Barry Smith - Learning about Learning

We’re off to Chamonix with a group of 40 youngsters today.  I’ll try and get an opportunity to blog during the week but if not there will be an update at the start of July!

Unit 4 of the Scottish Qualification for Headship challenges us to compare our skills and competencies to the Standard for Headship in the context of our progress to date and identify areas of strength and areas for development backed up by appropriate evidence.  As a precursor to my unit 4 submission I’m going to use my blog to help that process along.  The reasoning is twofold, it allows further reflection on my part in relation to my progress towards meeting the Standard for Headship and it affords anyone who wishes, or who has perhaps worked with me, the opportunity to provide feedback on my claims.

The Standard for Headship is comprised of Professional Actions and 3 essential elements of practice:

1.  Strategic Vision, values and aims

2.  Knowledge and Understanding                    

3.  Personal qualities and interpersonal skills

In this post I will begin to deal with the Essential Elements. 

I have explored and discussed my educational values through my blog.  I believe this has helped shape my moral and ethical perspective in relation to education. Reading educational literature as documented on this site has also challenged my thinking, as has engaging with the views of staff members in school, students and ‘bloggers’.

Completing a critical self-evaluation as part of SQH unit 1 allowed me to communicate my vision for an effective school.  Undertaking the 360 degree review as part of SQH unit 1 provided further insight to my current practice, including my ability to articulate and embody my moral and ethical standpoint in relation to education.

My blog provides evidence of professional reflection and review of my own practice.  I have taken part in professional coaching sessions, covering personal development target-setting and values.

The ALPs programme has given me the opportunity to provide a rationale for practice and to be accountable for it, in relation to the way the programme operates and it goals.  On a daily basis I am accountable for the actions I take in relation to my dealings with young people and professionals.  The ALPs programme has also provided the opportunity to encourage critical reflection in others, including young people, as has my blog through comments and interactions with others.

Comlpeting Unit 2 of the SQH, including a school self-evaluation allowed me to demonstrate knowledge and understanding of school improvement.  Developing the S5 Social Education programme and monitoring and evaluating the ALPs programme and Pre-vocational educational programme allows me to employ strategies for improvement. (taking account of pupil voice, using attendance and behaviour statistics, taking account of stakeholder perceptions, recognising achievement)

To be continued at a later date.

Stephen Heppell’s visit to the school was a great opportunity for me to see some of the incredible animation and film work being created by the youngsters at Preston Lodge High School.  If animation and film-making are your thing it would be worth getting in touch with our Art department, PT Jim Cramb and the other members of staff are helping to create our film-makers of tomorrow. The link above is to an immensely powerful film about the Holocaust used in school for Holocaust memorial week and created by Preston Lodge students.

I then had an opportunity to discuss the ALPs programme with Stephen,  Ewan MacIntosh and David Gilmour and share experiences and views on working with youngsters who are in need of significant support in the mainstream setting. 

Having these opportunities helps convince me further that the type of work we are doing with our ALPs youngsters has the potential to spread much further than just the ‘NEET’ group.  I hope that we will have the opportunity to explore avenues for such development in the coming years as A Curriculum for Excellence broadens out our ideas of the curriculum.

I went to Telford College today to see our ALPs students make a presentation to bring to end their time with the college.  It was fantastic to see the boys making such an effort with what was obviously a real challenge for them. 

We now have four out of seven boys placed on a vocational course for next session and are moving ahead with the organisation of work placements.  The boys are also taking part in a pilot programme with our HE department to learn the ‘industry skills’ of a sous chef, courtesy of Dave Robertson who was himself a chef before coming into teaching.  This is an idea loosely based on the Hospitality Skills for Work programme that we have been considering as a possibility for the future.

Finally, we welcome Stephen Heppell to the school on Wednesday to see what we have been doing with technology to help engage the students and to chat to some of the ALPs participants.

I’ve tried to take my notes for Michael Fullan’s Leading in a Culture of Change and summarise them.  It’s still pretty rough and I’ll be trying to tidy it up in the next few days. The essential concepts have been put in bold. 

It has been very humbling to read a book like this and measure my own skills and qualities against it.  However, it is a fantastic aspirational tool and like many of the other books I have read so far as part of my SQH reading, one that I will regularly revisit.

Leading in a culture of change  

Moral purpose :

Authentic leaders display character

We have both egoistic and altruistic desires

Culture and core values central to an organisation

Understanding change

Successful leadership styles:

Authoritative - “come with me” enthusiastic, self-confident,optimistic 

Affiliative - “people come first”Democratic - “what do you think?”

Coaching - “try this”

Unsuccessful leadership styles with a negative impact on climate

Coercive - “do what I tell you” -resentment & resistance

Pacesetting “do as I do, now” - burnout & overwhelmed staff (I was particularly interested by this section) 

The goal is not to innovate the most

Appreciate the implementation dip

Listen to, and work with resisters

Reculturing - changing the way we do things around here

Leadership is by its nature complex  

Relationships

Seven essentials to developing relationships :

Setting clear standards

Expecting the best

Paying attention

Personalising recognition

Telling the story

Celebrating together

Setting the example 

Good leaders inspire by;

Selectively showing their weaknesses

Relying on intuition

Managing with tough empathy

Showing what is unique about themselves   

School capacity is the key to success:

Teachers knowledge, skills and dispositions

Professional community

Programme(curriculum) coherence

Appropriate technical resources

Headteacher leadership   

Every school needs a strong professional learning community

Emotional quotient/Emotional intelligence is vital.

Intrapersonal - self awareness

Interpersonal - empathy, social responsbility

Adaptability

Stress management

Mood - happiness, optimistic  

Build knowledge and capacity

Information is only valuable in a social context

Explicit knowledge - words and numbers that can be communicated in the fom of data and information

Tacit knowledge - skills, beliefs and understandings below the level of awareness.  It is highly personal

Coherence from complexity

It never ceases to amaze me how ‘full on’ this time of year is.  So far this week we’ve had the change of timetable with all that entails for Pupil Support staff, pre-vocational college induction, S6 induction(where I gave a talk on leadership to our new S6), Thursday and Friday bring our S5 induction, we have a Rhythm of Life drumming performance on Wednesday night and I had an SQH tutorial on Monday after school after having completed our Unit 4 oral presentations at the end of last week(I passed thank goodness!). 

I’m out of breath just writing it!!

The space and time to think are at a premium just now, I have a summary of Michael Fullan’s Leading in a Culture of Change that I’d like to publish but it’ll have to wait. 

The title is a reference to how my brain is feeling, the roundabout is getting faster as the end of term approaches!  Then I’ll be able to concentrate properly on my Unit 4 submission.