English language skills in your school.

I assume for this post that English is the first language of your school.

If your school is in the USA you will follow the US English. If you are in Australia you will follow the Australian English.

Now your teachers need to get on the same page about what the standard English is for your school.  In a primary (elementary school) this requires some discussion amongst the generalist teachers to ensure that they are being consistent across the classes.

If a school has specialist teachers of English and other subjects much inservice is needed to ensure that the standard English is the same across all classes in your school no matter what the subject.  The English teachers, assuming they are in agreement about the standard English desired, can take a lead in the inservice discussions involving other subject specialists.  In this case we would see 'distributive leadership' in action. Every teacher in this specialist context is a teacher of English.

I am unsure the extent to which US English is influenced by Australian English but I suspect not a lot.  My observation is that it is the reverse.  If we take the oft used word programme (the old standard English spelling) and its now more common form 'program' used across Australia I am all in favour of this change to the US version.  The question is are all the teachers in your school?

At the risk of insulting my US colleagues I find the influence of US English a little irksome across my country.  My hackles rise when I hear the following:

•  'get go'
• New years (Even hear this on the government broadcaster the ABC when normally Aussies would say New Year)
• gotten
• off of

Now I must tell a tale against myself.  As a visiting student in a graduate program in a Canadian university I came across the common expression 'a bunch' of this or that and found myself thereafter using this expression.  It is now common in Australian English.

Sorry.  However my point is that your teachers must be on the same page about such usage.  They must even be more on the same page about the golden rule of effective English communication being the KISS rule.  Choose fewer appropriate words to create your sentences and paragraphs.  One of my favourite teachers was a teacher of English and he once told me to take more time and write a good short essay.

No teacher in your school should accept shoddy and lazy English, but they must apply this constraint in a positive way.  All students need to learn that everything they say for others to hear, or write for others to read, must be written in a way that does not insult the listener or the reader with poor language.

I of course recognise the value of colloquialisms and again at the Canadian university when I had to deliver in a tutorial I caused much mirth with my Australianisms like 'spot on'.  I also recognise the text message abbreviated language of the mobile phone. Not sure that I heartily approve of it but swimming against this tide is very Canute like.

Hopefully the chosen English syllabus for your school provides clear guidance for your teachers however I still strongly maintain that there should be the in service discussions described above.

I am an avid user of my Kindle reader and just read a book in which the author took great delight in using the word 'moue' over and over as if to just show that he knew it, when a simple word like pout or grimace would have been more appropriate.  This same author also appears to be very confused about what comprised a simile making this error more than once.  My review of this book was not kind.

How's this for being old fashioned!  I am a great believer that learning the format of letter writing both of the informal and formal variety is an excellent discipline for learning what makes an effective sentence and an effective paragraph.

My age shows in this post but I recklessly proceed to post it anyhow.


May the Force be with you in this New Year's Eve!  Go for it in 2018.


GD

Symbols and Ceremony

Schools have symbols of their culture and it is vitally important that these be recognised and nurtured.  Such symbols are:

• School song
• The school uniform
• The school flag
• The various sporting trophies and awards. (Many are donated by ex students and various dignitaries.)

The ceremonies are:

• Recognition of significant national and state (Provinces in Canada) days 
• Transitions from Primary (Elementary) to Secondary (High) school with maybe extra transitions if there is a Middle School
• School dances/balls
• Graduation from Secondary (High) school

Added to the above are any major performances by the students such as plays and musicals.  So many students can be involved in these and for some it is one important time when they receive wide public recognition.
Celebrating successes such as major sporting wins and outstanding academic performances.  It is important to let the whole school feel the pride of achievement of their representatives.

I think it is fair to say that US schools are tops in all of the above.  In my own Australian culture we have over the years been a bit more reserved, but in contemporary schools I think we would tick most of the above boxes.

An important rider is that teachers also get to celebrate and be recognised.  I recall as a teacher in a Secondary school that the Principal would publicly announce outstanding tertiary study results by his teachers.


May the Force be with you!


GD

Political correctness in schools.

Contemplate a non government (private) Christian school in Australia.  It is a fee paying school but also receives some government funding.  It can preach its own religious tenets within the law.  However with the recent same sex marriage bill that made such marriages legal such schools have a problem if they deem by their religion that marriage is only between a man and a woman.

The federal government is to address such issues in 2018.

At a more general level in Australian government schools the approach is secular and along with political correctness in a very multicultural society this means only a thin veneer of Christianity in such schools.  As I said in a previous blog the annual nativity play is pretty much a thing of the past as is the reciting of the Lord's prayer.  The safe route is to teach comparative religion.  I am all for the secularity and the comparative religion, but deep down having been a school principal feel that maybe a bit of ceremony has been lost.  I guess it is up to the various religious groups in the wider community to provide the ceremonies.

In all Australian schools Principals have to address the gender issues now out in the open for LGBTI persons.  The protection of the law is there in terms of acts of discrimination.  However within a school community Principals have to manage parents and their views when it comes to how the school will manage this situation.  It is a very tricky area with parents needing to be well informed of what the school is doing and having the right to exempt their child if it goes against their family values.

There is a more general side to the gender issue of being male and female.  These days and rightly so women keep pressing for equality and the schools need to take this into account.  On the other side of the coin I sense a feeling amongst men that their masculinity is somehow being quietly denigrated. One hears men speaking out about this and at times women also supporting them in this concern.  One boys only private school near my home advertises that it is there to produce "good men".

Then there is the political correctness in day to day language use.  A good thing, but it can be overdone and teachers need to be in top of this.

The joys of being a school Principal in contemporary Australian society.


May the Force be with you on this Christmas day 2017!


GD

Is Principalship becoming too difficult?

I read alarming articles indicating that Principalship has become so demanding that it is no longer a desirable career.

What are the pressures that may result in this situation?

With a majority of Western Australian government schools opting to become Independent Government Schools Principals then become responsible for a one line budget and must account for all costs including employing their own staff.  Maybe the added administrative demands are too much in a context of not being trained for such.

Then there are the pressures of modern devices and software like the internet, Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and the mobile phone.  There is no doubt that the whole population is hooked adults,  teens and even younger children.  These aids can be turned to good effect in an effective school as most contemporary Principals well know.

Another area of concern is the need to recognise the LGBTI concerns amongst student populations and I have written about this elsewhere.  This a particular problem for Principals of non-government independent schools where a religious core of teaching precludes the support of say same sex marriage.  Australia now has a law recognising same sex marriage.

A further area of concern in Australia is the pressure for the federal government to see students performing well in the compulsory NAPLAN tests.  Poor results see comments from the Minister for Education that that teachers have much work to do.  Principals are under pressure here as their results appear on the federal government sponsored Myschool website.  Teachers are accused of teaching to the test.  They are only human and one cannot be too harsh in judging such activity.  It would require a bold Principal to stand upon and strive for a 'no gaps' learning policy as I have recounted several times in previous posts.  You are probably sick of reading about it in this blog.

Despite all the above I still claim it is a wonderful job to be a Principal and with the appropriate training the contemporary pressures can be managed.  'Distributive leadership' is a way to go whereby the talents and knowledge of every staff member can from time to time be deployed in leadership roles related to more effective learning of the students.  Leadership does not reside solely in the traditional administrative hierarchy of a school.


May the Force be with you!


GD

Communication with parents new to a school

Hi readers!  Back from my time with my grandies.  Children are a wonder and so candid.  I asked my 10 year old grand daughter whether she thought I was old fashioned.  She said grandad I have to say that those sandals you wear are awful.

To my topic for today's post.  One of my grand children is starting a new school for 2018.  I was naturally curious about the curriculum the school would use so I went to the school website but could not find the answer.  The website consisted mainly of many encouraging statements about how the school would care for and educate its students. They were a bit flowery but okay.  So off I went to the federal government Myschool website on which details of each Australian school are registered.  Again my curriculum query was not answered.  I then went to the official Western Australian Education Department website and found the answer.

One element of my concern was that the school is an Independent Government Primary School and I wondered how much freedom the school had about the curriculum to use.  I discovered that Independent or not it was required to utilise the curriculum devised by the State Curriculum and Standards Authority. To my delight this curriculum is essentially the recently developed Australian National Curriculum (ANC) with some variations applied by the state of Western Australia.  In this blog I have commented often on how much I like the ANC.  I am not a fan of busy classroom teachers having to devise a curriculum.  This is a job for curriculum experts with the classroom professionals spending time together in each school making sure they are on the same page with their interpretations of the prescribed curriculum.

The school that my grand daughter will attend in 2018 would be well advised to include in its website general information for new parents about the curriculum to be used and how they might pursue further detail if they so desired.  I need to add that in speaking with a parent with children at that school with this parent going to be President of the Parents and Citizens group for that school during 2018, I discovered that there were plans to update the website.  I just happen to have this parent as a neighbour.

I don't intend to let the school know my views about new parents being informed as to the curriculum to be used, but will lobby through my neighbour to suggest the inclusion on the upgraded website.


*************************

To all Christians out there I take this opportunity to wish you a blessed Christmas and a prosperous New Year.  To all who respect the Christian celebration of Christmas, but for whom it does not have personal religious significance I wish you a prosperous New Year.

For whatever vacation period you have at this time of the year in the Northern and Southern hemispheres I wish you a relaxing time.  Spend it with your loved ones remembering that they are the  priority above all else.

May the Force be with you!

GD

Time to smell the roses

Hullo to those who log in to this blog.  Will be taking a few days to spend time with grandchildren.

Have another post in mind to be done before Christmas, but it must wait until I complete my joyous family commitment.  It's about schools' communication with parents.

Thanks to my readers.  Hope what I have to say is of some practical assistance to Principals out there in school land.


May the Force be with you!


GD

Being a school Principal in a democracy

In my country of Australia our federal parliament has just passed legislation to legalise same sex marriage.  It has been a fierce debate across the country as Australians were given a postal vote to assist the parliamentarians.  The vote was clearly in favour of sane sex marriage.

Schools are right in the mix of the collateral events that might arise from this legislation.

Government, or as my overseas colleagues would say, public schools must be secular in every way.  It would seem that this is clear cut and I would hope that it is.  The days are gone in nominally Christian Australia where prayers and nativity plays were the go.  It has to be a comparative religious environment suited to our multi-cultural country and as such is embedded by law.  I've got to say, having recently seen my grand daughter in a nativity play in a private Christian school I weep for the Principals of government schools. It was enough to bring tears to the eyes and the little kids were wonderful. However supposing as Principal I said yes to a nativity play yet had Jewish and Muslim students in my school.  I suppose they could be exempt as Jewish children were from Christian religious education in the good old days when I was a student. By the way, I am not Jewish yet have a Jewish daughter-in-law and Jewish grand children.  It is not a problem in  our family and I wonder if it might not be a problem in schools.  Silly me, of course it would be a problem for some.

It is not that simple when it comes to sexuality.  I have written about the Safe Schools Program in previous posts.  To recap briefly this program originally designed for primary (elementary) and secondary (high) schools enables the exploration of sexuality taking into account the needs of LGBTI  students. On the face of it one would have to say that this is a good thing, especially for the wellbeing of LGBTI students.  However the program is so controversial that it has been banned in government primary schools.  As a school Principal I would want the authority to canvass parents for their permission for their student children to experience this program.  If a parent said no then so be it and their sons and daughters would be exempt. Tricky!

For non government private schools some function in accordance with religious beliefs that are antithetical to same sex marriage and in Australia are refusing to budge.  There is now some talk that their government funding may be in  jeopardy. I don't think that in any of these schools there is any sense of not accepting LGBTI persons for who they are.  It is just about the marriage thing.

It seemed in my days as a school Principal so much simpler, but I guess it wasn't simple for LGBTI students who suffered in silence.  I don't recall any incidents of this but worry that it could have been overlooked by yours truly.  They were unfortunately different times with less sensitivity to issues like LGBTI.  The acronym had not even been invented.  I'm glad it has.

May the Force be with you!


GD

Celebrating success

As the school Principal you will be keepingt a keen eye out for successes to celebrate.

Suppose you have just received excellent results for your school in the compulsory government NAPLAN tests in literacy and numeracy.  Time to celebrate with the whole staff in some form another.

Suppose your school has been lauded for an excellent stage performance of a play or a musical.  Time to celebrate with all the participants.

Suppose the school grounds have been kept tidy for a long period of time.  Time for you to get on the PA and congratulate the whole school.

Suppose some bright maths students have won prizes in a competition.  Time to celebrate with the particular students, their teachers and to let the school bask in the success.

At a more personal level a long time ago a very effective administrator showed me samples of the personal congratulatory notes he wrote to various of his staff for commitment beyond the call of duty.  I took this on board and used it myself.  The notes are very private to the persons to be congratulated. As an example, when I was Director of Personnel for the Education Department of Western Australia,  one of the 160 clerical persons for whom I had responsibility pulled out all stops to resolve a cleaner shortage in a very remote school.  I left a a note of thanks on his desk indicating the importance to that school of what he had achieved. I can't recall but as was my way I probably spoke personally to him as well.  Spoken words are good, but the written note has a permanence about it that the recipient can return to from time to time and also use as part of reference material for job applications.

The 160 staff beavered away over their computers day after day and by dint of effective guidance from their Managers were able to get the government schools across the state successfully staffed for the opening of the school year.  This was a vital target, as to not achieve it caused problems at school level and opened the Education Department to annual criticism from the media and the Teachers' Union.  To celebrate my Managers and I organised a barbecue in adjacent grounds for the 160. The Director General joined us for the celebration and was bit taken aback, but supportive of the fact that we did this.

If you are a Principal of a remote school often staffed by young teachers boarding away from home in an unfamiliar environment, celebrations and just time to get together and relax are vital.  In our climate barbecues are good.

Lest you think I am bragging, as an educational administrator the indications are that I did okay, but I am here to tell you that I made many mistakes as I learned my craft. I hope I learned from them.


May the Force be with you!


GD

Building a professional relationship between teaching and non-teaching staff.

In my experience this is usually a no brainer as most teachers are expansive people who recognise the contribution of non-teaching staff and develop positive relationships with them.

However I offer a note of caution about the few teachers who might somehow feel they are a bit above the non-teaching staff.  As Principal keep an eye out for any such feelings and nip them in the bud.

I offer a personal experience that still rankles within me.  My darling wife, after raising our children to an age where they were no longer little ones, decided that she would like to become a Teacher Assistant which was new in terms of her pre-marriage career.  She set about achieving this and in several situations of various schools and teachers she was very happy in this role.  She had excellent  reviews from all the teachers with whom she worked.  In what turned out to be her last posting, a new teacher came to that school and my wife was her Assistant.  Things went along smoothly for some time then this teacher began to talk down to, and one has to say mentally harass my wife.  This was a totally new experience for my wife, who had got along so well with previous teachers that these persons became her friends outside the school setting.  My wife, who is a very tough little lady, was brought to tears by this situation.  At the time I was a Superintendent of Schools in the same education system and after a time contacted the school Principal to see what he could do about this.  He was nice guy but not strong enough to get in and unravel the problem.  I did not pull rank nor would it have been appropriate for me to personally investigate the situation.  It was never resolved and my wife after a time resigned.  If she had not done this I would have taken more drastic action possibly requesting the Superintendent of the district for that school, which was not me, to investigate the situation.  Even this would have been fraught with the risk of me to be seen pulling rank and displaying a vote of no confidence in that Principal.

I've got to admit that I have never been able to come to terms with a Principal not being strong enough to resolve such situations.  I feel that any Principal worth their salt must be trained for and capable of doing these tough things in a just and fair way, with due process and natural justice in play.  Sitting on one's hands and hoping it will all go away is not an option.


May the Force be with you!

GD

Meetings

This post is not about how to run an effective meeting but about meetings in general.

School communities have many meetings that are traditional like staff meetings, subject (learning area) meetings, School Board meetings, Annual General meetings and so on.  The time taken for meetings is valuable to all present and there is nothing worse than spending 45 minutes or more in a meeting then walking out knowing that it has been a complete waste of time.

I am assuming that Principals know how to organise for and run meetings so as I noted above I am not going into this.  The set of meetings that your school has needs to be reviewed as part of the School Development Plan (see previous posts on this blog about the School Development Plan) to ensure that meetings are not overdone. This review should also tap into the effectiveness of the meetings.  Any meeting that is not relevant to the learning of the students in some form or another is probably not worth having."

I spent my last couple of career years as the A/Director of Personnel for the Education Department of Western Australia.  Today this would be called Human Resources Director.  My department had 160 staff whose prime job was to ensure appropriate staffing of all State schools and to ensure that the entitlements of all staff were appropriate, inclusive of paying the fortnightly salaries and accommodation for teachers in rural schools.  I had managers to whom I could delegate to ensure that our goals were achieved for each off the various sectors of the State school system.  I was lucky to have three superb managers respectively of the Special Ed sector, the Primary school sector and the Secondary school sector.

My department was one of many in the overall Education Department and part of my job was to attend various meetings.  My meeting schedule was ridiculous. My experience was that I attended so many poor meetings that were a waste of time that on one occasion (tongue in cheek) I suggested to my PA that she cancel my attendance at half the meetings I normally attended to see what would happen.  We never did this, but to this day I suspect my not going to many of these time wasting sessions would have not made one scrap of difference to anything.   I felt that if I attended another meeting where we were again entreated to conceptualise this or that I would go mad.  It was often so impractical in tone and outcome.  I wanted to say to many of those present that at this very moment the kids and their teachers are out in the schools doing what this should be all about.  This experience of so many poor meetings has turned me off meetings for life.

Thank goodness school communities are the front line and the meetings are likely to all reflect this.  I say again: "Any meeting that is not relevant to the learning of the students in some form or another is probably not worth having."

While this post is not about how meetings should be run I cannot resist saying that any Chair of a meeting who does not create a good listening environment for participants within that meeting had better rethink.


Sorry my tone is a bit bossy, but I felt the need to cut to the chase with this topic.


May the Force be with you!


GD

PS:  Forgot to say that meetings that are full of eduspeak and jargon can be a serious pain.  Plain language with the use of technical terminology only as needed is the way to go.

Principal's open office door or not?

In large primary (elementary) and secondary (high) schools the Principal usually does not have an officially designated teaching role and is generally busy running a complex organisation.

The question is whether under these circumstances the Principal should have an open door to their office.  This can be difficult if it gets to the stage of so many interruptions that the Principal's daily administrative and educational goals cannot be easily achieved.

There is nothing wrong with having times where you are not available to everyday sorts of interruptions, but care is needed so as not to isolate oneself and be seen to be unreachable.  A reliable secretary or personal assistant (PA) will be alert to let you know if there is an urgency that you would want to attend to immediately.  The role of this PA is crucial for you as the Principal.  The PA needs to be a super communicator who never appears officious in shielding you from contact by staff, parents, board members or students.  I was lucky as a Principal and Superintendent of Schools to have excellent secretaries.

There will be others in the hierarchical chain who have delegated roles that in effect give you time to focus on your leadership role.  They shield you from the everyday interruptions. These persons have various designations such as assistant or deputy Principal, Counsellor, Registrar, Curriculum Coordinator.  You need to be an effective delegator to bring these persons into play.  Once you have delegated a set of responsibilities you need to let the person get on with it.

Many Principals do a bit of teaching to keep their hand in and maybe lead by showing that they have not lost it.

If your self assessment process comes up with judgements that you are unapproachable or remote you have a problem.


May the Force be with you!


GD

Are teachers on the same page with their interpretations of the syllabuses of the prescribed curriculum?

In Australia schools, especially government schools, are being urged to follow the Australian National Curriculum (ANC) or the state by state adaptation of the ANC.

Now teaching is a fairly isolated business whereby a teacher is there fronting a class whether they be in the primary (elementary) or secondary (high) school sectors.  I have concluded after all my many years in schooling that teachers should be given the opportunity through in-school in-service whereby they work through the various syllabuses discussing the prescribed learning outcomes to ensure that they have a common understanding of what each outcome means.  For primary school teachers you might think this would take forever but believe me I have proved that it doesn't.  For secondary school teachers the task is easier as they have one or two specialist subjects but all should also work through the English syllabus.

If this is done  the teachers of say the three classes of year 4 students are all on the same page not isolated in their classroom having made their own interpretation of the prescribed learning outcomes in the various syllabuses.  Likewise the secondary maths teachers are on the same page across the various year levels the they teach.

Part of the discussions is to agree on what behaviours would demonstrate mastery of the various prescribed learning outcomes based on a commitment at primary school level that a least in English and mathematics a student should not be moved to new learning if they have not mastered the prerequisites for that new learning.   To move students on when they have not reached this mastery is at the root of the complaints that literacy and numeracy standards are not what is desired across the country as it result in cumulative gaps in the learning.  For secondary school teachers such mastery would be expected across all subjects.

An offshoot of such inservice is to encourage teachers to also chat about the learning strategies to be used to attain the prescribed learning outcomes.

Such in-service whereby teachers discuss and share at a practical level related to their teaching is generally hailed as one of the most effective forms of in-service.

You may see this post as a repeat of the previous one but it is more a reinforcement of an approach about which I could possibly be classed as a zealot.


May the Force be with you!


GD

More complaints about the Australian school compulsory national testing program NAPLAN

If you track back through earlier posts you will find more detail on NAPLAN (National Assessment Program - Literacy and Numeracy).

A couple of Queensland tertiary educators were seem recently on TV raising all the negatives about the NAPLAN program.  Stuff like teachers teaching to the test and minimal evidence that NAPLAN is leading to Australian students improving their literacy and numeracy performance.

Such criticism always causes me to go to back to my basic strategies for improving literacy and numeracy.  I would use NAPLAN as a school principal to show where a student sits in relation to their age cohort, but even more crucial I would ensure that the following occurs in my school community whether it be a primary school (elementary school in the USA) with generalist class teachers or a secondary school (high school in the USA) with specialist subject teachers.

Strategy #1:   Teachers must be given the opportunity to sit and talk with one another about the maths and english language syllabuses to ensure that they are making common interpretations of what these syllabuses require. I have proved that this is effective inservice from which teachers develop common understandings of what each syllabus learning outcome means and what evidence they would accept that a student has mastered a prescribed outcome.  This latter agreement is in effect a standards setting exercise.  Teachers move through the syllabus prescribed outcomes very quickly in such discussion situations.

Strategy #2:  For prescribed learning outcomes that can be deemed essential for functional literacy and numeracy I would have a policy whereby each student has to show mastery of these essential outcomes that are also prerequisites for the new learning to come. Mastery means demonstrating that they have fully achieved a prescribed outcome over several spaced assessments for what that outcome requires.

In previous posts I have provided much detail about these two strategies to show that they work in a practical and effective school community.  The politicians who cry out for Australian students to rank high in international tables for literacy and numeracy probably wouldn't tolerate these strategies or should I say understand them.  They want the pressure of NAPLAN to drive teachers to greater efforts.

Once again I rest my case.

May the Force be with you!


GD

Looking after yourself

I probably shouldn't write this post in case it insults you by teaching you to suck eggs.  However I know how easy it is for work as interesting and rewarding as being a school principal to become all consuming.  Been there, done that and probably in hindsight should rate myself as a workaholic.

As a school Principal you are the lynch pin of the school community.  To be always on your game you need to look after yourself physically, emotionally and socially.

You will have peer colleagues, friends and loved ones all of whom are your support base.  Revel in this support in a general everyday sense and seek out appropriate persons when you need extra support and maybe specific advice.

Physical Wellbeing

There is no substitute for regular exercise.  If you are still of a relatively young age you may play a lot of sport for the thrill of the competition, the fun and the fitness. As you move through the years you can keep up suitable exercise regimes.  For me it was jogging, swimming and tennis.  Even in my now senior years it has become as much physical work as I can do in my garden and regular walking.  No matter how many pressures are on at school the exercise time provides a release and better management of the issues when you get back to them.  Not to mention the overall health benefits.


Social and Emotional Wellbeing

One needs to be cautious in making pronouncements about social activity as we are each different.  Some like a lot of social contact and some less social contact.  Amongst your staff you will need to be a measured communicator who engenders confidence and trust.  Even when tough love is to be delivered anger and tension are to be avoided.  People respect you if you are quiet, calm, measured and fair and communicate with others showing respect at all times.

Amongst your friends interactions become much more close and amongst your family very close and intimate.  Again respect is the true fabric of effective human relationships.  Respect morphs into love for ones partner and ones children.  Your work as a Principal is very rewarding, but in the end it is work and not an end in itself.  You need to spend vital time with family and friends.  I offer these words from a daughter who lost her father tragically : I offer them because they express her deepest feelings but also contain a message for our own wellbeing:

"Hold your family close.  Never for a second take them for granted as that will be the second you lose them."

You'll think I'm mad but for me the relationship with my loved ones is the ultimate nature of reality.  It is my practical metaphysics if you like, with apologies to the true believers in say a Christian, Jewish, Muslim God and other transcendental beings.

It is easy to become stressed by the myriad responsibilities of being a school Principal.  Such stress can creep up and not be recognised for what it is.  If you experience this learn to de-stress through the support of your loved ones and through some good old fashioned physical exercise.  Often a chat with a Principal peer helps to solve the issues that are causing the stress.  I am resisting comment on severe stress which you would know must be dealt with and in the worst case scenario by professionals who know how to do this.

I have not mentioned activities like meditation to help us maintain our wellbeing, mainly because I know so little about it.  There are many who swear by it.  I have always had a form of meditation I guess in my love for fishing.  There is nothing more calming that being alone on a beautiful beach as the dawn breaks to the sound of the waves and the smell of the salt air.  Making sure one treats the catch as humanely as possible is part of this.

I guess fishing has really been a sort of hobby and I mention this as I am sure hobbies of various sorts are helpful in maintaining our wellbeing.  Hobbies can include many artistic and practical pursuits.

As Principals we are not expected to walk on water, but we are expected at times to attain to something pretty close to that remarkable feat.


May the Force be with you!


GD

PS:  After writing this post I set about playing my guitar.  I love it, but it is a skill learned long after my time as a busy educator.  I wish I'd had it then as it is so therapeutic.  To all you muso Principals out there, happy picking, strumming, tapping, bowing and blowing.

GD

The Safe Schools Program

I write this post in a context of Australians just having voted in favour of same sex marriage.  The LGBTI community is overjoyed and so am I, a heterosexual male married to a woman.  We voted 'Yes' for same sex marriage to be legal.

In Australian schools over the last year or so the Safe Schools Program has been designed and implemented to assist the LGBTI students as they process through school.  It is a program for all students to experience.  It has caused a hue and cry amongst lobby groups and politicians such that it was banned in primary (elementary) schools.  It is said to allow students to face the realities of LGBTI persons and their rights not to be discriminated against.  During the lead up to the postal vote about same sex marriage the Safe Schools Program was often cited as a concern by the advocates of a 'no' vote.  They felt that if the vote was 'yes' it would be open go in the schools for the Safe Schools Program.

As a school Principal I am sure you would be pulling out all stops to ensure that LGBTI students do not suffer bullying or discrimination in your school community.  You might however be under subtle pressure from some parents who might baulk at their children being open to discussions about sexuality.

In the past in Western Australian government schools when sex education was on offer, parents had the right to know and refuse to have the school carry out this aspect of education for their children.  In the contemporary scene of this controversial Safe Schools Program parents should be informed of the details of the program and have the right to exclude their children.  However if the State Governments, which are responsible for government schools in all Australian states, legislate that the Safe Schools Program be taught Principals are obliged to do so.  I just hope that each Principal in consultation with their School Board has the freedom to allow parents to exclude their children if they deem this appropriate.

Having said this, Principals will have to be careful to operate within the legislation as not to do so could see them accused of discrimination against LGBTI children.

In some religious-based non-government schools the Safe Schools Program may not be taught on the grounds that the religious beliefs prohibit this.  I watch with interest as the Federal Australian Government now works to put into legislation protections to ensure that such schools will not be seen as discriminating against the LGBTI community.

Very tricky stuff.

May the Force be with you!


GD

Using your time wisely as school Principal

You now have super powerful computers to help you to be organised for all the day to day jobs that a busy Principal has to do.  I am too far removed from the contemporary scene in schools to make much comment on how you go about your administrative tasks using this digital technology.

However I want to make the point that as school Principal no matter what the size and complexity of your school you are the educational leader first and foremost.  Thus you need to budget into your weekly timetable time to keep on top of how the learning program is going.  Part of this should be to have face to face contact with student groups but not to the extent that you spook the teachers into thinking that you are looking over their shoulders.

At any time an outsider should be able to ask you how the learning is going and receive an answer that convinces you are on top of this.

In very large secondary K-12 schools you can easily become very far removed from the learning as you have delegated persons who are very hands on with this.  There should however be a system of regular discussion with and reporting to you on how it is all proceeding.

I spent time as the Director of Human Resources for all the government schools in Western Australia.  I had 160 staff to do the work that affected the 32,000 Education Department employees.  I entered this job from the position of having been a school Principal and a Superintendent of Schools so I brought to the position a real hands knowledge of what it was like out there in school land.  Even with this experience it was hard to keep the focus that everything we did in Human Resources was for the betterment of learning in the schools.  I got rather desperate to keep a grip on the realities on the ground and recall a plea from a small very remote school that they had lost their school cleaners and had issues.  I asked my appropriate manager to set one of his staff urgently on to the problem until it was fixed.  The clerical person charged with fixing the issue did so quickly and effectively. Now the kids and staff of that school had a hygienic safe workplace once again.  The principal sent me some student art as a thank you and I was delighted to festoon my city office with the student output.  This is what it was all about.  I wrote a personal thank you note to the clerk who had dealt with the issue so quickly and effectively.

In this central office position my managers made sure that they and I together periodically visited the various school districts to support the Regional Superintendents and their Principals, teachers and non teaching staff.  We took on board the issues that came from the ground and on return to the central office I made sure that we took immediate action that was helpful.

My point as you can see is that as school administrators we must resist becoming too far removed from the student learning.

Sorry, I hope this post is not too much like teaching you to suck eggs.



May the Force be with you!


GD

Expect the unexpected

I am deeply saddened to tell you that a car plowed into a demountable classroom of a primary school in Sydney yesterday.  Two 8 year old boys were killed and 20 other students injured.  The seriously injured appear to be recovering.  The horrible truth is that the driver of the car was a mother with children at the school.  Apparently she went down a driveway that passed the demountable, which was well set back form the outside road system.  We wait to see why the car got out of control.

What a shock for all concerned and there was the Principal expecting that day to be able to get on with planning for 2018 while winding down 2017.  Apparently the Principal handled the situation superbly.  My feelings got out to that school community.

While as a Principal you expect a steady safe day, there it is you are dealing with a tragedy.  Somehow in the Principal armoury there needs to be a readiness for the unexpected sitting there in the back of the mind.

I always say Principalship is a tough gig but we all love it.


May the Force be with that school community!


GD

Listening is good part 2

Professor John Hattie's team for the Melbourne University Graduate School of Education works in schools observing teachers as they communicate with students in the classroom.  The team is of the view that too much talking at the students to the detriment of listening to the students reduces the effectiveness of the learning.  A team member observes the teacher and measures the extent of the teacher input and the student input.

I observed a teacher under this scrutiny on a TV documentary and the teacher found it daunting, but gradually adjusted to provide more time to listen to student concerns about the learning in progress.  From memory the teacher was in the early stages of the observation surprised at how her input dominated.

Lets consider an example where a new maths algorithm is being taught.  It will require what I call some direct teaching from the teacher to initiate the new learning. During this explanatory period the teacher pauses to take questions from the students. As the questioning proceeds the teacher gauges from the students' questions and comments whether the students have a sufficient grasp of the process to attempt an example.  An example is set and the teacher moves quickly around the room doing over the shoulder advising and assisting.  This process is repeated until the teacher feels confident to let the class have a try at say 5 examples.  Again the teacher moves around the class doing the over the shoulder assisting, marking the student's output and providing positive encouragement. At the conclusion of this step the teacher calls for more questions and comments, all the time gauging the success of this total pedagogic process.

The imagination of your teachers will be able to apply the listening procedure to various subjects.  For example in science there can be a lot of encouragement for students to work out what will happen if one does this or that in say chemistry or physics.  The students do most of the talking.

The trick in all of this is to ensure that students are bold enough to ask questions and to raise points without fear of any sort of put down from fellow students.  Of course they should never fear a put down from the teacher.

Listening is good!


May the Force be with you!


GD

Listening is good

As a school principal listening is good, listening to your staff, listening to students, listening to parents, listening to experts.  Listening to experts is not alway good, but if you don't listen you have no basis for not accepting what they are selling.

I have a confession to make.  I always found it difficult when I felt that those around me were coercing me into various forms of team or group membership.  I recall being on a one month live in leadership programme.  We were broken into teams with which we stayed for the duration of the program. On one occasion we were asked to critique a presentation which we had all experienced.  I thought the presenter was too one way, talking at us, and I was still critical of this despite his expertise.  The rest of my team thought he was tops and set about trying to coerce me into their point of view.  I would not budge and this created unease within the rest of the team.

On another occasion when I was a Superintendent of Schools I was on another in-service that included exercises on learning to trust one another.  I felt that one of these was irrelevant as were a lot of the rest of the experiences on that course.  From memory I quietly faded away back to my district.

The point of my confessions is to show that one should not feel obliged to buckle under if one feels strongly enough. At NASA a 'group think' process, in which they participants could not see the wood for the trees, resulted in 5 astronauts losing their lives.

You may as a Principal experience one or two mavericks on your staff who are very effective practitioners in the classroom, but not too good at operating under a hierarchical administration.  Listen to them.  My experience is that they are usually someone I would want on my staff.  I can think of actual mavericks who worked on my staff and thank goodness they did.   I urge you to have an ear for the staff member who has an out-of-left field idea that benefits the learning in the school.

I watched for the second time the true story of Alan Turing who invented a computer to break the enigma code in WWII.  At first none would listen to him but eventually those experts around him could see what he was on about and they melded into a team and the code was broken.

I am all for team work that improves the learning of the students and makes for a happier settled staff cohort who love coming into their school community each day.  Teaching in teams is well known and very effective if the team members listen to one another and provide continuity of learning for the students.  It is still common that a teacher is alone in class with a group of students, especially in the secondary (high) school situation.  Opportunities need to be given to those secondary school teachers to communicate regularly with the teachers from other specialised learning areas so that they develop a common understanding about each child.

Effective staff teams also lend support to one another in the general sense of morale and a feeling of wellbeing.

In my next post I will say more about listening to students. There is some interesting primary research in good old Australia on this score.


May the Force be with you!


GD

Winding up the school year

For my US readers the title of this blog is all out of kilter as your school year commences around September of each year.  By now you are well underway working towards the Christmas break.

In Australia the school principals are busy preparing for the new school year 2018 and winding up the 2017 year.  The schools finish in December then have the long 6 week summer holiday.  The 4th term of each year is therefore a very busy time when the principal and staff are tiring, not to mention the students.

I empathise with my principal colleagues at this busy time.  Keep a cool head and plough steadily through the prioritised tasks.

If you are retiring I know you will leave the school in top shape for your successor.  I hope that you have done a thorough preparation for retirement which brings some challenges like relevance deprivation syndrome.  I am still suffering from this hence I blog away and write about effective schooling. It is not life threatening.  I strongly advise people not to retire too early as with the longer life expectancy of today you can work a lot longer than in the past, health permitting.

Good luck with whatever phase of the school year is currently your challenge.


May the Force be with you!



GD

Tough Love

Tough love from the Principal is not something that is needed every day, but it is right and proper that the students and staff know that you as the principal will deliver tough love if needed.

An absolute no brainer is to never raise your voice and/or become angry with a student or staff member.  They need to know that you will be firm and fair, delivering the tough love in a calm and considered manner.

Serious student offences such as stealing, physical violence, wilful damage of school property or verbal and mental abuse towards another member of the school community will be sure to require the deliverance of tough love from you or your delegated authority. There must be consequences for the student who is learning that rule breaking has consequences that are usually not pleasant.  Parents need to be aware that tough love is part of the culture of your school community.

Teachers deal on the spot with classroom breaches of behaviour standards but they must do this within the tough love parameters that are part of the school culture. With serial classroom offenders you may need to deliver the tough love.

Student offences or rule breaking, if persistent, are usually a symptom of deeper underlying issue that has to investigated along with the deliverance of tough love.

Teachers operate in a context of school community commitment to best practice and when they are so committed they seldom need tough love to bring them back to the way it is. At times a teacher can stray and say administer disciplinary action that is beyond the tough love limits.  Tough love may be needed if this is the case. They may breach the dress code that their school community encourages and again tough love can be needed.  As I write that I can think of a case of one my teachers doing just that and I applied tough love.

Of course there are serious offences such as teacher abuse of students in various forms.  This cannot be tolerated and at a certain level it can be criminal.  Tough love and legal requirements say that this cannot be tolerated and must be dealt with swiftly.

If a teacher is not coping in the classroom such that their class management and general pedagogy is off the mark then there are policies that require natural justice and due process to right this.  Every teacher in the school should be aware that such processes exist and that they can expect fairness, but also that the matter must be righted.  In extreme cases dismissal can be the consequence.  You as the Principal must play a major role in resolving such matters as the eduction of the students may be suffering.  I have dealt with this at various levels of seriousness on many occasions as a school principal and as a superintendent with responsibilities across many schools in my district.  In the end it is your responsibility as a principal.  A tough gig that cannot be avoided if the situation arises.

When I was a principal the cane was still used in government schools.  I tried to ban it in my school and was surprised at the staff resistance. It was banned many years ago now thank goodness.

Just wanted to say something about the ancient practices of making students write lines or lists of words as a punishment.  I banned this in my school kindly pointing out that we were busting our insides trying to get the kids to love the English language.  I cannot imagine that such practices still exist.

Another concern that I had as a principal was the regular use of 'scab' duty as a punishment.  This saw students having to spend their lunch hour picking op rubbish around the school ground.  I also banned this on the grounds that we again were working hard to have the students value their environment, becoming self regulating in keeping it tidy.

I sound like an old tyrant.  Perhaps I should not have used the word banned rather describing how I tried to positively convince staff to accept other ways of administering tough love.

Finally on the matter of suspending a student from school for several days as a consequence of breaking school community rules.  This is a serious step to take and only works if the parents are part of the action.  Maybe it is needed as a circuit breaker, but again I say only if the parents are fully involved.

In a school community where student and staff wellbeing are seriously worked on tough love is needed on fewer occasions.

Forgot to mention drug use within the school community.  Very tricky!  Needs to be dealt with but you may need expert help with this one.


May the Force be with you!


GD

Playing my guitar

Having a rest from serious posts today and just playin my guitar.

Considering the next post on 'tough love' from the Principal towards staff and students.


May the Force be with you!




GD

Continuity of student learning

I watched with interest a TV speech to the National Press Club of Australia by the CEO of the Business Council of Australia.  She outlined a plan for the reform of school and tertiary education in Australia.

My first comment is about her recommendation that outstanding teachers should be paid more to remain in the classroom rather than aspire to be school Principals.  I am not against paying them more  but not to the level of the remuneration of a school Principal.  The positive effect that an effective Principal has on the performance of a school is well documented and I have seen it over and over in the field.  A top Principal will ensure that all his teachers are up to the mark on best practices.

My second comment is that the speaker in referring to student performance in Australian primary (elementary) and secondary (high) schools did not mention how vital it is to ensure continuity of learning for each student.  That is in subjects where mastery of prerequisites is needed to move on to new learning, the next step if you will, teachers need to be dogged in enabling students to attain the necessary mastery.  I still have my serious doubts that there is a commitment to this in all schools and I continue to worry about relevant data transfer as students move to new teachers in the next school year and from primary to secondary school.  In some cases there are more transition points from primary to middle school to secondary school.

My book on effective schools is big on the continuity theme and I have shared this in previous posts on this blog with almost the passion of a zealot.



May the Force be with you as you carry on being great school Principals!


GD

Taking on students with a disability in a mainstream school

Many years ago I was asked by parents to take on their seriously hearing impaired daughter in my K-12 school in a fairly isolated rural environment.  Understandably they did not want to send her away from home to a location where more specialised education was available.

I took her on but found that teaching a seriously hearing impaired person is one of the hardest things I have ever attempted.  I encouraged the family to organise to seek more specialised help.  We just did not have the skills nor the resources to do justice to this child.

This week I read a report from the NSW government about schools taking into their mainstream classes students with various forms of learning difficulties and in particular autistic children.  I understand why the parents want these children in the mainstream and agree with this practice if the school has the staff trained to manage such situations and still give all the other children their best shot at a comprehensive education.  The report tabled practices to manage these children that it described as totally inappropriate and in some cases abusive to the individual student.

Some of the criticised practices smacked of desperate teachers trying to manage without having the full array of skills to do so.  My concern is that schools may feel pressured to mainstream say fairly severe autistic students in sympathy with what is deemed standard practice the days.  Nobody is a winner in such situations, especially not the students and their parents.

I will probably be labelled politically and ethically incorrect for showing sympathy for the sincere teachers who just could not manage to provide a full education for these children.  Human and other resources must be at their optimum if a school is to take on such students in the mainstream.  Principals should have the discretion to resist mainstreaming such students if they do not have the resources.  Principals need to to be brave in this for the good of the students and should not be subject to unwarranted criticism by the resource providers who have not come to the party.  Hopefully  the affected parents would agree.

May the Force be with you!


GD

Editing feedback

Part of my purpose in sharing with any interested readers the draft of my book on School Effectiveness was to possibly receive some comments about the usefulness of the content to practising school Principals. Any comments would assist my editing and decision whether to publish or not.  It is crass to seek comments on a blog, but I would be disappointed to present in published form something that is useless to the practising school Principal.

I have consistently received an encouraging number of readers and wonder if any of these interested persons have time to provide me with a comment or two.  The comments could be on individual posts or general comments.  Don't spare me if what I have presented is not useful.  Having been a Principal I know how busy you are and that you have no time to waste on poor materials that provide no assistance to your day to day work.

Take care and I trust the trauma of the the Las Vegas disaster is not too close to home for my US readers.  I am reminded of the song Everybody Hurts. We all hurt at some stage in our lives, but it usually passes or at least dims with time and the love of those close to us. To be hurting over the Las Vegas tragedy seems more than anyone should have to bear.

When I was a Superintendent of Schools I used to write to all school staff members of the many schools in my district towards the close of a busy school year via my newsletter.  My central message was to take time out with loved ones as this is the ultimate nature of reality on this Earth.

Contemporary school Principals have an incredibly busy life and face many more challenges than in my day as a Principal.  It is a wonderful job as I have said many times, but no job is worth losing you family over.

"Hold your family close.  Never for a second take them for granted as that will be the second you lose them." ( A quote by a daughter whose father's life had been tragically taken.)

Sorry.  I begin to ramble.


May the Force be with you!


GD

School Development Planning (SDP) element #26

Hi to my followers out there in school land!  This is the final element of the SDP.  Do I hear sighs of relief?

SDP element #26	The Annual Report
Aligned SE criterion	In a general sense the parents can access the Annual Report of the school as an extra line of communication.
Current school documentation and situation	The school documentation affirms the requirement of an Annual Report and contains a suitable template that is flexible enough for items specific to a particular year.
Development objectives for 2016	Compile and publish the Annual Report.
Resources needed ·       people, ·       money ·       time ·       location ·       stationery ·       IT	·       Administrative and clerical staff ·       Over a 4 week period ·       On site ·       Relevant IT data bases
Timeline to achieve the objective(s)	During Term 4 2016
Process for achieving the objectives	Gather the relevant data and compile the report.
Outcome(s) of the assessment of the attainment of the objective(s)	An Annual Report was produced for 2016.  It adequately informed the school community members and met the requirements of the National School Opinion Survey.

+++++++++

You might recall if you have followed this blog for some time that each post is part of a book in final editing.  The book is about school effectiveness and how to ascertain how effective a school is.  It is written by a narrator/scribe about the views of Tom, a revered educator.  The whole book is put down on Tom's boat. This will assist you to make sense of the closing paragraphs of the book as follows:

"There it all was.  Tom concluded that evaluating school effectiveness was a formative process enshrined in the SDP.  If the evaluation revealed ineffective practices then change needed to occur.  Summative snap shots of student performance in some syllabus areas were to be obtained from the NAPLAN testing.  Even this was formative in the sense that it could reveal areas in the learning program that needed improvement.

Tom noted that schools have access to The National Improvement Tool (NSIT) developed by the ACER and approved by the Australian Council of Ministers of education for use in Australian schools.  He suggested that it is well worth a look by schools as helpful for their school improvement strategies.  (See NSIT on the internet)

It was early evening and we sat and had a quiet drink to unwind from the intensity of the day.  Tom had invited me to stay for the night and I was pleased to do so.  It had been a pleasure working with this unassuming educator.  We chatted about the tasks that I now had ahead of me to put the treatise into publishing order.  Tom being the practical and humble person that he was expressed some doubts about the usefulness of the treatise to practising principals.  I tried to put his mind at rest and indicated that we would make a good fist of getting it out there and let the audience decide the worth of the work.   It was a beautiful night on the river with the lights of the distant city reflected on the calm river surface and the lapping of the water gently on the hull.  Sleep came easily."

*************

There it is folks for what it is worth.  GD is all but written out on being a school Principal.  I am here to interact if anyone is interested.  Maybe we could strike up a dialogue or the overused term a "conversation".   I humbly submit that maybe I can be of help with a problem you may be experiencing as a school Principal.

I close this post by reiterating how I loved being a school Principal.  I guess I have been reliving those happy years in writing the book and posting this blog.

May the Force be with you!

GD