Some thoughts on leadership

Last week my cohort discussed qualities of effective leadership in and outside the classroom. A lot of rich discussion resulted because this is one of those topics that runs deep with all of us. We all have strong personal feelings on what effective leadership looks like, and what it takes to be a great leader. I've had some time for our discussions to settle a bit, and am going to try make some sense of it.

Initially when thinking of leadership I think of those who are the leaders in a community, whether that be a school, playground, office, or parliament. We all can associate to those roles, but I do believe leadership takes on many different faces. Sometimes it is simply being comfortable taking a stance, helping and encouraging others, or being the silent rock of the group. Leaders know when to speak up, and when it is beneficial to have some quiet time. I think being comfortable with silence says more than the urge to constantly talk from anxious nerves. Leadership is the ability to provide ideas, or facilitate a group on this. Moreover, it is being a calm persona for others to bounce ideas off of or absorb tension. It is having the ability to rise to the occasion, and turing frowns upside down. Leaders are those who we look up to and admire. Leadership takes on so many different faces it's impossible to peg down one defining characteristic or attribute.

Leadership I believe is a skill and to a degree innate quality. (The jury is still out on this one though!) And like a skill, I believe leadership abilities can be taught and learned. Just recently I ran a workshop in my Methods class on cooperative and collaborative learning. One of the important ideas we stressed is we need to explicitly teach and model for students how to work collaboratively in the classroom. We all learn from observations and experience; therefore if you have never been privy to great leadership demonstrations then it will be more difficult to cultivate your own abilities. With that said, I do believe great leadership is completely subjective, and is influenced by your environment and experiences.

Knowing when to take a step back and let others step forward is a wonderful skill as it empowers others and creates a greater community of partnership, equality, and learning. Being an active participant is just as important as leading, and to be an active participant students need to learn how to actively listen. I strongly feel one of the most important characteristics of effective leadership is the ability to support and develop people. When you succeed at this you empower the individuals, and this will create a wonderful trickle-down effect to all those around. These feelings are as contagious as laughter, and when the school is feeling great the team-bonds grow stronger and greater. This leads to everyone taking on and sharing leadership roles in their community.

Altogether I believe we are all leaders in our own right. Those moments when you witness unexpected kindness, thought, generosity, new ideas or outlooks - those are the moments of great leadership in action. Those 'wow' moments when you stop and think about your own choices and behaviours - the ability to evoke these emotions is something each and everyone of us does every day. As I mentioned laughter is contagious, well so is negativity, and so is positivity! As much as the term "reflect" is started to seem like one of the most used terms I've heard since entering teacher's college; it does seem fitting to say we need to stop and think about what we are doing and how we are affecting those around us. Great leaders understand this dynamic relationship, and practice it too.

Looking back at my first teaching practicum

A little over a month has now passed since my first practicum teaching block in a grade 4 classroom. Since then I have begun a new term at University with some new courses and familiar faces. Over this time I have seen a dramatic shift in the way I am approaching my classes, for everything we are doing I am now thinking "how can I apply this in the classroom?" What's more is my next teaching placement is in a grade 1 classroom, so I am now on the constant lookout for ideas and techniques related to this age group. I am shifting my course work and projects to have a primary focus where feasible as well. In my Language Arts class the past two classes we have been modelling a writer's workshop, which has been a fantastic experience! I haven't written creatively in that capacity since I was forced to in high school! I'm pretty chuffed with the story I wrote - a parody on the Three Little Pigs - my version is the Three Little Wolves and the Big Bad Pig who eat's their den's down. I'm hoping to finish it by next Monday, and potentially use it in my next teaching block.

A mask I created in art class - never
got the opportunity to teach in to
the grade 4's though sadly.

Looking back at my first placement, I think the most important lesson I personally learned was to be yourself. Having your personality come through in the lessons really helps get the children excited and interested. My most successful lessons always had a personal touch to them, whether that be creatively through art or drama, or through connecting personal experiences and stories. The lessons which seemed to lack that "je ne sais quoi" were typically lessons that I adapted from textbooks or I was trying to replicate an idea my associate passed on vaguely. What this taught me was the importance of having ownership over your lessons. One of the most helpful tips I learned from my associate teacher was when he asked me at the end of the day "what did you want the students to know at the end of that lesson?" I had just started the new math unit on linear measurement a day or two prior, so I said "I just want them to know what the five ways to measure something are (length, width, height, depth, thickness)." Seemed pretty straight forward to me, but my associate tactfully told me to just teach to that then because I had also tried to introduce a new concept - decimetres. He told me I was making the same common mistake all new teachers make - trying to teach too much in one lesson. This is such a simple lesson learned, and it really also helped drive home the necessity of backward-design. Even though I had been hearing "backward-design this, backward-design that"; to finally have that 'a-ha' moment about its importance and significance was fantastic. This really helped in the last week and a half of my teaching block in all my lessons, as I feel I achieved a much greater focus and in a way, simplicity.

Another really important lesson I learned looking back is regarding classroom management. Throughout the block I created and taught the Science unit on Light, and I had an absolute blast doing so. I really enjoyed re-creating some of the experiments I remember doing as a kid. The students really enjoyed the hands-on learning that I incorporated into nearly daily science experiments. However, where my own learning as a teacher took place came from a few areas. Firstly, I taught science the final two periods of the day after the second nutrition break. By the end of the day the students often got a bit restless and tired, so their attention started to fade and they began to act out more. This was amplified if it was a black-top nutrition break, which we did have a few of. Secondly, to reinforce the classroom behaviour expectations and safety considerations before beginning the lesson are vital. It was such a fun unit to teach, and to see the excitement on students faces when they learned something new, or saw something they were never expecting in the experiment was wonderful. When I asked the students what colour they thought light was, and we brainstormed a few ideas - the overwhelming consensus was white or yellow. However, when I told them I heard a crazy rumour that it was made up of lots of colours they all became very curious. It was a simple experiment of shining a light source into water which then hit a mirror, that reflected the light onto a white piece of paper. When the students dispersed into groups of three to try the experiment, it was great to see some of the teamwork being exhibited, and the look of awe and excitement when they finally were able to see the rainbow on the white paper was fantastic. Another great science lesson I taught which to be honest was one I thought was going to be a bit drier was on light technology. My idea was to teach the students about the camera, and how it uses some of the ideas we were discussing. I spent so much time researching the camera, when it was invented, etc; and shared it with the class. What made this lesson successful was my delivery of it - I got really excited about it, and that enthusiasm transferred to the students. Then when given the opportunity to research the telescope they jumped right in. Both my associate and I were shocked by their interest, but agreed it was through my delivery that created this learning opportunity. This really taught me the importance of being excited about what you are doing - such a simple thing to say, but you really need to amplify it in the classroom for the students to really get it. 

Probably one the best lessons I taught came on my final day of practicum when I taught a Language Arts lesson on organizing ideas. I told the students a story from when I lived in Australia and went on a road trip with my mate, and one of the exciting events of the trip. As I told the story I intentionally mixed up a few of the details, feigning that I wish I had my ideas in order. Then after the story I asked the students to help me organize my story so I could retell it another time, so i had an Organizational Chart printed off which as a class we completed while using a document camera. Afterwards I had all the students get out their writers notebook, and begin writing about one of their ideas using this organizational chart. I was thrilled at how attentive they were during the story, the details of the story they remembered, and then their silent individual work during their own writing. It felt so amazing after seeing the students engagement and work ethic throughout that language block!

One of the most exciting and rewarding moments for myself as a teacher during this block was teaching everyday using the Smartboard for interactive lessons. I was fortunate enough to have one in my classroom, and having been trained to a level 2 on it in September, I was eager to give it a go. The first week I only used it a few times sadly - to be honest I was more concerned about making sure my lessons worked! But by the final week I was incorporating it into every lesson throughout the day. I thought it was fantastic to teach with for two reasons. First, it really engaged and got the students attention. Even if I was only doing simple infinite multipliers or reveals, they loved it - especially when we played the jeopardy game as review for the Light Unit. The second reason I enjoyed teaching with it so much was it helped keep myself focused in the lesson. I was able to have questions pre-made ready on it to teach and solve with the class, provide visual queues, and even keep it going with instructions for students to refer to when doing individual or group work. It was amazing seeing how excited the students were when I called them up to interact with the board, and I was amazed at how careful they were with it. What I also found very useful was asking students to be my helper for the day with the Smartboard, as it kept them involved throughout the lesson, and minimized acting out.

Student's stainglass lightbulb's on the window.

The final thing I wanted to mention was how great it was to incorporate art and drama in the classroom. I had the class create stain glass pieces out of construction paper and tissue paper for one of the science lessons on translucency, opaqueness, and transparency. It was fantastic to teach, and the students absolutely loved it. I taught the lesson my first week, so the cleanup took a bit longer than anticipated; but well worth it!

The eyeball I created for science class,
and my stainglass lightbulb example.

I also came back after block to volunteer one day before Christmas, and taught an art lesson where the students painted a winter holiday theme and then applied glue and glitter to create a fantastic effect. For one of my science lessons on the human eye, I created an eyeball by cutting in half a large styrofoam ball, and painting on the parts of the eye. The students were so fascinated by what I created that the next day I brought in a smaller styrofoam balls for them to recreate themselves. We also got to do a fun drama exercise one day to learn about rhythm, tone, and pitch. Again I had done this exercise at University, but had such a great time with it I shared it with the students. They had an absolute ball with it as they clearly did not have drama regularly when one student asked "what's drama?" when he saw it on the daily agenda! This lesson was so much fun, and really taught me the importance when teaching to really put on a show for the students. They respond so well, and really enjoyed just playing as they saw it. Luckily for me though this did hit many curriculum expectations!

I think one of the most special experiences I had throughout my first teaching block was seeing the academic and personal growth of one of my low IEP students. This boy was so lovely, and it was amazing to see him start talking more and make great strides. We gave him the academic award for the month of November, and to see his beaming smile walk across the stage during the assembly was really special.

My associate teacher (left) and I (right) posing with great mustaches! Eek!

One of the amusing moments during November was my associate teacher and I participated in "Mo-vember". What an experience that was. It was hilarious seeing the reactions of students in the hallways, and hearing them whisper "Why does he have a mustache?" and "I think it's for Mo-vember".  Nevertheless, it was a relief to shave it off at the conclusion of the month.

Despite how much work it was during this first teaching block, and how I never saw any friends outside of a few who I lesson planned with; or how I was incredibly tired and fell asleep thinking about my lessons, and woke up thinking about how my lessons would go - I am amazed how much fun and how much I relished this experience. Now more than I ever I truly know how much I want to be a teacher. From doing prep work to walking down the hall chatting to students, to helping coach the girls volleyball team during nutrition break and staying late after school to score keep; there is nothing else I would rather be doing. Simply amazing! And now only six more weeks until my next teaching placement beings - this time in a grade one class! For those of you who took the time to read this and are fellow teachers, I would be very interested to hear how your first teaching experiences relate, and how they have changed over the years?