100 Posts in 100 Days
This post is part of a series that started with school relationships and various states of dependency. Through those posts, the threads of clarity and communication stood out. Which has led to 3 recommendations I have. This post is about the 2nd recommendation: A schoolwide culture of growth mindset. To read all the posts in this series, go to www.learningattheheart.com and start with post #71: Interdependence.
Your planning has been impeccable. You’ve applied all you know about planning a change or new initiative and you’ve communicated across the school. (See yesterday’s post, “Change Models and Frameworks”.) Your intentions are clear and articulated.
Now it’s time to execute the plan. What could happen?
Well, everything could go according to plan. Each person flawlessly fulfills his/her/their role and the intended results are achieved.
But, what if it doesn’t all go according to plan? What then?
The simple answer is this: You take action. You identify what the unexpected thing is, reflect on why it diverged from the original thinking, revise the steps and approaches, refocus your efforts, and try again. You monitor and adjust. It is the cycle of improvement.
This happened to me last night. I had a meal plan and a grocery list and headed off to the store. My list was for the next few days, but it was already dinner hour and I was hungry, so I wanted a “to go” meal for last night: California rolls and veggie rolls from the sushi counter. Only, all that the store had when I arrived were salmon rolls and salmon nigiri. I needed to adjust my plan. One option was to stay with sushi, albeit all salmon. Or do something different altogether. And since salmon was already on my list for another night, I opted for something different. I checked out the variety of fresh pastas and discovered an artichoke ravioli. Something I hadn’t even considered before I was forced to reconsider. It didn’t fully fit the “to go” criteria since it would have some prep, but it was minimal, it got me fed, and it offered the variety I wanted.
Respond to changing contexts and conditions is part of every day life, as my story about my dinner illustrates. Yet, here is something I have experienced as a school leader. In full disclosure, it’s something that has been a source of frustration at times. Let’s take the PLC example I started with yesterday:
The PLC plan started with our school leadership team digesting our schoolwide data and wanting to try something different in order to impact student achievement. We knew that if we tried the PLC approach, we would have some district support and resources available to us. We talked with schools in our district already doing the work and got some advice. We revised our initial plan.
We grew our audience by starting to talk with staff and hear their questions. We listened to their concerns and we revised our plan.
We went to the Solution Tree PLC at Work training. We developed a schedule and schoolwide recording tools, and we revised our plan again. We were now on at least the 3rd iteration.
We got started at our school site. We had training for all staff and the team meetings began. Some things started to come up: a teacher sick on their PLC meeting day (do we meet without that person or reschedule), missing or insufficient data to help us with initial analysis of student learning needs (how can we get the data we need), teachers who weren’t keeping pace with the rest of their team making ongoing progress monitoring a challenge (how can we help teachers stay on pace), and early student results that were less positive than we had anticipated (what else might we try). We revised our plan, again.
Suddenly, those revisions didn’t seem like revisions any more. Improving the plan was one thing. But this was implementation and those adjustments translated to changing behavior. Instead of a mindset of continuous improvement and problem solving, the updates were met with, “That’s not what you told us. That’s not what the plan says.” (See the Stages of Concern in the CBAM model from yesterday’s post.)
And, this is why my 2nd recommendation for achieving interdependence in a school is to cultivate a growth mindset.
Essentially, a growth mindset is holding the belief that abilities can be developed. (See Carol Dweck’s book Mindset: The New Psychology of Success.) I think that cultivating a growth mindset in a school means attending to a lot of “f’s” and “r’s”: first drafts, focus, failure, feedback, flexibility, reflection, refinement, refocus.
Over the years, I have observed teacher after teacher work with their students to develop this mindset in their learning. Entering a classroom where a growth mindset is prevalent is magical. The problem solving, perseverance, productive struggle, and pride in the work is palpable. (All those “p’s” were not intended, but since I already have the “f’s” and “r’s”, I’m going with it.)
If the teams in our school are to develop interdependence, which is a reciprocal relationship, then every member of those teams must live the growth mindset. As leaders, we must do all the “f’s” and “r’s” ourselves. We must create opportunities and environment for our teams to do all the “f’s” and “r’s”. We must normalize risking, failing, and persevering. After all, that IS learning and that IS improvement.
Individuals develop the growth mindset. I would offer that when groups of individuals develop a collective growth mindset they also develop grace. Those “f’s” and “r’s” (and “p’s”) are (insert “f’ing” or “really”) HARD! Interdependent teams and individuals support each other when feedback is hard to give or receive, when first drafts need improvement, when revisions are made, and when roles and responsibilities shift with those revisions. A growth mindset isn’t just for the students in our classrooms, it’s for each and every one of us. And when our teams can develop it together, we are one step closer to interdependence.