By Jennifer Glasheen, SEEC Director of Teaching & Learning
As we tear off the last page of the 2017 calendar, I am once again reminded thatI am getting older! I finished my student teaching 19 years ago this month and what I have learned since then is overwhelming to be sure! One of the most important is to be a critical consumer of information and reflective of how to truly engage in continuous improvement that will impact students for the better.
As we all do, I have my biases - as a student, teacher, parent of three uniquely amazing kids, wife of an educator, and Director of Teaching and Learning at the SEEC - which have shaped who I am and how I engage in conversations about "the next big thing".
To be clear, I spend my days (and nights) trying to help schools make connections between seemingly competing initiatives and striving to develop supports for educators and schools that are practical, reasonable and doable. The questions I am faced with most often is
"What is going to make the greatest impact?" and
"How do we do it?"
In the complex world of education, the answers to these two questions are not always clear and to complicate things further, they are most certainly contextual to the school or system involved - which means simply that just because it works in one school doesn't always mean the exact same thing will work in another place.
So what do we do when faced with the new opportunities or flexibility to make positive changes in our schools? My hope is that educators engage in critical analysis of research, evidence-based practices and establish a solid foundation on which to build.
There has been a lot of BUZZ surrounding Innovation, Personalized Learning, and Competency-based education as the direction schools should move to prepare students to be Choice Ready in our state in the past year and a half. As we exercise our critical thinking muscles and make decisions about what this means in our schools and for our kids, I've provide some resources to consider.
