Exploding Leadership? The problem of igniting change...
So - my attempt at a blog prior to SLTcamp.
It's probably the English teacher in me, but on given the theme of 'igniting change', I'm immediately drawn to the language we use, as teachers and as leaders. I remember, for example, talking with one colleague who would repeatedly refer to efforts to improve learning and teaching as a 'crusade', 'a battle' or 'a campaign', with the vaguely sinister militaristic language revealing much about their fundamental conception of what leadership in schools is all about. Other typical examples of the language of leadership include such gems as 'driving change', 'driving up standards' and 'accelerating progress', all of which sound a bit Top Gear for my liking. 'Igniting' change - I'm not sure. Makes me think of... burns, maybe arson. It's a little bit explodey, a bit space-rockety for my liking. It seems to suggest a vision of the leader being the agent which brings light and power to the dulled masses, sparking off a firework display of professional growth and success through the illuminating brilliance of their input, and in my experience so far, it's just not like that.
My own early leadership experiences provide some useful case studies of clumsily trying to ignite change in a very leader-led, top down way. About seven years ago, I was appointed leader of an English faculty that was full of committed, experienced, successful teachers. It was clear within a few minutes of starting in the job that behaviour in lessons was something that we could improve; having come from a school with relatively strong behaviour systems, the obvious conclusion seemed to be that some change needed igniting round these here parts, and I was the guy to do it! In my old school, behaviour was great - surely all we needed to do was copy the same systems that I was used to, and that would be job done. I therefore made the classic leadership error of thinking that a 'good idea', presented via a powerpoint lecture in a faculty meeting, was exactly what was needed to light the tinder paper of success. Personally, I was excited: 'Ignition achieved - 10, 9, 8, here we go people, ready for LIFT OFF PEOPLE!' (thinking this, not actually saying it, let's be clear on that). Back in the real world, everyone nodded along - it was, to be fair, a beautiful presentation: animations not overdone, nothing tacky, tasteful colour scheme, the lot -, and I then sat back and watched as absolutely nothing changed. At all. No-one had any ownership of my 'good idea' but me and, I suppose, my old school but that didn't help much. This is what happens, I think, when leaders try to force change in a way which is non-consultative, led by one individual, and quick-fix - the hero, space rocket model of leadership which sees the leader as the bearer of wisdom, whose function is to generously share their compelling insights, thereby waking all the other poor buggers up from their relative professional slumber and MAKING EVERYTHING BETTER. Starting NOW!
These days, now that I have moved on from being Head of English (the year before all this new-fangled and, let's be honest, hideous Controlled Assessment system was brought in, so lucky lucky me), the approach we try to take at our school is characterised by sustaining focus on a very few areas of classroom practice; those which evidence suggests make the most difference. 'Good ideas', or at least new good ideas are therefore fairly rare - in a bid to avoid the draining initiative-overload of the past, we are trying to foster much more realistic and ultimately more profound change. An illustrative recent case study is the way we've tried to improve the use of models / success criteria in lessons. This seems to be a particularly significant aspect in our school as we have such a range of attainment on entry - the fact is that some of our students will be able to cope without the clarity and explicitness that modelling of quality is designed to provide, and they will still make reasonable progress. Others, who perhaps come from less literate or advantaged backgrounds, need to be shown what to do more carefully, and to have quality unpicked a little more, in order to give them access to success.
To try to engender actual change in this area, we've tried to just keep it at or near the top of the agenda in school, building training around it, referring to it in lesson observation feedback, sharing practice of successful examples from various subjects etc. Teachers have invested significant time and efforts in trying to develop their skills in this area, and we have seen some superb stuff. However, it's a slow process, for the simple reason that learning complex skills is slow, especially when you are dealing with the day-to-day, minute-to-minute demands of being a classroom teacher in a secondary school. If pushed on language, I'd have to go for something less exciting than is implied by a sparky 'ignition' - much more along the lines of smouldering, slow burning change, with leaders gently blowing on the embers from time to time and not getting frustrated and building a whole new fire when it seems that the first one has gone out.
Another fascinating aspect to all this change is the extent to which leaders deal with what Michael Fullan (actually, probably not him in the first instance, but anyway it's in his book) calls 'the implementation dip'. This refers to the fact that, as teachers are generally already at a level of competence and confidence in their work, by dint of the training and experience they've already had, any attempt to change practice is likely to result in a dip in performance for a while, before improvement is felt. This is all sensible, logical thinking - to get better we might need to get a bit worse in the short term, but it is kind of awkward when we are working in an educational context which seems to call for constant, smooth improvement and 'rapid progress' on every front. Our emphasis on modelling as described above exemplifies this well - very often, when a teacher who is not in the habit of regularly modelling for quality in tasks then tries to incorporate this strategy in their lessons, it won't go well for a while.Typically, teachers who haven't placed much emphasis in lessons on modelling may tend to over-complicate initially - to try to use models / success criteria which are too big or clunky, or lessons may become excessively teacher-led as the class are taken through the model in detail. There's the problem of ensuring that the model provided really does exemplify the summary of qualities provided in the success criteria - if not, then it gets confusing for students and can be counter-productive.
Ultimately, after considerable practice, failure, reflection, persistence and all that, it's usually a productive journey, and fluid, light touch, precise, interactive modelling of quality in tasks really does result in a much wider proportion of students being able to gain the satisfaction and fulfilment of producing excellent work. My point here, is simply that the journey to get to this worthy goal, is far from a leader-inspired flaring into life of dormant practice. Rather than an ignition of change, it comes from a 'recognition' (clever wordplay, thanks) that change is often a ponderous, lumbering dinosaur of a beast, and that, in the words of Bruce Hornsby and his Range, is just the way it is.
It's probably the English teacher in me, but on given the theme of 'igniting change', I'm immediately drawn to the language we use, as teachers and as leaders. I remember, for example, talking with one colleague who would repeatedly refer to efforts to improve learning and teaching as a 'crusade', 'a battle' or 'a campaign', with the vaguely sinister militaristic language revealing much about their fundamental conception of what leadership in schools is all about. Other typical examples of the language of leadership include such gems as 'driving change', 'driving up standards' and 'accelerating progress', all of which sound a bit Top Gear for my liking. 'Igniting' change - I'm not sure. Makes me think of... burns, maybe arson. It's a little bit explodey, a bit space-rockety for my liking. It seems to suggest a vision of the leader being the agent which brings light and power to the dulled masses, sparking off a firework display of professional growth and success through the illuminating brilliance of their input, and in my experience so far, it's just not like that.
My own early leadership experiences provide some useful case studies of clumsily trying to ignite change in a very leader-led, top down way. About seven years ago, I was appointed leader of an English faculty that was full of committed, experienced, successful teachers. It was clear within a few minutes of starting in the job that behaviour in lessons was something that we could improve; having come from a school with relatively strong behaviour systems, the obvious conclusion seemed to be that some change needed igniting round these here parts, and I was the guy to do it! In my old school, behaviour was great - surely all we needed to do was copy the same systems that I was used to, and that would be job done. I therefore made the classic leadership error of thinking that a 'good idea', presented via a powerpoint lecture in a faculty meeting, was exactly what was needed to light the tinder paper of success. Personally, I was excited: 'Ignition achieved - 10, 9, 8, here we go people, ready for LIFT OFF PEOPLE!' (thinking this, not actually saying it, let's be clear on that). Back in the real world, everyone nodded along - it was, to be fair, a beautiful presentation: animations not overdone, nothing tacky, tasteful colour scheme, the lot -, and I then sat back and watched as absolutely nothing changed. At all. No-one had any ownership of my 'good idea' but me and, I suppose, my old school but that didn't help much. This is what happens, I think, when leaders try to force change in a way which is non-consultative, led by one individual, and quick-fix - the hero, space rocket model of leadership which sees the leader as the bearer of wisdom, whose function is to generously share their compelling insights, thereby waking all the other poor buggers up from their relative professional slumber and MAKING EVERYTHING BETTER. Starting NOW!
These days, now that I have moved on from being Head of English (the year before all this new-fangled and, let's be honest, hideous Controlled Assessment system was brought in, so lucky lucky me), the approach we try to take at our school is characterised by sustaining focus on a very few areas of classroom practice; those which evidence suggests make the most difference. 'Good ideas', or at least new good ideas are therefore fairly rare - in a bid to avoid the draining initiative-overload of the past, we are trying to foster much more realistic and ultimately more profound change. An illustrative recent case study is the way we've tried to improve the use of models / success criteria in lessons. This seems to be a particularly significant aspect in our school as we have such a range of attainment on entry - the fact is that some of our students will be able to cope without the clarity and explicitness that modelling of quality is designed to provide, and they will still make reasonable progress. Others, who perhaps come from less literate or advantaged backgrounds, need to be shown what to do more carefully, and to have quality unpicked a little more, in order to give them access to success.
To try to engender actual change in this area, we've tried to just keep it at or near the top of the agenda in school, building training around it, referring to it in lesson observation feedback, sharing practice of successful examples from various subjects etc. Teachers have invested significant time and efforts in trying to develop their skills in this area, and we have seen some superb stuff. However, it's a slow process, for the simple reason that learning complex skills is slow, especially when you are dealing with the day-to-day, minute-to-minute demands of being a classroom teacher in a secondary school. If pushed on language, I'd have to go for something less exciting than is implied by a sparky 'ignition' - much more along the lines of smouldering, slow burning change, with leaders gently blowing on the embers from time to time and not getting frustrated and building a whole new fire when it seems that the first one has gone out.
Another fascinating aspect to all this change is the extent to which leaders deal with what Michael Fullan (actually, probably not him in the first instance, but anyway it's in his book) calls 'the implementation dip'. This refers to the fact that, as teachers are generally already at a level of competence and confidence in their work, by dint of the training and experience they've already had, any attempt to change practice is likely to result in a dip in performance for a while, before improvement is felt. This is all sensible, logical thinking - to get better we might need to get a bit worse in the short term, but it is kind of awkward when we are working in an educational context which seems to call for constant, smooth improvement and 'rapid progress' on every front. Our emphasis on modelling as described above exemplifies this well - very often, when a teacher who is not in the habit of regularly modelling for quality in tasks then tries to incorporate this strategy in their lessons, it won't go well for a while.Typically, teachers who haven't placed much emphasis in lessons on modelling may tend to over-complicate initially - to try to use models / success criteria which are too big or clunky, or lessons may become excessively teacher-led as the class are taken through the model in detail. There's the problem of ensuring that the model provided really does exemplify the summary of qualities provided in the success criteria - if not, then it gets confusing for students and can be counter-productive.
Ultimately, after considerable practice, failure, reflection, persistence and all that, it's usually a productive journey, and fluid, light touch, precise, interactive modelling of quality in tasks really does result in a much wider proportion of students being able to gain the satisfaction and fulfilment of producing excellent work. My point here, is simply that the journey to get to this worthy goal, is far from a leader-inspired flaring into life of dormant practice. Rather than an ignition of change, it comes from a 'recognition' (clever wordplay, thanks) that change is often a ponderous, lumbering dinosaur of a beast, and that, in the words of Bruce Hornsby and his Range, is just the way it is.
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