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San Diego, CA, US.

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San Diego, CA, US.

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A Fun Morning with Los Altos School District

Wednesday, Oct. 16, 2014

What an exciting and inspiring morning at Los Altos
School District.  Alyssa Gallagher,
Director of Strategic Initiatives and Community Partnerships arranged for us to
spend three hours with Superintendent
Jeff Baier, Assistant Superintendent of Curriculum and Instruction Nancy Davis,
District Technology Coach Erin Zaich, Innovative Strategies Coach Kami
Thordarson, and STEM Coach Karen Wilson.  Additionally, the Superintendent of Milpitas Unified School District,
Cary Matsuoka, joined us.  An added
bonus: we picked up our friend and Chief Provocateur, Grant Lichtman, at San
Jose Intl Airport so he could join in the collaboration with all of us!
We started off with introductions in their iLearn
Room.  Alyssa asked us to share an
“ah ha” on our innovation journey. We immediately knew we were among
people with a similar vision,and we felt right at home. 
After the D39C team shared the progress of our journey in
our new school, we then had the opportunity to select a topic for small group
dialogue.  The four themes that surfaced
where Rethinking Professional Learning, Culture and Climate, Blended Learning,
and Change.  The next hour and half was
lively and very beneficial to everyone.
I sat with Nancy and Erin to talk about Rethinking
Professional Learning.  We shared the
challenges of offering opportunities for our teachers to learn, and promoting
more widespread participation.  It was
exciting to think of the possibilities if our districts could define the
“sandbox” or overall focus, and then facilitate teachers as they
develop their own professional learning centered on our districts’ focus
areas.  We like the idea of teachers
taking the ownership, deciding what they need to know and learn more about,
what they need to let go in order to shift learning to students, and (most
exciting point) modeling the  learning
experience we are hoping for our students. 
We were intrigued about the notion of giving teachers a challenge to
develop time for more collaboration.  We
discussed the benefits of developing true collaborative skills and strategies
for all staff.  (I shared that I have
worked with The Thinking Collaborative, Maximizing Capacity in Individuals and
Organizations  http://www.thinkingcollaborative.com/).
Additional group summaries:

Culture and Climate
  • The importance of breaking down
    traditional mindsets and structures in order for real change and innovation in
    classrooms.
      How to make it sustainable throughout the
    district.
  • Everything speaks: labels of our spaces and title.  In order to change the way we teach, we need
    to change the way we label it.
  • Modeling
    the change at the district level, working with teachers, and the need to work
    with principals so they can lead the change at their sites.
  • Listening to students, using student voice to
    change culture and climate.
Blended Learning
  • What is wasn’t.  It has become kids in front of computers with
    headphones on, not truly blended.
  • It is
    truly a blended experience of integration of tech as a tool, direct
    instruction, design thinking, collaboration, and just in time learning.
  • It is difficult to lesson plan because it is
    much more organic.
     

Change
  • Changing
    how an organization initiates change
  • Finding ways to light more brushfires,
    rather than rewriting district strategic plan and hoping.
  • Examining our language and vocabulary to
    reveal what people truly believe about an organization.
     

It was so exciting to be with kindred spirits for the
morning, and we are excited about continuing this partnership.  Google Drive and Hangouts/Skype/FaceTime will
be our day to day tools to continue our dialogue, with a few visits sprinkled
in here and there!  We are very
appreciative of the time and energy Los Altos SD and Milpitas USD gave to us
this morning!

Sonya Wrisley

@Design39Campus

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