Research in Education: 2010 Symposium

I attended a Research in Education Symposium and was invigorated by the wealth or knowledge and research presented during the sessions. Here are some of my thoughts on a few sessions I attended.


Session 1: Social and cultural influences on ICT policy (Hunter & Austin)


This session discussed ICT in Albert, NFL and Ireland. It was interesting to see the trends and development of that ICT policy has based on social and cultural developments within a country. The historical and political events that occur within a current are reflected in a countries ICT policy within education.


Session 2: Media(ting) identities: Digital identity projects in an ESL classroom (Eamer & Hughes)


This session involved a look into engaging ELL students in two different classrooms (different grades and schools) by helping them develop digital poetry about themselves. We saw two examples of work created by students which demonstrated student self reflection, personal identification within a new culture and comparisons between the culture in their countries of origin vs Canada. Students used powerful images, words and sound/music to convey their identities. I believe this study demonstrates the necessity and benefit of educators encouraging ELL students to reflect about themselves through media and literacy in a safe, fun and motivating environment.


Session 3: Digital Technologies & SDL (Bullock)


This session was about encouraging and developing self-directed learning (SDL) in digital technologies in teacher education. I found this session particularly enlightening in the area of self-directed learning. Teacher candidates were encouraged to choose an area of digital technology for SDL and follow through on their study of it via their in school placements etc. I think the concept of SDL is key for all educators because an educator should always be continuously learning, reflecting and researching to better their own practice. This session was a reminder that no one can focus an individual to "learn" - the process and cognitive change can only occur if an individual makes it happen.


Closing Keynote: Teaching at the cusp: Coping with technology and research (Hunter)


This closing keynote presentation was a perfect way to end the symposium. What I took away from it was the emphasis on educators being researchers in order to benefit of our students. All other professions have research components and as educators, we cannot call ourselves professionals unless we are continuously learning, researching and inquiring about concepts, methods, ideas and theories pertaining to education.


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Phillip Schlechty - Presentation for Foundations in Leadership

The images have been removed from this PowerPoint for the purpose of this blog.

Shah Urvi Schlechty Presentation Blog Version

Changing Education Paradigms

Integration of Robotics into Curriculum

21st Century Education in New Brunswick, Canada

Food for Thought - Interesting Quotes by Schlechty

-       “The concept of the normal curve and the notion that most people are average are ideas that have a devastating effect in school. They condemn to mediocrity all but the few. What one needs to understand is that nothing short of excellence should be expected of anyone.”

-       “People are the chief resources in the education enterprise.”

-       “The idea of distributing students into classrooms comprised of thirty or so youngsters and a single teacher is an accident of history rather than a calculated decision.”

-       “Perhaps the most important understanding here is that students are volunteers, whether we want them to be or not. Their attendance can be commanded, but their attention must be earned. Their compliance can be insisted on, but their commitment is under their own control.”

-       "Values and vision rather than programs and rules will drive the system."

-       “It seems to me that educators — following the lead of persons like Terry Deal, Tom Sergiovanni, Michael Fullan, and a few others — need to study more systematically transformational leadership in education. In the meantime, I take most of my inspiration in such matters from the literature in business, biographies of great transformational leaders, and the reading of history, plays, and novels.”

-       "Educators must prepare themselves to totally reinvent the American system of education."

-       “We need educators who are comfortable in working on the cutting edge of ignorance as well as those who work on the cutting edge of knowledge. We must envision education systems unlike any that have existed before and busy ourselves with the task of creating them.”

-       “When families and communities lose control of the education of the youth, they have lost control of the future, and with this loss of control comes, almost certainly, the demise of democracy and the rise of a totalitarian system of information control. School reform is a civic matter as well as a matter of economic concern.”

Foundations of Leadership Prezi Created by r^2u^2

This prezi was created for Foundations of Leadership course. Click on full screen mode for better viewing.

Foundations of Leadership - Concept Map on Prezi

Curriculum Theorist Timeline

The Nature of Teaching, Learning and Knowledge - Written by UShah for Principles of Learning, July 2010

Introduction

                The aim of this paper is to present my perspective on the nature of teaching, learning and knowledge (TLK) based on personal experience, academic knowledge (BEd and MEd) and further developed using the concepts presented by six educational thinkers: Piaget, Levy, Papert, Von Glasersfeld, Vygotsky and Montessori.  

                For visual clarity, two concept maps have been included. My understanding of TLK is that they interact in a cyclical manner similar to a biology cycle such as Kreb’s cycle where different components feed off each other to keep the cycle continuous (Wikipeida, 2009). The product of the TLK cycle is changes in schema of the person (or animal) that is learning. This also presents that teaching, learning and the development of knowledge are ongoing and lifelong processes given the right mental state and environment. Included in the second concept map are six mini-cycles indicating brief TLK definitions of the six thinkers mentioned above. These definitions were derived from researching their work through online resources and books. The links between various thinkers is discussed in the text and not shown in the diagram.

Concept Map

Concept Map 1. The cycle of TLK.

Concept Map 2. Brief definitions of TLK of six different theorists.

No Child Left Behind Video

Leadership Theories and Theorists

Transformative leadership - Bennis and Nanus

Sustainable leadership - Hargreaves, Fink

Transactional leadership

Participative leadership

Inclusive leadership - James Ryan

Transformational leadership - Leithwood

Multicultural curriculum/leadership - Christine Sleeter

Change leadership - Michael Fullan

Motion leadership - Michael Fullan

Moral/ethical leadership - Sergiovanni, Covey

Shared leadership - Senge

Invitational leadership - Purkey

Managerial leadership

Effective leadership - Druker, Peters

Relational leadership

John Dewey - The Nature of Method

"I believe that interests are the signs and symptoms of growing power. I believe that they represent dawning capacities. Accordingly the constant and careful observation of interests is of the utmost importance for the educator.

I believe that these interests are to be observed as showing the state of development which the child has reached.  

I believe that the prophesy the stage upon which he is about to enter.

I believe that only through the continual and sympathetic observation of childhood's interests can the adult enter into the child's life and see what it is ready for, and upon what material it could work most readily and fruitfully.

I believe that these interests are neither to be humored nor repressed. To repress interest is to substitute the adult for the child, and so to weaken intellectual curiosity and alertness, to suppress initiative, and to deaden interest. To humor the interests is to substitute the transient for the permanent. The interest is always the sign of some power below; the important thing is to discover this power. To humor the interest is to fail to penetrate below the surface and its sure result is to substitute caprice and whim for genuine interest." (Dewey, 1897)


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Criticisms on the Theories of E.D. Hirsch

"On the all important issue of race, Hirsch rejects the view that racism accounts for the problem with many schools in the inner city. He deals with the problem of racism by folding it into his overall concern with schools' failure to provide a core curriculum to all students. In his analysis, Hirsch fails to consider that race, class, and gender influence both content and the way it is presented, and, moreover, that they influence it in a way that reproduces patterns of dominance in our society.

Hirsch's philosophy is based on what is sometimes called a transmission
view of meaning: teachers hold meaning in their heads and their job is to
transmit it in the most efficient way to the heads of students. Whole class
instruction, telling, and rote memorization are frequently seen as the most
effective means for accomplishing this. And standardized tests are the most
effective way to tell if the task has been accomplished. (I suspect this is why,
in analyzing uneven academic achievement, Hirsch does not examine factors
such as class size and unequal funding.)" (Walter Feinberg, 1999)


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Motion Leadership - Notes from Michael Fullan Video

6 Secrets of Change


1. Love your employees
2. Connect with peers with purpose
3. Capacity building prevails
4. Learning is the work
5. Transparency rules
6. Systems learn


- theory comes from practice (two way street)
- turn around entire systems (whole schools, whole districts, whole provinces/states)
- WHOLE SYSTEM REFORM
- "collective capacity" and "collective competencies"
- high quality teachers and high quality principals
- take mystery out of complexity - do things well (simplexity)




Problem: how do you elicit change when people involved don't want to change?
(9 ways to help people get on board)


1. Relationships first
- if you come off too strong or too slow or too fast, people won't want to change or get on board (first create relationships with people involved, then create change)


2. Implementation dip
- first 6 months of change can be rocky or slow


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A Working List of Educational Theorists

Kieran Egan -


Wenger - Community of Practice


Bennis and Nanus - 


Siemens - Connectivism


Hargreaves and Frink - Sustainable leadership


James Ryan - Inclusive leadership


Darling-Hammond - 


Michael Fullan - Motion leadership (change theory)


Christine Sleeter - multicultural education


Wheatley -


Gilligan and Shakeshaft - Feminist theory


Pestalozzi - "heart, hand, head"


Dewey -


Freire -


James Neil -


Seymour Papert - constructionism


Jean Piaget - constructivism


Lev Vygotsky - social constructivism


Elliot Eisner - 5 orientations to curriculum


Hilda Taba -


Franklin Bobbitt - 


Ralph Tyler - 


William Pinar -


Lawrence Stenhouse -


F.W. Taylor -


Horace Mann - 

Phil Schlechty - 21st Century Schools

"Given wisdom, leaders stop trying to control everything and stop taking charge of everyone and see themselves as one part of a complex operation." (Schlechty)


http://www.schlechtycenter.org/meet-phil-schlechty


"Teachers are leaders and those they most often lead are students. This is an old idea and one that has appeal to teachers once they accept the fact that it is the performance of their putative followers that is of most importance in school. The performance of leaders can make a difference in the performance of followers, but it is the performance of followers that determines the effectiveness of the performance of leaders. Teachers are more dependent on students than students are dependent on teachers. Teachers cannot teach without students being present, but students can learn without teachers and increasingly they can learn anytime and in any place. Schools are no longer as essential as they once were and they will be increasingly less essential if they are not transformed into learning platforms. Teaching is increasingly available to those who are motivated to learn, and schools are not the only places where teaching and teachers exist."(Schlechty, 2010)


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Peter Senge - Shared Leadership

Leader as Teacher


“Leader as teacher” is not about “teaching” people how to achieve their vision. It is about fostering learning, for everyone. Such leaders help people throughout the organization develop systemic understandings. Accepting this responsibility is the antidote to one of the most common downfalls of otherwise gifted teachers – losing their commitment to the truth. (Senge 1990: 356)


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