Learner Agency - more than just a buzzword!

Learner agency at Hobsonville Point Secondary School from EDtalks on Vimeo.

Admittedly, even I'm impressed at the litany of edu buzzwords I manage to ram into one video here. When I first watched this, I couldn't help but imagine Tom Barrett poised with his Buzzword Bingo card and a kind but cruel twinkle in his eye. ;) And indeed I got royally roasted by Steve Mouldey, particularly when I managed to define one buzzword with another - did you know learner agency is really about student efficacy? Well now you do.

But joking aside, Learner Agency is bloody important.

So what does Learner Agency actually mean. The way I define it is the idea that the learner has a sense of ownership and control over their own learning. The word 'agency' is defined as "action or intervention producing a particular effect", so I guess if we apply this to the learner, it means they engage in a particular action or trial an intervention which then produces a particular effect. In the context of a school this might involve students taking action, whether it be through reading, researching, discussing, debating, experimenting, making or tinkering and as a result, gain (through their own efforts) new understanding and new learnings. This being a shift from the notion of teachers, teaching at the student and fundamentally providing all of the knowledge and content which they then transfer to the the empty vessel.

Of course this notion is not new, in fact, it's positively ancient. I sometimes think Socrates must be turning in his grave.

So if this notion has been bandied about since the the time of Socrates, why the hell are we considering it as cutting edge now? I'm guessing the honest answer is that education started off pretty sweet, then got a bit crap in the last 100 years or so.

Public schooling as we know it appears to be have been formed or at least heavily influenced by the reforms introduced by The Committee of Ten, a group of US educators who called for the standardisation of the secondary curriculum. They recommended 12 years of education and a range of subjects or learning areas that have remained, for the most part freakishly unchanged (remember, this was a 120 years ago!!!). They also recommended that "...every subject which is taught at all in a secondary school should be taught in the same way and to the same extent to every pupil so long as he pursues it, no matter what the probable destination of the pupil may be, or at what point his education is to cease." [4]  I do wonder if it recommendations such as this that resulted in learners falling victim to the generations of well meaning educators developing well honed teacher agency, attempting to produce similar outcomes for all learners by delivering same size, one size fits all learning regardless of learner strengths, weaknesses, interests or career path.

Even in modern times, the notion of standardised testing has the unintended effect of producing standardised teaching. To ensure that teaching remains standardised, learners must not interfere! I actually have no issue with standardised testing or even standards. It's actually our notion that to meet common goals, we need to get there through common means that is the issue.

If the world around us wasn't changing so rapidly, we might have got away with sticking our heads in the sand and believing (like certain schools still do) that effective education means little, if any, learner agency and whole lot of control and teacher centred pedagogy.  Don't get me wrong, there is still a place for direct instruction and even rote learning, but if you are limiting yourself to such practice, no matter how awesomely charismatic you might be, you are doing your students a massive disservice.

Firstly there is the issue that students no longer need you or I to access knowledge and expertise. Once upon a time you may have got away with little learner agency because they (the students) had few if any other ways to learn. I once worked with a teacher that claimed that school was like the dentist, that students simply had to suck it up and do what was good for them. I'm sorry lady, but you need to wake up and smell the laughing gas. Students no longer necessarily need us to learn, if learning is something they have to suffer through they will look elsewhere. However, they do need us to know how to learn more effectively and to curate what skills may be good to learn and what content might be useful to know in the future.

Secondly there is the reality that we are preparing learners for a different world than we were in 1892. We are no longer producing compliant workers for an industrial workplace where basic writing, reading and arithmetic and learned compliance was the key to success. In fact we don't actually know what we are preparing them for. We are almost certainly preparing them for multiple careers, more casual, informal work and/or self-employment. This calls for a broader set of skills. Yes, the three Rs are still incredibly important, but now the ability for young people to self-manage, learn to learn and then re-learn and adapt is going to be a basic need for survival. Complex problem solving, creative thinking and risk-taking are undoubtedly going to be the key ingredients for success. I mean look at the list Forbes produced as The 10 Skills Employers Most Want in 2015 Graduates

1. Ability to work in a team structure
2. Ability to make decisions and solve problems (tie)
3. Ability to communicate verbally with people inside and outside an organization
4. Ability to plan, organize and prioritize work
5. Ability to obtain and process information
6. Ability to analyze quantitative data
7. Technical knowledge related to the job
8. Proficiency with computer software programs
9. Ability to create and/or edit written reports
10. Ability to sell and influence others

These are not skills developed in a teacher centred learning environment. And who know what the graduates of 2025 and beyond may need. Whilst I do don't have a crystal ball, I am guessing agency and efficacy will be even more important than ever.

So what are 10 ways you might provide Learner Agency in your classroom or school?

1. Introduce one to one devices or BYOD and actually give students the freedom to use technology in a variety of ways - not just a glorified exercise or text book. There is no question - all students having access to a browser is incredibly liberating if you just shut up and get of the way and let them go explore and actually use more than just the latest app or platform you've stumbled upon. Technology is not actually about improving grades, it's actually about improving agency (and hopefully greater agency should then result in better outcomes).
2. Give students choice about context or topic where possible.
3. Give students choice about how the record or process their learning - paper & pen, written notes, images or voice recording.
4. Give students choice about how they evidence their learning - let them choose whether evidence is verbal, visual or oral (or a combination of all three)
5. Give students choice about how and where they learn - provide an online platform with 24/7 access to clear learning outcomes, prompts, support and challenges.
6. Provide students with a platform or space for online discussion about their learning that doesn't rely on you.
7. Give students time and space to work independently - yes sometimes they will waste time, get distracted and frustrated - but so do we! And how are you going to bloody well learn to to learn for yourself without being given the opportunity to do so. as an aside - it always cracks me up when schools wonder why Year 13 students don't cope with "free periods" when we have barely given them a "free moment" in the 12 years prior. 
8. Allow time for independent inquiry, where students have time and space to seek out and create new understanding.
9. Where possible let them personalise inquiry to give them even greater ownership - do those students really need to explore the same topic, book, period or place? And do they need to all present it the same way (see #4)
10. Give students a choice of classes or modules or if this isn't possible in your present environment, at least give them the opportunity to co-construct the course they are in - even in a school where you have to present some sort of year plan, you can still hack that plan....if there is one benefit of a non-MLE environment you can usually get away with being as creative as you blooming well like in the privacy of your own classroom. 

This list is not exhaustive. Would love to hear how you develop/enable/encourage learner agency in classroom or school. 

Oops. Once again what I intended to be a pithy reflection has turned into a ramble. See learner agency isn't just a buzzword, it's a bloody great ramble!

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So what are you doing differently this year in your classroom (and/or school)?

Source

Whether you did a formal inquiry into your teaching practice last year or simply taught some kids and did some some stuff, one truth will remain - there are a number of things you need to change about your teaching and/or learning environment this year.

As my ancient buddy Heraclitus once stated (admittedly didn't hear him first hand, but am choosing to trust my sources), "the only constant is change". Now this is most certainly true of our world, society and most work places, but unfortunately bar a change of names on your class roll this often not the case in the classroom. I acknowledge change is challenging and many of you work in environments where change feels glacial at best, however that needn't bother any of us as change starts with you! Whether you are in a dynamic environment where everyone is striving for "adaptive expertise" or feel like you are a lone nut in a school where the status quo (which may well produce excellent academic results) is protected, there is nothing stopping you leading the charge, even if it is only in the safety of your most likely four walls of a classroom.

The chances are if you are the sort that reads this blog, you are already thinking about change, if so, I would love to hear your plans, if not, here are some scenarios and ideas of areas you might like to address and change up this year:

Scenario One: My kids results results were disappointing last year.

I start with this as this is often the data your HOD and SLT look at, and if you are teacher senior secondary it is the sort of thing that might have bummed you out when NCEA exam results were published in the holidays. The obvious thing to do is when you have your new cohort is to ensure that you know their learning needs in specific areas and ensure you address these through careful differentiation and UDL strategies (that we will discus more thoroughly later), however I suggest you do something different - address the personal elephant in the room. One thing I did a few years back when I was briefly HOD at AGGS was to get all of us to actually look more closely at ourselves. As teachers we be can very quick to look at student data and identify their potential strengths and areas that need greater support, but how often do we really do that to ourselves.

Here's the process: hunt out as many years class results of your own that you can get your hands on (even if you don't have the hard evidence I am sure you can work this out with some brutally honest reflection), now look at it closely and as objectively as possibly - which areas do your students tend to do well in and which do they do 'comparatively' suck at. At this point you need to quiet your internal defence mechanism that tries to blame the kid's weaknesses, socio-economic status and exam/assessment writer's flaws and be  really honest - are there some parts of the curriculum or subject that you teach that you don't like? Are there areas that you are weaker at, so gloss over, in comparison to the areas you LOVE and indulge in like a pig in mud. I bet, if you are REALLY honest, there is one or two areas where it's actually you who is a but sucky (for me it was on always Unfamiliar texts in English....big yawn...and I sucked). Next step, declare it, either in a quiet chat to someone you see as a support person or even better (if you have the team culture that makes this safe) share it as a group. Be sure to call the bullsh#tters who say their only flaw is caring too much or working too hard. If you are doing this as a group, once you have declared your area that needs addressing, get everyone to declare an area or two of success and choiceness - you can then use this as a way to find in-school mentors, and people you can bribe with coffee until they spill their secrets and resources. If you don't have team approach you can still sniff out those that love the stuff you love less and connect with them - coffee dates work well, classroom observations even better.

Scenario Two: My kids did okay/great/awesome, but if I'm honest, they were a bored and/or stressed (or maybe you were bored and/or stressed too) 

and/or

I am in a school where I have little autonomy and don't feel like I have much freedom to plan what I want.

First up, kids doing okay or even excellently academically is not an excuse to rest on your laurels and say "I nailed it!". High five yourself for sure, but this should simply free you up to focus on what other areas you need to change, iterate and evolve in your practice. Whether you are in a school where autonomy is limited or somewhere where you can do as you wish, the following are a range of innovations you might like try on for size. As with anything I suggest you wrap a teaching as inquiry approach around your personal change, ask yourself "What is important (and therefore worth spending time on), given where my students are at?" This will ensure you are not you are not just innovating for innovation's sake, that you are trialling these strategies because they meet your students needs in some way. And don't just limit yourself to strategies where there is lofty research and evidence base to prove their worth. Hattie is only talking about the sh#t that's been happening for years anyway, if we have any hope of NZ being the world leaders in education we need to stop looking solely in the rear-vision mirrors, instead put those headlights on full beam and look forward. I mean, Edmund Hillary didn't sit around waiting for the evidence that scaling Mt Everest would be choice for his career, he just cracked on and did it.

So what are some new strategies/approaches you could try?

• Teach your kids about 'growth mindset' and 'grit' - we talk about this a lot as teachers and how we need have a growth mindset, but do you actually teach this to your students?? In a post I did last year as part of the #hackyrclass series I provided this definition - 

Mindset is a simple idea discovered by world-renowned Stanford University psychologist Carol Dweck in decades of research on achievement and success—a simple idea that makes all the difference.

In a fixed mindset, people believe their basic qualities, like their intelligence or talent, are simply fixed traits. They spend their time documenting their intelligence or talent instead of developing them. They also believe that talent alone creates success—without effort. They’re wrong.

In a growth mindset, people believe that their most basic abilities can be developed through dedication and hard work—brains and talent are just the starting point. This view creates a love of learning and a resilience that is essential for great accomplishment. Virtually all great people have had these qualities.

Teaching a growth mindset creates motivation and productivity in the worlds of business, education, and sports. It enhances relationships. When you read Mindset, you’ll see how.

Source: http://mindsetonline.com/whatisit/about/

You might also like to teach your students about the idea of 'grit' or as TED Talker Angela Lee Duckworth puts it: grit (according to her) not ability is the key to success.

• Introduce design thinking - Whilst it might be easy to write off design thinking as just another passing fancy of us educators that reckon we are all super cutting edge, it is important to recognise that design thinking has been around for ages and is not going anywhere, what feels flash in the pan for us is actually a well proven approach that we can use as teachers to iterate our planning and more importantly a skill we can share with our learners to ensure they really do become life long learners (and innovators). I have a full explanation of design thinking in a post from last year, where I included this definition:

What is Design Thinking?

“Design thinking is a human-centered approach to innovation that draws from the designer's toolkit to integrate the needs of people, the possibilities of technology, and the requirements for business success.” —Tim Brown, president and CEO

Thinking like a designer can transform the way organizations develop products, services, processes, and strategy. This approach, which IDEO calls design thinking, brings together what is desirable from a human point of view with what is technologically feasible and economically viable. It also allows people who aren’t trained as designers to use creative tools to address a vast range of challenges.

Design thinking is a deeply human process that taps into abilities we all have but get overlooked by more conventional problem-solving practices. It relies on our ability to be intuitive, to recognize patterns, to construct ideas that are emotionally meaningful as well as functional, and to express ourselves through means beyond words or symbols. Nobody wants to run an organization on feeling, intuition, and inspiration, but an over-reliance on the rational and the analytical can be just as risky. Design thinking provides an integrated third way".

Source: http://www.ideo.com/about/

• Turn your classroom into a maker space - So why do we need to thinking about makerspaces? Because making things is choice, is fun and makes learning memorable. I bet if you reflect on your favourite experience as a learner, it most likely involved actually making something. Personally I think all teachers and all classes should be looking to develop one. The reason I think this is simply - they develop 21st Century Skills (particularly critical thinking, collaboration, creativity and problem solving) and provide students with opportunities to engage in constructivist/deep learning. Look at our New Zealand Curriculum and I also see many opportunities within a makerspace environment to engage in effective pedagogy and for students develop a wide range of competencies. In a post I did last year, I provided the following definition (and a whole lot of ideas and resources):

What is a Makerspace?

Makerspace describe a makerspace as community centres with tools. Makerspaces combine manufacturing equipment, community, and education for the purposes of enabling community members to design, prototype and create manufactured works that wouldn’t be possible to create with the resources available to individuals working alone. These spaces can take the form of loosely-organized individuals sharing space and tools, for-profit companies, non-profit corporations, organizations affiliated with or hosted within schools, universities or libraries, and more. All are united in the purpose of providing access to equipment, community, and education, and all are unique in exactly how they are arranged to fit the purposes of the community they serve.

Makerspaces represent the democratization of design, engineering, fabrication and education. They are a fairly new phenomenon, but are beginning to produce projects with significant national impacts.

Source: http://makerspace.com/

• Let your kids go free range - I believe self-direction and developing student agency and efficacy is the fundamental shift all educators need to make to become more future-focused in their practice. In a sense we want step away from our 'caged' classrooms to develop increasingly 'free range learners'. Even if your school is not embracing of free-range approaches, there is a lot you can do in your classroom. In a post I wrote last year (yep, last year was very good year ;) I shared the following definition and a whole lot more thinking about this topic. 

Free range learners who are:

• Free to choose how they learn
• Free to choose where they learn
• Free to choose how they process their learning
• Free to choose how they evidence their learning
• Free to experience learning that is relevant and responsive to their needs not our limitations

This does not mean the teacher becomes redundant, quite the opposite as they are challenged to provide authentic relevant contexts for learners, with just enough 'enabling constraints' to ensure that our little chickens don't accidentally cross the road...in heavy traffic. Our roles need to change from teacher, to facilitator and ultimately to learning activator. Providing triggers and opportunities to learners to develop the relevant skills needed for their world (whilst somehow pleasing those pesky bloody UE requirements....universities of NZ...you have a lot to answer for in relation to slowing progress).

• Practice and teach the concept of 'mindfulness' - mindfulness, like design thinking might be easily written off as the next edu-fad, but personally, in a world where the pace of life and the amount of time we spend online, I believe mindfulness is simply a means to maintain balance. In terms of what mindfulness is, I like the infographic below. And this is not just for students, I have shared my journey towards increased mindfulness here (very much a work in progress).

Source: http://mindfulnessinschools.org/mindfulness/

Scenario Three: We have just introduced BYOD and I am sh#tting myself.

Fear not. BYOD is choice. It is not a destination, marker of modernity or an effective pedagogy (in and of it's self), it is simply access to a whole lot of approaches that can vastly improve student outcomes, engagement and autonomy (if used well). My main suggestion is that you actually make it about the students making the most of BYOD, not the teacher. You will achieve this by simply letting go a bit and letting students choose how they record their learning and share their learning and by ramping up your level of vigilance - don't be sitting at your teacher desk wondering why kids are distracted by the technology and access to cat videos. You need to be present (if you have to sit, sit behind them) or even better - amongst them! And you need to ensure their learning is interesting and relevant to them! Because if it isn't, a more interesting distraction is just a URL address away. Many moons ago, I made this wee EdTalk and this wrote this blogpost to provide a few simple ways STUDENTS can be the ones making the most of BYOD.

Claire Amos: Ten tips for BYOD from EDtalks on Vimeo.

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Realising the Future of NZ Education - an open letter to all NZ educators (and Minister Parata)

Realising the Future of Education from Claire Amos

On Saturday I was lucky enough to be invited to speak at The Festival of Education as a supposed 'mover and shaker'. Here is an overview of my presentation on 'Realising the Future of Education' which endeavored to look at why, how, what, when we need to change education and what the government could do (IMHO) to support it. Okay, so not so humble...more righteous really.

Why must we change education?

As Ludwig Lachman stated, "the future is unknowable, but not unimaginable" and whilst we can't see into the future, we can look to a strong body of research to try and divine our present and future learners' needs. Put simply, we need to change education, because the world is changing...and changing rapidly. In the Western world we have moved through the 'Agrarian Age' where the land and agriculture were central to existence. We then moved into the 'Industrial Age', it was in this period that what we know as modern school structures and curriculum really came to the fore...and by and large there they have stayed. We are now however entering the 'Knowledge Age' where increasingly society and the economy is driven by ideas, information, problem solving, creativity and innovation. In a world where our learners are faced with more information, more people, more careers (but fewer jobs available) and fewer resources - our learners need new skills. Add to this the notion that the rate of change is accelerating, see Moore's Law based on Intel founder Gordon E. Moore's prediction that the power and speed of computer processing power would double every year, a prediction that holds true 50 years after it was made. It could be argued that we are, in fact, entering a period of hyperchange. Indeed. As Heraclitus once stated, "the only constant is change".

How do we need to change education?

Firstly we need to change our focus. We need to ensure we are focusing on actual 21st Century skills. This does not mean we need to throw out traditional learning areas with the proverbial curriculum bath water, but we do need to overlay these subjects with skills such as complex communication skills, collaboration, critical thinking, problem solving, creativity, innovation as well as digital and information literacy skills. These are skills that need to be developed in a way that reaches across traditional subjects and silos. With this traditional subjects and silos may also need to be challenged so as to find more authentic connections and contexts to make the learning more relevant to our learners' worlds. 

We also need to address our models of teaching practice. As Scott McCleod highlights in his blog Dangerously Irrelevant three educational shifts are needed which will have the most impact on our students future and their success within it. There is a need to move from low level thinking such as recall and rote learning to high level thinking and complex problem solving. We must engage shift from analog to digital (or I would actually argue 'blended') and as Sugata Mitra states "unlock the power of new technologies for increasingly self-directed education". Which leads us to the final shift - teacher centred to student centred. Critical thinking, digitally rich and increasing levels of self direction will ensure we are developing learners who can survive in the knowledge age and flourish in the age of hyperchange.

I would actually argue that self-direction and developing student agency and efficacy is the fundamental shift. In a sense we want step away from our 'caged' classrooms to develop increasingly 'free range learners'.

Free range learners who are:

• Free to choose how they learn
• Free to choose where they learn
• Free to choose how they process their learning
• Free to choose how they evidence their learning
• Free to experience learning that is relevant and responsive to their needs not our limitations

This does not mean the teacher becomes redundant, quite the opposite as they are challenged to provide authentic relevant contexts for learners, with just enough 'enabling constraints' to ensure that our little chickens don't accidentally cross the road...in heavy traffic. Our roles need to change from teacher, to facilitator and ultimately to learning activator. Providing triggers and opportunities to learners to develop the relevant skills needed for their world (whilst somehow pleasing those pesky bloody UE requirements....universities of NZ...you have a lot to answer for in relation to slowing progress).

I would argue if we are to realise the new MoE catchphrase 'Education, Excellence, Equity' then I would suggest we actually look very closely at the concept of 'Universal Design for Learning'. We need ensure that we are actually using pedagogical approaches that are reaching all learners. We need to ensure all learners are provided with multiple means of representation (or ways of receiving information...think visual, oral and written, offline and online). We need to ensure all students have multiple ways of expressing and evidencing their learning (again think visual, oral and written, offline and online) and multiple ways of engaging. This is equitable, but it is also challenging for educators have not had the methods or means of teaching challenged (in any rigorous way) for some time.

At HPSS we are in our infancy (we only opened this year), trying our best to meet these challenges. doing our best to learn and share along the way (see this earlier post to see how we are going about it). We are looking at delivering secondary education in increasingly authentic and engaging ways, offering up a programme that addresses a desire to develop both personal and academic excellence through a mixture of specialised learning (in both integrated and single subject modules), learning hubs, project learning and a generous serving of MyTime. We certainly don't claim to have nailed it...yet, but I would say we are wearing our future focused nappies rather well. You can check out both Steve and Maurie's recent reflections on our progress. 

How can we lead change in our schools

So how can we all lead this change, particularly when not given the gift of a clean slate. Put simply we will all need to get good at changing. We will need to lead our educators to become adaptive experts who as Linda Darling Hammond states "know how to continuously expand their expertise, restructuring their knowledge and competencies to meet new challenges.” All leaders in schools need to be firmly focused on the future. Future focused leadership is  about change leadership. Luckily, that continuous cycle for developing adaptive expertise already exists within the New Zealand Curriculum, the Teaching as Inquiry cycle in a sense represents an effective model of change management on a micro or classroom level. It is actually just a matter of ensuring that all teachers (and leaders) actually engage in robust, longterm inquiry. They need to be looking to student data, getting to know their learners' interests and needs and trialling new strategies. In fact, they need to become learning designers who are willing to iterate and prototype their teaching practice on a daily, weekly and annual basis. And it is important that the cycle is continuous so as to build on growth achieved from previous cycles of change management. As the Sigmoid Curve demonstrates, long term gains are more likely when transformation happens in periods of growth rather than decline. Put simply, it is better to be proactive than reactive. We simply must all keep evolving and moving forward. It might seem brutal, but quite frankly if you aren't willing to move forward, maybe you should consider moving out of the way. It isn't about innovation for innovation sake. It is about innovation for improvement sake.

How can we be supported to make the necessary changes?
Firstly we need to be acknowledged by the present MoE as active partners in our own future and knowledge building (letting educators help select the foundation members of EDUCANZ might be a good start...just saying :-). As Keri Facer stated "the future is not something that is done to us, but an ongoing process in which we can intervene" - please let us all intervene...we are more than capable of doing so. If there is one thing (more like a few things) I could say face to face to Minister Parata, it is this. Be warm but demanding! We have the technical infrastructure (or at least we soon will have that) and for that we are incredibly grateful. I can only look forward to promising developments such as Network for Learning evolving in to an even richer platform and portal (please get ESAA working and mash up a solid range of pre-provisioned SMSs and LMSs for all schools to easily engage with...just a suggestion). We have phenomenal educators - yes some are better than others (just like our learners..we vary), but with the right support we can all fly. We have spectacular students - I actually wish you would stop labeling them so bluntly - your term 'priority' is potentially problematic. I am sorry, but for me, ALL students are my priority learners. I know we have a tail that desperately needs addressing, I am just not convinced that label actually helps. We have a stunning curriculum - don't waste resources and time on changing it...just yet. It is slim, it is creative, it is both freeing and just constraining enough. I adore the NZC from front to back and front again. So you if could just leave it be (for now) that would be ace. Yes, please have high standards for us as we have (and you want us to have) for our learners, and if you must, measure results, but just don't publish them. Use achievement data as you would have us use achievement data, for identifying teachers (who are learners too), school and geographical areas that need your resourcing and support. In publishing that achievement data, all you are doing is creating shame, and you know as we do that shame only does harm. It creates resentment, it creates loss of face, it eats away at confidence and knocks the very communities you claim you want to support and rebuild. This doesn't mean we want you to be soft, quite the opposite - we need you to be firm. Firm, warm and supportive. What we need for all educators and all schools, whether they are struggling or 'successful' (and achingly traditional) is recognition, celebration (The Festival of Education was a good start) but more than anything we need resourcing so WE receive the education WE need as well.
Demand high standards.
Demand excellent outcomes.
But mostly, provide generous amounts of ongoing professional learning and support. Provide support that is as relevant and authentic as the education we must provide for our learners.

Where and when will we make the change?
So whilst my last paragraph might have been targeted at those who support us, I would like to end with a call to arms to all educators. All challenges aside, we are actually more than capable of leading positive change ourselves. We need to set aside any perceived barriers, be it our leadership, our school, our socio-economic situation, classroom or class size - the reality is we can all start making changes in what and how we teach our young people. We can begin by supporting one another by sharing our stories, our resources and our strategies. We can create our own networks and support systems, whether they be the teacher next door or teachers on Twitter across the country or globe. Without resorting to singing some Whitney Houston or John Farnham at you, we need to acknowledge that the change actually starts with you - you wanting to change and then actually, quite simply, changing. As Ford once said, "if you think you can, or think you can't, you're probably right". The change can start here and now… …it’s simply a matter of developing a growth mindset.

In lieu of me attempting a power ballad (my colleagues will attest that it wouldn't be a wise idea), I leave you with this...a short poem by Claire "Righteous" Amos. ;-)

The Future of Education
The educational revolution will not be televised.
It will be blogged, tweeted and co-constructed in code.

The future is unknowable.
Change won’t be slowed.

So hurry up, build your own map.
And whatever you do, at least get on the road.

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Edutouring - Moving on from self-paced to self-directed at Mary Ward

Mary Ward is the second of four self-directed schools we are visiting on our journey, and in a sense also represents a shift along the continuum from self-paced to a more genuinely self-directed style of learning.

Like Westmount, the staff and students of Mary Ward greeted us with warmth and openness, keen to share and to also learn from us. The weather, whilst still icy, was a little more kind and we managed to arrive in time to experience a full school day. On arrival we were greeted by Derek Chen (one of the Vice-Principals) who welcomed us to the school and took us through to the library to be introduced to Mary Ward life by a lovely group of students, giving us all a snapshot of what a day at Mary Ward entailed. Unlike Westmount which is a traditional school that has adopted self-directed learning, Mary Ward is a school built for the purpose. This means the design and layout can in a sense more effectively support the model, with each Learning Area having a large Learning Commons, a staffed resource centre and a range of smaller rooms and seminar spaces to support different modes of teaching and learning.

Mary Ward is working towards a model of truly self-directed learning, working to develop a genuine learning partnership between student and teacher.

So how do they manage this?

All students meet with their Learning Advisor (a group of 18 students or less) every morning. During this time they take the roll and plan their day ahead. They have three advisory check-ins a day including this morning session, this allows them to complete roll checks and attendance, this being vital as subject teachers may not see their students for days at a time.

During the day students can work in the space of their choice, completing Learning Guide workbooks either independently or in groups. Students also have the choice of working independently or seeking assistance from a subject teacher who is rostered on to floor time in every Learning Common. Students can also sign up for seminars to support their learning, students are notified of seminars through a daily notice referred to as TA (Teacher Advisor) mail. This daily notice also provides each student with updated grades and personalised messages from subject teachers and coaches. This is generated through a web mark software which seems to provide the much needed means of structure and order in what may otherwise become organised chaos. Similarly to Westmount the whole system is very paper heavy, but this is something they are aware of, and with increasing numbers of students bringing their own device are looking at moving to handle through online platforms. Interestingly their is a providence wide Learning Management System referred to as D2L (Desire to Learn) and whilst a single LMS seems useful, it didn't seem to allow for teachers and students to integrate other platforms the may have preferred (although as always I believe other platforms such as Edmodo were still being used at this stage).

Students for the most part seem to be independently working through paper based Learning Guides that we collected from resource centres in each Learning Common, with students completing units at their own pace and signalling when they were ready to sit a short test at the end of each unit, which they often assessed themselves to measure whether they we ready to move on to the next unit. Like Westmount there was little differentiation across units, but there was increasing differentiation within Learning Guides around contexts and ways they could demonstrate their understanding.

One of the real highlights at Mary Ward was their development of Learning Quests that happened at different points of the programmes and often provided a way for students to demonstrate learning in more than one subject through a single product. A quest unit seemed to take place at specific points of a programme. For example in a 18 unit course they may complete normal Learning Guides for units 1-3 and then the fourth unit may be a quest unit where the student negotiates with teacher and works out a way to demonstrate their learning. They can be interdisciplinary and can sometimes be completed as a group. Interdisciplinary connections were often suggested in the quest, such as if you were doing a report for History, you might be able to have this count as credit for English etc. Students made the comment that "to quest" had actually become a verb with students looking at ways they could "quest" tasks across curriculum areas and saw it as challenge to try and quest things across as many subjects as possible. These seemed to be negotiated with each of the subject area teachers. Cross-curricular and interdisciplinary ways of learning were also being explored more formally with themes such as genocide being covered in tandem across Learning Areas.

Another great example of more truly collaborate learning was in Art where in Grade 12 (our Year 13) students were given pretty much blank programmes, with the teacher working with each student to actually develop the units of work themselves. This, of course, was only possible due to the knowledge they had gained from years of experience of the system. Very cool.

The formal student/Teacher Advisor interview that took place once every fortnight was another real highlight. All teachers were advisors and each had timetabled time for a fortnightly 15 minute interview with each and every one of their students. During the interview the teacher brings up a screen on the (LMS) Web Mark software. The screen shows each of the student's subjects, grades and comments from the last interview and the same subjects, updated grades and space for comment to be completed during this fortnight's interview. The teacher then talks though the each subject checking that progress has been made since the last interview, writing a brief comment for each subject. This gives the teacher an opportunity to put in place interventions as needed, for example students falling behind may have to start using a "unit tracker" which involved teachers signing off progress on a daily basis. Once this was completed the student and teacher typed in a general comment and then completed a rubric measuring Communication and Application (effort) for the past fortnight. The magic of this software, is that then with a click of a button this was converted into a templated email home to the parents - providing incredibly efficient and regular feedback to students and parents. Take note KAMAR software developers, we are going to need something like this, sooner rather than later!! It was the technology that actually provided the structure and management to make this work without becoming unwieldy.

In summary, Mary Ward was doing some excellent things. Student learning was more genuinely self-directed and they were increasingly able to co-construct their learning path. There were still some cons; some students clearly struggled to manage their time and tried to take advantage of the relative freedom. The system was also VERY paper heavy (at present) and did still have elements that felt, like Westmount, a bit sequential and correspondence school-like. But that said, they were definitely working to improve these areas, and like Westmount were very open and honest about the need for continual development of processes and systems. It was lovely to enjoy time with yet another group of passionate, open and honest group of teachers and learners. There was so much to learn from Mary Ward and they most willing to share.

Mary Ward is another great school I would heartily recommend educators to investigate, especially if they want to see how students can genuinely direct their learning with forgoing structure and rigour.

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Edutouring - the journey from traditional to self-paced and beyond atWestmount

Canada greeted us with most unfriendly weather, zero degrees and snow on the ground. This however could not have been further from the warmth and generosity we were greeted with on arrival at Wesmount.

Westmount is the first of four Canadian schools that we are visiting, all of whom are part of the Canadian Coalition of Self-directed Schools. These schools range from Catholic to secular, old to new, high decile to low decile, large to relatively small, all however are defined by their desire to deliver self-paced and increasingly self-directed learning programmes for students. This means students, by and large, are free to design each school day, choosing where and when they complete their school work through a system of daily or weekly planning under the watchful eye of a learning advisor and then work through units of work at their own pace in the space that best suits them. Having seen two of the four we are visiting, I suspect each school sits in a slightly different place on the continuum from more structured, self-paced learning to genuinely co-constructed student developed and self-directed learning. Westmount being a long established traditional co-ed public school probably sits closer to the self-paced end of that continuum, and because of this actually offered an excellent example of how any traditional school in very traditional spaces should not use this as an excuse to not develop 21st century learning models that challenge students to genuinely lead their own learning. Westmount was also fabulous in the way they clearly demonstrated what they were doing was a long and tough journey. They had come a long way from anything I have seen in NZ, yet they were nowhere near content to settle on where they had got to, with teachers actively seeking out ways to develop the model from a self-paced model to a truly self-directed one.

So what did we see there?

Due to the unseasonably unreasonable weather, we were a little late to arrive, meaning we missed experiencing the day in its entirety, this coupled with the fact that it was the day of the state wide literacy test, meant Juniors were locked down for the morning and some seniors had chosen to work from the warmth of their own homes. Still, on reflection, we saw and learned a huge amount.

On arrival, we were greeted at the door by the passionate and charming Principal, Rick Kunc. You could see immediately that his relaxed, open and honest nature had gone a long way in establishing an open, friendly and genuinely reflective team of teachers who were willing to admit shortcomings, share practice and take positive risks to ensure their model was forever evolving and developing in a way that met their learner's needs. Rick and one of his senior leaders, Greg, welcomed us in and gave us a brief introduction to what the school was trying to achieve and some of the successes they had enjoyed so far.

Basically (and apologies if I get this wrong Westmount!) how the school works is by offering what looks like a normal weekly timetable, with teachers allocated to each class, however teachers did not necessarily lead the learning (unless a skill or concept needed to be directly taught), instead students picked up a learning guide for a unit that they worked through at their own pace, meaning they could "fast track" their learning if they wanted to, or could take longer if needed. This meant they could also work pretty much independently if they preferred, or could work more closely with peers or teachers as needed as well. In addition to this, students were free to sign out of their classrooms to work where they thought best met their needs, so if they they needed to work on something in another area, they could do so. Teachers continued to maintain a level of control in that they were could veto student requests to move about if they were seen to be falling behind or taking advantage of their relative freedom.

Students who then took us on a tour gave us insight as to how they used the system, but also were candid enough to share how at least one of them really struggled with it, having to manage her time from Grade 9 she clearly took several years to refine the art of managing self-paced learning, learning the hard way by initially procrastinating and then cramming in a way most of would find familiar if reflecting on first year at Uni. That said, she had got to Grade 12 (equivalent to our Year 13) and she now had worked out how to use her time wisely and avoid panic setting in. I couldn't help but think how much better she was equipped for dealing with post school life, these students were definitely confident and in control by they time they graduated.

The way they managed the fast tracking did rely on pre-written Learning Guides, so if a student competed their first Learning Guide, they let their teacher know they were ready to be tested, they could then go to an Examination Centre in the library to complete the assessment, and if they succeeded they could then pick up their next Learning Guide. Each Learning Guide represented approximately a week's work (I think), students could complete a maximum of two a week (this helped to manage work flow of both teacher and student). This meant a student could potentially fast track some courses and free themselves up to complete other courses at a more leisurely pace. Students sat down with a Learning Advisor at least once a fortnight to go over grades, track progress and ensure students were doing what was best for them.

In the afternoon when we sat down with a team of of their teaching staff we got to hear their perspective. What was most heartening was their revelation as around how they struggled with, but ultimately enjoyed their transition from "sage of the stage" to facilitator and how they really did see that you could in fact "teach less" and see students "learn more" as a result. They also shared how they were trying to now move from simple sequential programmes that were paper heavy (this system involved a lot of paper!) to integrating blended approaches to begin offering multi-modal and more differentiated programmes. They were incredibly honest about the pros and cons and how they were learning and had a long way to go to become truly self-directed. One teacher shared his Media programme that had become a more buffet style course, where some units were compulsory, whilst others were their own choice selected from a wider range of units. Teachers were also working hard to give students choice about the means and modes by which they demonstrated learning. In this way I felt a huge connection with where NZ teachers are in their exploration of blended learning and differentiation.

There were some short comings, this approach does not suit all learners, it was at present paper heavy, and in parts felt like distance learning at school. But on the other hand they had achieved a spectacular shift away from what we presently do, giving the opportunity for students to become self-advocates in a way that will set them up for life. It was lovely to see such a passionate group of educators so happily sharing their journey.

If you are looking for models that demonstrate how a traditional school can genuinely shift the educational paradigm I would suggest Rick and host team offer a great place to start!

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