Tuesday, September 27, 2011

Leadership Philosophy – Is it necessary?

Started in Term 4, the middle managers of the North Zone were told to reflect on our own personal leadership philosophy for the dialogue with the Supt. It was observed that some middle managers have actually not or difficulty with expressing their leadership philosophy. I agree that it did take some effort to start penning down, especially if we have never actually expressed our leadership philosophy before.

But is it necessary? – was the question from some of the middle managers. To me, it was helpful as it enable me to begin to consider exactly why schools have middle managers and school leaders! What do we middle managers and school leaders add to the school? How can school be helped by good middle managers and school leaders and hampered by bad ones? Hence, by considering these questions, it may lead me to home in on how I view my own role as a middle manager!

For example, some middle managers and school leaders viewed themselves as the arbiter in the school, where decisions are made when an exception to the rule is permissible. There are also some of them who see themselves as people developer, motivating others to achieve goals. And there are some who see themselves as repairman, fixing one problem after another as they encounter them. A few are visionary, always looking into the future and considering what it might be.

Undoubtedly, we will conclude that we middle managers must assume each of these roles from one time to time. Some actually felt that it is a waste of time, a waste of effort as they did not have any idea of such leadership philosophy but only took ideas from the internet! But I believed that I need to reflect and know which of those examples I had illustrated tends to be my default position! And by gaining feedback from others will definitely make the whole picture clearer. In this way, it will help me understand better why I do things the way I do, and more importantly, what I am trying to accomplish.

Thursday, September 22, 2011

Let our students make our day!

It can be all too easy for teachers or even middle managers to get caught up in negativity. After all, students and teachers alike bring you their problems all day long. We hear complaint after complaint. We even have to deal with people who fail to honor their commitment in their duty! After hearing such distressing news day after day, week after week, not only from students, but also fellow teachers, nearly anyone would be cynical. Consider how a recent survey found many Singaporeans are a cynic!

Why do not students even think of coming to a teacher with good news? Likewise, why does not a teacher even think of going to the middle manager with good news? They do go to school leaders with good news!

Well, I do not think I will wait, just for someone (student or teacher) to approach me. Instead, I went to look for some on my own. While others may prefer to form their opinions solely on personal feeling or hearsay, I went to conduct a survey from all my students to gain a better understanding of my own teaching and learning. In addition, I engaged them in a conversation about the best educational experience he or she has had.
Or when a teacher came to see me about some issue whatever, I extended that visit a few minutes by asking about that teacher’s favorite moment of the day.

Indeed, I found this practice very valuable and decided to make it part of my regular routine. It has provided me with insights that I did not realized before. Moreover, if I were to continue with both survey evaluation and conversation, I believe that I will quickly learn what is the best part of my teaching and learning and more importantly, what it need to make it better.

Finally, whenever I hear a student also say something else wonderful about another teacher, I make it a point to share what I have learnt with that teacher, so to make his or her day. And resulting in a break from the cycle of negativity!

Monday, September 19, 2011

Documenting – A need to start?

In today’s reflection, I will like to provide my opinion on one of the items which Professor Lee Peng Yee spoken on during the Secondary Mathematics Seminar 2011. He talked about the need for teachers to document their success, and “not to reinvent the wheel”.

Much of what we accomplished as middle managers in the school remains intangible. Our budget proposals, curriculum improvements, departmental plans and policy reviews usually do not result in the same kind of instant satisfaction that can be felt when a research paper has been accepted, a project proposal has been funded, or a student finally understands a concept that had long been puzzling. For this reason, it can be particularly important for middle managers to document the nature of their successes and reflect in which we can keep printed material and a computer folder for electronic documents, and begin storing items related to our achievements. Consider what would not be the same at school were not for you? How many new improvements did you initiate or, in times of trouble, how was the issues resolved? How has research been enhanced or learning enriched through the policies you introduced?

With such rich source of information, did we document it down? or is it only found in your personal storage memory? Hence, it is important that whenever we set aside documents related to some activities, include a note about why that initiative was important. This is especially true for our teachers, many of whom do not document their years of experience in teaching and learning. However, be selective! We do not want to simply include every document that we create, rather choose only those related to the teacher’s best achievements. This portfolio of success will soon become tangible to the teachers. Teachers can then share such rich teaching and learning, as well as review it whenever things are not going well or when teachers sense that the middle managers’ policy has been ineffective. Teachers can also refer to it for examples during mid and end of year reviews, which serve as data evidences to support their teaching and learning. More importantly, teachers can study it to reveal about their own best practices whenever they or others faces challenging situation they have not encountered before.

So, let each IP department start this important task of documenting their best teaching and learning practices today.

Monday, September 12, 2011

Team – Learning and Building

In today’s reflection, I will like to speak on and also land my support to one of the items which was touched on during the dialogue with the Supt session – that is learning not only as individuals, but rather learning as a team.

In Math, we speak of Partial Fractions. The sum of many terms, but to me I see any school (or even any department within it) is much more than the sum of its parts. As mentioned in my previous reflections, a team benefits from both the individual talents of all its members and especially the synergy that comes about the different abilities working together. From this, I hope that some of the members can develop their own team, help others also generate high morale, and so the start of the ripple effect and finally having an extremely productive school environment. This is what happend with the ICT PLC team members who were involved in the ICT competitions. These teachers had branched out and develop their own team of students, leading and guiding them to out-do others in the competitions. At other times, others and even I may need a little encouragement before a supportive working relationship can be developed. As I review on my area which I am in charge of, I need to keep this notion of promoting team building and try to identify concrete steps to realize this notion.

What are some of these steps I feel can help to realize team building? Encouraging people to recognize and celebrate each other’s accomplishment is one way my principal had advised me to do. Just look at the grins and smiles I get which I mentioned to my many teachers that we will be acknowledging their accomplishment in guiding our students in doing well in ICT competitions during staff meeting. Another way which I feel is important and that I had done when selecting these teachers to be in charge of the ICT competition is to give them a sense that they are part of something truly significant. And also to make them feel that their achievement in the whole team is also a personal accomplishment.

Through communication and discussion on a regular basis, the school goal will become a shared goal. I also make it a point to celebrate progress made (instead of just at the end result) towards achieving this shared goal through sms-ed encouragements and acknowledgement to the school leaders. More importantly, my demonstration to my teachers that I am personally committed to their success or share of their non-success. This is my conscious effort to improve the morale and encourage the team spirit, and not just an accidental by-product from random delegation.

There are also areas which I am currently working on, that is to try to hold social events where my members can bond and not directly on work. I believe that I need to think and implement strategies that suit my own personality and also the nature of the teachers I work with. As I aim for working out my own approach with guidance from the school leaders, I look for the best suit for the personality of my team.

Wednesday, September 7, 2011

Providing Context on New Policy, Procedures

In one of my reflections, I spoke of leaders having to help others (like parents, students and even teachers) see the context regarding new policy or procedures. And in order to do this, the leader will need to have strategies to analyze the context of what is happening and respond appropriately and help others connect and understand the context. I will attempt to elaborate more on this matter in this week's reflection.

Often, teachers feel as though they are sometimes expected to carry out instructions that are developed by others or often find it completely unrelated to one another. I understand how these teachers feel and also believe that it is definitely easier to understand the big picture when we are seeing from higher levels in the organization. Often, teachers go about their day to day duties, having little or no idea why a new procedure was established. I believed that such procedures were created out of good intentions. However, just rolling out these procedure based on good intentions without much explanation will not do justice to it. Below are some steps which I find helpful to help contextualized so that others can see the connection.

The first step towards better communication is by clearly explaining the significance of some goals or projects that is important to you. It is important to articulate as explicitly as possible on the benefits that may result and how those benefits relate to the overall mission of affecting learning in our students. Then be open to questions which others may ask. Often I am glad that others ask questions. This shows that there is actually some real consideration by these teachers on the new procedures which everyone will need to adapt. Also, they may see aspects of the issue that are invisible to me because the nature of my work may be different from theirs. Even if answers to their questions seem overly obvious, do not just dismissed them but we need to take these questions seriously. Often, this project or goal have been in our minds for quite a long time now, while to others it may be a new and unfamiliar idea. What is necessary is for others to see why it is important to accomplish the objective that was outlined or to change their procedures in the manner that was proposed.

Once we helped others to contextualized, even if they do not come away agreeing with the change completely, they are likely to perform the work more effectively since they now have a better understanding of the context in which the new procedure has been adopted.

Thursday, September 1, 2011

Clarification of responsibilities

One of the things that teachers most complain about in the educational profession setting is not knowing exactly what is expected of them. Teachers have performed many roles, like invigilation in National Examinations, apart from the normal classroom teaching and may have carried out many of these duties repeatedly. Yet, at times they may feel uncertain as to precisely what their responsibilities are, which decisions they are authorized to make on their own, and in what areas they may exercise initiatives without infringing on someone’s else duties. Fortunately, some of these expectations were brought up before by my Principal a few years ago. But with the large number of new teachers joining the school, I feel that this matter needs to be brought up again.

As a new or experienced teacher alike, it can be maddening to realize that you were expected to do something you never realized was a part of your responsibilities, and it can be almost as frustrating to learn that you could have make a decision that no one ever told you that you were empowered to make. The standard way is to conduct a staff briefing before the start of the National examinations. So it is important to gather everyone to attend such briefing. But I suggest another way, which is to first survey the teachers, and then let the teacher’s People Developer have a brief conversation with each of them about their specific duty responsibilities. This I feel is more personalized. Some teachers are worried about meeting up with their People Developer. I believe that we need to make clear that they have not done anything wrong and it is just that the People Developer want to “make sure that we are all on the same page” about who’s doing what and where each teacher’s area of responsibility begins and ends. Through this conversation, I think that we may find that certain teachers assume that they are able to do certain matters on their own that really need to be addressed at different levels of the school, while others feel that particular duties are not their job even though, as People Developer may believe that they should be performing these tasks.

I am sure that clearing the air in this way can sometimes cause some hurt feelings or grumbling for a while. But if each People Developer handle the situation with tact and diplomacy, the end result will be a staff that better understands what the school need each teacher to do and why.