skipolsen's Blog

How do you use rewards and punishments on a team? Or in a collaborative environment? A PLC?

"I sit in a room without windows, participating in a ritual etched into twentieth-century tribal memmory. I have been here thousands of times before, literally, I am in a meeting, trying to solve a problem. Using whatever analytic tool somebody has just read about or been taught at their most recent training experience, we are trying to come to grips with a difficult situation. Perhaps it is poor employee morale or productivity. Or production schedules. Or the redesign of a function. The topic doesn’t matter. What matters is how familiar and terrible our process is for coming to terms with the complaint.

The room is adrift in flip chart paper—clouds of lists, issues, schedules, plans, accountabilities—crudely taped to the wall. They crack and rustle, fall loose, and, finally, are pulled off the walls, tightly rolled, and transported to some innocent secretary, who will litter the floor around her desk so that, peering down from her keyboard, she can transcribe them to tidy sheets, which she will mail to us. They will appear on our desks days or weeks later, faint specters of commitments and plans, devoid of even the little energy and clarity that sent the original clouds—poof—up onto the wall. They will drift into our day planners and onto individual “to do” lists, lists already fogged with confusion and inertia. Whether they get “done” or not, they will not solve the problem.

I am weary of the lists we make, the time projections we spin out, the breaking apart and putting back together of problems. It does not work."

The idea for me is to find new ways to be with one another that allows and encourages each person to their highest potential. It's not easy; it's not linear; but it is absolutely necessary if we are going to be successful with ALL of our kids, and with each other.

I think you're right—there can be healthy changes at individual schools for the time that the creative and interested individuals are there. And 2 prep periods—one for the individual and one for the team—seems like a terrific improvement. How long will the new practice last? Is the new practice sustainable?

Nicely done! A very astute observation about Shirky's ideas. Those questions are great and the answers provide some direction. For example, in answer to creating opportunities for developing  bridging capital, what would happen if a school management team decided to hold quarterly meeting with invited community people (it would be open to all, of course) to hear a panel discussion about education, learning, the future, etc. It seems to me that the school and staff could prod, provoke, and convene communities to begin the necessary and meaningful conversation. It could provide vast amounts of information and discussion.

I agree. And I'd like to see more real world work--problems that can be thought about and figured out. I really like the idea of Ted Sizer of performance, i.e. report, demonstration, a creation, an explanation about what was learned by the student and why it is important. What difference did or does this learning make? What's the next step? I do like your phrasing—"a silly laundry list of trivia items."

@David "Why do you think kids skip class, sleep, fail to do their homework, forget their pencil, fall asleep, day dream and not ask questions." I think they do these behaviors because, among other things, their bored (check out the reasons many students drop out). As long as we continue to teach "class" and not individuals, we're sunk. It is impossible to customize learning with the plethora of confines that the present institution has. And I think many teachers do try to do what they can to individualize. How much time is there to individualize in a 55 minute period with 30-35 kids in class?

Sorry, I fell into the trap again. I didn't mean to say "school". What I should have said is learning environment.

Sometimes it's hard to articulate what I mean or what I see. Occasionally I see something and I say, "Yes! That's it!" or it is something like that. I must share with you a favorite TED talk that inspires me to say that this is the way SOME schools should be. This is a hoot! I'd be interested in what you think.

I wonder if we're thinking widely or deeply enough. Schools, for me, are impossible--an archaic way of learning conceived over 100 years ago. One of the ideas I have is that educators are too pinned down—natural affinities are not very possible in schools because of time constraints, contract constraints, and the mental models we all share about "schooling". What would happen if a teacher brought lamps to use in "class" instead of the glaring overhead fluorescents? What would happen if a group of 6 or 7 teachers decided to work together across the curriculum but in 30 or 40 minute blocks? What would happen if there were an interim of 2 weeks or longer that were projects learners could sign up for—like bookbinding, altered books, building a wood project or?? How could we make arrangements for kids to have different schedules—say one kid comes at 8 am and another starts their day at 10 am. What if a student was an apprentice to an artist some of his/her school time? Why are we still organized in age-segregated classrooms? I bet if we talked about it, we could create some nifty learning places and practices.

@David "The attitude is ussually more that the teacher is responsible to teach and the student is then responsible to learn." I've thought about this for a long, long time. I really don't know if I want to be responsible for another's learning, anymore than I'd like to be responsible for their spiritual development, or their health, or their ethics. I think when we declare that we are responsible for some one else's learning, we relieve them of their responsibility to learn.

Thanks for the reference. I went out and bought my copy today. Just had a chance peruse and it looks great.

Nicely done and well written! The question that pops up in my mind, following the premise of the book, how do we change this? Clearly, your presenting research and discovering the almost universal but hidden feelings of the staff was to no avail. As I write this, I am thinking that this may be one of the problems noted in the book that is so big that it takes a larger conversation to change the situation. So maybe that becomes the way to influence what happens.

@Scott. I think that is a terrific idea. And building off of David's comment about conflict management, fierce conversations, and teamwork, it occurs to me that the idea of breaking down things is important. When I've been called into a school for conflict management, for example, things haven't been "broken down"—there is just a general angst. I think the same is true for embedding technology in schools—such a broad brush is used that the opportunities one sees when things are "broken down" are missed in the larger picture. Focus, focus, focus. This is very helpful.

@Rob  What an astute observation. I think you're right. I think educators have confused schools and learning, seeing them as synonymous when they are not. I wish there were more artists and craftsmen in schools. And David's comment below is evidence. I, too, am sorry for those students who have been turned off--and I'm sorry for our country.

"I really think the last paragraph of your post sparked something for me. I am not so sure that if we don't make some very needed changes schools as we know them may very well go away."

"Occasionally the problem you"re dealing with stems from long-held and widely shared norms. Virtually everyone has done the same thing for years—even generations." (page 154) I think this is an accurate statement with respect to schools. As I've said elsewhere, school today is essentially the same as when my father went to school early in the last century. And there have been copious reports on the inappropriateness of school as we know it in the 21st century. Check out this post for a good listing of them with links: http://www.dangerouslyirrelevant.org/2008/05/so-what-if-scho.html

I invited kamccollum to tell me about her PLN. I'd be interested in yours as well.

I had some additional thoughts about PLNs. I follow many blogs and subscribe to other sources. When I find something interesting on the web, I FURL it to come back to at another time. You can see what I FURL in my public folder at http://www.furl.net/member/skipolsen. And I think you would be able to see the topics (folders) I save to by clicking "my topics" at the bottom of the page. So I'm constantly reviewing and refreshing and interacting with this vital source of self-built information system.

I was fascinated by the work of Prof. Walter Mischel with the kids and the marshmellows. The thought I had was we should be teaching this to the kids so they know explicitly the difference between the "grabber" and the "delayer" and in situations beyond marshmellows. We should also teach them about the impact of the study by telling them about the predictive power of this simple experiment.

Can we change professional development? Can PLCs provide a basis for changing personal ability? These are excellent questions, but they are the same ones we've been asking for years.

At my website (http://LearningReimagined.com) I argue that substantive, deep change in the educational system in this country is impossible because the system is locked down tight by an interlocking set of forces making it immobile. We're losing 50% of new educators by year five and one-third of our kids are dropping out—and that doesn't count the kids who have tuned out and are just playing the game of school. While it is possible and probable that there will be pockets of change where things like PLCs and PD get done effectively, the "system" of education is still pretty much the same as when my father went to school. Until we fundamentally change our learning model and our mental models, change will be impossible.

Not to be pessimistic about it all, I think one of the most important things we (educators) need to do is to talk with each other and expand the conversation to include parents, community leaders, students, business people, etc. about what we want for our children, our future and our society. I think we should be provocateurs and organize the conversations so that across this land people are talking learning. We need to quit wasting precious time and resources marching down the same worn paths trying to re-form this institution. It's too late for that. What we need is re-creation or re-invention, new language, new practice, new narratives—or we are sunk.

I have three artifacts I'd like to share about PLCs and PD. The one was made by a teacher whose school is "focussing" on PLCs. Says he, "Trying to install a PLC here is like trying to install democracy in Iraq." That has lots of meaning for me. 

I apologize for answering so late. My wife and I were on vacation last week and I'm just now digging out.

Clay Shirky's Here Comes Everybody: The Power of Organizing without Organizations (sorry, the link button doesn't seem to be working) is a good read. Many stories about the impact of technology and our ability to organize people. And I think the impact of technology is having a profound impact on my learning and is causing me to think about my own Personal Learning Network.

I know I'm falling behind but I was struck by the work of William Miller and I think some of his ideas apply to education, schools, and learning--so I just have to comment. "The instant you stop trying to impose your agenda on others, you eliminate the fight for control. You sidestep irrelevant battles over whose view of the world is correct." (page 105) "What William Miller teaches us is that a change of heart can't be imposed; it can only be chosen." (page 106)

Thanks for the post. You raise (for me) a very interesting idea. Educators of all kinds ought to know how to use technology, not only to use it with students, but also to use it in their personal/professional life. How, for example, do you professionals "organize" the vast amount of information that they track? And I think the information revolution is going to get even more complex. One of the exciting ideas I'm reading about in blogs are PLNs--Personal Learning Networks. I think I need to do more thinking about this. I don't think it is any more appropriate to say, "I'm a techno peasant" or "I don't know much about it, it's for the younger generation" than to say, "I can't read or write".

What if the things that are driving people nuts are the very things we have no control over?

Thanks for the reply. I know that there are some healthy schools out there. I also know that many are diseased with crippling practices (inner cities) and many others where students and educators alike just "play" school. While this may not be the case in Keokuk or Fort Dodge, I'm afraid it is very much a national problem and has been for years. It's not getting any better, despite the best efforts of many good and intelligent people since A Nation At Risk was published in 1983. I wish it wasn't so.

Thanks for your reply. I'm not convinced that behavior change is possible in schools, generally. As dkeane points out, there are individual schools that are rare examples in the 14,000 school districts in the U.S. The context and structure of schools determines so much of the behavior in school:

I wonder if it is possible to create profound vicarious experiences in schools for either teachers or students. It seems to me that the answer is a loud no--but I'm willing to rethink it with suggestions from you all. We're too hobbled by time, place, numbers, mental models, and a governing structure to make that happen.

I'm curious. Reading the posts leads me to believe that there are not many in this group.