Banishing The Culture of Busyness

At the start of each year we arrive back from our break hopefully rested and energised. The new year brings many new opportunities including new students, new team members and new teaching programmes. We begin again the climb up the hill with a fresh group of learners arriving at our doors full of excitement who will rely on us to meet their learning needs in the year ahead. All of this means we are at risk of starting the year with a certain level of panic. There is so much to do, our students are not accustomed to our routines, we don’t know each other well, there are parents to meet, assessments to be done and before we know it we are back to being busy. 

Being busy is rapidly and disturbingly becoming the new normal. Our days seem to get shorter and while we feel like we are fitting more in we also seem to get less of what really matters to us done. Like poor Bilbao Baggins playing riddles in the dark “We need more time”. And yet all this busyness is perhaps the biggest part of our problem. Increasingly those how are interested in time-management, mindfulness, human performance and leadership are offering research that reveals the damage our cult of busyness is causing. The upshot of all this is that to get more done and to start the year positively we need to include time to slow down, switch off, let our minds rest and rebuild our cognitive capacity. Not only does this down-time allow us to better cope with the challenges of the times when we need to be on, it is in these down-times that our brains process and synthesise new understandings and generate creative ideas. Einstein understood this and said ‘Creativity is the residue of time wasted’, revealing the importance of giving our minds time to process thoughts in the background of our subconscious.  

Last year at this time I compared the days at the beginning of the year to a sprint and the weeks that come afterwards as the marathon. The initial pace we set for ourselves in these early days as we rush to do all we can as quickly as we can clearly cannot be sustained. The year ahead of us is much more like a marathon and we know we will need to conserve our energy for the many challenges that lie waiting for us; however, there is more to how we approach the start of the year than just conserving our energy for the mid-year reporting cycle. How we start will determine how we finish and wise carefully considered decisions now will set up positive patterns for later in the year.  

For our students, this is the time when they learn to trust us as the guide they will require for the year ahead. Across the days and weeks at the start of each year they are told what to expect and what is expected of them. Promises are made and exciting opportunities for learning are outlined. In the coming weeks, they will judge the reality of their experience. Handled well the result will be students who feel known and trust that their teachers will meet their learning needs; handled poorly and the damage can be hard to undo. If we move too fast now, make quick choices, react rather than taking the time to reflect and get things right the first time we miss opportunities to model to our students our fullest understanding of what it takes to be a learner.  

For students, new to a school the next few weeks may be very important. The initial celebrity that comes with being new has worn off and friendship circles are rapidly forming about them. Some will negotiate this with ease but many will find challenges here. This is the time when our pastoral care programmes earn their keep and a culture of acceptance and inclusion pays off. It is also a time when they need opportunities to switch-off and experience moments of quiet calm. They will rely on their teachers to set this tone and create these spaces for them.  

The initial panic at the beginning of the year is often a construct of our fear that we have so much to achieve and so little time to do it. Compared to the students who have just left us this new group naturally seems to need so much; after all they are a full year behind. The desire to quickly fill that gap is natural but will not benefit our students. Taking a step back and identifying each little step towards our goal for the year is important. This is also the ideal time to remind ourselves that learning should be more about the journey than the destination. Our students might need to be ready for high school or final exams or even University in just twelve months’ time but they also need to enjoy where they are now with their learning.

For us as teams of teachers the start of the year also brings new challenges. Some of us will be new to the school, others will be in new teams and some will be renegotiating well known connections. At the start of the new year a period of ‘storming' within our teams is typical as relationships are tested and negotiated. Beyond this phase comes a somewhat dangerous period of ‘norming' where team cohesion appears. This can be a time of calm as much of the stress of the initial weeks is put behind us and the team’s natural rhythm surfaces. The danger is that too much cohesion can lead to 'group think’ where divergent thinking disappears. Effective teams should be able to shift back and forth between divergent patterns of thinking where new ideas explode into possibility and convergent patterns where the best of those ideas are put into place. Throughout the marathon that is a school year including opportunities to shake things up with some quality divergence can keep teams fresh. 

To maximise the benefits of divergent thinking, innovation and creativity will require that all important down-time. Our busy, always connected lives mean that we are more likely to react to divergent thinking badly, more likely to reduce the space available for creativity in our teams and are less likely to personally engage in innovative thinking. If we hope to have innovative organisations or we desire to produce a culture of learning where new ideas are embraced, we must respond carefully to divergent thinking. Rather than worshiping at the altar of busyness we need to respect the times we spend quietly, calmly and reflectively ‘wasting time’. 

By Nigel Coutts - Adapted and updated from - Between the Sprint and The Marathon

To better understand the cult of busyness join me in reading "Too Fast to Think: How to reclaim Your Creativity in a Hyper-connected Work Culture' by Chris Lewis

Rethinking Mathematics Education

Mathematics holds an important place at the core of all curriculum models for good reason. The traditional focus on Literacy and Numeracy reinforces the special place that Mathematics holds in our educational thinking. The importance of Mathematical thinking to our daily lives is arguably increasing as we rely on computational models and large data sets. Industry, according to multiple reports requires more graduates with a STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering & Mathematics) background and the M in STEM is seen by many as providing the glue which holds the model together. Despite the importance of Mathematics and the high esteem it holds as a discipline too few students are pursuing it as a pathway beyond school and many people report a fear of Mathematics. 

According to Stanford professor and author Jo Boaler mathematics requires a mindset makeover. “Mathematics, more than any other subject, has the power to crush students’ confidence’. (Boaler. 2009) What is needed is a deliberate shift away from perspectives that make it OK to believe that one is not good at mathematics. This perception of mathematical abilities as a fixed set of attributes which some possess and others do not is a significant hurdle to be overcome if we are to encourage all learners to achieve success in the subject. A first step towards this goal is for teachers and parents to adopt the language of a growth mindset for mathematics and ensure that their children and students are not exposed to negative attitudes of fear or failure that many adults carry forward from their experience of school mathematics. 

A recent ‘Guardian’ article by Bradley Busch offers advice for teachers when responding to students about their mathematical achievements. He describes the ‘comfort strategy’ that is often applied when students underperform in mathematics. The comfort strategy tells students that their results, even when they are low, is not something to worry about, that mathematics is hard and that not everyone can be good at it, or that you are good at other things. The opposite approach offers strategies for improvement. The research cited by Busch shows that students offered the ‘comfort strategy’ tend to estimate that they will maintain consistent results while students offered a ‘strategy focused’ response believe they will improve. 

How we learn mathematics is just as important as our attitude towards the subject. Boaler cites research she conducted as part of the last round of PISA (Programme for International Student Assessment) which looked not only at achievement scores but asked how students learned in mathematics. The clear finding was that countries with a focus on memorisation underperformed, countries which achieved positive results focused on problem solving, number-sense and challenge.(Boaler & Zoido. 2016) Boaler’s long-term research supports this finding with case studies that compare schools teaching through challenging problems linked to the real-world use of mathematics with traditional classrooms with a focus on mathematics as a set of rules and processes to be memorised. Classes which produced the best results, the students with the most positive attitudes towards mathematics and the greatest equity of learning where those where mathematics was taught in richly collaborative settings, where mathematical dialogue was the norm and where students embraced challenge. Beyond a focus on the repetitive manipulation of algorithms and manual calculations, successful mathematicians learn to use multiple representations (including pictures, diagrams, charts, tables, graphs and physical representations) of mathematical concepts that assist in the development of ‘number sense’ and particularly the understanding that numbers can be readily decomposed and recomposed. 

The role of challenge in mathematics is important and the research shows that traditional approaches that seek to make mathematics easy by deploying rules, mnemonics and ‘simple’ processes are doing learners a disservice. Research by Manu Kapur (2014) shows that students are better able to develop a deep understanding of mathematical concepts when they are allowed to fail on their first attempt to learn new ideas. The experience of failure better activates prior knowledge and prepares students for subsequent instruction. This requires that students are presented with sufficiently challenging material and that it is presented in ways that allow for failure. Kapur (2015) also suggests that students are best served by opportunities to generate problems as a part of their mathematical learning and that doing so assist with conceptual understanding and transfer of learning to new situations. Boaler’s research supports this and shows that “our brains grow when we make mistakes because it is a time of struggle, and brains grow the most when we are challenged and engaging with difficult, conceptual questions”. (Boaler 2009) Steven Strogatz (2015) of Cornell University adds “This is not the way math should be taught, even at an elementary level. There really ought to be problem solving and imaginative thinking all the way through while kids master the basics. If you’ve never been asked to struggle with open-ended, non-cookbook problems, your command of math will always be shaky and shallow.”While we believe we showing care for students by making mathematical learning easy and by removing challenges from our students pathways (particularly those labeled as low ability) we are inhibiting their learning. 
 
Boaler and others are concerned that the Mathematics is a diluted version of the real subject. This dilution of Mathematics to a set of rules to be mastered and applied robs the subject of its true beauty and real power. Conrad Wolfram as the founder of ‘Wolfram Research’ a company dedicated to mathematical applications is well placed to describe real world mathematics, the sort we should be teaching. "At its heart, math is the world’s most successful system of problem-solving. The point is to take real things we want to work out and apply, or invent, math to get the answer. The process involves four steps: define the question, translate it to mathematical formulation, calculate or compute the answer in math-speak and then translate it back to answer your original question, verifying that it really does so.” Conrad advocates for teaching that makes use of computers for much of the calculating that is required for problem solving just as is the case in the real world “In the real world we use computers for calculating, almost universally; in education we use people for calculating, almost universally”. Conrad has launched a site advocating for “Computer Based Math” as a solution to the crisis he perceives in mathematics education. 
 
What becomes clear, as you dive further into the emerging research that connects what we know about learning, mindsets, dispositions for learning and the development of mathematical understandings, is that a new approach is required. We need to move away from memorisation and rule based simplifications of mathematics and embrace a model of learning that is challenging and exciting. We can and should be emerging all our students in the beauty and power of mathematics in learning environments full of multiple representations, rich dialogue and collaborative learning. 

by Nigel Coutts

References & Resources:

Learning to learn with a MakerSpace

Making, Maker Centred Learning and STEAM fit neatly alongside Inquiry Based Learning (IBL) for many schools. Commonly this approach includes a constructivist view of knowledge and teachers seek to establish conditions which allow students to explore questions and ideas with greater independence than may occur in the traditional classroom.  Learning becomes a collaborative partnership between teachers and students with a clear focus on a learner centric approach. These core beliefs are enacted through a combination of scaffolds such as those developed from the research of Harvard’s 'Project Zero’ where cultural forces, thinking routines, and an awareness of habits of mind focus the learner’s efforts on developing positive dispositions for learning while building deep understandings. In such an approach to learning Making becomes a pathway to developing the dispositions required for success in the 21st Century and a way of demonstrating one’s competence within a creative and collaborative environment. 
 
This philosophy of teaching and learning has significant implications for the nature of inquiry and Making in schools. Student projects are developed as responses to the problems, wonderings and questions which result from the student led inquiry process. The long-term goal is that students become effective and tenacious problem finders and solvers and this requires that students have a sufficient degree of freedom to identify the problems and subsequent projects which they explore within the necessary constraints of the curriculum. Success in this goal is indicated by the degree of autonomy evident in the student’s projects; the deviation from the norm present in each response and the variety of processes used in achieving a final solution. This brings challenges in terms of resources, project management, time-frames, lesson planning, assessment and evaluation. For teachers with experience in a traditional classroom each of these challenges require an adjustment to not only how they teach (pedagogy) but to how they perceive and value what they teach (curriculum) and significantly the place that assessment has in the teaching/learning cycle. This shift most critically requires teachers to place greater value on the processes of learning (the capacity for empathy, collaboration, critical thinking and creativity their students develop) rather than the product produced or the knowledge retained. This is made increasingly difficult given the current quantitative assessment and accountability frame through which educators, schools and systems are evaluated.
 
A MakerSpace brings with it new affordances and this is reflected in the projects undertaken by students. The most significant use of the space that I share with my teaching team thus far has been that associated with the Year Six, ‘Personal Passion Projects’. In this, students are given time across a semester to develop a project that extends their interest in a personal passion. Many of the projects undertaken included an aspect of making as a way of concluding the project and sharing a solution to a problem defined through the initial planning phases of the project; the ‘Why?’, ‘What if?’ and ‘How might?’ questions that students started with. The diversity of Maker Centred projects undertaken was significant and included items of furniture, mixed material artworks, clothing/fashion projects, sporting equipment, instruments, games/toys and basic electronics. With this diversity came the use of a wide range of materials, processes, tools and subsequent skill development.
 
This diversity shone a light on the challenges to pedagogy, curriculum and assessment identified above which result when students are given autonomy in their pursuit of inquiry based learning but this was largely overcome by measuring the success of each project against the broader skills which were involved. In each case the student projects offered clear evidence of learning associated with project management, problem solving, application of a design process, attention to detail, critical thinking, creativity, collaboration and communication. Teachers quickly found that they became ‘insiders’ with students on the projects and from this perspective as co-learners and collaborators a very clear view of the learning that was achieved by each student was evident. In many respects the Maker Centred Learning environment is an opportunity to make visible the student’s ability to take charge of the inquiry process and all that it entails from initial ideation to concluding performance of understanding.
 
Parallel to the development of the ‘Makerspace’ has been the enhancements made to the ‘Media Lab’. While the Makerspace supports projects which are large and messy, the Media Lab caters for projects which are born out of digital explorations and designs. The addition of two 3D Printers to this space and a campus wide subscription to Makers’ Empire has allowed Year Five students to include a maker aspect to their study of ‘Space Exploration’. Using the Makers’ Empire students design vehicles and environments that reflect their understanding of the challenges of exploring other worlds. The designs are 3D printed and students use these as they explain their research and understanding to an audience of parents and peers. A similar process was undertaken by Year Six students who used the software to create models of great buildings from the cities they studied in Term Three. In this instance the technology was supporting student understanding of mathematical concepts such as 3D Shape, scale and ratio. Two laser cutters are also available and it is hoped they will play a larger part in Making projects throughout 2017 as students explore options for the accurate cutting and engraving of lightweight materials with CNC accuracy.
 
Working with younger students, the level of scaffolding required for effective learning increases and with this the degree of autonomy offered seemingly decreases. Working with sticks, leaves, soil and recycled cardboard, students in Year Four have explored the construction of houses from the Australia of the mid to late 1800s. The use of common materials and methods resulted in projects with many common elements and presentation. Looking more closely and listening to students explain their designs and the processes they used reveal that even here students have brought individuality to the projects and achieved varied learning goals. Bringing Making to the younger years as an introduction to Maker Centred Learning, Design Thinking and as an extension of existing models for ‘play’ with loose and found materials should serve to strengthen what students are capable of producing as they move into Stage Three and beyond.
 
A current limitation to the projects undertaken in the Makerspace is that created by the knowledge, skills, imagining and comfort level of the teachers and students using it. Presently there is a bias towards projects which use timber and associated construction methods; advanced craft projects with additional tools and jointing methods. Some projects extend this into the use of plastics and composite materials (fiberglass) and there is some limited exploration of electronics including the use of ‘Littlebits’. This bias results from a variety of factors but most notably from teacher expertise and familiarity and the influence that early starters have on the projects which other students subsequently mimic. This bias has been identified and efforts will be made in 2017 to broaden teacher understandings of the sort of projects which can be attempted in the hope that this filters into the ideas explored by students. Late in 2016 the Year Six teaching team attended a workshop offered by ICT Educators NSW on the use of Arduino boards and other forms of physical computing within Maker Centred Learning as an evaluation and initial exploration of this for inclusion in student projects throughout 2017. While this offers new possibilities and would allow Making to move into new areas such as Internet of Things (IOT), data harvesting and automation it brings with it a need for greater professional development and new costs in providing suitable development boards and ancillary equipment.
 
The question of how to fund Maker Centred Learning in schools requires consideration. The materials used in many cases cannot be re-used and in essence become the property or valued trash of the students. Particularly where students are not creating the same product, where they are using widely differing materials, and where they may require relatively expensive materials the question of how this is to be funded cannot be easily answered. Providing a pool of resources to be used is a partial solution but ensuring equitable access to this brings new difficulties. Equity issues are exacerbated when the quality of the finished work is a consequence of the materials to which the student has access and even though teachers are evaluating the processes and thinking behind the product the final display is judged by its audience as an amalgamation of inputs both human and physical.
 
In looking for evidence of successful STEAM and Maker Centred Learning projects in the wider community there is evidence that many schools are not offering students significant autonomy in how they respond to or develop design challenges. While there are interesting projects being undertaken, the final results often have a very similar look and feel. Instead of an inquiry process driven by student questions, that results in a diversity of ideas, the projects on show resemble colour by number artworks where the real thinking and learning occurred before the students become involved. It is also disappointing to note that very few of the STEAM projects involve the unique DNA of each discipline. Rather than a rich intermingling of ideas revealed by a multitude of lenses, STEAM projects can frequently be typified as amusing technology or simple engineering projects. An important goal for the Maker Movement and STEAM will be to ensure student projects are driven by student ideas and require them to embrace the values and value of each discipline under the unifying umbrella of STEAM.

 

By Nigel Coutts

Maker-Centred Learning & STEAM

In 2016 we embraced the new possibilities that come with having a dedicated Maker Space and students in their final year of Junior School were the first to fully benefit from this. The Maker Space allowed for a significant expansion of the Maker Centred Learning which was already a hallmark of the Personal Passion Projects and many students developed projects which pushed at the limits of what was possible. The Year Six rooms and Makerspace were a constant hive of activity as students rose to the challenge and teachers endeavoured to ensure safety, respond to questions while facilitating ongoing inquiry and as all sought to solve complex problems. The process was richly collaborative, enormously creative and tremendously energising while also somewhat all consuming. That the day to day running of the school, the daily demands on teachers and the constant struggle for a work-life balance did not go away during this time meant that by the end of the term all involved were ready to collapse. Spectacular learning of this sort is demanding of teacher energy levels and there are no easy days. That said, all involved are keen to be involved in this style of learning again.
 
There is however,  a degree of resistance to this maker-centred style of learning and that must be acknowledged and overcome if it is to thrive. It is considered by some to be lacking the rigour associated with traditional learning methods and is not deemed to be an efficient method of learning the content so valued in the traditional classroom. Traditional curriculum, pedagogical and assessment models favour particular modes of learning and forms of knowledge. High-stakes testing reinforces this and encourages teachers to devote time to teaching facts, developing skills for communicating those facts in the ascribed method and assessing the ability of students to do exactly that. Making by contrast is messy, noisy, complex and difficult to assess. The challenge is to build opportunities for teachers (and parents) to see that Maker Centred Learning develops dispositions for learning far beyond the superficial skills required for a task. Our goal is not produce a nation of carpenters or crafts persons but to provide opportunities which demand creativity, critical thinking, collaboration and communication such that our students become agentic life-long learners. Making is one part of this process. The hands on nature of the projects, the natural feedback that is provided when an idea falls short of expectation and the very real challenges which are encountered, immerse students in a learning environment that prepares them well for the diverse challenges they will encounter beyond school.
 
The greatest challenge to change in schools, is our exception of what school should be like based upon our experience of it. This is true for teachers, parents and even students. There is an expectation that we go to school to sit in class and to be taught. Learning is something that happens to us, as a consequence of the actions of others. Teachers are experts who have all the knowledge we require and are skilled at transferring this into our heads. These notions are increasingly challenged by a growing understanding that this model of teaching and learning is not fit for the world we live in nor the world we will enter beyond school. The challenge when seeking ‘buy-in’ from the school community with non-traditional methods (IBL, PBL, learner centred models, making, tinkering, play) is to encourage a new understanding of the purposes of education. In 'Future Wise’ David Perkins challenges readers to seek learning that is ‘life-worthy’, that is learning that is likely to matter in the lives learners are likely to live. 
 
Similarly for STEAM, further challenges exist as teachers are asked to teach across disciplines and to integrate learning time and goals across departmental boundaries. The economies of time which come from an integrated approach to curriculum delivery, the enhanced transfer of learning that it affords and real world applicability of cross disciplinary tasks are countered by fears of less face to face time, dilution of content, redistribution of budgets away from traditionally vaunted disciplines of mathematics and science and reduced rigour. STEAM will require the development of respectful collaborations, evolving understandings of the place that the traditional disciplines play in society and new approaches to pedagogical content knowledge. In Primary Schools, STEAM is easily accommodated assuming adequate professional development is provided such that teachers may develop programmes based on strategic integrations of the disciplines where the learning outcomes achieved are enhanced as a result. In Senior Schools and Tertiary Institutions STEAM faces the additional hurdles posed by timetables and interdepartmental rivalries.
 
The most significant challenge facing STEAM, Making and Maker Centred Learning is undoubtedly access to suitable professional development. In addition to building an understanding of what is possible in this area teachers need to be exposed to the maker mindset. Sharing what it means to be a maker, to see the world of products and environments as a canvas or set of obstacles to be overcome and hacked to serve new purposes is a key part of this process. Professional development that takes teachers through the Design Thinking process and shows them how this approach is broadly applicable will encourage wider experimentation and begin to shift teachers away from valuing the products of learning over the processes. Methods of planning for Maker Centred Learning, pedagogies for making and for STEAM and effective assessment strategies which adequately capture the breadth of learning which occurs for students within these programmes is vital but largely lacking. What exists presently is centred around guiding teachers through the specific details of a particular project where teachers learn to make a specific item and then run that same project with their students. Beyond this are projects which teachers or schools can buy into that provide students with a formulaic challenge and prescribed set of processes with which to develop a solution. As these projects are often associated with an inter-school competition the rules which are aimed at ensuring a level playing field serve to also limit true innovation and the resulting products are consequently identical in all key dimensions.
 
A broader approach seems to be offered by ‘Agency by Design’, (ABD) a part of Harvard’s Project Zero. A multi-year research project, it seeks to answer three essential questions:

 

  1. How do maker educators and leaders in the field think about the benefits and outcomes of maker-centered learning experiences?
  2. What are some of the key characteristics of environments in which maker-centered learning thrives?
  3. What kinds of educational interventions can we develop that support thoughtful reflection around maker-centered learning and the made dimensions of our world?

From this starting point the project has evolved and is increasingly looking at how maker-centered learning can have broad-scale and long-term relevance to the education field through strategies for documentation, assessment and making thinking and learning visible, this resulted in three further questions:

  1. How can learners make visible their ability to look closely, explore complexity, and find opportunity?
  2. How can teachers qualitatively measure students’ performance within the realm of these three core maker capacities?
  3. How can we collaborate with students and teachers to design a suite of practical documentation and assessment tools best suited to the development of maker empowerment?

In addition to the just published results* of this study ABD offers an online course for educators looking to add Making to their repertoire.
 
While there are a wide set of resources, books, magazines, teach meets and faires which support Making and Maker Centred Learning translating these resources and opportunities into professional development is not easy. While changes to accreditation processes for teachers through Australian Institute for Teaching and School Leadership (AITSL) require teachers engage with set hours of professional development not all hours are created equal. There are limits to the number of hours which can be recognised as self-identified and this includes attendance at non-accredited courses, Makerfaires, teach meets and engagement with professional reading. Thus while there is a broad range of supports for teachers, there is a reduced incentive for engagement compared to what would exist with officially sanctioned courses.
 
Building close connections with the school community, industry and tertiary education can facilitate a richer understanding of what is possible and desirable within STEAM and Maker Centred Learning. If schools are to become centres of innovation and creativity we will need to understand what these ideas mean and how they are interpreted beyond school. Since Ken Robinson claimed that schools kill creativity efforts have been made to better understand how we might teach for creativity. A desire to understand how creativity is encouraged and facilitated has resulted in significant interest in research in this area and increasingly teachers are seeking answers to questions such as ‘What is creativity?’ and ‘How might our schools promote this?’. The answers to these questions have relevance beyond schools and there is an extensive cross pollination of ideas here between educators and industries looking to enhance the creativity of their workforce. Encouraging collaborative research between all those who have an interest in understanding and facilitating creativity, innovation and critical thinking is essential. 

The establishment of innovation centres, the adoption of design thinking and a general awareness of the value of creative collaborations is increasingly the norm in industry and this echoes the efforts made in schools as they develop MakerSpaces and strive to teach for innovation. Undoubtedly within our parent bodies lies expertise that can inform our teaching or provide access to Role-Models and Mentors to both teachers and students. Access to mentors can have direct benefits for the students in multiple ways as it expands the overall awareness of what is possible, provides access to technical knowledge and real world expertise in problem solving and potential access to resources and facilities typically not found in schools. Fears that insufficient numbers of students are pursuing STEAM pathways throughout their schooling and that there is gender bias in this area can be addressed through the provision of positive role-models who are able to share with students the exciting career prospects available. For girls in particular it is important that they have access to positive female role models at an early age if they are to see a STEAM career as a viable option. Research shows that girls make their career choices early, before age 14 (Broadley, 2011) and possibly before they move into High School. Peters (2013) shows that girls interest in STEM careers as they exit school was best predicted by interest as they entered Secondary School. This means that schools need to ensure that girls are receiving affirmative messages about the potential of STEM pathways while they are in Primary school.

There are opportunities here for formal collaborations and for industry to develop programmes connected to their ideals of civic responsibility and community connectedness. Mastercard’s ‘Girls4Tech’ programme is one model of this and one that offers staff an opportunity to enthusiastically share what they do back into the community. Other opportunities are made possible through the CSIRO’s ‘Scientists, Mathematicians and Engineers in Schools’ programme which connects schools with industry experts and provides resources and training to facilitate this. Greater success will occur in this area as industry and schools work in close collaboration to develop programmes which leverage the pedagogical, curriculum and assessment expertise of educators along with the entrepreneurial understandings and business acumen that industry can offer. These collaborations will be to the benefit of all involved as educators have much to offer industry in regards to specialist knowledge of learning, thinking and personal growth which can directly inform programmes within industry. Further to this, as educators increasingly develop research based understandings of the creative processes of problem solving, critical thinking and collaboration and develop practical methods to enhance the capacity of individuals and groups to do so, the value of their expertise to industry is enhanced. 

*'Maker-Centered Learning: Empowering Young People to Shape their Worlds' By Edward P. Clapp, Jessica Ross, Jennifer Oxman Ryan, & Shari Tishman

By Nigel Coutts

Engaged by, in and with learnng

As teachers we hope our lessons are engaging and that our students are engaged. We understand that positive learning experiences are more likely to occur when we are engaged cognitively and affectively by what we are doing and that when we are, new ideas and skills are more likely to stick. Engagement is an important consideration in learning and as such it is worth taking time to consider what it means to be engaged and perhaps how we bring the benefits of engagement to our teaching and our learning. 
 
In schools, engagement occurs in multiple flavours dependent upon perspective. From the teacher’s perspective we hope that our students are engaged by the lessons that we plan and deliver. This is an important goal and one that we cannot take for granted. In a time where we are competing against a vast array of powerful distractions, entertainments and even alternative sources of learning the task of engaging our students is increasingly difficult. Being aware of the factors which intrinsically motivate us is one step towards success. Understanding that we are more likely to engage with learning that is relevant to our daily lives and where we can see opportunities to develop mastery in domains that matter helps. As teachers we must have good answers to the student question which we so often face ‘why do I have to learn this?’. At one point it may have been enough to reply because you need to know it for the test, or you will need to know this later in life but if our goal is genuine engagement then we must do better. Our students are more likely to be engaged by our teaching when we understand the true value of what we are asking them to learn, are passionate about the teaching of it and show our students the relevance of it to their lives.  
 
One way to view engagement is to consider it as a consequence of interest. “If you are interested in something, you will focus on it, and if you focus attention on anything, it is likely that you will become interested in it. Many of the things we find interesting are not so by nature, but because we took the trouble of paying attention to them.”  (Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, Finding Flow: The Psychology Of Engagement With Everyday Life) In this way engagement is not only a consequence of what we find interesting but also of our conscious decision to show interest in a subject. For teachers this is an important notion for much of our role is bringing our students to ideas such that they may engage with them even where the student had not previously imagined them as interesting or engaging. This introduces the perspective of the student who is engaged in learning. Here we move beyond engagement as something that others provide for us and see that we can make the choice to be engaged in our learning. Students who value learning, who see it as a personal life-long goal are more likely to actively seek engagement. For this to occur students need teachers who value learning as a process, who celebrate the embrace of positive dispositions for learning and who encourage a growth mindset.
 
We can also consider learning as something that we need to engage with. This affirms that learning requires active participation and mindful effort towards the goal of learning. Learning is not something which can occur as a consequence of our passive involvement or exposure to a set of experiences but is one that requires our fullest attention. Learning is a process that we can control; a result of our active engagement with the process of learning and a consequence of deliberate application and reflection. As a process, it is one that we can learn to do and as such our engaged practice in the learning process is one that may be enhanced through our choice to actively engage with understanding how we learn. For students, having teachers who understand how we learn and devote time to teaching the processes of learning will have positive impacts. This can include the use of scaffolds for thinking, reflective practices that encourage students to become mindful of how they learn and opportunities to share learning practices with fellow learners. 
 
We can see implications here for the choices made about the type of learning experiences we offer students. Students are more likely to engage with concepts that matter to them and to this end autonomy or choice in the topic can assist. Topics which are relevant to the students’ daily lives will promote engagement and this can be often achieved by making meaningful connections between prescribed content and local or national issues of import to the students. Revealing the applicability of an historical issue to today’s politics or the usability of a mathematical concept to real world problem solving are simple examples of using relevance to enhance engagement. Engagement with learning can be enhanced through the use of problems and provocations which lead students into a problem solving or inquiry based learning environment. Problem solving and inquiry are active processes of and for learning and once a learner has bought into the need to find a solution learning can easily become self-sustaining as the challenge inherent to the task drives engagement. Sharing our processes of learning and inviting our students to collaborate with us on learning tasks shows that learning has real value, supports the development of a culture of learning and encourages a life-long engagement with learning. 
 
 By Nigel Coutts

Holiday Reading List

For those in Australia the end of the teaching year has arrived or is just around the corner. With holidays approaching now might be the perfect time to find a good book to read and reset your thinking ahead of the start of a new year. Here are my favourite reads from this year. 

1.    King Arthur’s Round Table: How collaborative conversations create smart organisations - David Perkins


Understanding how the conversations we have within our organisations shape them and help us to achieve our goals is the focus of this book by Harvard’s David Perkins. Readers will explore how to shape positive conversations, the challenges that organisations face, the nature and benefits of different leadership styles and how the many pieces can be aligned to create an organisation that fosters success. Told through stories and with the tale of Arthur’s Camelot woven throughout this is a must read for anyone interested in organisational leadership, change and collaboration.  

2.    The Doodle Revolution: Unlock the power to think differently - Sunni Brown


Why do we insist on having our students demonstrate their understanding through the traditional essay? Why is note taking a dry process that produces pages of text we never return to? How do the tools we use to organise our thinking constrain the results? The Doodle Revolution aims to undo all of this and shows us that we can all use doodling or sketch noting to organise our ideas, reflect on our learning and demonstrate understanding. Sunni Brown’s book makes doodling accessible to all and challenges the notion that it is something for the visual thinker or artist.  

3.    The Sketchnote Handbook: The illustrated guide to visual note taking - Mike Rhode


If Sunni Brown inspired you to start doodling, this book and its related workbook will take you to the next level. Full of ideas for how to use sketch noting and with tips to make your notes masterpieces of style and clarity Mike’s book is the perfect guide for the budding sketch noter. Follow the tips and your notes will quickly be transformed into artistic works you will be happy to share and that your audience will appreciate for the understandings they reveal.  

4.    Visual Tools for Transforming Information into Knowledge - David Hyerle


Sticking with a visual theme but moving in a slightly different direction is this book by David Hyerle. The focus here is on how we might use strong visuals including mind maps, flow charts and diagrams to better understand and represent information such that it becomes useable knowledge. If you think you know all there is to know about mind maps you need to read this book, it will show you a whole new set of possibilities and bring clarity to an often oversimplified domain.  

5.    The Art of Tinkering - Karen Wilkinson & Mike Petrich


This is a beautiful book that takes you deep into the world of making and tinkering. With good advice on why we should encourage our learners to tinker the book begins with a compelling case for this style of learning. Beyond the theory it invites you to explore a host of projects that are bound to inspire. From creating flying cameras with re-cycled goods to and electronic scribbling machine or an astounding set of improvised instruments the book overflows with projects that will have you thinking 'what if?' and 'how might?’.  

6.    Innovation and its Enemies: Why people resist new technologies - Calestous Juma

Innovation.jpg


If you are wanting to understand why change and particularly new technology is resisted and even feared this is a must read. This book will challenge your thinking about the role of technology in society, our perception of it and our responses to it. In a time where technology touches so many aspects of our lives and change occurs at a seemingly exponential rate understanding the enemies of innovation is vital for all and especially for those charged with teaching the next generation of innovators.  

7.    Maker Centred Learning: Empowering young people to shape their worlds - Edward P. Clapp, Jessica Ross, Jennifer O. Ryan, Shari Tishman

If you are looking to understand the educational implications of making, makerspaces and maker movement this is the book for you. The result of a multi-year study by Harvard’s Project Zero and the Agency by Design team this book shares the learning that has occurred and offers clear guidance to maximise the benefits available from a hands-on, minds-on, student centred pedagogy.  

What the Agency by Design research team quickly discovered was that, while making in the classroom was not a new concept, maker-centered learning suggested a new kind of hands-on pedagogy— a pedagogy that encourages community and collaboration (a do-it-together mentality), distributed teaching and learning, boundary crossing, and responsive and flexible teacher practices.

8.    Participatory Creativity: Introducing access and equity to the creative classroom - Edward P. Clapp

Anyone interested in teaching for creativity, anyone inspired by Sir Ken Robinson’s claim that schools kill creativity or any teacher who imagines they don’t have a creative genius like Steve Jobs in their class should read this book. Creativity is not what we thought it was and teaching for creativity requires a participatory, collaborative and richly social environment to thrive.  

9.    Innovation: How innovators think, act and change our world - Kim Chandler McDonald

If we plan to teach for innovation, we should understand what it is. In this book the author presents a series of over 100 interviews with innovators and from this frames what innovation is and the conditions which make it possible. The author has assembled an impressive set of insights and the book is an easy read that will encourage you to think differently and establish the conditions for innovation in your organisation.  

10.    Solving Problems with Design Thinking: 10 stories of what works - Jeanne Liedtka, Andrew King, Kevin Bennett

The use of design thinking as a strategy for problem solving in a complex environment continues to gain momentum. In this book the authors explore diverse examples of the use of design thinking and share strategies and tools that bring results. For teachers considering a design thinking approach in their teaching or for the management of change in their organisation this book is compelling reading.  

Also worth a look: 

‘Flow: The psychology of happiness’ and ‘Creativity: The psychology of discover and invention by Mihaly Csiksgentmihalyi 

'Drive: The surprising truth about what motivates us' by Daniel Pink 

‘The Everything Store: Jeff Bezos and the Age of Amazon’ by Brad Stone 

‘Grit: The power of passion and perseverance’ by Angela Duckworth 

‘The Accidental Creative: How to be brilliant at a moment’s notice’ by Todd Henry 

 

by Nigel Coutts

 

Learning to love teach meets

There is a growing momentum in education driven by a desire to share our practice and learn from our colleagues. Increasingly teachers are finding ways to break free of their classrooms and share their ideas. Collaborations in the interests of unlocking the collective potential of the profession are spreading within and importantly between schools. For many these collaborative endeavours and desires are satisfied by online communities but for many the possibility for a face to face conversation is more alluring.
 
This is where 'Teach Meets’ come into the picture. Originating in the mind of Ewan McIntosh the first teach meet as it came to be called occurred in Scotland a little over ten years ago. Since the first meeting the idea has been to provide a venue for teachers to gather in and to discuss and share their practice. The simplicity of the idea has caught on and teach meets are now an important source of professional learning for teachers the world over.
 
A small degree of structure brings a level of predictability to teach meets. The normal routine is a brief introduction by the host followed by a series of short presentations around a pre-selected theme. Presentations typically are in one of three lengths, two minutes for quick snapshots of practice, five minutes or seven minutes to allow for more complex ideas. The relative brevity of the presentations and the option for the quick two minute one removes the anxiety and need for detailed preparation that comes with longer, more formalised presentation models. Naturally the rules are there to be broken and bent to the needs of the community. Some teach meets are followed by a teach eat which is not as frightening or cannibalistic as it sounds.
 
And it is the community that matters most. Teach meets are a construct of the teaching community, relying on hosts and presenters from within it. More than likely if you attend a teach meet presented by a particular teaching community you will find yourself attending others by the same group. In the times between the teach meets social media plays the role of maintaining and strengthening the connections between community members. A popular model is for a teach meet to be followed by an online Twitter chat where participants reflect on what they have learned from the teach meet. 
 
Attending your first teach meet can be a little daunting. Joining a community of unknown teachers can be a little frightening, as is joining any new group. What you will find is a collective of passionate teachers keen to expand their learning community and eager to share and embrace new ideas. On your first visit you may choose to just attend, sitting in the audience and joining the conversation afterwards. Making the move from a member of the audience to a presenter is highly recommended and requires little else than an idea worth sharing and the understanding that if you found it valuable, so too will others. Remember that teach meets rely on community participation and the willingness of its members to share. 
 
The rapid spread of teach meets ensures that you are likely to have access to one in your area and in most cases to have access to one that specialises in areas of education that you are interested in. Searching online for teach meets will produce a list of results and there are sites such as TM Sydney where communities can publicise their events. If you are looking to host a teach meet publishing the details through social media with a #tag relevant to and used by the community, you are targeting will bring attendees. Adding the details to online lists will help too. If starting out be prepared for a slow initial growth that gradually accelerates; don’t expect 100 teachers to attend your first event. Much of the charm of teach meets comes from the smaller size of the groups and the close knit communities that they create.  A real benefit of the teach meet community will be the connections that you make.
 
With increasing demands on teachers to involve themselves in documented professional development teach meets are now a way to engage in learning by choice. A typical teach meet will last about two hours including time before and after for discussion. Most teach meets are free and the cost of hosting one is minimal; a little catering. For the host comes the opportunity to support the community and to bring teachers into your learning environment. For schools interested in encouraging their teachers to attend teach meets being a host can be a positive first step and an accessible one at that.
 
Over the past two years I have attended many teach meets and made numerous friendships and collegial relationships along the way. My teaching practice has improved as a result and I have shared my ideas with real audiences who have provided valuable feedback. The team of teachers with whom I am lucky to work have embraced teach meets too and the collective experience has strengthened us as a team and allowed us to better see ourselves as a community of learners. 

By Nigel Coutts

Process vs Product in Maker-centered Learning

The maker movement and with it maker-centered learning brings new possibilities and challenges into the classroom. It has spawned makerspaces and students are busy designing and making products. The danger with all this frenzied making is that it is very easy to miss the point, to focus on the product and not the journey.  

Our year six students are presently engaged with their Personal Passion Projects. Many of the projects fit neatly into the description of maker-centered learning. These are the projects where the students have identified a need and the solution is a product which they design and then prototype. The processes involved in the projects vary immensely as do the materials used and the challenges confronted. The learning curve for some students is very steep as they master new tools and methods. A significant piece of the learning that many of the students are engaged in is linked directly to the specific details of what they are making and this is important but ultimately this learning is secondary to a larger process. 

I doubt that many of my students will enter careers where the maker skills they are learning in this project will be of great importance. I don’t think they will become seamstresses, carpenters or factory workers. I wonder how many of these careers will still exist when they leave school? The fundamental skills of putting things together, of knowing how to use a screwdriver, understanding which glue works best with large flat surfaces or how to use fibreglass to create surfboard fins are nice to have but unlikely to play a part in the lives that the students are likely to live. So why do we have students engage in maker-centered learning? 

Understanding the value of maker-centered learning requires a fundamental shift in our thinking about the processes involved and the nature of learning. The output is not all important. This is not an easy concept for teachers to embrace as it is traditionally the output which we use as we evaluate and assess student learning. The essay at the end of the history unit, the maths test, the narrative, the speech are all examples of the output of learning and in each we hope to have captured evidence of the students learning. Maker-centered learning upsets this pattern. The process is what matters most and it is the process which we must assess even where the output fails to capture the learning which occurred.  

Failing is a part of the process and failing disrupts output based assessments. At the core of the maker philosophy is a process of ideation, iteration and emergence. Commonly it is called Design Thinking and with this comes a certain degree of structure. Students move through phases of thinking that include empathy, needs analysis, ideation, planning, prototyping and evaluation in patterns both linear and non-linear as needs require. Tinkering is another pathway with less structure but offering the potential for ideas to emerge from a free-form experimentation where ideas and goals emerge from play. Regardless of the degree of structure adopted the product will not always capture the quality of thinking that went into nor the level to which the student has mastered a process that they will be required to apply time and time again. 

The creative process that leads to innovation is understood through its practical application. Students need opportunities to learn the process of developing ideas that solve practical problems. Sometimes the solution will be a product, sometimes a service and sometimes traditional research. The common element is the process and it is this process that maker-centered learning teaches. With this in mind it becomes important to look for mastery of the process that students are utilising as they solve the problems they encounter in their making. How do they deal with obstacles? How did they plan their solution? How effectively do they collaborate? What did they do to understand the problem and how did they monitor their progress?  

Capturing evidence of the creative process can be challenging for teachers. Traditional assessment measures are easy to implement, easy to compare and easy to record. Increasingly though we want evidence of the so called soft-skills which students use. Creative confidence, risk tolerance, collaborative intelligence, critical thinking, resilience are important skills and dispositions but each is difficult to measure. Strategies such as those encompassed by ‘Making Thinking Visible’ (MTV) can help here. MTV strategies offer two advantages to teachers and learners. Importantly they provide structure to thinking and encourage a deeper engagement with concepts and ideas. They also allow the thinking that is occurring to be made visible and thus a part of the assessment process.  

MTV routines combined with reflective journals and process diaries can all play an important role in documenting student learning. Design thinking can be supported through the use of mind-maps, hexagonal planning with post-it notes and story boarding all of which captures the process towards a solution. Combined with digital portfolios of images and videos teachers and students can capture a rich story of the learning that has occurred within a maker-centered classroom and use this as a guide for future learning. By valuing the process and not the product in maker-centered learning we can celebrate our student’s success and point them towards their next achievement even when the final product doesn’t meet expectations.  

By Nigel Coutts

 

Questions at the heart of learning

At the heart of learning are the questions to which we do not yet know the answers and the journey to the questions we have not yet asked. Such simple truths and yet understanding this can have fundamental consequences for our approach to learning and growth are best unlocked by great questions.

We learn via the questions that we ask and we expand our collective understanding of the worlds in which we live through the questions that we discover. Human knowledge is a historic journey of wonderings that have sparked imaginations and a desire to understand. If there is one thing that separates humans from other species it is our deep seated desire to understand why things are the way that they are; our natural curiosity coupled with the capacity and tools to seek answers.

Our natural curiosity is however a fragile thing. Much has been written about the decline of our propensity to ask questions with some sources stating that we peak at age four (Right Question Institute). In a ‘More Beautiful Question’ Warren Berger explores this in detail and shows that a confluence of factors including immersion in an environment that feeds learners with facts, a focus on right answers not questions and even low tolerance of questions from educators are at play. Look at the curriculum of any major educational system and you find the knowledge that students are expected to learn as a result of their schooling. From curriculum content come lessons aimed at translating that prescribed subject matter into learner knowledge and the scope for questions is curtailed. Time poor teachers have little time to cover questions not directly related to the curriculum and even questions related to the content are unlikely to be given much importance as the course materials will by design ensure students encounter the answers whether they are asked or not.

The net result is that by the time we are adults questioning has largely been trained out of us. This results in adults who are inhibited inquirers and often poor learners. We have the skills required to find and communicate answers. We are effective problem solvers and may even be able to do so collaboratively. We are less skilled at asking and finding questions and this has some serious consequences as we move away from traditional work places where very few people were required to do the creative work of identifying the new questions which would innovate the industry.

Today we are told that we all need to be life-long learners. The difficulty is that if we rely on learning that is driven by questions which are set for us our learning will depend on the presence of ‘others’; others who possess the wisdom and skills we need to master. The great difficulty in an increasingly connected world is that if the knowledge or skill already exists within the system it can be sought out and applied from the source. What is wanted in such a networked world is the capacity to find questions which have not yet been asked, the 'What if' and ‘How might’ questions that lead to new insights and new opportunities.

Failure is the new darling of innovation but the unrestrained embrace of questions is perhaps more important. If we want to uncover new ways of doing things, then we must be tolerant of questions and we must reward those who ask them. Unfortunately, many organisations send clear messages that questions are not wanted. Questions shine a light on what is not working, expose weaknesses and miscommunication, and consume time. Questions require us to think and thinking is something that we do not always want to do, particularly if we believe it is our job to have answers. Questions require a cultural shift.

If we are to embrace the concept of professional learning communities, we must be prepared to place learning at the centre of all we do. If we accept that learning is powered by questions and the growth opportunities for business begin with the questions we have not yet asked, we begin to move towards the culture we need. While we seek to maintain power through the control of knowledge and the dissemination of wisdom from above we will miss the opportunities made possible by beautiful questions.

By Nigel Coutts

The false dichotomy of The want to vs The have to

We struggle to achieve balance with so many parts of our lives. We see things in dichotomies and try to weigh one against the other believing that we must give time to one and not the other. This tendency to see things in often false dichotomies leads to the problem of the “want to’ vs the ‘have to’. Unfortunately, when we are faced with this dilemma we often make a choice in favour of the 'have to’ but we chose this option for the wrong reasons.

The ‘want to’ are all those things we want to achieve for ourselves, our families and as teachers, for our students. They are the things which have significant long term value but they take time and energy. The ‘want to’ are the ideas we have which we may well be passionate about but never get to put into place. Maybe we discover a new teaching method and want to try it out. Perhaps we see that our students would benefit from more thinking time in their lessons and we want to try some thinking routines with them. We might want to master a new piece of technology or develop a collaboration with an inspiring colleague. Every teacher has a long list of the things they ‘want to’ achieve.

The ‘have to’ are the things we feel we have to get done, we have to do, the things that get in the way of the ‘want to’. We have to mark the role, we have to check our emails, we have to do our yard duties, we have to update our day book. The ‘have tos’ all matter and we can’t not do them. The problem is that when we are confronted by the dichotomy of the ‘want to’ and the ‘have to’ we always find time for the have to and not the other. The trouble is not that we have to do certain things but that as we squeeze things into our day it is the things we ‘want to’ do that get squeezed out first.

For fans of Stephen Covey’s work this will have you thinking of his ‘Time Management Matrix’. Some of the ‘have to’ fall into quadrant one, the important and urgent. These are things we have to do and cannot put off, the things with deadlines and the immediate problems that we must solve. However, many of the ‘have to’ fall into quadrant four. The not-important and not urgent time-wasters that occupy large chunks of our day; acknowledging an email message, rearranging items on our desktops (physical and virtual), checking social media (again).

By contrast the ‘want to’ are often straight out of quadrant two, the important but not urgent. These are the actions that build capacity and are preventive in nature. Spending more time on the ‘want to’ would not only bring benefits now but would have a transformative effect making future learning more successful. A simple example shows the thinking here. Attending to a smoke alarm is without doubt both important and urgent but developing safe practices in the kitchen is not; yet time spent on this may reduce the chance of a fire in the first place. It is the shift between being reactive and becoming proactive. Schools are confronted by this sort of division regularly. Developing awareness of cybersafety takes time away from other areas of the curriculum and requires staff time to develop and implement. Not attending to cybersafety can lead to embarrassing situations for schools, reactive policy development and long term damage for students.  Developing a culture of thinking takes time, attention to detail and considered school wide planning but in the absence of a whole school approach quality thinking will remain sporadic and disjointed with students left to make the connections themselves as they move from one teacher’s approach to the next.

Often we claim that there are simply not enough hours in the day to do everything. Ask any teacher what they want more of and the answer will be ‘time’, but time is a finite resource. A better approach is suggested by Ron Ritchhart. Manage your energy and not your time. This is particularly relevant when dealing with the ‘want to’ and the ‘have to’. Do you find that you are better able to cope with the ‘have to’ when your energy levels are low or when they are high? The answer will be an individual one. You may find that many of the ‘have to’ tasks require minimal energy levels and are less cognitively demanding than the ‘want to’ tasks. The ‘want to’ tasks may require your best thinking and highest energy levels or they may be so intrinsically rewarding that they provide the boost you need. Unlike time, energy is not a finite resource and with the right conditions and a shift in thinking you can find more of it when you need to.

The consequence of managing your energy levels and aiming to spend more time in quadrant two with your ‘want tos’ is that in the long run your works should be more productive and more rewarding. For your students the extra time on your ‘want tos’ will enhance the quality of their learning and allow you to be the model of energy management that they need.

by Nigel Coutts

Organisational Learning

For schools the concept of a learning organisation should make perfect sense, after all learning is our core business, or it should be. Perhaps that almost three decades after Peter Senge identified the importance of learning within organisations the idea is only now gaining traction in schools tells us something about the approach taken to learning and teaching within schools. With an increased focus on the development of professional learning communities as a response to the complex challenges that emerge from a rapidly changing society, it is worth looking at what a learning organisation requires for success.

As this quote from IDEO CEO, Tim Brown shows, "The traditional way we've thought about leadership—which I would describe as leading from the front, this idea that someone is at the top making all of the decisions—is not the most effective way of unlocking the creativity of an organization, whether it's a traditional design organization, like an Ideo, or a company that's trying to be more creative in the future," he says. "The pace of change, the level of volatility, and the level of disruption across every industry requires that all organizations either constantly evolve, or they get out-competed by someone that's fitter than they are." (Read More)

The concept of a learning organisation can be extrapolated from what it means to be a learner or even what it means to be intelligent. If we see intelligence “the somewhat general capability for and tendency toward complex adaptive knowledge processing in response to or in quest of novelty” as David Perkins describes it in King Arthur’s Round Table we have a broad definition with a focus on our attitude towards problem solving. Intelligence requires in this definition a disposition towards learning as it is in approaching problems as a learner that we uncover new solutions. This definition requires also that we see learning as a process within the control of the individual and as much more than knowledge gathering. Unique and novel problems will not be solved through models of learning which emphasise rote knowledge acquisition but this model should equally fail to satisfy our ideals of intelligence.

A learning organisation is like our individual intelligence because it is able to solve complex novel problems through a process of learning. A learning organisation should have the capacity to cope with novelty and continue to function effectively when confronted by change. Unlike traditional highly managed and policy driven organisations which struggle to adapt to changing circumstances the core strength of the learning organisation is its adaptability. This adaptability relies upon the collective intelligence of the organisation. A simple summing of the individual intelligence within an organisation will fail to provide a reliable measure of this collective intelligence. Many factors will contribute to this measure including the experience each member has with a learning organisation, the quality of the interactions between members and the degree of autonomy and purpose experienced by members.

Certain conditions are critical for the establishment and success of a learning organisation and there are parallels here to the practices of effective pedagogy in an inquiry based learning environment. If our goal is to have every member of an organisation contribute to the learning that occurs then we must establish a culture that allows this to occur. Feelings of safety, acceptance of diversity and risk taking must become parts of the culture. In our classes we establish the conditions where our students feel safe sharing their ideas even when they do not conform with the majority. We establish a belief that there are often multiple correct answers and in doing so foster creativity. The same conditions are required in our learning organisations.  Nurturing a learning organisation is a little like nurturing a garden and Tim Brown echoes this sentiment ""It's about nurturing the conditions in which creativity is most likely to happen, That's really about culture, environment, rituals—the sorts of things that give people permission to explore, that encourage open-mindedness, collaboration, experimentation, and risk taking."

In our classrooms we aim to ask open ended questions and to allow our students to find questions of their own to explore. In our learning organisations the same conditions must exist. Not every problem confronting an organisation requires the deployment of learning organisation. Where the solution is known and there is no need for alternatives to be explored a management approach of communicating the required actions will serve the organisations needs most effectively. Only when the problem is complex, the solution is unclear or there exists a desire to uncover a new way of approaching it should a learning organisation approach be taken. Often though this is not the case. Damage can be done to the culture of a learning organisation when it asked to offer a solution to a problem that has already been solved and for which only the single answer already known by the teams leadership will be considered. This ‘guess what I am thinking’ approach is common in traditional classrooms and beyond checking student knowledge results in little real learning. This approach when applied to a learning organisation damages morale and trains creativity and innovation out of teams.

Learning is a process which demands mistakes. If you are not making mistakes you are not trying anything new. This is perhaps one of the most challenging aspects of learning organisations for schools. We do not have an option to prototype with anything other than real learners and while each student spends many years at school they get but one turn at each year level. There is an expectation that we will get it right and yet real learning will see us make mistakes along the way. Being certain of our foundational principles and ensuring that we develop in every student the resilience and growth mindset that allows them to bounce back from less than ideal situations will minimise the negative impact of our mistakes. A shift away from a lock-step progression of content based learning moments will further lessen the impact of an isolated experiment gone wrong.

For staff the prospect of a learning organisation should be a positive one. It allows us all to play a part in the decision making processes and to have ownership of it. There are consequences and these need to be factored into the planning and implementation phases. Developing a learning organisation takes time and the decision making process requires more time. Real discussion must be facilitated and collaborative conversations require delicate management. Decisions can not be forced and feedback must be given in ways that encourage ongoing participation. There are new levels of complexity to be negotiated between the individuals and groups that comprise a learning organisation, after all such organisations are made of people and constructed by conversations and dialogue. There are assuredly benefits to becoming a learning organisation but success in this journey will demands careful planning.

by Nigel Coutts