My April Educational Leadership column is online

My latest Power Up column Technology and the Illusion of Creativity from the April 2014 issue of Educational Leadership from ASCD is now available online. Enjoy. Links to all my Power Up columns can be found here.

Comments, as always, are welcome.

The place to toot the worth of libraries is NOT in library mags

From the IASL listserv this morning...

Oh boy

As a deputy principal who was a passionate teacher librarian I can safely tell you it is all about the dollar

I could write spooooo many articles about why the school library doesn't feature in curriculum discussions

About why the school doesn't value teacher librarians

About why reading for pleasure is not valued

About why school Principals cannot get the fact that school libraries are so important

It is very depressing

If only I could have the time to write articles for journals other than T L journals

   Independent school journals

   Principal journals

   Middle school journals

   Secondary journals

Folks the place to toot the academic worth of school libraries is NOT in school library journals

Pat Carmichael

Deputy Principal with a mission for school libraries

If only I had another life time

Pat's comments were in response to an announcement that the article Research that Resonates: Influencing Stakeholders by Debra E. Kachel could be found in School Library Monthly.

Pat, I agree. Your observation is one that's been a constant personal irritation over the past 30 years - why do we  librarians just talk to each other and not to others in education?

While I do not do so enough, I've been lucky to get some articles about the impact of libraries and project-based learning in a number of non-library educational publications including Educational Leadership, Kappan, Principal, InterEd, DesignShare, NASSP Bulletin, School Administrator, and others. Maybe one in 10 or one in 20 of my articles are published in journals outside the library or technology field. Not enough for sure.

First, I appreciate anyone who writes for professional publication be that publication library/tech or for general ed or for the general public. It takes time and courage. Thank you. We need to keep each other formed about best practices in our field.

And let's face it - getting published in Kappan or Educational Leadership is a lot more competitive than some of our own journals. But more librarians could publish in general education if they kept these things in mind:

1. Remember your audience. Why should a principal be interested in libraries anyway. What's in it for the reader? Use non-technical language. Don't impress - inform and convince.
2. Don't put "library" in the title. Sorry, don't talk about libraries in general. Speak of them in relationship to other programs that may be important: 1:1, literacy, differentiation, 21st century skills, etc.
3. Have a co-author who is a member of the group for whom you are writing. If you are writing for a professional development publication, get your PD coordinator to co-author. If you are writing for an association publication, get a member of that association to co-author.  
4. Don't advocate for libraries or librarians. Always, always, always frame your arguments in terms of how libraries benefit students, staff, and your community. Library users.

I'm glad Kachel's article was published in SLM. Smart, proactive librarians will find ways to get it in the hands of their admins and teachers regardless of where it was found. Not only will copies go in principals' (e)mailboxes, but conference time will be scheduled to actually discuss the piece.

But we do need more library professionals writing for educators, parents, and the general public about how library programs can be good for kids. Make your next article one for non-librarians.

 

The most important reason kids need to learn to be creative

Creativity, I believe, is a vocational skill, a work skill, a means to secure good jobs.

But idealist that I am, I also want students who feel empowered, knowing at heart they have the ability to be sufficiently clever that they can solve any problem they encounter. That they don't have to simply take what life throws at them and live with it. That there is always a way, if one is sufficiently innovative and persistent to get around, over, under, or through any wall. 

Far too many children leave school without the confidence, mindset, skills, or even realization that they have the ability to solve their own problems. They rely on parents, teachers, or perceived leaders to present “the solution” to issues that trouble them.  In large part this is because schools have had the historic societal charge to create conformists, order-takers, and in-the-box thinkers. As David Brooks observes about that student who has a perfect academic record:

This person has followed the cookie-cutter formula for what it means to be successful and you [as an employer] actually have no clue what the person is really like except for a high talent for social conformity. Either they have no desire to chart out an original life course or lack the courage to do so. Shy away from such people.

Schools have done a good job of creating followers. In his book Savage Inequalities, Jonathan Kozol, after examining schools in  East St. Louis, Chicago, New York City, Camden, Cincinnati, and Washington D.C. concludes that two separate public school systems operate in the United States”

... children in one set of schools are educated to be governors; children in the other set of schools are trained for being governed. The former are given the imaginative range to mobilize ideas for economic growth; the latter are provided with the discipline to do the narrow tasks the first group will prescribe. (Kozol, 1991).*

As a life-long educator, my mantra has always been that as a teacher my mission is to create thinkers, not believers. A large part of thinking should be thinking creatively as a means of solving one's own problems, solving the problems of society, and understanding that we all have the power to choose the paths we take in life.

 

Personally, I love the everyday MacGyvers I encounter. Those who see an obstacle as something akin to a jungle gym - a chance to not just climb, but to get joy and satisfaction in doing so.

Can you think of a better reason that students need to practice creativity?

* Check the recent Annie E Casey Foundation report on acheivement gap by ethnicity if you think Kozol's 1991 findings are ancient history. What chances are students who are performing poorly academically being given to be creative, empowered personal problem-solvers. My guess is about zero. Pass the test then maybe, maybe we'll think about dispositions like creativity.