Blogging in School District #36 seems to be a rather recent phenomenon. Rick Fabbro might have been one of the first administrators to begin blogging as his first post (Rich Babbles) goes back to November 10, 2010. Many others began blogging but most of them only within the last 8 months. Seven of the administrators…
Creating Fire
Tonight we launched our Digital Discovery Series. This is a three-part series that focuses on helping leaders understand their role in moving student learning forward in a digital age. Our three key themes are Using Mobile Devices, 21st Century Learning and Social Media. We had 220 educators in the room. What did the evening look…
Ipads: Six weeks in the classroom
How are the iPads being used in our district? I sit on the District Technology Advisory Committee (DTAC), which makes key decisions about directions in technology. The Superintendent posed the question and I needed to find the answer. We have twelve schools in the Innovative Learning Designs (Digital Focus) pilot. I did a quick email…
Ramping up innovation: Leading Learning
The culture of YES! Chris Kennedy’s turn of phrase resonates with innovative leaders. He has, in a simple way uttered words that override the formal part of the school organization. The word YES opens doors and minds and feels like an exhilarating call from the informal side of the organization where innovative ideas are sparked—this energy is…
Make like recess today
I’m going to make like recess today. I’ve been thinking about that for a few weeks now. I’m on supervision duty (due to the labour dispute) at Frost Road Elementary three times a day, morning and the double recess. Each day I watch the students run out the doors of the classroom to the…
Can we strategize innovation? A teacher responds
“Yes, we can strategize. It is an uphill battle as it does require going against the status quo (or at least much of the current status quo). I believe we are moving in that direction and there are two forces that are allowing this move. 1. We are modelling permission to fail. Exploring next practices won’t land on…
Meeting on Their Digital Ground
“Writing still matters. Reading still matters. In fact it may matter even more.” Those were some of the key points I took away from our first session of Engaging the Digital Learner, featuring West Vancouver Superintendent Chris Kennedy. Chris’ message wasn’t new to me, I have heard him before but I still found it wonderfully…
Creativity is thinking up new things. Innovation is doing new things. Theodore Levitt Innovation in education can and will take different forms. Leadbeater (2011) refers to five options for strategizing change. Personally, when I read Leadbeater’s ideas, I find I am forced to take a much larger view of education, as if helicoptering above to see it in the grander…
You Can’t Google This
The greatest challenge is moving beyond the glitz and pizzazz of the flashy technology to teach true literacy in this new milieu. Using the same skills used for centuries—analysis, synthesis, and evaluation—we must look at digital literacy as another realm within which to apply elements of critical thinking. Jones-Kavalier & Flannigan Often I get the…
Finding the Triangular Space
Do we need innovation in education? What are the skills that children will need to prosper in their future? Charles Leadbeater (2011) and many others suggest that reproducing knowledge will become secondary to the ability to apply “knowledge in inventive ways in novel contexts.” We won’t be providing students “with access to a fixed stock…