Pause a moment

Pause for a moment...

• Put some air in your tires
• Check your map
• Play a game that your kids play
• Accept thanks for something without over analyzing
• Read the funnies
• Look at old pictures of your kids
• Park in space farthest from the entrance
• Plan your dream vacation
• Give somebody else time to figure it out for themselves
• Call your mom
• Kiss your grandchild on the top of his head and find her a cookie
• Wear your oldest sweatshirt
• Have two glasses of wine instead of just one
• Read an old-favorite book
• Take out the earbuds and enjoy the birds
• Catch your breath

It's that time of the year. School starting. Kids in activities. Big projects. Community events. Must read books. Friends and relatives who need your help. 

Here's the thing. If you get to the big stuff five minutes later, it won't make a big difference in the long run. 

BFTP: A Thick Skin

A weekend Blue Skunk "feature" will be a revision of an old post. I'm calling this BFTP: Blast from the Past. Original post August 23, 2008. 

This post resonated with me this week since I looked around at a tech department meeting and was struck by how very, very fortunate I am to have a team of people who are brave, who are willing to risk criticism themselves in order to make changes that benefit kids. 

The two things you need to make any kind of change are a thick skin and a mission from God. All of us are sensitive to criticism. ... What helps deflect the arrows is faith that what you are doing is in the best interest of others. (Or as the Blues Brothers put it: “We’re on a mission from God.”) Without this faith in yourself and what you do, it won’t take much to turn you back. Machines are the Easy Part; People are the Hard Part

Leadership is getting someone to do what they don't want to do, to achieve what they want to achieve. Tom Landry

...the innovator has for enemies all those who have done well under the old conditions, and lukewarm defenders in those who may do well under the new. Machiavelli

My guess that you have made some changes over the summer in your library, tech department, or classroom for what you believe to be in the best interest of kids, parents, or staff. I'd also guess that these changes will not be universally appreciated. And a few of those not liking the changes will be more than happy to let you know what an idiot and incompetent you are.

Never underestimate the importance of being able to deal effectively with criticism if you are to be a true change agent.

The day after tomorrow my district's teachers come back to work and half that first workshop day will be spent training them to use our new student information system, Infinite Campus. The implementation of big systems always include some, ahem, surprises. IC was no exception. Some things took longer. Some things we'd not anticipated needing to do, needed doing. Lots of things are done in a different way and require practice. Some things simply can't be done that were done in the old system. (We have a middle school schedule that I swear depends on the phases of the moon to determine whether 7th graders have health or PE on Thursdays.) In other words, we know the product we will be asking our teachers to learn won't have all the bugs worked out of it. The data is not as clean as we want it. Class lists, student names, and other things won't be perfect or available as soon as they want them. There will be a learning curve for using the system. There will be problems that can't be immediately solved.

I also know that in a few months, nearly everyone will be happy we made the change. (See "Where's the Light Switch?") But for the next few weeks I will need to have a pretty tough hide since I anticipate criticism flowing freely.

In situations like this, I normally I joke that I need to wear my "iron underwear" since everyone wants to take a bite out my ass. But when it comes to criticism, a thick skin is better than armor. Not all criticism ought to be deflected - some should sink in if one is to become a more effective leader, and quite frankly, a better person.

I see the following "flavors" of criticism directed at me fairly regularly:

• General frustration with life. I am too busy. I already have too much work to do. This means learning something new and I am about to retire. I am frustrated with my finances, my marriage, my own kids, my health (but you are convenient and I don't want to think about the real causes.) OK, this is venting/whining. I tolerate little of it from anyone but the LWW. If I feel another person is whining at me, I will interrupt and simply say, "What exactly are you asking me to do?" If the person can't articulate any solution other than inventing a time machine or changing every other human being's basic nature, I try to kindly say that it's not my job to listen to problems I can't do anything about. End of story.
• Criticisms about a policy or product. When we switched our web hosting to from regular web server to a content management system, 98% of our staff was happy and empowered. But for a few teachers who had learned HTML programming and had used it to create some extensive, useful and often beautiful webpages, the new system looked like a step backward. Dealing with these criticisms is difficult since even knowing and appreciating the disruptive nature of the change for these few people, I would have made the same choice if it was to be done over. About all one can do is offer a cogent rationale for why the change was made. (That making things easier and more powerful for 790 teachers at the expense of 10 teachers in district was why the decision was made.) Oh, and this is NOT the time to pass the buck and blame others for the choices made.
• Constructive criticism. I admit that I've done plenty of boneheaded things for which I deserve criticism. The first year we installed lots of IWBs and mounted projectors in the district, I didn't think to include our custodial/maintenance staff in the planning. And these building-proud people let me know just exactly what a stupid oversight that was. It was justifiable criticism and I learned from it. Our custodians have been important players in the project since. The person who can set aside defensiveness and actually use complaints to determine better ways to do things has turned a critic into an asset. But it is harder than it seems - especially for those of us with fragile egos.

This last kind of criticism is why a "thick skin" through which some jabs can be felt is better than "iron underwear" off which every complaint, valid or not, is simply deflected.

I hope all your changes this year are immediately loved and accepted. But if not, remember you are on a "mission from God" and that, like getting your teeth cleaned, a little painful criticism is good for your overall health. 

But I think just for this Monday, I'm digging out the iron underwear.

What techniques have you developed to deal with criticism?

On being a Connected Educator, Part Two

What follows is a continuation of yesterday's post of questions I am answering for Connected Educators. Oh, I also remembered that I wrote a column on this topic for Educational Leadership last May that you can find here.

 

Q; How has connected education benefited Mankato Area Public Schools? The introduction of GoogleApps for Education in late 2009 ignited an explosion in the use of online tools that increased online collaboration (connection) among our district’s staff members. We are a large district (for Minnesota) with 18 schools and office buildings, so being about to work on curriculum documents, do joint school PD planning, and hold meetings and trainings using Hangouts has brought us together as a district.

Student/teacher communications have benefited. In less than three years, our Moodle server now hosts 348 blended courses and we have over 5,000 users this September. 195 teachers (out of about 600) have at least at least one course. Over half our 7600 students have participated in some form of locally offered online learning experience. GoogleApps is how our students create documents, spreadsheets and graphics – and how they share them for feedback from their teachers and from each other.

We have also built connections with our families. Using the student and parent portals in Infinite Campus, our student information system, teachers keep parents and students current on their attendance, grades, and completion of assignments. Our classroom teachers and administrators have long used webpages to inform families, but social media including Facebook, Twitter, and blogs is now adding an element of interactivity to these connections.

Much of our professional development related to technology use has moved online to classes and activities offered in Moodle. We’ve been sharing our successes (and challenges) in afterschool Hangouts, with teachers from multiple buildings presenting their experiences. The convenience and effectiveness of these online experiences has overshadowed our poorly attended, voluntary inservices.

Q: What do you think your peers at the district technology office level should be doing to support connected education? Very simply, we should be enabling and encouraging online interactions by staff, rather than blocking them. By filtering at the minimum level required by CIPA, we have kept open as many means for interaction as possible. We do not block Facebook, YouTube, Twitter, or other means of sharing original digital content.

Technology directors also need to take a leading role in making sure there is a solid Digital Citizenship curriculum in place that teaches students (and teachers) how to act ethically and safely in a connected learning environment. We have written board policy for social networking, as well as guidelines that support our Acceptable Use Policy.

Finally, I believe our most powerful role may be as models of connected learning, sharing resources we have found (and our means of finding them) with our administrators and teaching staff. Technology directors should themselves share with their peers through professional blogs, Google+, Facebook groups, Pinterest, and Twitter, leading by example. A day doesn’t pass that I am not thankful for one my peers in my PLN who has informed me, raised my level of concern, or even made me angry. And it is the least I can do in return. 

The edited final version of this profile will be here.
<http://connectededucators.org/innovations/connected-educator-profiles/>