What Would You do if You Weren't Afraid?

Lisa Weiss contributed this post. Click here to read more of Lisa's thinking.

I’ve been writing about difficult conversations over the past few months, and I wanted to do some thinking about a question (that I now consider to be a bit magical) that has influenced my ability to have critical conversations: What would you do if you weren’t afraid?

About 10-15 years ago, when I was teaching middle school students, a few of my students were reading book called Who Moved my Cheese for Teens. I never read it, but recall having conversations with Jeremy about why he was reading it, and what was keeping him interested because it was not a book/student match I would have made; I was surprised he was reading it based on the content he shared with me. Imagine my surprise, years later, when a question from that text was shared in a coaching capacity…What would you do if you weren’t afraid?

I ask that question of myself in my personal and professional life quite often, and have used it with coaches and teachers. I think it’s a revealing question, and a question that comes to mind as I’ve been writing about courageous conversations because it exposes my heart, my beliefs, my values...which positions my thinking when I need to hold kind, but critical conversations.

It’s a grounding question, one that I respond to quickly; it’s fascinating how quickly the answer comes. What I have come to learn about myself, by looking for patterns in my responses, is that I will  always do what I believe to be right for kids! I see myself as an advocate, which makes crucial conversations a bit easier, because I understand the importance the conversation holds for students.

What is even more interesting about the question is that it puts me in a position to consider all that I am worried about in each situation, revealing my true fears. They are typically people-related. I don’t want to ruin a relationship I value, I’m worried this person will get upset, I don’t want to add stress to this person’s life, etc. Sometimes my fears are not about relationships, but the point is that there is much to learn about yourself (and what you stand for as a coach) when you look for patterns in your gut reactions to the question, and spend some time reflecting on your fears.

This analysis solidifies what is important to you, and  what you are willing to do to protect what you value, or get to a desired state...

In the book, which I eventually skimmed through when I learned about this question, the authors claim that once you identify the action (what you would do if you were not afraid), happiness will come. I’ve considered that, and I think it is true to some extent...perhaps an ease comes because you know what you need to do, or really want to do, and then you begin to plan for that action. That planning and anticipating can still be stressful, but sometimes just making a decision and working through the next steps can bring about some sense of peace. It’s also sometimes stressful until the conversation takes place, but then, afterward, it has been my experience, no matter the outcome of the conversation, peace returns. I like to think the happiness is there because I have done what needed to be done, that I struggled through something difficult, advocating for students, and came out of it knowing more about myself, having grown as a coach, and had impact on a teacher who will make positive moves for students.

Try out the question, and experience what I am talking about. Think about a situation you are struggling with, and ask yourself the question: What would I do if I wasn’t afraid? Start writing your response, and see what you learn about yourself...

What Are You Reading: March 2016

We believe it is important for educators to be readers and writers, so every month we take a day to report out on what we're reading. Join in by sharing your current reading list in the comments.

Maggie is reading Courage for Beginners by Karen Harrington. Maggie explains, "This is a sweet story of courage, friendship, and finding your way through middle school. Mysti has an agoraphobic mother who doesn't leave the house, and at the end of summer, her father has a bad accident and ends up in the hospital for an extended period of time. As a result, Mysti ends up taking on the role of provider and dealing with some big challenges during her seventh grade year. This story is a great reminder that we don't always know as teachers what our students are dealing with outside of our classroom."

Jaimie says, "I'm actually reading What's Math Got To Do With It?  by Jo Boaler. Yes, a 'math' book. :)  I am a part of a book study.  I am finding the book very interesting.  The concepts and instructional strategies that Boaler recommends, I find very easy to relate to literacy.  It is neat making the connections between the two contents."

Sharon says

Sharon is reading RTI - Roadmap for School Leaders - Plan and Go by Tom Hierck and Chris Weber. Sharon says, "I really got to thinking, we keep looking at Tier 2 and Tier 3 trying new interventions in order to move those students up/out of our groups.  Are there other ways to look at RTI? This book explains why Tier 1 is the most important tier and informs all RTI decisions."

Heather is reading An Elephant in the Garden by Michael Morpurgo. Heather describes it as, ". . . a young adult book that takes place during WWII.  This book is a story of saving an elephant from the zoo, who is going to kill all their big and dangerous animals before they are bombed."

Andrea just added Jennifer Abrams's Hard Conversations Unpacked:  The Who's the Where's and the What-ifs  by Jennifer Abrams to her pile. She says, "I haven't actually started to dig into it yet, but I can say that it looks like it really focuses on how to provide feedback that will help us grow.  I'm also interested in the fact that she addresses how race, culture, gender and generational filters influence perceptions and offers ideas on how to account for them."

Barb finished My Grandmother Asked Me to Tell You She's Sorry by Fredrik Backman. Barb says, "This was the inaugural choice for a book club my friend started. I only finished it because of the book club, and I have to admit that I liked it a lot better after talking with people about it."

Carrie (who is at home with a new baby!) just started The Love Song of Miss Queenie Hennessy by Rachel Joyce. Carrie says, "It is the companion novel to The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry. I'm excited to see the 'other' side of the story of the lost love between Harold and Queenie." 

Julie is reading I Am Reading: Nurturing Young Children’s Meaning Making and Joyful engagement with Any Book by Kathy Collins and Matt Glover. Julie says, "This book shows how to support and nurture the earliest of readers, before they can even read the words in a book."

Barb read most of Unmistakable Impact by Jim Knight. Barb says, "Unmistakable Impact discusses Knight's model for whole-school reform, with coaching as one component. I abandoned it for something that focused more specifically on coaching."

Maggie read Stonewall: Breaking Out in the Fight for Gay Rights by Ann Bausum. Maggie describes it as, ". . . an excellent nonfiction read that tells the story of the Stonewall Inn of Greenwich Village in New York and the Stonewall Riot that changed the course of history for gay rights. This is an engaging book that highlights significant events in the gay rights movement."

Maggie also read Stars Above by Marissa Meyer. Maggie says, "This is a collection of short stories from the author of The Lunar Chronicles and the stories are fun little missing chapters or prequels to the different books highlighting the back stories of the characters. I love it!"

Barb read George by Alex Gino. Barb says, "George tells the story of fourth-grader, George, who wants to play the part of Charlotte in her school's production of Charlotte's Web. This on-stage role is an opportunity for her family and classmates to see George as she sees herself - a female."

Mindset on My Mind: Chapter 5 Disco

Barb Novak contributed this post. She is reading Mindset by Carol Dweck and sharing her thinking about every chapter. Click here to read more of Barb's posts about mindset.

Chapter 5 was about the impact of fixed and growth mindsets in business. The information wasn't surprising - a leader with a growth mindset created a business that was financial successful and an enjoyable place to work.

The examples that were most stunning to me were those where the leader actually changed, learned, and grew along with their business and employees. The best examples were Welch (GE) and Mulcahy (Xerox). The director of human resources once spoke against a promotion for Welch, say Welch ". . . was arrogant, couldn't take criticism, and depended too much on his talent instead of hard work and his knowledgeable staff" (p. 127). Welch used this feedback to grow and, eventually, was selected as the CEO of GE because he "promised to develop" (p. 128).

Mulcahy - the only female executive discussed in this chapter - demonstrated her growth mindset by going "into an incredible learning mode, making herself the CEO Xerox needed to survive" (p. 131). She learned answers but also learned exactly who could provide answers she could not.

The business leaders with a growth mindset demonstrated the same "growth", "passion", and "gratitude" they wanted to cultivate within their organization.

What does this mean for education? Or for me as a leader?

It reminds me that we (whether a principal or a coach or a teacher or a parent) serve as models. Those around us internalize and act upon what they see us doing. Every gesture, facial expression, conversation, email, and action reveal something about our mindset. . . and the mindset we would like to cultivate in those around us.

Kindness - It's Not Just for Others

Artful quote from Alexandra Nelson's Instagram. Ali offers a monthly subscription of hand-drawn inspiration directly sent to your real mailbox.

I'm ending my week with an impossible list of things that still need to be accomplished and feeling a whole lot like I didn't do enough this week. I'm working hard to be kind to myself about everything I didn't get to - trying to practice some self love and self kindness.

To re-focus myself, I'm taking a few minutes to write a different kind of list this Friday:

Positive Things I Did for Myself This Week

• Went to yoga
• Found a mantra to focus on each time a certain stressful thing enters my mind
• Drank no soda
• Took a few vacation hours
• Recognized my limits in a social situation

Every day, extend yourself the same kindness and patience and positivity that you reserve for others. 

Comprehension Focus Groups: Using Reciprocal Teaching within the CFG

Heather Zimmerman contributed this post. Click here for more of Heather's thinking about comprehension focus groups.

October 2015 Hot Topics at UW-Oshkosh had Lori Oczkus as a keynote speaker.  After hearing her passionately talk about different strategies during her keynote, I was hooked and decided to stay for a session she had about reciprocal teaching.  I had heard of reciprocal teaching, but never implemented it in my classroom.  But after hearing Oczkus talk about the power of reciprocal teaching, I knew I had to implement it in my next Comprehension Focus Group (CFG).

Link to My Notes from the Conference

I thought my 7th grade group would benefit from Reciprocal Teaching the most.  I decided to use a graphic organizer- though she showed us this cool way to tear paper and use a sheet of paper.  I opted for a bit more writing space for my middle school students.  This was used during the informative unit where my students did some reading on the Middle Ages (before they started in social studies class).  

Link to Graphic Organizer

Oczkus talked a lot about puppets for the different roles, which I did not think my middle school students would find “cool”. I did use the Quincy the Questioner idea though- without the puppets.  My middle school students seemed to enjoy the idea of quizzing their friends.  

I thought using Reciprocal Teaching was effective in the CFG.  It provided an opportunity to review summary writing, and also through the “Clarifying” component, students were able to capture questions they still had for further research in phase 3 of the CFG.  

For those of you who are using CFGs, what graphic organizers or strategies have you found success with?

Building on Vitality

I recently read Bob Tschannen-Moran and Megan Tschannen-Moran's "The Coach and the Evaluator", an article for a 2011 issue of Educational Leadership. Click here (if you are a Wisconsin educator) and prefer to read the full-text PDF via Badgerlink.

Several paragraphs are about approaching coaching from a strengths-based perspective. Tschannen-Moran and Tschannen-Moran suggest that, "Strengths-based coaching conversations stay within three positive questions [bullets added for emphasis]:

• Where are the signs of vitality within a teacher's current practice?
• What can we learn from those signs about teacher strengths and capacities?
• How can we leverage that learning to invite new possibilities for teacher growth and change?" (2010, p. 16)

I've become a little obsessed with the power of these questions. It's not surprising because I'm also a little obsessed with the idea of approaching people as "naturally creative, resourceful, and whole", a concept from co-active coaching that Laura Gleisner introduced me to.


What do you think? How can these questions impact your coaching?

I See You, I Hear You (Part 2): How do students know we see and hear them as readers and writers?

Meghan Retallick contributed this post. It is the second part in a series. Click here for the first post.

My reflection around this question has grown in the last two months as a coaching cycle has developed into a full-scale action research project.  A few months ago, I began working with a high school social studies teacher to incorporate supports for struggling readers within in his 9th Grade Global Studies course.  We decided to try a push-in model of support by conferring with readers during the independent reading time he has incorporated into his class structure.  First, I cannot give him enough “props” for taking a risk three years ago and incorporating independent reading time into his classes.  Now all Global Studies teachers have used this model, so each freshman in our high school has this as a part of their Global Studies experience.  Our coaching goal is to refine this process and support students who are struggling with motivation, stamina, and engagement.

After reading Cathy Toll’s book on coaching, I decided that the opening conversation with students should take a similar approach as I get to know them as readers.  You can read my post from last month to find out what happened when I first introduced myself to students.  I do not have a daily relationship with them, so my questions must be ones that allow me to learn about who they are and direct our focus for conferring.  The two questions I opened with were:

• How do you view yourself as a reader?
• When you think about your success in reading, what gets in the way?

An amazing thing happened in the very first interview.  This student is one that has been talked about in teachers lounges as unmotivated, edgy, and sometimes defiant.  When I asked her these questions, she didn’t even bat an eye as she went into a detailed description about the differences for her as a reader outside of school vs. inside of school.  Her comments were living proof of all the research I’ve read about adolescent reading motivation.  Here was a student who has been written off by many tell me that her and her friends spend hours writing through an app, critiquing each other's work and publishing their work online.  She certainly sounded like a motivated writer to me!  

She shared her story in such a way that I could not capture in writing and do her justice, so she inspired me to take the next step in my conferring process--to audio record all my conversations with students.  This led to conversation after conversation of insights from students.  I still can’t believe how asking two simple questions opens the door to these conversations.

My work now is to put this together in a format to share with a large audience.  I was sharing my plan with a few other teachers from the high school and the assistant principal the other day.  The assistant principal asked me if most of the responses I heard from students were that they viewed themselves negatively as a reader.  I, surprisingly, have found that this is not the case.  Many students consider themselves to be okay readers if they are reading about something interesting to them.  What was clear to me from the interviews I’ve done is that many students don’t understand why they are reading what they are reading.  The purpose is unclear.  I was also surprised by the number of students that labeled themselves as lazy and unmotivated when it comes to school reading.  As one student said, “I know I could do more as my teacher tells me all the time.”  My response was, “What do you think is keeping you from doing more?”  This is the heart of what I would like to uncover with my continued interviews and research to find better ways to support both students and staff in increasing reading motivation.  

My biggest take-away from the initial start to this process is that two simple questions unlocked all of this thinking and further research.  In the first interview with students, those questions allow me to truly hear and see them as readers.  We can grow from that first meeting to set a goal and monitor their progress together.

As I continue this research, I can’t wait to see where it leads.  Look for more in my coming posts on how being culturally responsive fits into this process.

How do you show students that you see and hear them as readers and writers?