Transforming education .... through ICT ...yewk???

What is your big vision for education?

15 years ago I would have talked about a holistic vision for education, seeing its values, philosophies and pedagogies as helping to stretch humanity into a place I thought we needed to be for the survival of the planet and humanity. 10 years ago I realised for many teachers it is too big a shift, and worked with people where they were to help expand their seeing, thinking and actions, mainly through action research. I also began to recognise that"holistic"philosophies were based on a particular value system which I was priviliging and to be open to emergent possibilities. Since then I have been squirming around in my head thinking through integral framing of the issues and wondering whether some of this thinking may be useful for others.

In the last year I have been involved in a project where we asked educational leaders what are their issues and visions around ICT and e-learning in education, inorder to help us better understand the implications of the new promised high speed broadband to education.

ICT... yuk. Technology. Yuk. Useful... but what has this got to do with the soul, with passion, with ethical living in the world, with beauty, mindfulness, generosity, with nature?

Well quite a lot actually. When asked about what high speed broadband can do, it is very easy to talk about the actual technology - high streaming video conferencing, schools being able to upload and download multiple media files, visualisation of data sets into 3D worlds...

When you talk about it that way it can fail to excite many educators. When I started asking these leaders to tell me why these things would be valuable to education suddenly their voices were filled with passion and excitement.... the opportunity to break down the walls of the classroom, ignite creativity in students and teachers, enable global participation and contribution, to find new places to belong, to transform education...etc...

In listening to the leaders I began ot realise that much of what they valued could be mapped onto a spiral dynamic framework. The following diagram gives a spectrum of values which underpin some of the affordances of ICT for student development and learning. Such a diagram can help make explicit the range of things which we value, and help us to realise that they can be from very different value systems. As a whole these provide a very powerful narrative for education. We can use it to see how we are contributing to the whole and value those who are contributing to a different part of it. Part of the challenge is to give examples of what teachers and students doing, making these affordances evident. (Note - this diagram is by no means complete - just tries to give a flavour of the differences and has the danger of caging our thinking in.)

I used this framework to develop "stories" of what students were doing or could do with high speed broadband. I presented these stories with some colleagues at the Broadband for Society Summit and also at a cross-sector e-learning educational forum which was part of the NBN in education research project (see powerpoint). For both audiences the stories acted very powerfully. I believe that was because they spoke to people heart to heart - about what we value. Leaders also liked the framework as a tool for helping us to put what we value upfront.

Subsequent to the forum event I have been reading the work of Schieffer and Lessem on transforming organizations - Part 1, Part 2. One of their suggestions is that transformation is often done without actually understanding the cultural ground of being of where people are at - what they value. We need to start at the "ground" and then go through a process of emerging (holistic world), navigating (rational world) and effecting (pragmatic world).

It is timely to discover such a model to help reflect on what actually happened in the forum and whether we could have facilitated it better. I realise how much the work I did on values actually helped people to connect to the ground of their being - to their heart and their culture. The stories with different layers of affordances cut across differences to speak to people in different ways.

But did we move from our ground?

I also realised that the work I had done on synthesing the interviews - not just around the issues - but also around different perspectives and mental models that people were bringing, helped to create a greater holistic narrative. I developed a framework which indicated the key perspectives we needed to have to look at the issues - pedagogy, educational vision, professioanl learning, student pathways, inclusion, policy and supporting technologies - far more than usually considered in ICT debates. I also used a simple quadrant integral framework to explose some of the mental frameworks that people were bringing to thinking about the issues - cultural, systems, things and experiences, individual innner aspects. A key aim of using these frameworks was to show how the diverse and often conflicting views and lenses actually together made an important whole. We need to be agile in our thinking across all these different ways of seeing and framing the issues.

I think what we observed on the day was the willingness of participants to come to know the differences of each other... to listen out for the interesting questions and to explore them rather than just dismiss them for their lack of pragmatism. Sheiffer and Lessem talk about the importance of opening to the "other" to break down habitual limiting cultural patterns. (Your culture is still the ground of your being but where you transform to is a hybrid space where you have reframed your culture, rather than leaving it behind.)

Towards the end of the day we went into the more rational and pragmatic stages to see where to next. But I felt that something was missing from the day... we needed to also move into a more spacious visioning space - perhaps consider global and local scenarios... and then come back to asking Are we seeing "holistic"enough? Are we asking the big questions... not just some interesting ones.

I approached the research using a causal layered approach... what are the issues and barriers (the litany layer), what are the emerging themes or perspectives (the social analysis layer), what are the worldviews and values, and the next layer is about collective visioning. One day is not enough...

It is fabulous that the theories have now been freed from rattling around in my head.... I now can let go of the need for them to be accurate or sufficient - seeing them as temporary scaffolding that has a timely usefulness to help a particular group have a conversation in new ways....

And so the conversation continues...

And my head is now more spacious for other things to squirm around...

Telling a new story of the Essential Learnings through paradigm lenses

I have been in mapping mode lately. It happens to me in cycles... but I am beginning to pay attention to my need to systemise because often it creates a pressure cooker for surprising insights to occur.

My big emergent insight at the moment is that we need to tell a new story about the Tasmanian Essential Learnings (the K-10 curriculum in Tasmania which was dismantled two years ago). Over the last two years many Tasmanians have heard that:

ELS = failure

But that is not the way that is seen nationally, overseas or even locally. I feel that the ELS holds hard-won "collective wisdom" about visionary change in education for the 21stC. Every person who took part in the journey - educational leaders, teachers, parents, business people, students, grandparents, community groups - each have gained important learnings. All different, all which might give insight into something that could be of great service to the rest of the world. The global challenges which informed aspects of the ELS are still with us.

How might the ELS be re-framed today? Could we re-frame the metaphors we use about what we value - from being "leaders" or the "best" of something in the world - to "What can we contribute to the world?"

Can Tasmanians have something to contribute to the world through telling our stories of this epic learning journey? Perhaps we need a time to reflect over the sudden dismantling of the ELS, a time to heal, and then a time to tell. What could we learn from each other if we were invited to give our unique perspectives, to use perhaps different lenses to tell our stories and then do some "appreciative inquiry"? What have we learnt, who have we become, what do we now value, what are emerging intuitions, interesting positives, where are our metaphors now, and how might we vision the next step? How can we crochet new conversations and what might they create?

What might enable such conversations - virtual or face-to-face? Who might want to listen?

Why might our collective experiences be significant? Can they be generalisable to other countries who are looking for new educational visions and transformation processes?

Looking at generic paradigms

Spiral Dynamics suggests that there are generic paradigms in which societies move through. We can map key patterns of society - key underpinning values, ways of thinking and ways of being. People might tune into different paradigms whether at work, play or with family. There is an evolutionary movement of the paradigms with entry points (letting go of the old and practicing new things), mature stage (combining learnings from previous paradigms with new ways of thinking and practice) and exit points (where disillusionment happens.)

Perhaps our education reforms can be mapped on such a paradigm map. Based on my own experiences I have made a possible map which might tell part of the story for the evolution of teaching of science - from blue to orange to green to yellow. This is "my" story of our journey which may resonate with others and may not.

Each colour represents a way of thinking and being represented by different aspects of society:

The key metaphor for Blue is the traditional librarian - the holder and keeper of knowledge - the worlds' collective wisdom - which is structured in ways so we can access it and make sense of it. But how do we cope with increasing knowledge?

Orange is about being part of an entrepreneurial and technological society - initiative, making thinking and processes visible (meta-cognition), problem solvers, investigators, empowered to live in a complex world. We have habits of mind for successful people but do we need qualities of being for soulful people?

Green brings together criticality, caring and community - looking at ways of building human capacity and contribution in an emancipated postmodern society. But in its anxiousness to be inclusive it can often marginalise the more traditional ways of knowing, being and learning.

Yellow tries to find what is valuable in all, and to find ways of enabling conversations between disconnected voices.

Perhaps the ELS curriculum represents a "mature" expression of the green paradigm for educational transformation. The journey and "lived experience" of those who participated in the implementation of the ELS are as important as the artifacts of that experience - the curriculum documents. How might we be capturing those experiences for others to incorporate into their own journeys? Can we have a sense of where our individual journeys and tensions sit when we use a model such as this? Were we trying to move too quickly between the different paradigm spaces?

And is this mapping of the ELS onto a paradigm model like this too simplistic? Absolutely! However, in trying to name it and see the patterns enables me to "let go" of many of my agendas and perhaps look back with greater perspective. Thus enabling me to wonder in new ways. Is it useful for you?

So come and play the Snakes and Ladders game with me...

1. Start at the bottom and develop hard-won knowledge
2. Choose to be on the leading edge OR wait to see how things are going before deciding to join
3. Choose whether you stop for a while and integrate, or push on
4. See who you are bringing with you and who you might be alienating
5. Become aware of how cultural paradigms shape you. Be aware of how your own journey is a symptom of society - its needs, dreams, concerns - and everyone is an important part of the system's message
6. If you have fallen behind, beware of jumping too far ahead without some of the mediating experiences which can help you master essential new skills, ways of thinking or being
7. Master the whole so you can move wherever you want.
8. If you fall down a snake - don't panic - it happens to everyone. Look for others who might help you re-frame your experiences so you can use your hard-won wisdom.
9. Be part of continuing conversations
   

The new ELS story = we can contribute our collective wisdom to the world????

Photo: Margaret Wertheim - Institute For Figuring hyperbolic crochet corals and anemones

Developing a community of practice - part 2

In this post I describe my tute for my second group of pre-service teachers in the Professional Studies unit. It follows on from the last post where I reflected on my tuturial for my first group.

Last post I said the first tute seemed to confirm my sense of vocation for teaching teachers; the second made me seriously doubt it. I left feeling I had a lot of cheek standing up in front of prospective teachers and believing that who I was and what I knew was in anyway aligned to what they wanted and needed - which was to get out into prac with real students and real schools. I felt humbled.

Okay, so that was my typical angsty emotional response that Brookfield says we teachers can get into. Can critical reflection really stop the cycle of self-blame and help us into a a more useful perspective?

Some critical reflection

The whole experience brought back memories of my "difficult" maths students who had been so disempowered all through their schooling that they took on behaviours that continued to sabotage their learning. When I invited them to have a voice, debrief about past injustices and be part of negotiating the processes and content for their own learning I opened a floodgate. Suddenly I was the recipient of pent up anger and resentment. And once that was out of the way, we could move on and develop real relationships and learn how to help each other tune onto learning.

So when I gave my second group of pre-service teachers an opportunity to "really" explore what sort of community practice they wanted a whole lot of stuff came out about their whole course:

• a sense of disempowerment,
• a concern that the census date (which locks you into paying fees for the course) was before the pracs - so students could not test whether teaching was for them,
• concern that they were just overwhlemed by content after content with no space to digest,
  
• concern that simple basic needs such as sufficient break to eat lunch, walk around etc was not factored into their timetables.

My topic is based on the notion "we teach who we are." When I stand up within a classroom in a building I am more than this me, who is teaching. I am part of the systemic whole; the policies, the buildings, the timetable, the lack of access to water. I am complicit in it all. And while I might stand up and try to model a critical constructivist teaching philosophy, the environment that I am in teaches something different. It stands for something different - it teaches who it is - which is perhaps not the modelling we want our pre-service teachers to take with them into schools.

When I asked the course co-ordinator whether the students could have access to filtered water (the water in the building is problematic) she said that they had asked the university previously and were refused, because the uni management wanted students to go down to the ref in the union buildings to get access to food and water - so encouraging centrality of student mixing. Hello? Isn't access to water a basic human right?

So really what we are talking here about is making visible the set of values that are guiding educational decisions. Brookfield suggestes we need to challenge the assumptions of such values. The value of student mixing might be a good one, but we need to also ask, "what might be diminished if we whole heartedly privilege this view?" Perhaps each value comes with an opposite. Our role as teachers is to see the dilemmas, and then see the greater landscape. so rather just staying in complicit holding patterns we can begin to challenge those greater factors which conspire to detract from learning.

Reflection on critical reflection

Moving into a critical reflection stance has left me militant, and full of flem. I want to rebel, make waves, stand up for the rights of others, treat issues at their source.

Calm down, calm down. Is there another way? What is whole, good and beautiful in what we do and how can we build on this?

Parker Parmer says we need to take responsibility in owning all of ourselves - the shadow as well as the light, the fears as well as our gifts. How does a whole organization do this?

I am left with a feeling of asking, what is me, what isn't me? What can I change, what do we need to change? I am into teaching primarily because I want to transform the world, evolve consciousness, help heal society. I know that means a commitment to my own transformative journey and a commitment to engaging with many reflective lenses that can help challenge me and move me into new perspectives and insights. How do I invite others to join me, because I need partners in helping to create social transformation.

First step, a water cooler in the the education building.

Image Creative Commons: Robillard

What is a community of practice?

Here are some ideas of what we might like a community of practice to be like. It is based on the work I am doing with university lecturers who are examining new ways to be leaders of professional learning.

"Supporting each other to be that change"

A community of practice connects us to others who enrich our thinking and being.

A community of practice draws on processes we know for building successful relationships and community.

A community of practice is a place which values exploring, taking risks and moving out of comfort zones, rather than just achieving practical outcomes. As we do so the tensions and contradictions that exist become more visible. We value the dilemmas as opportunities to dig deeper into the truth behind things. We value the support to try on new roles, new lenses and see how they feel.

A community of practice is a place which is open, enabling diversity, playfulness and honesty. It allows us to speak from the heart and to be personal. It awakens our deep humanity. In this place we learn to listen well as a way of valuing another. We learn to give people space to process. We learn to tune into the moment.

A community of practice is a place where we can be vulnerable. It is place where we can open ourselves to experiences that can challenge who we think we are. It is a place where we can share our issues, our doubts and our fears. It is a place where we know we are supported as we engage in a process of self-reflection, letting go, emergence and transformation.

A community of practice is a place where we offer our stories for deeper exploration of meaning. It is a place where we are developing a shared language that enables us to name and tease out the complexity of issues in new and insightful ways. It is a place which celebrates the journey we are on together yet honours the individual journeys and the individual steps.

A community of practice is a place where we value difference. We honour the unique experiences and perspectives each person brings, inviting each to share their wisdom and resources. We find ourselves saying “and… “, not “but…”.

A community of practice is a place which nurtures and renews. It builds on who we are, what we believe and what we do. It models the environment we want to create and allows us to practice being who we aspire to be. It can be a physical place where we meet. It can be the place in our own hearts that we have for the other. It is a place where we enjoy the ability to contribute to a greater whole.

A community of practice provides a sense of communion. It creates cohesiveness. It enables a coming to know another though being with them and sharing their stories. It is a place where we are at home with ourselves. It is a place where we glimpse our own gifts through seeing and receiving the gifts of others.

What do you think? What might you add, change? What do your communities of practice look like?

What might a community of practice look like which evolves?