Brian's Blog

Reflections from Day 2 of EduTECH 2017.

Reflections from Day 1 of EduTECH 2017.

One of the biggest challenges school leaders face is how to redesign the learning system to have the greatest effect on our students? With researchers such as John Hattie (2012) focusing his lens on the impact of the teacher on the student’s learning there is the push to have teachers identify ways that they can redesign the learning environment, redesign pedagogy and redesign assessment. How do we re-imagine the concept of school to make the teaching have the greatest effect on student learning in real and authentic ways and what will this look like? As we drill down into this question the focus is drawn further away from the upfront teaching and redirected firmly to student centred learning. Having a shared understanding of what learning looks like is essential as practitioners we can identify ways of embedding this into practice.  Learning is the essence of what happens in the classroom every day, but when we discover what good learners are and the keys to switch all le...

During my last holiday break, I had the opportunity tick one of my major things I wanted to do off my list of must do’s. It was to climb to the summit of Australia’s highest mountain, Mount Kosciusko with my extended family from all over Australia’s eastern seaboard. During the ascent, I had much time to reflect on the parallels between educational leadership and mountain climbing and how shared experiences can mean a variety of things depending on the person’s perspective. What I also noticed was in a state of reflection I was also able to recognize and empathize with the pain and joy of the others with me, as well as acknowledge my own state of being. With me climbing this mountain were my parents, my brother and sister and their families and my own. Beginning with myself, I was fully aware of the magical moments from streams of fresh mountain water, the beauty of falling snow crystals being blown around in the breeze, to the feeling of satisfaction knowing that I had reache...

School systems have a shared responsibility to improve student learning outcomes. Likewise, for staff there is an obligation to provide extended opportunities to build on what they already know. High quality recording methods that ascertain growth mapped over time can identify trends and highlight threats allowing organisations to predict implications of applying a learning initiative or intervention. This can become complex and messy due to competing agendas and a variety of interpretations. For this reason, organisations have an obligation to develop a fair, ethical and shared understanding how data will be used and interpreted (Stoll & Fink,1996). A strong and user-friendly data system when properly implemented, empowers teachers to discover value in functions that bring student data to their fingertips (Brunner, Fasca, Heinze, Honey, Light, Mandinach & Wexler , 2005). Therefore, teachers require adequate learning support if they are to use data to improve practice ...

The balance between work and personal life is a constant conflict for leaders in many fields ( Friedman & Greenhaus, 2000; Pocock, 2003). Education is certainly not immune (d'Arbon, Duignan, & Duncan, 2002; Hudson, 2012; Grissom, Loeb & Mitani, 2015).  In fact, how this issue is managed and supported by schools is increasingly recognised as of strategic importance to the organisation and of significance to employees (De Cieri, Holmes, Abbott, & Pettit, 2005; Queen & Queen, 2005). It would be thoughtless to consider that community demands on educational leaders do not cause stress and impact on where they spend their time. In fact, it is only through an examination of the effects of the culture of stress that educators can begin the process of reclaiming time, priorities and health (Queen & Queen, 2005). In my own context, moving into a new facility with five teachers collaboratively co-teaching side by side 112 students aged 11 and 12, we as a ...