill that’s done in front of a crowd.

What happens when the audience is authentic? Is love still visible?

25 Ways Educators Across the Country are Using Google Hangouts

Yesterday, I blogged about our celebration of Digital Learning Day at Hoover High School and our week of Digital Challenges. We held a day of PD on Google Hangouts and I invited members of my PLN to join us throughout the day to share ideas with us about how to use GHOs at school. Today, I'm sharing those ideas with you.

First, let me share with you who visited us via Google Hangouts. 

Lisa Meade (@LisaMeade23) 

Jennifer Roach (@JennGRoach)   

Kayla Hall (@HallKaylaR ) 

Alicia Dudley (@mrsadudley ) 

Tara Havard (@TaraHavard_ ) 

Vicki Randolph (@VRandolph1 ) 

Jason Markey (@JasonMMarkey) 

Melissa Eddington (@melsa777) 

Kory Graham (@tritonkory) 

Eric Turner (@_ericturner) 

Jonathan Kegler (@JonathanKegler) 

Nathan Barber (@_nathanbarber) 

Reed Gillespie (@rggillespie) 

Todd Nesloney (@TechNinjaTodd) 

Garnet Hillman (@garnet_hillman) 

Amy Fadeji (@mrsfadeji)

I reached out on Twitter and asked if there was anyone who would like to spend 10-15 minutes with us and share how they were using GHOs. It was especially cool for the two tech guys and me to spend the entire day hosting PD during teachers' off periods. By the end of the day, we had heard from 16 different
educators from all over the country. 

Here are the ways GHOs are being used or have been used by them:

• Bring in experts, such as Rick Wormeli and Dave Burgess, to "talk" with staff
• Google Hangout with 5th/6th graders and Kindergarten students, where older students performed science experiment and explained to younger students what they were doing an the scientific principles they were testing
• Four kindergarten teachers all do lesson planning with each other via GHOs. Instead of doing it at school, they get home, take care of their own families, then collaborate via Google Docs an GHOs. They said it is a huge time-saver!
• In one school, they use GHOs between classes of the same grade level who perform the same science experiments an compare data
• Google Hangout with an author
• Google Hangout parent conference for parents who can't come in for a meeting
• Weekly PLC meetings between campuses via GHO
• Use hangouts with classes when a sub is there such as a greeting to start class when you, the teacher, are not there
• In one school, their Engineering class worked with a class in another state on the same project
• One high school's student leadership team got to work with members of Google X team via GHOs.
• One administrator did a GHO with a PE teacher in New Jersey who wanted to get input on a presentation he was working on
• One administrator used GHO to talk to Jonathan Kegler’s university class
• One school's librarian reads to students in other schools
• A Kindergarten teacher connected with a teacher at an alternative school, and his alternative school students in Tennessee have been reading to her Kindergarten students in rural Minnesota
• When students go on vacation, the student on vacation can share about the location with students who may not ever get the chance to travel there
• One administrator in a private school has interviewed students for the school via GHO
• Several administrators have done initial teacher interviews via GHO to save the candidate on airfare
• GHOs have been used to connect foreign language students in different schools. 
• Teachers hold office hours online via GHO for students to get extra help
• Distance learning has been done with other schools via GHO
• GHOs have been used for meetings for book chats
• One school does 40-60 per year, including GHOs with authors, athletes, White House, Miss America and Mystery GHOs
• One school has used GHOs in conjunction with Genius Hour to connect with experts
• One school uses GHOs with students who are hospitalized
• Another teacher surveys parents and asks, "Do you have any level of expertise?" Then the teacher sets up GHO with those parents.

Two pieces of advice from the day? 

"Take a risk and try it." 

Our tech guy, Keith Fulmer, told the teachers he gives a 100% guarantee. 

They just need the idea, and he'll make it work.

"Keep it simple"

It doesn't have to be an original or outrageous idea. Reach out and connect you students and/or school to new ideas, people, and opportunities for learning.