How can I get you to read my blog? Feel good news.

If you are a newspaper reader or a TV news watcher you are well aware that what you see is almost all the bad news. I always wanted to start a feel good newspaper, knowing very well it would NOT be popular. I actually found a feel good newspaper in Bali, of course! Than there is the onion news that you can read and watch at http://www.theonion.com/content/index This will give you a great laugh, but it is just making fun of all the bad news. Try  this video http://www.theonion.com/content/video/are_violent_video_games

CNN Heroes http://edition.cnn.com/SPECIALS/cnn.heroes/ is a great place to find feel good ideas that people are doing. You can nominate a 2010 hero! 

If you are one of the few who enjoys good news, than become a follower of the PEL Library Blog. Here you can read good news. You can even write to the author, ME, and suggest what you would like to hear and know more about. 

At this point, I have 9 followers on the PEL Library Blog. My own son is not even following it. If you want to motivate the author, ME, please log in and click follow. I wish to have 200 followers by the end of the year! 

Make my WISH come true!

BEING RESPONSIBLE WORLD CITIZEN NOW!

How can it be that every 3.5 seconds a person dies of hunger and WE HAVE enough food to feed the world? This is a question that the Pattimura Grade 5 students have been asking themselves, each other and their teachers. Java Feeding the Millions is a unit of study they have been working on for the last 4 weeks. This unit was introduced on a wiki that can be found at: http://javafeedingthemillions.pbworks.com/FrontPage
If you are an interested in logging on to this site, please contact rpolonsky@jisedu.or.id
Here is their task:

Dear JIS Grade 5 Students:
My name is Ibu Siti Pattimura. I work as an aid agency called FOOD FOR ALL or YAYASAN MAKANAN UNTUK SEMUA (YMUS) and we are trying to feed the world. As an aid agency we are looking for a group of experienced researchers to create a compelling "story" about hunger.
The author, Daniel Pink writes, "Stories can be healing." Throughout the ages children have been told stories by adults at times when they need guidance in order to cope with a difficult life situation. Stories teach us what is right and wrong. Stories are how we learn. YMUS would like your research group to create a compelling true "story" of hunger. We will use your presentation to:

1. Convince large companies and governments to improve conditions which lead to hunger.
2. Convince the public to give generously when they donate to our cause.

We are interested in hiring the research team that best expresses the facts of hunger in a compelling and empathetic way that speaks to all who view your presentation. YMUS knows that there is enough food to feed the world population, but still many men, women and children are hungry everyday.
You have 4 weeks to create a project to present to the Board of Directors of the Yayasan Makanan Untuk Semua.  Your teachers will divide you into groups for collaboration. See the pamphlet from the library about the "Six Easy Steps for Research Projects" to help you with this process.
This presentation must include the following information:
Background: This is where the team has to provide general information on hunger based on research that they have conducted during their inquiry. This portion of the presentation should demonstrate that you understand:

    * What hunger is?
    * The different causes of hunger
    * Why, despite there being enough food, people are still going hungry?
    * The different types of programs that are currently being used
    * Hunger from the perspective of person who you are trying to help
  
After you have researched your background information your group will decide on how they will present the information using appropriate visual media to engage your audience. Your team should include innovative suggestions of how to solve this global issue but understanding the steps may start small.
Remember the saying: “If you give a man a fish he will eat for a day, if you teach a man to fish they will eat for a life time.”
OR
“If you teach a man to fish, you feed him for a lifetime. If you teach a man to learn, you feed him for a lifetime and he doesn't have to only eat fish. ..."
OR
They don't need to be taught to fish-instead, they need an opportunity to break the cycle of poverty. (by Shawn http://uncultured.com/)
In four weeks time the Board of Directors  of YMUS will be here to experience your presentations.
Good Luck!
Sincerely Yours,
Ibu Siti Pattimura

The wiki has resources that include websites, videos and books to assist students in their research. It also includes the rubric on creativity and has information about how to research. The Pattimura TeLMS (technology & library media services) as a team have decided to introduce the first NETS-S standard on creativity. We want to thank Bindu Bammi a MS art teacher for her useful rubric that we changed slightly. The rubric was introduced to all the classes and gave them the vision of what to strive for.
The excitement and learning has been escalating over the last few weeks as students learning research skills, new technologies, how to collaborate and most important how can they be responsible world citizens!

Middle Leadership Workshop

: Nov. 14, 2009

Fieldworks

Mark J. Pam Harper, Howard Marshall

Started with a terrible slide: lots of words of outcomes

The why, what, how, when

Teaching leadership skills to kids. Can start age 5

Senior leaders vs middle leader: has to do with scope of accountability

Reflection is a key part of learning: 

sticky note: one side: a trait you have that is good for leadership

other side: what you need to be better at. 

Outcome of successful leadership:

Happiness: climate-how does it feel to work somewhere?

Provide a growth in students and teachers

Shared belief, vision and direction 

Strong sense of community

Positive school

Change: best practice

MOST IMPORTANT: positive impact on learning

What is your leadership job title? 

teacher librarian

restitution guru

environmental nut

Effective leaders: Vision, strategic issues, transformation, ends, people

Doing the right things: moral dimension, path making, complex -org. goes somewhere

Paul Buckley

Geoff Smith

Obama

Mandela

Monica G

Oprah

Effective Manager: implementation, operational, transaction, means, systems

Doing things right: value management, path following, clarity (transparency) org keeps going

Gordon Brown

Steve Jobs

Niall Nelson

Branson

Bill Gates

Warren Buffet

Both are important: different and complementary, each with its own function and characteristic activities and both are necessary for success.

Coordination: Doing things, path tidying, consistency
H. Gardner: Changing and transforming the mind the of people

NEED both leadership and management

Reflections: 

Where do you spend most of your time and effort?

Do you feel that you have the balance about right?

What do you bring to the role?

Michael Fullan: iceberg model-what you see, know, skill, what we don’t see (underwater) is attitudes, values, motives, beliefs, self-image. 

Goldman: EQ: key to leadership

self-awareness

Self management

social awareness

Relationship management: putting self in other shoes.

Manage perception: How do you manage the perception of what people think about your?

That you care about students and learning.

situational leadership: works one place but not another.

Praise: Who says to the leaders that you are doing a great job? 

Why should school ML in the 21st century be different from that in the 20th century?

Paradigm shift: Learning is more important than teaching

Distributed Leadership

What are the formal leadership roles in your schools?

Proteaus: greek god who could reform into different shapes and that is what the diagram of leadership may look like.

sustainable leadership spreads. It sustains as well as depends on the leadership of others.

Book about distributed leadership: University of Chicago:  Spillany, James

What do we know about distributed leadership in school?

What are the key messages from your experience?

Shared agreement of what is distributed leadership. Increase capacity of leadership. Can’t distribute accountability but responsibility.

Sharing jobs is delegating the jobs is not distribution. 

more about vision, belief.

Problems with distributed leadership

Collective accountability not individual delegation of tasks

lack of will to change

poor sense of team ship

little ability or desire to influence

leader not able to let go

Informal leaders: Have influence what is going on.

Where does this place. 

Personalized power

position of authority

influence

modeling

high trust

commitment

be professional

listen

a culture of learning

Attending a workshop on Middle Leadership in schools. Activity: Your team are the owners of a brand new school which will open next year with a full capacity of students (ages 4 to 18, 1000 students).
What leadership and management structures will you put into place at your new school.
What will the roles/positions within your structure be called?
How will it work and what are the reasons for your decisions?

Team name: Student` First

Consider leadership

Present ideas and thinking

Your presentation must last no longer than 4 minutes

no powerpoint presentations

you will be observed working as a team

Making it work as a team...

Did we have a plan?

Who was the leader in the team?

Team players?

Group and individual perspective?

Commitment?

Efficient v effective?

Reflective and review?

Also...

Learnt behavior of team members. What are your strengths?

Knowing what it feels like to be part of a successful team.

Managing meetings?

Pet PEEVES:

• Before: Late
• During: authority of decision making, roles?, a decision rather than the issue, no agenda, off task, monopolize the conversation, 
• After: Shoot the messenger, point of the meeting,

Before:

Each person has the responsibility for the success of the meeting.

Do we actually need to meet?

Purpose of the meeting: what is going to change/get better as a result of this meeting? (what does this have to do with student learning.

Norms needed

more...

Who, when, where, how long and what for?

Agendas: inform, discuss, decide...

Meeting preparation

Locate the power within the group

See the mind map handout of electronic agenda

During:

Decision making process:

Who is making this decision

What is the process for making this decision?

After:

Minutes

Action points

Next steps for direction of group

Evaluation of the process

BIG Question: What percentage of you meeting is about learning? What impact did/will your meeting have on learning?

Collins: Hedgehog is learning. Focus

How to do it>>>IN article given called HOW TO ORGANISE LEARNING-FOCUSED MEETINGS

HOW WILL THIS IMPROVE LEARNING?

IS THIS THE BEST US OF OUR TIME TO IMPROVE LEARNING?

IS OUR DECISION ABOUT THIS LIKELY TO IMPACT ON LEARNING IN ANY WAY?

TO BE CONTINUED

New Horizons

My husband and I are looking for new jobs. At the moment we are interviewing with a school in Accra, Ghana. Talk about learning!! They want me to be the High School Librarian! Yes, me. The very same person who was a kindergarten teacher for 25 years. The highest grade I taught was grade 3 until I worked in the library and now I teach grade 5. 
At first I was a bit amazed that they would ask, but than I realized just how exciting and new and fun it could all be. I may not have ever taught teens, but I have two boys who have been teenagers. In fact one still is. I have gotten to love working with teens and just think of the learning curve. I have to do my CSU Professional Experience coursework and hope to spend 10 day in the HS library with Matthew Schaffer, our new HS librarian. I guess I should also spend time with Kate Hodgson in the MS. The fact that over the last two years I have been doing my masters, gives me a "can do" attitude. Bring on the challenge!
The Lincoln Community School in Ghana http://www.lincoln.edu.gh/ is a small (600 kids) IB school in the city of Accra. Beaches close by and clean air. Accra, the capital of Ghana, is an English speaking, democratic, politically stable and economically growing country in West Africa. Along the Atlantic Coast are miles of palm-fringed beaches. The interior offers tropical forests, savannah, wildlife parks, and the culture of ancient African kingdoms. An array of African art and handicrafts can be found throughout the country. Accra (3.5 million people), is located on the Gulf of Guinea. It is a friendly and vibrant city. Its residents enjoy a tropical climate with a constant breeze, sunshine and clear air. The temperature ranges from 21-30 degrees celsius throughout the year.
Did you notice that I said "clean air" twice?