Written by All students, no matter their age, cycle through stages of learning. During my MA, I was introduced to the Competence Cycles. I think they’re pretty neat, so I’ve included a brief description below.
Most learners begin in the ‘Unconscious Incompetence’ stage. This is where they don’t know what they don’t know. Ignorance is bliss? Next it’s ‘Conscious Incompetence.’ This is where you start to figure out what you don’t know. Stage 3 is ‘Conscious Competence.’ That’s a pretty nice place to be. You know what you know and you’re competent at it. Finally, there’s stage 4: ‘Unconscious Competence.’ This is where you’re so competent, you don’t even need to think about it anymore.
You might wonder why I’ve brought this up. At the Cohort21‘s 3rd Face to Face session, it’s been a great experience to think deeply about my action research question : “How can I best facilitate a rich, professional learning culture for faculty, to improve student learning at RLC?”
I’d never really thought about the ‘problem’ leading to my action research, and it struck me that in terms of best practice, a lot of the time I, and many other teachers and administrators, just don’t know what we don’t know. Don’t get me wrong. We’re not incompetent! Far from that! As I mentioned in my previous post, we’ve made a lot of progress in the past 2 years. Cohort21 has been a great way learn more about what’s out there and theories about integrating tech into education. We all have the potential to be even more competent, but if we don’t know what we don’t’ know, it’s hard to get there. I’d like to help change that.
That’s what my action plan is really all about.
1. Immediate Next Steps
– set up a timeline to break things down into manageable chunks (meet with Headmaster, sketch out a 3 month, 6 month, 1, 3 and 5 year plan)
– connect with Garth and Justin and Les and Joe Smith regarding what they’ve done and are doing in their schools
– create a survey which solicits feedback from teachers on PD preferences
– do some research on PLN’s
2.When will I publish next?
– I will publish again by March Break
3. How will I present my findings?
– I’m not exactly sure on this one yet. Probably some sort of Prezi/Powerpoint
What a great action plan.
Bookmark this – https://www.edsurge.com/professional-development
Cohort 21 will be a perfect place to “mine” answers to the question “What are other schools doing”.
You came to the right place 🙂
J
Hi Justin,
Thanks for all the great resources!
I was feeling consciously incompetent about knowing where to start, so these are perfect. I do intend to ‘mine’ you and others for info, so watch out!
Hi Meg,
I loved reading about the cycle of competencies. This makes so much sense! It’s funny though, because in many ways I feel like with teaching, you might be feeling competent around, say, assessment, but maybe still unconsciously incompetent when it comes to, oh say “redefined use of technology”. We can be both things at the same time in this practice because there is so much to master.
Have you had a chance to connect with @jmott? Your action plans are vaguely similar and you might have some notes to share with each other. John should definitely read some of your questions and see if there is any wisdom he can share!
Let the brain picking begin!
Hi Celeste,
Thanks for reading and commenting on my post. Your comment about being competent in some areas while incompetent in others is so true! I have yet to connect with John; thank you for putting us in touch.
Hi Meg,
Thanks for sharing the cycles of competency! I would welcome any articles you explored while doing your MA. I am exploring a similar plan at LCS, and have tagged the same people to touch base with.
Brent and I have just put out a survey as to when people would like to explore pd options – lunch, prep, before, after school, weekend. It would be great to touch base with respect to results and what you have in your survey. Want to collaborate via Forms?
It’s exciting to see so many exploring PD in one way or another this year! Say hey to Aaron and Benji for me please! Looking forward to connecting with you!
Hi Meg’,
For many administration, PD is a moving target. The most valuable thing that I’ve understood from my time and research is that PD must make sense. It must make sense to the school as a whole, Admin’, middle-admin, teacher-leaders, teachers, students and parents. You have to be able to explain the direction and rationale for PD – the time, money and energy that teachers put into, and what is expected afterwards.
“We are working towards…”, “We are learning more about”, “We are delivering on…” etc… are great phrases.
I think you’re starting in the right place – with the overall direction of the school. I’m constantly reminding myself of where BVG is now, and where and WHY we want to get there. Speaking of which, I suggest the book “Start with Why” – it’s a quick read and reinforces that “Why” is something all stakeholders will ask when you ask them to participate in PD.
Love it! Can’t wait to connect,
garth.
Hey Meg,
I hadn’t heard of cycles of competency before, and I’m glad to have been introduced to the concept – thank you! It fits in nicely with the Design Thinking approach because again it really focuses on the user and their needs. That’s why I think your plan of starting with a survey for staff is a great idea. There’s also a good chance that you might find some leverageable expertise within your staff that you didn’t know existed. Building on what @gnichols mentioned, buy-in from your users will be important, but if you make an effort to understand their needs then they will take ownership of it (much like we do with our students). Carefully crafting those survey questions and then sharing the results with the teachers sounds like a good place to start. I look forward to seeing how you progress!
Les