Question 1: During the first face to face we used the language of Urgent vs Important to help frame our discussions and thinking around the use TIME. Reflect on why you joined Cohort 21 and your professional goals for this year. Now that the year has begun and you have met your students what IMPORTANT goal might you like to address and leverage this community to get support with.
Time. I imagine time as one of the most common items featured atop wish-lists of those in the education world. A large number of the conversations I’ve had with colleagues over my career have focused on time in some fashion. Laments like ‘there’s not enough time to do this right!’ or ‘I wish I had more time for fill in the blank’ often comes up in some form or another. I don’t think that I’m alone in thinking that each new school year is another opportunity to wrestle back some control from the hands of time and make ‘more time’ for what I’ve deemed important for my students. Holly made such an accurate statement in her blog reflection in regards to how quickly educators start to feel the pull from urgent activities as October comes to a close and November creeps in. It’s easy to lose sight of the important activities when so many urgent activities pile up. I’ve often found myself considering Eisenhower’s principle this school year and fighting to make more time for the important while at the same time turning down the volume on those activities that fall into the not important and not urgent pile. I strongly feel the matrix is a fantastic tool to help consider how we truly manage our time day in and day out.
As for my important goal for this school year, I would like to leverage this wonderful community for continued support on how best to build inclusive, meaningful relationships with my students that consider best teaching practices and how to best support student wellness and academic success. One of the reasons I was so drawn to Cohort 21 was the enjoyment I feel when learning something new from like-minded educators. There’s something special that happens when you put a bunch of educators into a room or even within the confines of a zoom call and you then share with them the gift of time to think about best practice. I always enjoy that positive, professional jealousy that comes from learning a new skill, learning tool, or strategy that leaves me thinking, ‘I wish I’d known about that before!’
Question 2: Which of the Season 10 Strands did you choose and why? Share what you feel is both urgent and important about it for you and your school at the moment and some of the questions you have around moving forward. Feel free to change strands should you want to.
To be honest, I struggled choosing just one strand to focus on. I believe that the increased attention to DEIJ is long overdue and is both urgent and important for all stakeholders across education to focus on. My hope is that by choosing to inquire into how we as educators may best engage, support and assess our JK-6 learners both on campus and remote to help best support students wellness and academic success, that I can include a focus on DEIJ as part of the best practice in the process.
I strongly believe that many parents were reminded of the importance of on campus learning during the last two years. I also believe it also became abundantly clear that remote learning was vital in allowing students and teachers to remain connected in challenging times. As difficult as it may have been at times, I’m not sure I’d want to imagine what the alternative may have looked like if remote learning was not an option.
As for what I feel is urgent within this strand, student wellbeing rises to the forefront. I think it is fair to say that every student had a different experience while online during remote learning. While some students were able to thrive during remote learning, it was clear that it was a tough experience for many. It’s also clear that a return to campus has been easier for some students, while some have really struggled to adjust to life back on campus. The focus on wellbeing needs to stay. As for what is important, I hope to dive further into discussing, evaluating, and learning assessment strategies and learning tools that best support student learning regardless of whether students are on campus or remote.
So glad you joined Cohort 21! Looking forward to your posts.
@mblack Looking forward to your response on our first two Season 10 prompts. Here is a video explaining how https://bit.ly/c21season10firstpost
@nblair @gnichols
Thank you Justin! My bad, I read the deadline as before the end of November 15th and not before November 15th. It looks as though Post # 1 is in the books now though. Enjoy!
@mblack Not at all 🙂 I had set aside the long weekend to leave feedback on all the blogs so this was just a soft reminder. All deadlines are soft here at Cohort 21
Yes, Monday was a great day to catch up on some work after a nice long weekend. I hope that you were able to catch some rest along the way as well. I’m looking very forward to our next F2F this Saturday!
@mblack. I hope you are well! If there is anything I can do to help/support, just let me know!
Thank you Leslie! I hope that all is well on your end as well.