Just finished facilitating learning with a passionate, optimistic group of middle leaders on the last day of a five day programme, spread over seven months. The programme is based upon the key principles of ‘The Learning Imperative‘. On the final afternoon, leaders present back their own learning and impact on their leadership, as well as on learning and teaching in their teams. I find this a fascinating process, to find out which elements they connected to most, given the own and their team’s stage of development.
There were, however certain key themes that came through time and again in the presentations made, which are listed below.
Be really interested in which resonate with you in your role…
Doing more…
- De-privatising classrooms
- Build learning culture based upon strong relational trust
- Prioritising my time, so I can lead the development of teaching in my team
- Ensuring micro focus for improvement both for individuals and the team as a whole
- Planning and teaching backwards from the desired outcome
- Developing learning dialogue about teaching
Doing less…
- Meetings with overloaded agendas that squeeze out time for adult learning and deeper dialogue
- Over assuming there is shared clarity about what ‘beautiful’ represents
- Stressing over issues I have no control or influence over, which as one leader described as ‘shouting at the sea’. This he described as a pointless waste of energy and cause of personal and team stress.
- Trying to multi-task and firefight instead of focussing on task completion
Will continue to…
- To strive to model excellence and an openness to learning on a day-to-day basis.
- Have a relentless focus on identifying things we can ‘stop’ doing as they have no/negative impact, to provide the oxygen for learning.
- Develop shared language about ‘beautiful’ teaching and learning
- Long/medium term backward planning
Here is how one of the leaders captured their learning graphically…
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