Why become a teacher? part two – my story

Posted on July 29, 2016 by mwalker

Some people can pinpoint a single incident or person that answers this question – for me I need to tell a story as I came to my moral purpose quite late.

I went as a young 5-year-old to Corpus Christi, a Catholic Primary School in Glenroy, from 1960 to 1966. Glenroy in those days was changing from earlier days where fairly wealthy people built large homesteads to an expanding and fairly tough neighbourhood. My father built our house in the late 1950’s at the same time the Housing Commission of Victoria developed large areas of Glenroy North (about 1,700 housing commission homes for disadvantaged families). One resident of the housing commission homes in that era Leo Wilson wrote about some of the tough times back then when mums had to knit school jumpers and boys only had one pair of shoes that dads fixed on a Sunday afternoon.

Leo recalled the milkman delivering milk in his horse and cart – one of my brothers when he was 12 or so years old got a job helping deliver milk from the local dairy early in the morning.

I recall being called a “Mick”, which was a term used to slur Catholics, by the kids from the local state school just before you were punched in the guts. This happen regularly and I got to be a good runner in those days yelling “proddy dogs” back to them (a slur term for Protestants). The golden rule was never to caught walking home alone.

It wasn’t all bad for on holidays we would all build billy carts in our court and spend weeks racing and modifying them (the ball bearing wheels made a sound as you pushed quite fast along the concrete paths).

Friday afternoon’s at school were enjoyable particularly if you made the school football side. We proudly wore our red and yellow footy jumpers for the afternoon (we were like peacocks strutting around the school yard many years before John Travolta in Saturday Night Fever) and were coached by the parish priest Fr Poulsen.

Many years later in one of my university post-graduate courses I was challenged to reflect on my morale purpose. It was then that I recalled some of my woundings during my primary years.

I was made to read a reader (I know an oxymoron) in year one titled John and Betty by the nun that taught our grade. We were all scared of this nun for if we left out a word from the text or worse still couldn’t sound it out we were smacked on our hands. It was known years afterwards as the “smack and say” method of instruction. This seemed at odds with me for I enjoyed reading in bed (not “See John jump” text).

However it was two experiences in grade 6 that really stood out:

There were about 50 of us in my year 6 class with the desks in rows crammed from the back wall up to the platform where the teacher sat. We all faced the blackboard which usually contained the days work written out by Mrs Hassett, our teacher. Relief from this rigid learning was in the school yard or so I thought! It was during one lunch time where a bully named Shane stole my footy. Feeling somewhat scared of him I still gave chase. I did say I was fast – well I caught up to him only to be punched a few times with students yelling fight. The nun on yard duty dragged us both up to the principal to be strapped on the hand. I also had my prefect badge removed and felt angry at the injustice as he continued to snigger at me for weeks afterwards. He seemed quite accustomed to being strapped but I wasn’t and the pain never quite left me.

Corporal punishment was not banned in Victorian government schools for another 30 years as I was sadly to learn as a young teacher.

This incident was quickly followed by another far worse wounding of the heart. I had taken the year 7 entrance exam to gain entry to my father’s old school, Parade. The results were delivered to the school and the year 6 teacher stood at the front of the class and announced that I had failed to gain entry and I felt humiliated. Not content with that she soon afterwards walked down the narrow aisle between the rows of desks and stopped in front of me and pronounced that I really shouldn’t bother to sit any more entrance exams as I wasn’t smart enough and would only disappoint my parents even further. I remember hiding for hours after school too humiliated to tell my parents that I hadn’t got in.

Well I ended up going on to St Josephs in Pascoe Vale and in the hustle and bustle shelved those memories for many years.

It seemed to me as a young and then experienced teacher and later principal that we should learn to listen and understand one another forming trustworthy relationships and that our emotions played a significant role in learning. Yes there were some times I kept students in at lunch to complete their work (I thought that a natural consequence of not working hard enough during learning time) but I was never tempted to hurt someone to achieve my and much later I was to understand “our” goals. My imperatives were to have students as partners in learning, to use our emotional intelligence in forming trusting relationships and become assessment literate so that learning was an informed process not a judgemental one.

I never forgot the pleasures of “play time in the school yard” and still kick the footy with the kids in the yard.

I think the ideas of restorative justice / relational learning came easily to me rather than the crime and punishment dichotomy and similarly DataWise which uses the power of data to inform both teaching and learning.

The more I hear these stories the more I find the answers to this question quite personal yet strangely similar.

Posted in reflections, school, teacher efficacy, Teaching | 2 Comments

Why aren’t us parents seeing any benefit in smaller class sizes?

Posted on July 29, 2016 by mwalker

I have just responded to this post by a parent:

As a parent, the Bloomfield Public School system has sold smaller class sizes as part of their narrative. The experience of my two children has been a DECREASE in group interaction and all of the other good things that should be occurring in a classroom. Individual interaction is also on the decline.

Am I alone in this suboptimal experience?

As a Principal I was “sold” by teachers that smaller classes would achieve better results – reducing in the K-2 classes was also supported financially by the state. By reducing we mean K-2 classes from 25 to 19-20 and senior classes (3-6) from 29 wish to 25. This took a lot of resources (e.g. no special ed teacher, reducing other interventions for targeted small group support (2-4), reducing several budgets e.g. in external professional learning) and over a 5 year period didn’t produce significant academic improvements.

So I redirected some of these resources away from 2-6 grades into targeted instructional improvements that the data suggested we needed to make (e.g. spelling). The resources (increased professional learning, in class coaching provided, more teaching  resources and a new spelling program – Words their Way). Results went up both initially and over time. We measured both overall scores and students and group growth rates against state growth rates.

However to note that this wasn’t the only intervention occurring at that time (e.g. restorative practices to improve the relationships between teachers and students and students and students, targeted small group interventions in reading in year 1 and 2, professional learning in using data more formatively to adjust instruction and curriculum were just some of the other interventions). I really liked Elmore’s thinking that you need to change all 3 things (relationships, curriculum and instruction) at the same time to have an effect.

Parents saw results but I didn’t manage some of their expectations too well (e.g. why can’t you do this across all disciplines at the same time and tomorrow) but that’s another story.

PS in the spirit of being balanced I have also provided these links which explores the effect or otherwise of class size:

Class Size and Student Achievement: Research Review.

Class size

Hattie and Class Size

Posted in Instruction, Instructional Rounds, Leadership, parenting, professional learning, school structures, Teaching | 6 Comments

Why are you a teacher?

Posted on July 25, 2016 by mwalker

Ever had that questions posed to you?

I have and its often followed by the popular quip: “because of the holidays?”

What do the numbers say?

numbers 1

More often then not it’s the story behind the numbers or data that inspires me and I read such a story recently:

We were truly disadvantaged.

Despite this, our mum was determined to make sure that our situation would not be something that followed my brother and I throughout our lives and she saw our education as a key component of escaping the cycle of disadvantage.

On 11 July 2008, just after my Year 12 half-yearly exams, Mum suddenly passed away after an accident at home. The attitude that she had instilled in me and the resilience and skills that went alongside it immediately became more crucial than she ever could have imagined. We had to find a way to survive and I had to try and complete my Year 12 studies.

I know for a fact that the teachers at my school were deeply concerned about how I would cope for the remainder of the year, as many people were, myself included. It could have been all too easy for those teachers to lower their expectations of me. All too easy to preface every statement, grade or piece of feedback with: “He’s doing so well, considering…”. All too easy to say: “At least you tried”. But those teachers, they didn’t.

They gave me the extra support that I needed, but they never stopped pushing me, they never stopped expecting me to achieve like I had before. Their continued belief in my ability to overcome my challenges was crucial in making that achievement a reality.

High expectations from my teachers gave me the self-belief that I could do something great — not just considering my situation, but in absolute terms. They inspired me and they set me on the path out of disadvantage, to university, to work in scientific research and into the classroom.

The work those teachers did to support me during that incredibly stressful and turbulent time has had a lasting impact on my philosophy of teaching and how I carry myself within my school. They were caring and giving. They went beyond what was required and they were inspiring.

The whole story is worth reading on the Huffington Post.

I’m interested to read other people’s stories if they would care to share theirs. I’m busy working on mine now.

Posted in teacher efficacy, Teaching | 8 Comments

You start a round trying to perfect your swing and end up thinking about leadership – how does that happen?

Posted on July 5, 2016 by mwalker

There are times when you are blinded by a parallel scenario as I was recently playing golf.

I had played badly the previous round and wasn’t overly confident as I started on my first hole. The ball just didn’t seem to be going as far as I normally hit it. The round progressed pretty much the same way until the last hole when the ball finally split open. You see there had been a crack in the middle of the ball for some time (two rounds) and I just couldn’t see it till the very end when it split open. I had spent the best part of two rounds fiddling around with my swing technique believing it was me that was the cause of the problem not the ball. I had never had a golf ball split on me before.

IMG_6657

Well whats the parallel I hear you say – well when the club’s golf professional Simon explained that the ball cracks from the inside and the driver cannot see the damage till it finally split I thought of leadership crack

I wondered if many leaders had experienced similar cracks in their organisation and not seen them till they exploded. You see leaders are all busy with the busyness of leadership (I wrote about the conspiracy of busyness in a earlier post) and yes some of us routinely ask for feedback and try an enact improvements – BUT – what if the core is cracked (e.g. disbelief in the values and strategic directions of the school) and no amount of swing or leadership behaviour technique alterations would make a difference?

Yes I know this is a simply analogue not to be overdone for in golf you simply change the ball. It’s not that simple in organisations – or is it?

I think the point I’m trying to make is that we must often confirm that the core beliefs and plans are being driven by our key people and if not listen and then offer feedback but always be ready to challenge and change (the ball) or in organisations (key people) if we continue not getting the effects we want or need.

Posted in Leadership, school, Teaching, Uncategorized | 4 Comments

Politics aside we need some truths to accept the challenges we face as a nation. That’s the election message we are sending!

Posted on July 5, 2016 by mwalker

ballot box

Well its election time here in Australia and we may have a tie. I don’t normally stray into politics but the situation calls for some commentary.

For my overseas readers we have 3 levels of government (Federal, States and local councils). Federal elections, which cover all of Australia are important for a number of reasons primarily as they most directly affect the economy, the environment, government services (although this is a shared responsibility between the federal and state governments in say education and health), trade agreements and a few other services and areas.

We have two major parties across Australia: a Liberal/National Coalition established around 1944 which is generally seen as right of centre and a Labour Party, which is the oldest party and seen and to be left of centre. Over the years we have seen some smaller parties come and go with the Greens now seen as a third-party. We also have the rise of the independent representatives which I believe is a growing phenomenon across the globe.

I watched my regular talk shown on our ABC television called Q&A where politicians and other commentators answered the public’s questions naturally enough on the unknown election results. There were lots of claims made as usual and I thought a quick fact check and comment worth noting.

Before I do there are many calls being made for our Prime Minister Malcom Turnbull to resign as the results of the election, whatever they are, are disappointing for the current Liberal/National Coalition Government. Calls are being made by his own parties far right conservative faction and their public commentators like Andrew Bolt much to the excitement of those with a left viewpoint. Well whatever the result I don’t agree with that call for in my view those far right conservatives in many ways tied Turnbull’s hands together with the public viewing his back-downs on earlier views poorly.

However to some points raised:

Economy

  • the economy is in deficit (true – $37 billion in 2016) and this is bad. Well that’s a viewpoint not shared by reliable independent sources but what is agreed is that if we let this continue and grow it will be bad. I think bad is defined as living beyond our current means and leaving a sizeable debt for future generations to pay off that will affect their quality of life.
  • Our net debt ($326 billion), which is lower than many of the worlds leading economies, can be reduced by successive budget surpluses (differing promises made by both major parties). Many people, including myself, doubt the effectiveness of these promises.
  • The major sources of annual government income ($411 billion) are from tax e.g. personal income tax ($216 billion) and company tax (68 billion).
  • The major sources of annual expenditure ($450 billion) include in order: pensions ($61 million), medicare ($45 million), family tax benefits ($22 million), public hospitals ($20 million), disabilities income support ($18 million) and a host of other services around $10 million including residential care, pharmaceutical benefits, non-government schools.
  • Source: Treasury Pre-election Forecasts 

Firstly as a voting Australian I like to be told the some simple facts (apparently this is hard although not so as I found out above) and not facts influenced by party values and beliefs. There are two ways to improve the budget deficit improve revenue and decrease expenditure and its usually a combination of both that political parties use to achieve their goals (e.g.reduce government debt.).

Revenue is expected to increase (2.5%) but that’s not enough so we have to cut some expenditure and here is where the hurt is and there’s little believable narrative from either side that’s balanced enough to believe. No-one wants to be hurt by cuts but I would like to think if its shared around a little its more palatable.

The voting Australian public, if told the simple facts (some are presented above) I think would accept a combination of fair and just strategies to make a declining budget deficit and pay back our debt over time.

Here are some of my thoughts based on the current suite of policies:

  • tax cuts to small business only (up to 5% as they are the major employer across Australia – 46% of employment in the private sector or 4.6 million according to Treasury ) however lets define small business (currently it’s under $2 million turnover). In effect that’s a saving of approximately $50,000 a year on a $2 million dollar business which I dare say will keep some in business and allow other businesses to perhaps expand a little – not quite employ a full-time person. I say stay in business firstly for those small companies with no employees (61% of companies) are the ones most likely to fold. Of the companies that had employees 28% had 1-4, 9% had 5-19, 2% had 20-199, and less than 1% had 200 or more. The L/C government wants small businesses defined as under $10 million as I gather that’s where the 37% of companies that have employees are situated. These tax cuts over time will also include their capital infrastructure which boosts productivity and hopefully wages. No problems here and I would suggest no problems with most voters however its the all or large businesses tax cuts that most people object to (the 3% of companies) as it won’t stop the large multi-nationals shifting their profits to overseas places with lower tax rates. I think the profit-sharing argument for tax cuts to big business is not yet proven to the voter or sustainable in our economy.
  • Increase some taxes (e.g. tobacco, super over $250,000) and improve tax avoidance as proposed by both parties.
  • the labour proposal of changing negative gearing bears some consideration. I’m informed over 2/3’s of the people who do this earn around $80,000 annually (I know one) and I gather this is their superannuation at work. However the 1/3 of people (I know a few) must own considerable property and there comes a point where one must ask whether our economy can continue this tax advantage for them. Tax incentives to invest in new property is a compromise I think. This is a big item.

 

 Education

I was always going to comment on this one. As I understand it “Gonski” was affordable until a Labour Prime Minister said no school would be worse off. This promise made it difficult to fund “Gonski” but was politically more acceptable.

We have a real issue in the under performance of many lower socio-economic communities (some independent schools are located in these communities particularly the low-cost Catholic schools) and this is an economic as well as a social justice issue. We cannot afford as a community to continue to have large sections of our community under perform at school and lower their life opportunities (employment) which often leads to increased healthcare costs as well. If we are to cut government services costs over time we must address some of the core divers and this is the biggest.

The answers on what to spend the additional school revenue on I think are clear: improving teacher effect (both social and academic outcomes) class by class is the biggie and reducing the effects of disadvantage. A simply example of this is to give a wider range of experiences and relationships for students in lower socio-economic communities in a bid to improve their limited vocabulary development and improve self-esteem and resilience. Simply put learning is both exciting and frustrating at the same time and requires real perseverance to be successful. That’s hard for some students who have a closed mindset where feedback/failure/error is not welcomed or acted upon.

One of the issues schools in all sectors face particularly those in well off communities is the ever-increasing expectations placed on schools by parents and this includes the best of the best facilities some of our schools seem to need. Taxpayers as well as parents are paying for these expectations and we need to reign in these expectations and costs for all concerned. Maybe then we can afford to spread the tax dollar a little further and cut educational disadvantage, one of the main drivers for people to improve. That’s a hurt for some as I said earlier.

This seems to be a rant but what I am saying tell us some facts and how your policies address these facts and not slogans and then we might not get hung parliaments which are really in no-ones best interests.

 

Posted in Community, Leadership, politics, Teaching, Uncategorized | 5 Comments

Don’t take yourself too seriously!

Posted on June 28, 2016 by mwalker

Each year the students set the school leadership a dare challenge if they raised significant funds for the school in the annual walkathon. I was reminded of this when I stumbled on the photo of one challenge they set me – to dress up as Katie Perry and sing her song fireworks at assembly.

kperry

Well they raised the funds and I sang the song – needless to say the kids loved it – some called me Katie for years afterwards.

Message: Don’t take yourself that seriously that you cannot have fun (at your own expense) – it endears you in the students eyes for years to come.

Posted in Leadership, school, school administration | 16 Comments

Choosing Schools

Posted on June 27, 2016 by mwalker

cs

Parents choosing schools based on the ‘vibe’ and community rather than test scores and fancy facilities

This newspaper article attracted my attention over the weekend as it resonated with my experience as both a parent and school leader.

In my last school as principal I conducted at least 150 sixty minute group tours for parents interested in enrolling their children. Groups ranged in size from 2 to 40 parents with an average size of about 12 parents. This means that at least 2,000 parents spoke to me over the years about choosing schools. This number of parents provides me with some perspective on what they are looking for when choosing a school.

Typically questions asked on school tour included:

  • school numbers, average class size and number of composite classes
  • best things about the school and what we were trying to improve on
  • teachers: retention, quality, number of new graduates (professional learning)
  • point of difference between schools
  • parent and community involvement
  • size of schools grounds and where children played
  • child safety (includes bullying)
  • homework
  • computers
  • curriculum depending upon what was hitting the newspapers at the time: e.g. do we teach phonics, times tables etc…
  • what are the extra curricula activities offered
  • child readiness to start school

Rarely was I asked about academic standards or school fees (being a public school we didn’t charge much (e.g. books, excursions, camps, sports, computer lease) and depending upon the extra curricula activities (e.g. instrumental music lessons) it rarely exceeded $1,000 per year.

Our tours were conducted during school time and we visited classrooms, specialist teacher areas (Art, Music, Physical Education), library and outdoor areas included the school orchard, playgrounds and the Chinese Gatehouse.

I spoke about a range of topics (that included these sorts of questions) but I think it was the classroom visits where children’s work and thinking was displayed, their interactions viewed, parents seen helping around the school (e.g. in classrooms, in the school uniform shop or the library)  and the relationship between students and myself and their teachers that carried the “vibe”. This was the generally unspoken information that parents sought and felt. It was a feeling that their child would be known, cared for and mattered that counted.

I always ended tours talking about the importance of community in which they would be members of and the necessity to look at a few schools before making their choice. No school would offer everything I would say (in our case that included religious education, drama – although there was a senior years musical) but if you chose our school we would see each other a few times before the start of your child’s first day of attendance.

School tours were supplemented with Open Days, Information Evenings and Kindergarten talks.

My hope is that most parents had similar experiences in choosing schools (e.g. a school tour), had their questions answered in a forthright and informative way, felt the school vibe and were empowered to make an informed decision.

P.S.

If you are going to ask about academic standards ask about “growth rates” being similar to or above state average growth rates – that’s the standard that counts.

What a school displays it values.

And

Always check out your local school – you’ll generally be happy.

Posted in Family, Leadership, parenting, school, school structures | 8 Comments

A School Farewell

Posted on June 21, 2016 by mwalker

This week I was very humbled to attend my farewell assembly at school. There were students, teachers, parents and some returning parents of former students, former and current colleagues, representatives from the Department of Education and my family.

Farewell’s are a mixed bag of emotions and I imagine people will feel different things but for me it was an opportunity to say goodbye to the students and community and wish them peace, happiness and a life full of opportunities.

There were a number of speeches (including one made by myself) and some nice acknowledgements made about my tenure at the school as principal. Some of those sentiments are best expressed by the children themselves in the short clip below.

school farewell from Mark Walker on Vimeo.

Lots was made of the difficult and complex role of the school principal and yes that’s true in many ways however as I leave my position and move into my consultancy company many of the memories I cherish are the funny ones or ones that seem funny now.

In my farewell speech I thanked a number of groups and people who have both supported and forgiven me through those 42 years of service. These groups included the Department for their faith in my capacity, encouraging my professional learning both here in Australia and overseas and an understanding when I needed some time to recoup. My assistant principals for their service and loyalty, my staff and my family for their love and tolerance over the many years.

Lastly its the kids I will remember the most – their names fade over the years but their smiles, their enthusiasm and their trust stays with me. I enjoyed the many high fives the children wanted as I exited the gym that morning.

My passion continues, hence the willingness to offer what support I can to schools through my consultancy company. I still intend posting to this blog.

Posted in Leadership, reflections, school, Video Clips | 29 Comments

Small classes are still being sold as the “golden” goose!

Posted on June 19, 2016 by mwalker

I’ve just finished cooking omelettes for breakfast and I open the daily paper (Age) and stumble across the Independent Schools Guide. It’s a 16 page full colour advertising features that doesn’t appear online.

The last thing I’m wanting to do is start a private versus public education for in many ways a similar debate exists within the public education sector when it comes to preferred schools however the slogans or ” buy-in” lines are fascinating to say the least:

The list goes on. There are few of these slogans we would not want to be true for any school.

However one of the slogans fired me up a little:

 

The advertisement nor the schools website seem to define what small means. There are some advantages to small classes, which from my experience I’m going to define as 20 or below (teacher workload being one of them) however it’s what the teacher does with the reduced number that makes the difference. Richard Buford in a recent online post “Does class size matter?” says it really simply

If professional practice is poor, the number of students in a classroom may not matter too much, as the teacher is likely to struggle and get mediocre outcomes with 15 students just as much as working with 20.

He quotes a new report which says:

Students selected to move from smaller classrooms into bigger ones with more effective teachers would see the biggest gains, according to the simulation. Kids who remained in the downsized classrooms also would see a slight benefit as their weaker teacher’s performance improved with a smaller student load.

So my advice to parents when considering selecting a school is to ask what is the school doing to make sure the teachers are supported to improve their professional practice? Check out Hattie’s research on this matter.

The second thing that irked me when reading the advertisement was a recent claim by a Federal education minister that Australia has the largest concentration of private or independent schools in the world (hence we need to support them?). A recent fact check by the ABC does not support this – we are fourth behind Chile, Belgium and Spain and fifth when it comes to secondary schools behind the United Kingdom. Still its fair to say that even 4th or 5th means at least 30% of parents are paying considerable sums of money for their children to be educated in these schools, some as much as $34,000 per year. The debate on whether a child gets a superior education (better exam results) at one of these schools is dubious according to newspaper reports as well. This political in my opinion was more on about supporting his political parties school funding policy which is pro independent schools.

So when we read advertisements lets treat them as such and not statements of fact.

Posted in school, Teaching, Uncategorized | 10 Comments

mobile/cell phones on school or summer camps

Posted on June 11, 2016 by mwalker

that sixth graders who spent just five days at a tech-free sleepaway camp developed greater understanding of real-world interpersonal communication cues, including a better ability to read facial expressions, make eye contact, and interpret tone of voice and other prompts, such as posture and keeping an appropriate spatial distance with others.

A recent study on children wanting to take cell phones to summer camp as quoted in the New York Times made this statement.

A surprise?

Not really – most people would this is just common sense. If this is just common sense then why is it a hassle to “ban” the cell phones from camps?

Putting down the phone can be at least as hard for the parents, who are often anxious about separating from their children and are used to constant check-ins, whether they are in the next state or the next room. We may complain that our children are always on the phone but “the reality is that we want that instant access to our children,” Dr. Uhls said.

Ah Ha! It’s about parent anxiety now just as much as it’s about habit with youngsters. Well what’s the effect of this?

With this constant communication, children seek their parents’ guidance and emotional support even when they are not together, leaving fewer opportunities to develop their own confidence and internal compass for decision-making. Wendy Mogel, a clinical psychologist and the author of the parenting book “The Blessing of a Skinned Knee,” tells the story of a college student at a salad bar who texted her mother to ask if she liked ranch dressing, rather than testing it herself. Such dependent relationships can rob children of the chance to trust and believe in someone else besides their parents. Creating bonds with others is one of the most important benefits of camp, and it is more likely to happen without the electronic connection to home.

Well if you thought this was just in America ….. your wrong……. it’s an issue in Australian school camps as well. Last year I did a hands up survey with year 6 students on who owned a mobile phone (72%). Allowing for some peer pressure here its still a high percentage. When I asked who was thinking about taking a mobile phone to camp the numbers went up to about 85%. Again even allowing for peer pressure and taking one’s older siblings or parents phone the numbers seemed a little extreme.

And it’s not just year 6 students but even year 3 students attending their first overnight camp.

Then there’s the peer pressure to photos to post on social media (not I’m not kidding) and some photos transgressed privacy (yikes).

The answer was simply enough NO PHONES ON CAMP. We will supply the digital cameras and download images to the school servers for educational reasons and yes post to parents from camp some photos and a sentence or two on our school messaging system.

Posted in Family, parenting | 2 Comments

Some essential questions to ask.

Posted on June 11, 2016 by mwalker

I was referred to this speech by a close colleague of mine, also like myself a summer school alumni member of Harvard (if this is indeed claimable). Having listened to the speech now several times I cannot but help think about an inquiry colleague Kath Murdoch when Jame’s gets to his second question: I wonder and I wonder if…. This is a question starter I now hear myself ask time and again.

However its the last extra question he poses that gets to me now:

Did you get what you want out of life ..even so…

he answered to be beloved (admired and respected) and he extended that hope to students that they would be beloved by their teachers.

I cannot help but think … as I transition from the employment as a school principal to … well an experienced mentor role what do I leave behind from the system and schools that I served? I would do well to remember his questions and the many questions that Kath posed to me as well. I commend his questions to you.

Posted in Uncategorized | 3 Comments

Revolution School, a must watch documentary on ABC television

Posted on June 5, 2016 by mwalker

There is a new 4 part documentary on our ABC channel called “Revolution School” with the first episode screened last week.

I think this is a must watch show for anyone interested in schooling. The ABC took cameras into a normal secondary school for about a year with the aim of finding out how this school “turned around”.

I should declare that the school has the support from Melbourne University Graduate School of Education. The university has a project now in its fifth year where it forms a partnerships with a select group of schools (usually around 15) seriously interested in improving student learning and well-being. The network is a 3 year commitment with a yearly fee of $15,000 and 0.5 of an experienced or leading teacher, called a success coordinator, dedicated to the project.

This revolution school is one of these schools.

One of my assistant principals Penny Jayne and I saw the possibilities of extending our work with Harvard University in Boston around using formative assessment data to improve teaching and learning (Data Wise). We started our partnership with Harvard in 2011 by attending a leadership institute and Penny will be accredited as a data wise coach in 2016.

We applied to join the Melbourne University 2016 – 2019 network and Elsternwick Primary was successful. The staff have selected a Maths Improvement Project and I look forward to the outcomes of the partnership over the next few years.

I have moved on as Principal from Elsternwick Primary but am in regular contact with the success coordinator and so can answer some queries people may have.

Posted in Accountability, Assessment, Data Wise Program, Harvard, Leadership, professional learning, school, teacher efficacy, Uncategorized | 8 Comments

Downsizing your house? We did and what did we learn?

Posted on June 5, 2016 by mwalker

Ever considered downsizing your house?

We sold our family home in October last year after about 6 weeks of preparation time. After we finished repainting (over 1/2 of the external house and windows – once you start where do you finish), replacing (guttering, downpipes etc..), gardening (cutting down trees, laying new turf and planting) and then clearing out the crap (a few skips and trips to the tip) we didn’t want to sell – the house never looked so good. We were buggered and relieved when it sold – also a little sad.

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Then came the process of looking for the perfect “townhouse” for the perfect “price”. One good decision was to rent for 12 months because it took us 8 months to find our new home. It’s this process of finding the new home I wanted to comment on for the unsuspecting downsizer.

We determined our perfect home would still have 3 bedrooms, 2 bathrooms and now a 2 car garage. The main bedroom must be on the ground floor just in case we found it hard to climb stairs in about 20 years. From those must have’s there were nice extra’s (central heating and cooling, a court-yard for a BBQ were some of those). Determining this list is a must first step – even before the suburb.

Here is some data that might be useful in understanding the long drawn out process. We looked at least 200 properties online – thank god for realestate.com. We inspected 57 properties over 13 different suburbs with each inspection taking about 1 hr which includes travel time. Yes that’s 57 hours.

For those in Melbourne the list of suburbs in alphabetical order and number of inspections are: Asburton (8), Ashwood (3), Balwyn (3), North Balwyn (9), Box Hill South (1), Camberwell (10), Carneige (1), Glen Iris (5), Hawthorn East (3), Kew / East Kew (9), Malvern (4) and Surrey Hills (1).

View Map

What did we learn?

  • determine your must have’s in a property (this can take a number of inspections before you finally determine the list).
  • use an online platform for your first search (and to contact agents for legal papers and indications of price).
  • have google maps or some other form of directional finder on your phone or iPad – it makes it easier and saves time and eases frustrations.
  • do you homework on prices – we looked each week over several months on auctioned properties determine a low (margin), medium (ideal) and high price (less than ideal). Based on your homework determine your range you are prepared to pay – and stick to it (non-emotional). We were outbid on 5 properties – not even getting a bid in on 3 properties. We saw  properties go well into the high price range some getting 58% over the initial price being quoted (I did a rant on Facebook before I wrote a letter to the manager of that real estate company for massively underquoting the property and wasting our time). Be prepared for somewhere between 15 and 30% over the initial price. Remember it’s not want the banks will lend you it’s what you can afford to want to pay back per fortnight.
  • do your homework on other costs and issues (e.g body corporate, neighbours, distance to public transport and coffee shops (schools if that is an issue for you) and distance to work for all those living in the house. If you can get a property built within 7 years you still have a builders warranty.
  • Finally you will want to buy or refurbish some items for the new property so clear out your rubbish (and that can be a long process with trips to the tip and skips), sell what you can on eBay or other such online services and enjoy.

Thank god for technology, an understanding family and wife and the time to make this happen. To those thinking about this I hope this post has been mildly helpful.

Images of the new home:

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Posted in Family, Uncategorized | 17 Comments

The Wounded Leader

Posted on May 31, 2016 by mwalker

Recently I recalled a book I read a few ago called The Wounded Leader by Ackerman and Maslin-Ostrowski.

In the book they suggest schools have leadership resistant architecture typically “the conspiracy of busyness: where there is little time for leaders to convene people together to plan, organise and follow through – its a catch as catch can” situation.

Well, I fear I have unwittingly led such a conspiracy where I tried to appease people (e.g. agree to give people time to complete things in classrooms and not meet) and groups (e.g. meeting seemingly tight industrial conditions) in the hope that they would believe in the strategic goals, feel the moral imperative and follow my lead. Well, while wounding is inevitable as a leader its effects can be destabilising, both personally and professionally. Simply retelling the wounding while maybe cathartic doesn’t help readers understand that through the experience I have grown and that they may grow through their wounding as well.

The short story (from my perspective) is that I felt somewhat nobbled from a contract renewal process where I felt my authority slowly ebbed away under a banner of consultation. Don’t misunderstand me to consult others is a positive and indeed an essential disposition for leaders except when it turns into an expected appeasement by others to conform to either popular opinion, harassment or formal agreements. Please note that I am making a difference between authority, that is the delegated power to make decisions, and leadership. I still felt I was making a difference as a leader to the school and supporting others to do well, in some cases exceptionally well and showing a willingness to take risks and embrace change.

The busyness is easy to accumulate in a school and for me at the time of the wounding it involved: the need to complete the financial and workforce plans for the coming year which for me included the employment of 30% of new staff for replacement and growth, the completion of a complaints process, supporting teachers and staff implementing a new curriculum, technological (1:1 notebook program) and intercultural initiatives with a sister school in China, the presentation of performance data at staff and board levels and actually interacting with our young people whether it be in classrooms or on the field.

What I didn’t think about was the effect of some of these initiatives on some people to such a degree where dissent for me was palatable. Some meetings where this dissent was laid bare were unpleasant to attend and needed much time planning for the meeting and debriefing afterwards.

In the end I made or consented to decisions that in reflection I feel were not in the best interest of the school either short or long-term e.g. not meeting with team leaders on a weekly basis or following through on sister school initiatives.

So what did I learn? That I needed to have higher expectations and make people more accountable for their actions (including words) and that having forged an educational vision through research, consultation, action and evaluation I needed to hold the line, not acquiesce to pressure and accept that people still might dissent but that was their decision. Easy to say harder to do.

I feel principals, even experienced ones like myself need mentors and even coaches who are independent from the school and paid for by the school or system. Maybe I have something here to offer others?

This post has been hard for me to write for several reasons: I’m still in the reflective stage and on leave so some emotions still exist and in writing I have tried to avoid blame (it’s a non-productive emotion) and people might interpret my writing personally and not accept its my learning.

BUT I felt now was the time to write before I move to other exciting possibilities. I realise that in writing about wounding particularly before goodbyes I leave myself open to criticism or resentment from others but that’s the chance I have taken. I do so in the hope that we may all learn going forward.

I will soon have the opportunity to say goodbye to a community that I was truly committed to and felt supported by over my 14 plus years of service and I’d like the chance to once more see the kids.

All of this has been made possible by a very supportive employer (DET) who recognised the wounding and have met with me and approved time for me to see the learning. I say this because often the “system” is seen as hard and uncaring but over my time I have felt the opposite – they were there when I needed them (and not just this time either).

I welcome comments and again urge readers to see this as my time to learn.

Yours truly

Mark Walker

Posted in China, professional learning, reflections, school administration, Sister School, Uncategorized | 13 Comments

Prioritising your workload

Posted on February 29, 2016 by mwalker

I recently read a short article in the January ASCD “education update” by Elena Hegland, an English teacher in New York, on the topic of prioritising work. It got me thinking about principal’s priorities.

Elena lists her top 5 priorities as

  • Student well being (“taking care of kids comes first”)
  • Lesson planning (this is a must for classroom management and student engagement)
  • Parent contact (within 24 hrs if possible)
  • Administration contact (often about the first 3 so if they are “fixed” you are well ahead)
  • Grading (this was more about formative assessment and she felt that if you set dates and timelines it’s more achievable and a must for point 2 anyway).

My only comment to the list is that I would clump assessment and planning together at 2 as often its 1 or 2 that parents call about anyway.

For principal’s I would suggest that they share and same number 1 and 2 – student well being and engagement, classroom management and academic success are the essentials. Then it becomes interesting for me. Depending upon the situation or the need I would usually have teacher contact next. We can often informally assess the first two when we wander in and around classrooms (take wandering as both focused e.g observations using structures like learning walks or coaching and also informal times during at the start of a day).

Then parents who I often apply a 2 day rule too unless it’s an urgent safety issue. I like to be informed prior to the meeting about the topic or issue so that I can be prepared and Both hear and lead a discussion toward a clear resolution and understanding.

Yet when the administration calls a principal they usually get first priority – dropped everyone and attend – and this has me wondering then about our first priorities. Have I got this wrong?

I’d be interested in some comments on this one?

Posted in reflections, school administration, Teaching, Uncategorized | Leave a comment