The awfully clever DHT is doing some studying these days and his reading of “interesting” stuff has increased somewhat. Conversations have always been peppered with “What do you think about…” and “I was reading about….” There are still more than plenty random and crazy conversations that are the core of our working life but I am enjoying the increased frequency of the theoretical musings (especially since I just get the interesting parts and don’t have to wade through the actual texts).
When I finished my last post-graduate study I really missed the conversations over coffee with colleagues and the “taught days” when we all got to leave our schools for a day and talk about education. I didn’t miss the writing of assignments, the evidence gathering and the Harvard Bibliography style haunts me to this day, but I missed talking about education because that really, really interests me.
I was reading an American educationalist online the other week and he was going on at some length about the challenges of educators in America. No surprises that these were pretty much as our own. However, he was making a point that, in his opinion, part of the issue was that teachers have a tendency to blame outside factors for challenges that they face in school. I stopped my usual skimming and scanning when I read this because this, to me, is dangerous ground. Speaking for myself I can get a tad prickly when someone starts in on the challenges of my job and how easy we teachers have it re holidays, working hours etc. We have all heard it. I was mentioning to some new colleagues that no one comes into teaching for the holidays or the pay. If they do then they will be disillusioned and disappointed really quickly.
However, back to the article. He made the observation that there are many things we cannot change about education, schools, pressures, challenges and the likes but we can change ourselves as educators. Now that made me think. Yes, I would broadly agree with that. As an educator I have never stopped learning and I have never stopped changing, developing and thinking about what I am doing and why. To me that is a foundation stone of effective teaching and learning; not being satisfied, not being complacent and not changing for change sake. Keeping things fresh is important to me and I believe it is important to a school. Thinking big while acting small; i.e. taking measured manageable steps towards improvement and development is always a challenge for me no matter which role I have had in a school. I always liked to try out a new theme for learning with each class. I would think about a theme that the children had shown interest in, or was current, or the class and I had been sparked by and I‘d give it a go. I am not a huge fan of Topic Programmes. I know they have many fine qualities and can support breadth and progression and several other very worthwhile educational aspects. For me though it is the progression of skills and knowledge and how we do that and show that through the children’s interest in a theme led to more knowledge or acquiring a new skill. Therefore when a teacher says they’d like to try something new or different and show me a plan that is educational sound and there is interest from the class and had purpose then I am usually sold.
Change is there, it can be hard, it is rarely pain free and we need to adapt, consider and keep a focus on what is important to us and our school community. Singing along with the Take That song that gave me the title for this, reaffirmed my belief that it is how we manage change and how we tackle the challenges that ensures the strength of our learning community. It goes without saying that chocolate also helps.