Saturday, June 29, 2019

Resiliance.


Resiliance.

noun
1.      1.
the capacity to recover quickly from difficulties; toughness.
"the often remarkable resilience of so many British institutions"
2.      2.
the ability of a substance or object to spring back into shape; elasticity.
"nylon is excellent in wearability, abrasion resistance and resilience"[1]                                    


I have been pondering this word for the past ten days or so since I got word that our Teacher Led Innovation Funding application was declined.  I get it – it is the last round and there are probably many many worthy applicants – but I couldn’t help but feel slightly crushed, not just for myself but for my colleague who had put in the bulk of the written application after all our Skype conversations. 

One of the comments that came back as feedback was there was not sufficient evidence that it was led by teachers for teachers (I’m assuming more teachers make changes = larger numerical student benefit).  The slightly cynical part of me was left wondering if we were from a bigger school/cohort, therefore able to have more teachers on board to start with – would it have made a difference.  Sure, we could have ‘proven’ we were impacting more teachers initially – but if our inquiry follows our hunch, it will be beneficial for both the teachers and students within our Southern Area Schools Kahui Ako and potentially beyond. 

So – what now?  Obviously we won’t have funding but we are still going ahead with our project, it will just be a scaled back and potentially longer timeline.  We have a SKYPE session with our inquiry facilitator early Term 3 to keep fleshing it out and ensuring we stay focused.  I have started changing my practice - part of that being using a wider variety of tech, such as Flipgrid with my students to reflect on their learning – and they know have learnt the WHY behind the choice to use those particular technologies.

DisruptEd the past two weeks has been prompting us to question the principles and mindsets required to deliver powerful learning.  I responsed to the question “What principles do you believe underpin powerful learning?” with he tãngata, he tãngata, he tãngata, - the people, the people, the people - by putting the learners first, the learning then become collaborative, it becomes accessible to all and authentic.   To this end, we will carry on and we will put our learners again in the center – changing our practice as needed to ensure positive outcomes, collaborative planning and real agentic learning for them. So – the link to resilience – I too need build the capacity and ability to move forward and bounce back after a disappointment – this isn’t the end of the world, it’s just a curve in the learning journey.