via plpnetwork.com
Have you read this? If not you should!!!! Immediately without a moment's hesitation. why?
Because it's right now and it's makes sense. If we create reforms based on these simple ideas (and I know they're not new but this is the new lingo and the new take on grassroots), the reforms would be embraced by the people who are actually responsible for implementing them and they'd work. Go back and read the other two articles as well because they're excellent...Diigo them, put them in your Evernote...whatever...just hang onto the ideas because I think they'll be coming up again in the future.
Ms. Steele-Pierce speaks of learning about intentional serendipity. Who knew before I read her article that it's what I believe in too. I didn't have such a cool name for it. So now I have two things I've learned in about 5 minutes that I believe are important in being more articulate about what I believe. I'm actually learning how to be more powerful in speaking about things I already do and already believe in....and now I have words to name those beliefs with. After looking at these slides, it's easy to see the power of this kind of thinking and I'm so gratefully relieved that it's what I've been thinking for a long time.
And from reading these articles, I have a couple of new people with whom I will be very intentional about reading, following and trying to learn from. Isn't that the great fun of the web? Treasure hunting? Hopefully at some point I will have something which to contribute back to them. So it goes with this new virtual world....a place where you can explore and find treasures you didn't know and come back feeling as if you aren't so much of a lone ranger!!!!
I will admit that I grow weary of waiting on other people to change, so I go off on my own and experiment. The kids and I will wonder what would happen if we tried doing it this way......and then we'll try it that way. That really bugs other teachers. They want to know exactly what will happen before they try something. I just see the classroom as a big science experiment and there is a lot of room to see what works best. When I find things that really work well---like my way of teaching nonficiton reading, or how to get better science writing or teaching science from a current events perspective----I don't really find lots of people who want to imitate those innovations. Ms. Steele-Pierce then challenges me when she says.
But you recognize that your change alone doesn’t change your school. You brought your edge experiences back to your staff—where the real change occurs as they move out themselves, and back again.
I realize after reading this that I'm probably stuck out at the edge if I think about change looking similar to what I do in my classroom from only the people with whom I physically work. But I've gone beyond thinking as that as my only group. I feel so much more collegial with people from far and wide....to recycle a phrase I used years ago in one of my first virtual learning networks....birds of feather. I've found fellow flockers.
This year I've worked on projects with buddies from across the district, across the country and even across the world. My students may not have had the chance to switch rooms and/or physical spaces with the other science or social studies class in my building....but they've made connections to students like Teegan, learned how to do things from Abbey an 8th grader in Indiana, or Mr. Miller's class in King City California, or a librarian in a building across the district where I used to work, my virtual buddies in California and North Carolina and even a new student friend YongMinSong who lives in Korea. I've taken the challenge to expand my learning net...and am expanding to work with teams in Australia and El Paso in ways I've never tried before.
So do you have connect back in your f2f environment? I'd say yes and no.
Yes because you do have a responsibility to spread what you've learned to the ones you actually see everyday. If they're willing to participate with you...hey....that's great. Do the best you can there and then go find other ways to return to the core.
And I'd say No. I just think my core may be in a different geographical location that in the room next to mine. I find that definition too constraining...and I'm not even sure that's what the author is saying. But I'd say if the f2f peopls can't, won't, or don't...then do the best you can with the and find your birds of a feather. Let them be your core.
The world has changed. I know...I've got maybe another decade in me before I retire. That's not much time to really figure things out and see how to make things better. I feel like I'm on the cusp of really good stuff with my kids. My work is getting more efficient and effective...kids are more plugged in, learning more and more deeply and they are connecting more with the world. It's working.
I know that push is NOT my way. It's never worked for me....I want to know why too often. Instead of just sitting there and doing what I'm told to do, I want to understand. Just ask my mom, I've apparently been asking why since I was about 2 years old (which wasn't cool in the 1950s). I'm definitely one that sees that pull is a better way and probably why I loved one of my first jobs back in the 1970s as a community health organizer (before I was a teacher and I worked for a local health planning agency in southern California).
Do you wonder if a physical location is too constraining once you start thinking that pull is finding your flock and then getting in the groove?
What do you think? Have I lost my mind......did I fall off the edge and not know it? Maybe you can never go home again once you find your flock.?????
Original image with Attribution license on http://www.flickr.com/photos/pictureperfectpose/81938785/sizes/m/ and then processed in Picnik
I love your take-aways and how you've shared them here. It's interesting that you chose a flock as your metaphor and image. Flock was one of the images that came up when I searched for "attraction." Cool?!
Your idea that "...my core may be in a different geographical location that in the room next to mine" really resonates for me, and I'd bet for many in our PLNs as well. Isn't it great that we have the digital resources to access and attract other thinkers to strengthen our core?
Great post. Big thanks! M.E.
Posted by: Steelepierce | April 21, 2011 at 08:21 PM