Fall Capstone Paper

Part I

The goal of high-level literacy and social studies learning is to prepare students “to enter adulthood with the skills they will need to participate fully in a democratic society that is part of a global economy” (Morrow, 2014, p. 7), and the role of a principal is to create and sustain a school-wide culture focused on culturally responsive teaching and learning as a driving force. As the leader of the educational community as a whole, the principal sets the tone and focus of the school’s culture. By making effective teaching and learning the number one focus of the entire school community, the culture will evolve and shift, “enhancing school climate goals like inclusion, empathy, collaboration, student-driven learning, kindness, and respect” (Tavangar, 2016, p. 62). With these skills, students will meet the ultimate goal of entering the world beyond school walls as learners who can read, write, and think with a deep understanding- ready to meet the ever-changing challenges of an increasingly complex global society.

Fostering a school culture where learning and teaching are the driving force can be a difficult task, especially within a school with an already-ingrained culture that runs contrary. As a principal, clearly and consistently communicating the vision of a community of learners is an essential part of making a difficult culture shift. As stated by Michael Fullan in What’s Worth Fighting for in the Principalship (2008), “leadership is not about making clever decisions and doing bigger deals, least of all for personal gain. It is about energizing other people to make good decisions and do better things” (p. 16). In order to ensure that ALL students are engaged in high-levels of learning, particularly literacy and social studies learning, the principal must set the bar high and then lead by example, showing to everyone that high-levels of teaching and learning are a priority from the top down. “The educational leader must, above all, be a practitioner of curriculum” (Daresh, 2007, p. 274). It is not enough to create a vision for others to fulfil. “True leadership only exists if people follow when they have the freedom not to” (Collins, 2011, p. 13). The principal must truly believe and live the vision he/she sets for the school community, and give all members the tools needed to succeed in the vision of creating learners ready to face the world. When all the members of the school community feel supported and prepared to live the school’s vision, the culture will be one where high-levels of learning occur for ALL stakeholders, both students and teachers. To quote Bernhardt, “There must be one vision for the school—we have to get everyone on the same page and moving forward together (2013, p. 1)

The importance of teacher collaboration and ongoing professional development in providing students with high-level literacy and social studies instruction cannot be understated. In order to foster a school-wide culture focused on culturally responsive teaching and learning, teachers themselves must engage in high levels of learning and collaborative practices on a continuous basis. “As educators, our challenge is to match the needs of our learners to a world that is changing with great rapidity. To meet this challenge, we need to become strategic learners ourselves by deliberately expanding our perspectives and updating our approaches.” (Jacobs, 2010, p. 4) When teachers develop their own instructional expertise and collaborative relationships with colleagues, they are better able to discern and meet the needs of the individual learners they teach. Teachers need to be armed with a strong knowledge of what is good evidence of high-level literacy learning in order to provide instruction and make appropriate instructional and assessment decisions. They need to be armed with knowledge that comes from research on best practices and professional wisdom (Morrow, 2014, p. 6). Research is proving that collaborative professional learning is more impactful on both teachers and students, and a good leader creates opportunities for collaborative learning at all levels. The principal is ultimately responsible for fostering “literacy achievement by leading by example, learning by example, and creating conditions for collaborative professional learning” (Jay, 2007, p. 52).

“Principals, as leaders closest to the scene, do not leave it to others to ensure that knowledge is front-and-center in the work of the school” (Fullan, 2008, p. 31)- principals are responsible for leading and participating in the collaborative culture they seek to foster among teachers. Principals must empower teachers to lead the learning environment and provide them with the conditions needed to make a collaborative culture a reality. This will ensure that teachers are able to vigorously “zero-in on effective instructional practices and to use data on student leading both as a lever for improvement and as a source for external accountability” (Fullan, 2008, p. 17). By giving teachers the tools they need to be impactful and the freedom to use those tools, the principal places trust in the teachers to decide what instruction looks like. Teachers become the leaders, providing their students with the instructional practices that will be most effective for each of them.

Differentiation is also tremendously important to ensuring rigorous instruction is being provided at a level that allows each student to achieve: “The core mission of formal education is not simply to ensure that students are taught but to ensure that they learn” (DuFour, 2004, p. 8). When teachers can authentically assess and determine the needs of students, it becomes easier to draw on the wealth of strategies in both their individual toolkit and the collaborative toolkit developed with colleagues. By giving teacher the freedom to assess and monitor student understanding in a meaningful way, principals are reinforcing that “teachers need latitude to help individual learners reach proficiency targets” (Jacobs, 2010, p. 9). There is a way to reach each and every student within the walls of a school, even if it’s not measured by the parameters of a state test. All students can learn regardless of reading level, socioeconomic status, disability, behavior issue, home life, etc. As written by Costa and Kallick in Discovering & Exploring Habits of Mind (2000), schools need to modify the old slogan that “all kids can learn” and change it to: “all kids can learn but not on the same day and in the same way.” It is our responsibility as educators not only to understand what it means to say that “all kids can learn but not on the same day and in the same way”, but also to effectively operationalize it in classrooms. (p. 18)

In an era where many schools fall into the trap of “teaching to the test”, empowering teachers to use their own knowledge and experience to drive instruction can be immensely powerful. Tying teachers to a specific curriculum and set of assessments does not adequately educate students for the global world- just for the next test. Morrow writes in Best Practices in Literacy Instruction (2014) that the goal of obtaining authentic information about students’ literacy capabilities “should not be sacrificed for the efficiency of contrived texts and tasks created specifically for assessment purposes” (p. 8). Truly high levels of student competency in literacy and social studies cannot be assessed by sticking to a script and teaching all students on the same field. Strong, comprehensive literacy instruction “supports and prepares students to independently use listening and speaking, reading and writing, and viewing and representing as a means to effectively comprehend and communicate for authentic and personal reasons” (Morrow, 2014, p. 8). This is instruction that requires more than just teaching to the test to develop globally competent citizens. Teaching to the test does not adequately prepare students for life beyond formal education, and in turn doesn’t truly give students the skills they need to be successful adults.

The use of data to drive instruction becomes easier to support when teachers collaborate. Traditionally, data has been presented as something new to do, a way for one teacher to look better than another, and a mandate that teachers must implement regardless of their own professional skills and competencies. Teachers are focused on how well their class does on one assessment, worried that they will “look bad” if their class’s scores on one test are lower than the other section for their grade. It exemplifies Bernhardt’s idea that “when only some data are used, the focus is typically on the gaps and improving individual students who are not achieving on that one measure that is used for compliance, and not on what or how teachers are teaching, or how to improve learning for all students” (2013, p. 2). The competent and appropriate use of data requires a shift in how schools use data- leadership direction becomes crucial in effective data team planning and entails modeling effective data use and connecting data analysis to clear action steps. Again, the principal must lead by example, modeling the use of questions stemming from data to drive instruction for ALL learners. The result will be a positive shift toward sustained and meaningful data-driven instruction at high levels- when principals use essential questions to focus the collaborative examination of data, school staff become much more engaged in the inquiry and process surrounding data-driven instruction (Ronka, 2008, p. 18).

How then, does a principal establish a vision for what should be taught? If the goal of high-level literacy and social studies instruction is to create a community of students who are proficient in a new category of global skills beyond traditional literacy learning- global collaboration, empathy, creativity, deep inquiry, and effective communication (Tavangar, 2016, p. 61)- then there needs to be “an explicit and transparent commitment to linking teaching practices to student-learning outcomes” (Fullan, 2008, p. 26). In a recent article in Educational Leadership (2016), Veronica Boix Mansilla reminds leaders that educating our students for global competency is now a necessity- it can no longer be considered a luxury if schools are to adequately prepare global citizens. This points to consideration of two essential questions: “What kind of learning are we actually after? and How can we best nurture such learning?” (p. 12). The use of these essential questions to focus instruction ensures that deeper understanding is the true goal of literacy and social studies instruction. Focus on essential questions leads to success in the ultimate goals of high-level instruction: to nurture students who are able to read and write with a deeper understanding (Morrow, 2014, p. 10) while they are “increasingly able to investigate the world beyond their immediate surroundings, understand their own and others’ cultural perspectives, communicate across differences, and take action to improve conditions” (Boix Mansilla, 2016, p. 12).

When considering best practices to prepare students to be globally competent citizens, one sticking point is that students must be emotionally invested in the experience of learning and responding to the world. According to Tavengar (2016), students’ learning will be most impactful when it is accompanied by both action and reflection- and when students feel as if they have an important role to play in their community or the wider world. The feeling of connectedness doesn’t just impact the learning of students, it is important for adults as well. “Students of all ages- children and adults- need concrete and meaningful experiences, problems, applications, and shifts of perspective to enable an important question to arise” (Wiggins, 1998, p. 33). Each student and adult needs the opportunity to explore and make a meaningful connection- “the world’s needs and opportunities are great enough that each student can find a sphere of interest and of meaningful engagement by the time they need to be college-and-career-ready” (Tavangar, 2016, p. 64). As principals leading the educational culture of a school, there are extremely positive benefits to increasing the school focus on educating students for global competence. According to a 2016 article in Educational Leadership, “students in schools with a global competency focus have higher test results and score higher on measures of social inclusion, community building, and social action” (Tavengar, p. 61)- all signs that students are being prepared to participate fully in a democratic society that is part of a global economy.

Part II

“Building global competency doesn’t need a big budget or a radical transformation of curriculum. It does need willingness, awareness, leadership, humility, and enthusiasm” (Tavangar, 2016, p. 61). In shifting the culture of a school to one where the focus is on teaching and learning for high levels of global competency in literacy and social studies, the principal must put a strong emphasis on earning the trust of his/her community. Ineffective leaders are often those who do not seek feedback from those they are working with, and sometimes forget that “practice of leadership is not the same as the exercise of power” (Collins, 2011, p. 12). Effective leaders are those who become known first and foremost as people of good will- teachers have confidence that the principal has their best interests at heart and will do whatever is necessary to help them develop and grow professionally. (Tschannen-Moran, 2004, p. 37) This level of confidence in the good intentions of the leadership engenders a level of trust that is mutually beneficial, and sets the tone for a positive supervisory relationship between teachers and administrators.

Teachers, too, need to be trusted to recognize that they must be continually learning and improving their practice- living the ideal that the “learning is the work” (Fullan, 2008, p. 27) both for the students and themselves. According to Robert Marzano in Effective Supervision: Supporting the Art and Science of Teaching (2011), “it is reasonable to expect all teachers to increase their expertise from year to year. Even a modest increase would yield impressive results”. Encourage teachers to work toward their own instructional proficiency in teams, as collaboration is one of the most effective forms of learning. “The best way to ensure that teaching is done right the first time (versus having to provide corrective instruction for substantial numbers of students after the fact) is to have teachers work in teams” (Marshall, 2005, p. 733). Teachers also need to be cultivated as leaders, and involved in important decisions

Another important element of a positive supervisory relationship is transparency and an open flow of information. People in general are much more likely to embrace change and reflect on how they can improve if the “why” of the change is clearly communicated. The power of why can be tremendous, and strong parallels can be seen between transparency of curricular processes and transparency of leadership actions: the role of the principal in “making certain that clarity is achieved between purposes and processes” (Daresh, 2007, p.283).

One specific method for building a strong supervisory relationship is The Collaborative Approach as described by Stark, et. Al. The goal of the Collaborative Approach is to promote a “frank exchange of ideas” and shared decision-making responsibility (Stark, 2017). In this model of developmental instructional supervision, the administrator uses three strategies for facilitation: presenting, problem solving, and negotiating. Throughout this process, the administrator reinforces the idea of collaboration over direction. This method honors the idea that teachers and members of the school community want to be treated as professionals who are valued for their expertise and experience with the students. The Collaborative Approach and Solution-Focused Strategies most definitely give the teachers that opportunity and experience while at the same time recognizing that the administrator is the ultimate instructional leader who guides and drives the process.

Conclusion

In conclusion, leaders who foster learning environments where ALL community members are engaged in high-level learning recognize the learning needs of all stakeholders- children and adults alike. “Schools must be wheels of learning, each spoke representing a separate constituent: parent, teacher, student, administrator, and staff. Each flows to the center, to the hub of the wheel, to the heart and soul of the school, to learning itself.” (Gaston Fisher, 2004, p. 159). Just as students need learning to be the focus of their school experience, so do teachers and principals as they improve their own professional competencies and continually provide impactful instruction. Students learn the importance of lifelong learning by example- “If they see about them adults who ask questions, read, write, pose and solve problems, work together, and struggle with important learning, they want to ask questions, read, write, pose and solve problems, and engage in and struggle with important learning” (Barth, 2001, p. 24). Schools are communities of interwoven lives, not a bunch of isolated groups with separate goals and agendas. The goal of each individual and the community as a whole is a united one- that everyone in the community is able to display the high-levels of literacy skills needed to participate fully in a democratic society that is part of a global economy.

Bibliography

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Bernhardt, V. (2013). Data Analysis for Continuous School Improvement. Routledge.

Boix Mansilla,V. (December 2016/January 2017) “How to Be a Global Thinker.” Educational Leadership, 74 N 4, pp.10-16.

Collins, J. (2011). Good to Great and the Social Sector. HarperBusiness.

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Daresh, J. (2007). Supervision as Proactive Leadership. Wave Land Press. Chapter 14.

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