What Do You Care About and Why?

This year at Middlebury College, on several Fridays every semester, you can go have lunch and listen to a conversation where one person, an alum, a faculty member or a student, speaks about what he or she cares about and why. This event is sponsored by the Center for Social Entrepreneurship. Apparently, this kind of thing happens also at Yale and Stanford and other colleges and universities. Last November,  I attended one of these Reflection Fridays, as they are called, to hear Laurie Patton, the new president of Middlebury College. I have been thinking about her responses ever since because her voice, her presence and her stories completely captured my imagination.

Here is what she said.

What matters to me and why.

The way I like to think about that question is: "What is my question?"

What is the one question that I’ll never be able to answer and that I will never get tired of asking.

I’d like to pose that to all of us.

We are all endlessly curious about something and we never get tired of being curious about it.

Every single one of us has that place of endless fascination and curiosity and joy.

It is not: "What is your passion?" though it could be part of that.

It is not, "What do you love the most?"

It is not is your identity. It’s none of those things.

It is what is the question that you keep asking and it always needs to end with a question mark.

For me, it is: “What is the nature of the poet in society?” That is the only thing I care about, actually.

I love this idea so much.  Of course, I started thinking about what my question would be right away.  I am still not sure why this seems so different than stating what you care about in a declarative sentence, but it is completely different.  Having this kind of question as a guide means that you are always a researcher, always looking for deeper meaning, always wondering, always seeking relationships and connections.  You are part of a process, an unfolding, a journey.

With students and teachers in schools we often refer to Essential Questions and Enduring Understandings which come from Grant Wiggins and his theories and frameworks for Understanding by Design.  This idea of searching for and articulating a Life Question puts us in direct relationship to these big ideas as Grant Wiggins calls them.

Laurie Patton went on to say:

I carry books around with me by Adrienne Rich and others, people who write about the role of the poet in society.  I carry them in my bag so I can always go back to them.  I learned some tough languages, Sanskrit and Gaelic because I had to understand the poetry of those languages. 

At a certain point, I realized that part of this for me is wanting everyone to find their voice.  The more I did academic administration and I loved it and people loved the way that I did it, I thought, "Why is this working so well?" And the reason is that what is so joyful about doing administration well is helping people come to voice, helping things that aren’t visible become more visible, and helping people speak whatever that truth is even if it is hard for others to hear.

And building a world, even if it is a small world, where we are better at it every day, even though we are never going to be really good at it because it is so hard, is so important.

Everything that I do is related to helping people come to voice and come to voice in the most poetic way possible. I don’t mean help them write great poetry, though some people can do that. Poetry is about seeing something new and juxtaposing two things together that are not usually together, that is what good metaphor is and there are various cognitive theories about that. What I love about good metaphor is that it allows you to hold difference in tension in a way that maintains relationship.

What I mean by coming to poetic voice… is that it allows for the deepest and newest meaning in our lives to emerge.

I am still working on my question and I will write about that in a future blog post.  In the meantime, think about your question. What matters to you and why and how does that take the form of an endlessly fascinating, always leading you on, always nourishing and inspiring, kind of question?

You can hear Laurie Patton in conversation with John Isham during this Reflection Friday here.

Baby Steps: Making Learning Visible

A few months ago I had an email exchange with an elementary school teacher. Here is what he asked me.

Hi Louise,

I have read several books including "Making Learning Visible" by Project Zero and "Visible Learners" by the PZ team. I have also read several books on Reggio and visited a Reggio preschool here in Atlanta called Saint Anne's. So I have a pretty good sense of what to do, but I feel overwhelmed and I don't know where to begin.

What is a simple, baby step 1, way to begin?

I will check out the books on your website.

Thank you so much.

Here is what I wrote back:

Start to have real conversations with your students and write down their ideas and perspectives. Put their quotes on the wall. (Read Talking Their Way into Science by Karen Gallas)

Take pictures of your students at work…with your phone.  Or shoot a video.  Print some photos… put them on the wall with their quotes and ideas about what they are thinking and learning.  Take good photos and edit them to select the really good ones that communicate curiosity, joy, collaboration, skill etc. and clear subjects with uncluttered backgrounds.)

Ask your students to draw and take time to draw. Get some nice black fine line markers Sharpies from Office Depot or somewhere. Teach your students to use them confidently to draw lines.  Ask them to draw objects, scenes, themselves, visual representations of what they are learning...put their drawings on the wall with their quotes and the photos of them at work…or ask them to take photos of themselves at work. Or ask them to write down each other’s ideas and have them select quotes for the wall. They are old enough to be co creators wtih you of visible learning. (Read the new second edition of In the Spirit of the Studio which I edited with others.) Look at Austin’s Butterfly video of Ron Berger doing peer critque with students. Google it. Read his book too, An Ethic of Excellence.

One last thing…study good layout and design, look at the way museums do it. Find a talented parent to help you. Find a graphic artist to help you.

You want what you put on the wall to be powerful, effective communication.  Find clear push pins, don’t staple or tape if you can avoid it.

Good luck! I know you, your students, your parents and your community will be thrilled and you will model making learning visible for everyone else.

*The images in this post are from The College School, Buckingham Browne and Nichols, Lesley University and La Scuola. Click on the images to go to their websites.

Yes, We Can Teach Fairness...Starting with Relationships

Frequently when I observe a classroom or a small group of students I become fascinated not only with the ideas that they come up with (whether with 3-4 year olds in blocks or 5th graders discussing "Matilda"), but also with their behavior, their interactions around sharing ideas. In recent article in the New Yorker magazine, "How We Learn Fairness," author, Maria Konnikova discussed current research that provides new insight on common behaviors around sharing ideas.

Two areas emerge: "disadvantageous-inequity aversion" (DI) and "advantageous-inequity aversion" (AI).  To put it simply, DI is: I don’t like getting the short end of the stick; and AI is: I don’t like getting the long end of the stick either.  In most cases, we humans prefer fairness.  (And, NO, I’m going to draw any parallels with the current political climate in the US…though you are welcome to.)

But why is this?

As teachers and parents, there are times when we witness ruthless competition among children: I am happiest when I have the advantage.  Yet, the research seems to bear out that students accept or reject offers (Here, you can have more candy…and not you….) not out of some abstract idea like “equality,” but rather from a perception of their social status.  Konnikova writes, Its not about right or wrong.  It’s all about me, and how do I come off in this scenario.

According to Paul Bloom DI is not about principles, it’s about status.  We have a natural aversion to getting less, not inequity.  The kids’ behavior isn't principled; on the contrary, it seems motivated by something very much like spite.  And the message is clear: I want to emerge on top.  The absolute number of candies matters less that my relative status.

Apparently, AI is also about social status.  If you live in a society where ideas of fairness and equality hold a privileged position, then it becomes meaningful to show yourself as embracing those ideas, even at personal cost…status gained by being an admirable role model (Konnikova).

To add more perspective on DI and AI, research shows that DI is innate (all over the world and in the animal kingdom, getting less than others is perceived as an insult); and AI seems to be a product of social life or culture.

This suggests that AI might require certain kinds of social environments in which to thrive.

Konnikova summarizes as follows: All of these findings have something to say about why we value fairness. Our ideas about fairness are relativistic, rather than absolute. In many ways, we approach fairness as a form of social signalling. People tend not to care about equality as an abstract principle; instead, they use fairness to negotiate their place in a social hierarchy. And, for that reason, we’re especially willing to give up our unfair advantages when there’s the possibility of strengthening a future relationship.

And there’s the kicker…perhaps the key, the same key we reference in almost every aspect of our work with teachers…it’s about relationships.  Study after study showed that, When participants…became more invested in their relationships…they gave up more to nourish and maintain them (Konnikova).

Yes, you can teach fairness, and it begins with growing relationships…awareness of others…honoring other.

Working Side by Side with Teachers

It has been a good week in Boston.  On Monday Ashley and I worked at Buckingham Browne & Nichols Lower School with early childhood through second grade teachers who are documenting a common project: an exploration of identity.  All of the teachers and students have approached this project in different and wonderful ways. Early this month we worked with them during a professional development day to organize a structured conversation where each teaching team could share their process, their learning, and their challenges along the journey of exploring identity and community with their students.

Each teacher or team is now in the process of writing a reflective introduction, choosing photographs to show the work in progress, choosing a format to share the student portraits and writing, learning to select common and effective fonts and font sizes for titles, student writing and quotes.

On Monday Ashley co-created with Anthony Reppucci, Lower School Assistant director, an overview plan for the whole gallery of this work that will fill the hallways and stairwells of the school building. Louise worked for several hours with Ben Goldhaber, one of the kindergarten teachers, on creating a draft display, all in the service of making the learning visible in the most respectful, effective and dynamic ways.

Yesterday Louise collaborated with teacher and director, Kristen Waters at Belmont Cooperative Nursery School to engage a small group of children age 3-5 in considering their pet guinea pigs closely...What have they noticed about them? What shape are their bodies? their ears? their feet? What color is their fur? What does their fur feel like? What do they like to eat? What do they like to do? Do they play? Are they friends? And then, using soft 8B pencils as well as harder HB pencils for the first time, the students drew guinea pig portraits. We were together for an hour and a half.

This is the kind of work that we have done for years, and it still endlessly captivating for us and for the teachers we work with.  All of the teachers we have worked with are surprised by what their students are able to accomplish, how they are seeing them with new insight, how much they are all learning together.

Rolling up our sleeves and doing the work along side teachers is what we do best and what seems to work best.  It is somewhat like the apprenticeship model.  We are all in it together, not only showing it, talking about it, and imagining it, but actually doing it.  And this seems to be fun, enlightening, practical, sensible and just plain necessary.

Side by side, we are putting inquiry and a strong image of the child at the center of our work.  Side by side, we are making creative materials as well as literacy essential and irresistible and we are making learning visible for the children and the community.

Learning Together in a Special Place

Learning Together in a Special Place: Perspectives on Leadership

June 11 - 16, 2016

Learning and Leading for the Future

Ashley and I, along with Lori Ryan, faculty member at the University of Colorado Denver, have been invited to co-facilitate the first of three June 2016 sessions arranged by Angela Ferrario in Mercatello sul Metauro, Italy. As I wrote in an earlier blog, the setting is particularly unique and beautiful.

We have begun preparing for the session and are excited about Learning and Leading for the Future as the fertile ground for the shared thinking of a small group of early childhood and elementary educators about the current challenges and opportunities within our 21^st century schools. As more and more is required of teachers, children, and families today, we find ourselves flipping the challenge on it’s head to ask ourselves…

What inspires all members of a learning community to embrace their passions, co-create a vibrant learning community and in doing so, contribute to a healthy, hopeful future for our children and our world?

How do teacher leaders, administrators and all members of a school community invite and sustain such contexts and cultures?

These positively oriented questions, can-do attitudes, and appreciative leading approaches will guide the experiences, conversations, and reflections of Learning and Leading for the Future.

As an interactive community of learners, participants will approach leading and learning for the future from a self-reflective, appreciative and curious stance.

Register here for an opportunity to…

• Look back at the field's historical roots and re-capture your own unique personal and professional stories ILLUMINATING THE BRIGHT SPOTS when things felt like they were working well and everyone was learning

• Study and consider global competencies, 21st century skills, systems thinking, current brain research, and creativity to ARTICULATE WHAT WE NOW KNOW while SEARCHING FOR PROMISING PRACTICES that can guide us skillfully into future educational experiences.

• Leave with a new vision, new possibilities and plan for LEADING ONE’S OWN LEARNING COMMUNITY with the future in mind

As facilitators, the three of us look forward to revisiting the origins of our work together that began many years ago as we studied and grew the three schools of the St. Louis Reggio Collaborative that now continue to thrive.

We look forward to a session that promises to be a blend of reflection, inspiration, and application as well as a lot of fun.  There are a few spots left and time to register.  Please join us in Italy!