Posts tagged principal

Staff from the six Te Atatu schools involved in the Koru Project (Enhancing Higher Standards Across Schools) – a Ministry of Education funded initiative, were greatly excited by Professor Hattie’s address at the 2008 Project Koru Conference on the influences on student achievement. Hattie and his researchers synthesized over 500,000 studies on student achievement. Several myths were challenged and there was great surprise at the relative value of various influences on school achievement. The debate and conversation in schools both formally and informally, has continued.

However, there is a danger of over simplifying what he was saying, of misquoting or of plain misunderstanding Hattie’s address and the implications of his research. His reporting continues and there are differences between his 2003 work and his 2007 findings.

2003 2007
Feedback 1.13 Self Report Grades 1.44
Students Prior Cognitive ability 1.04 Absence of disruptive pupils .86
Instructional quality 1.00 Classroom behaviourial .80
Direct Instruction .82 Quality of teaching .77
Remediation .65 Reciprocal teaching .74
(class size – .05) (class size .21)

The top five influences of 2003 are no longer the top five in 2007.

In 2007 Feedback goes from 1 to 8
Prior cognitive ability from 2 to 6
Instructional quality from 3 to 4
Direct instruction from 4 to 20

The importance of the various influences are indications only – they are not set in stone. From them, we can identify some important trends eg: that teachers really do make a difference.

However, it would be entirely wrong and a disservice to Hattie’s research, for teachers to jump on one characteristic as being particularly powerful or particularly useless. Some will choose to pick selective influences to “arm their cause.” In fact, all they may do is illustrate their ignorance. A good example of this is from the 2007 research of Hattie where class size comes in at a lowly position 72 on Hattie’s Hot Hundred with a size effect of just 0.21 – not making any significant difference to student achievement. Teacher training comes in at position 87 with an effectiveness scale of just .11. Billions of dollars are spent on teacher education and on lowering class sizes, the latest being the 2008 implementation of 1:18 for new entrant classes. If Hattie’s influences are viewed in isolation then there is absolutely no basis to reduce class sizes and maybe we could dispense with teacher training as we know it.

Certainly, the billions of dollars put into these two areas could be better spent in other areas of education or social services. Matipo Primary School has been pursuing inquiry based learning over the last five years. Educational author and consultant, Mark Treadwell, describes our approach as being in the “top five percent of the world’s schools.” Yet inquiry based teaching, taken in isolation from Hattie’s research comes in at 56 with an effectiveness scale of just .31. To some detractors, this was music, indeed a symphony, to their ears. “So inquiry based learning is not good, I told you so and now we have the evidence to prove it!”

This is the great weakness of those who don’t have the ears to listen, the eyes to see or the ability to think. When schools combine inquiry learning with lower class sizes, quality teachers, strong teacher – pupil engagement, good use of feedback and a good classroom tone, then the combined effect leads to powerful teaching and learning and better student achievement.

A great little truism is:
“to engage the brain before you engage the tongue.”
I strongly urge all teachers to take the time to read and consider Hattie’s research in full.

A lot is said and written about inclusive management practices but often without clear definition of the context in which it is appropriate.

Good management practice includes as being as inclusive and consultative as possible with stakeholders, within some defined parameters.
1. Good leaders lead, rather than prevaricate.
2. Decisions must be made for the widest possible good and based on a careful analysis
of the full information flow.
3. Those who bear the responsibility for decision making, should ultimately make the
decision.

Work places are not democracies and there needs to be a clear understanding of what constitutes consensus decision making. Consensus decision making is where the management will provide information, consult widely, make a decision based on full information, legal requirements / and to the advantage of greater common good (normally) them communicate both the decision and the reasons for it, to the stakeholders.

In this school inclusive management practices takes many forms. The Board of Trustees are briefed and make major decisions of a governance nature. They consult the community as appropriate, especially for major decisions. The Senior Management Team, together with the principal, discuss and often decide on a range of management and curriculum issues. They generally receive a wider information flow. All teaching staff have imput into the budget process, suggestions for purchases, professional development and school iniatives. Periodically, any extra money that materializes is available to staff and ‘wish lists’ circulated.

Syndicate Leaders and those with administrative responsibilities have the delegated authority to exercise their responsibilities within their defined parameters. Similarly, budget holders have the authority to spend their allocated budgets. In this aspect of inclusive management, there is an implied professional trust and delegated authority, rather than a ‘de facto’ delegation as in some schools where the principal or other senior staff, make spending decisions, despite someone else being (nominally) in charge of that particular area.

The development of a school vision or charter is often paraded as a crowning example of collaborative / inclusive / consensus partnership. Schools are required to consult with their communities on the development of a charter. Nearly all consult on a draft document rather than a ‘blank page’ approach. Many requirements in the charter and operations plan are mandated by the Ministry so are compulsory features. Such documents need to take account of historical contexts, environmental features (ie: proximity to immediate environment features for curriculum purposes) previous spending and development and the current stage and state of the school as well as Ministry initiatives and government directives. We don’t throw the ‘baby out with the dishwater’ each time you revisit the charter or school vision. From this context, a draft version is developed and circulated to staff and parents, genuinely seeking feedback. The recent strategic plan at this school was quite markedly changed from its draft form to its finished form with staff imput changing reporting targets and finance and property capital expenditure. The feedback from parents was minimal and represents a challenge to do better.

An inclusive philosophy is also about how you treat people. In this school, all staff are treated with the same respect and the same consideration. School functions are open to all staff members, full time or part time, teaching, property or administrative staff. Pastoral care and access to the principal is available to all staff employed at the school.

Matipo Primary School has a strong tradition and commitment to the development and growth of teachers. Opportunities are provided for study, course attendance and opportunity to exercise real responsibility. There is wide delegation of tasks. Our Leadership Project has helped to provide both knowledge and skills and leadership for the Senior Management Team and the Aspiring Leaders group.

Inclusive Management should lead to a more even distribution of workload, provide leadership opportunities to a wider number of staff and should ultimately lead to better learning outcomes for pupils. However, there are some corollaries that are part of the concept. Inclusive leadership involves some important attributes including:
• Good communication.
• Willingness and work ethic.
• Timeliness and task completion.
• An understanding and sense of professionalism.
• Vision, charisma and the ability to both drive and motivate.
And the willingness to in turn, delegate, grow and involve other staff.

Inclusive management needs to be real not theoretical and must allow real opportunity for others to both manage and grow.

This was a great conference and very significant. The big picture items or themes coming out of it were:
1. Schools as an institution are finite and perhaps within 50 years, won’t exist. We need to be thinking about or imaging new forms, ideas and curriculum for schools.
2. That children, teachers and schools learn better when they work together (in groups).
3. The importance being placed on the Arts and in Music particularly.
4. Of equal importance was the great bonding of our team and the better knowledge of each other and the willingness to work closer together.
5. That we can learn from business, sport etc in terms of systems and organization.

The most important message was the need for schools to change. We need to prepare children for a world that hasn’t yet been invented and for jobs that don’t yet exist. Again, the need to change the school from a place of teaching to a place of learning, the importance of digital technology etc. Our school is well down this path:
• Adaptive curriculum
• Inquiry Learning
• Thinking skills
• ICT
• Performing Arts
• New facilities to match changing curriculum
• Emphasis on pedagogy

The new New Zealand school curriculum gives the opportunity and mandate to change the nature and content of the school. Our school is now four years in to changing the school from a place of teaching to a place of learning and of trying to become a school preparing children for a 21st century life with action learning, learning together in groups, exploring digital worlds and having access to a strong arts programme.

Conferences are a time to think and reflect and a couple of areas of personal learning crystallized.
• The need to visit rooms more often.
• The need to give more feedback to staff.
• The need to recognize and reward ability.
• More opportunities for student voice.

All the speakers touched on leadership and management strategies and talked about various criteria of importance in effective schools which are summarized.

Peter Senge M.I.T was the most powerful speaker and strongest advocate for schools to change. We need to get away from the production line approach to schools and re-imagine our structures and curriculum to prepare children for a world which hasn’t been invented yet and for a job that doesn’t yet exist. Schools may not exist in 50 years. They began in order, to save the 19th century industrial revolution and will become outdated by geo political internalization of the world and changes in technology and employment. For Senge, learning is about thinking leading to acting. It needs to have an authentic context so that it has real meaning to the learner.

Brian Caldwell of Melbourne, was a substantive author of Tomorrows Schools in New Zealand. He gave a very well grounded presentation entitled 8 challenges for school leaders and politicians.
1. Trust the profession.
2. Intellectual autonomy (self management).
3. Re-build schools physically, pedagogically and in curriculum to match the 21st century.
4. Seek sponsorship opportunities in public education.
5. Students must be the centre.
6. Support the leaders with more management and support structures to enable them to be the educational leaders.
7. Alignment of capital (put all together).
- Intellectual capital – the professional capital of staff.
- Social capital – networks, partnerships, grants.
- Spiritual capital – values and attitudes.
- Financial capital – monitory resources.
8. Real governance is the process by which schools build and align their capital to reach their goals.

Michael Fullan ex university of Toronto is now education advisor to the Ontario Premier. He believes in central direction and mandated targets. He is a major world figure in education. He spoke of ‘six secrets’
1. Love your employees, parents, network partners etc, (respect and trust and build partnerships).
2. Connect peers with purpose – peer interaction within schools and clusters.
3. Bullying backfires (as a management tool).
4. Learning is the real work – doing, implementing, trialing etc.
5. Transparency works – sharing practice and resources, observation of each other, comparing results.
6. Systems learning – plugging in all parts of the system to work for the same end.

Andy Hargreaves from Boston is probably the leading world educational thinker. He believes in a bottom up approach. He talked about seven principals of sustainable leadership.
1. Depth and focus on learning – it works.
2. Endurance and change over time – it lasts.
3. Breadth – it spreads.
4. Justice – helping other teachers or schools.
5. Diversity – networking with others for new ideas.
6. Resourcefulness – you can’t run a school with dead leaders.
7. Conservation –honouring and valuing the past as building blocks for the future.
He reiterated Senge’s idea that we can learn from other sectors (business and sport) and from other countries as well as by networking with other schools and partners. His recipe for good schools is:
- Strong vision.
- Focus on learning areas.
- High quality teachers.
- Build strong professional learning communities.
- Networks and partnerships.
- Accountability

What was the personal learning I gained from this conference?
- Visit rooms more often.
- Provide more feedback especially about assessment reporting.
- Advocate for teachers to observe each other and in other schools.
- Recognize reward ability.
- Promote and defend the philosophy and direction of the school.