NZPF Conference: Dr Tony Wagner

Session One: Creating Innovators

Business no longer wnats children who KNOW - now they want what they can DO (that computers can't)

The longer kids in school, the fewer questions they ask.
 - what can we do differently to prepare for active citizeonship? Creative problem-solvers?

Teach Creative Problem-Solving Skills

The world demands that you take initiative, and challenge authority.

Rewarding and celebrating individual strengths V/s Team work, leads to Failure

Failure

  • Fear of failure comes from school
  • Graded on basis of numbers of mistakes

Innovation demands students to:

  • take risks
  • make mistakes
  • fail (growth mindset)
The world of innovation demands learning through trial and error

Human beings learn most of our important things through trial and error (eg - learn to walk)

Motivation

Higher grades, more money   V/S Intrinsic Motivation

That most motivates?  A deep desire to make a difference. Parents  and teachers encourage succesful learners, in relation to:
  • play
  • passion
  • purpose

As learners are older:
  •  they should be encouraged to try more, in order to experience more
  • they will understand the importance of pursuing real interests, and staying curious
Curiosity - becomes interest - becomes passion in adults

Passions evolve into a deep sense of purpose.

We are not here on this earth just to serve ourselves. we have some responsibility to give back and make a difference

Citizenship (needed to be a life-long learner)

active and creative leadership:
  • Critical thinking
  • collaboration
  • problem-solving
Using leisure to be creative - NOT to Consume more.

There is more at stake than helping kids to have job-related skills.

Early educators, worth remembering:
  • Elwyn Richardson "In The Early World"
  • Silvia Aston-Warner "One Look World"
Recommended Video:
"Most Likely to Succeed" - Teams of teachers teaching groups of kids.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZhoWYZN2_Rg

Making, building, doing, shaping

Communities of Practice - solving problems of practice, is the way forward.

Making work public - "I made this and everyone's coming to see it"



Session Two: 7 Habits of Successful Change Leaders

  1. Frame the problem, don't offer answers

  2. Create ownership, not mere "buy-in"

  3. Use evidence, not just data

  4. Focus on improving instruction (learning)

  5. Create communities of practice

  6. Prioritize

  7. Incent Motivation

 

1. Frame the problem, don't offer answers

The formulation of the problem is more useful than the answer
  • understanding and urgency for change
  • national standards movements - made things worse (all about the answers)
  • there is more risk in not changing than in changing
  • what's at stake?
  • Reasons?
  • Risk for kids if we don;t change?

2. Create the ownership, not mere "buy-in"

  • not selling solutions
  • ask the right questions - provide the rigth evidence

3. Use evidence, not just data

Supplement data with qualitative evidence (listen, ask), student voice
  • what is good teaching? (create shared criteria)
  • of all of yh different teachers you have had - what are their scores, rated against this criteria?
  • Engage parents - nature of era
  • our job is to bridge conversation gap - show video, panel discussions with students, etc
  • help our shareholders (in contrast to "stakeholders") hear the voices they don't ordinarily hear - bring evidence to our shareholders what were you most prepared for? what were you least prepared for? (about finding out highest priorities for graduates)
  • help people work through an understanding of "Why change?"

4. Focus on improving instruction (learning)

getting into classrooms, observing to understand more deeply:
  • what are our teachers' challenges?
  • what are the teachers dealing with?
Then...
  • what are the most important interventions that would help teachers
  • engage teachers in conversations
  • learning walks - looking for patterns, not reviewing performance of individuals
  • eg: quality of teacher questioning / learning discourse / collaborative practice / learner agency
Then...
  • engage teachers in "what is good questioning?', etc
  • revisit to observe change
Involves:
  • taking a risk
  • have to have a theory of change (eg "critical thinking and communication are the 2 most important skills")

5. Create communities of practice

  • Isolation is the enemy of improvement
  • teams of educators to work and talk together
  • solving problems of practice together
  • work together to solve a learning problem
  • Japan example - team of teachers collaboratively designed a series of lessons to solve learning problem. Video - watch eachother, plan, watch improvement.
  • We don't talk enough about improving lessons - feedback on eachother's practice
  • lessons studied
  • face to face - reciprocal - relational accountability
  • collectively we have to worh together to get better
  • eg - every classroom has one glass wall - no hiding
  • (re walk-thrus) - ask teachers to invite you - tell them - looking for evidence of innovative practice.
  • Walk thrus - " I am learning about the challenges teachers are facing"
  • allow teachers the same amount of time to debrief as to observe


6. Prioritize

  • If you have 10 priorities, you have none
  • Stick to prirority - don't change each year

7. Incent Motivation

  • innovation fund - teams of teachers apply
  • A TEAM who has done their research, can't fail
  • don't allow the "f-word" to be used, as it will kill innovation


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