Collaboration

The second week of school is coming to a close and we are in full swing. I find myself thinking back to a reflection from those lovely days of professional development, before the children arrive and reality sets in. These are the few precious moments we have to set resolutions with a clear mind. Before all is muddied by logistics. The three weeks of in-service training cuts into our summer vacation, but is a true gift to the staff. I am flummoxed as to why every school doesn't construct a similar experience for their educators.

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It is the last Tuesday in August. Students return to our classrooms one week from today. We returned to the building two weeks ago for an intensive orientation where we spent our days thinking about our mission and instructional focus, our practice, our curriculum, our students.  We started each day with a morning meeting in small groups, playing games and laughing together. We went out to lunch with colleagues we may not see again until June. We have been busy, but it’s time to get down to business.

This afternoon we close our final day together with an hour of reflection. We silently wander the halls and take time to review the dozens of posters we have produced on post-it chart paper over the past two weeks. We look over notes, think about the many difficult (and inspiring) conversations that we’ve had, and ask ourselves: So what? What will this look like when they arrive. It is, after all, all about the students.

My task is to synthesize what I have experienced in this orientation and articulate some “take aways.” I will write a letter to myself. I will create a bumper sticker with one pithy statement to take with me and share with others.

So what?

For me it all comes back to our mission:

To nurture a diverse group of students to become lifelong, active participants in their own education, develop a sense of self and community, and become responsible, compassionate members of society.

We start each of our professional development sessions by reciting the mission together. It is on the first slide of every PowerPoint presentation. And I want to make it live in my classroom. This is the first takeaway: keep the mission at the forefront of each action.

The past week has been surprisingly stressful. All should be good and easy this year compared to most (any?) years of teaching in the past. I have a solid teaching team, I know my students, I like the school, I have a great room. But this week I experienced one little glitch of not being able to access my old computer files until yesterday, and I felt paralyzed. I panicked. I couldn’t proceed until I had my files, and I lost a couple of days of prep time. I realized that I have already carved out little grooves in my practice, ruts that may be hard to escape if I do not remain flexible. The days ahead of us will require me to be responsive, tenacious, energetic, and thoughtful. There is no time for ruts. There will be problems this year, as with any, and I will need to be able to “solve” them… or at least work within them. This was the second takeaway: there is strength in flexibility.

I feel fortunate to finally work in a school that pushes and supports collaboration. They expect and encourage grade level teams to work together closely when planning and implementing instruction. I have a grade level teaching partner, an assistant teacher, a special educator who will be working exclusively with our grade, and a student support aide. While it is often difficult for me to work with others (I care too deeply about the opinions of others, and I am not decisive), I do not mind the challenge and know that the result is always better than what I would produce on my own. I do not work well in isolation. In my best teaching moments I have worked closely with another teacher to develop ideas together and share responsibilities of implementation.  Collaborating is not always efficient; it can be time consuming and difficult. But it is worth the effort.

I have worked on grade level teams where the extent of collaboration was sharing computer files and school supplies. I was not satisfied. My greatest concern is that in these two weeks we have not successfully laid a strong foundation for collaboration. That I will once again be on my own, each of us working in our own hemispheres. It is fine to share files and responsibilities, but I want to share ideas. And it is worth it to me to keep trying, even when there is not a shared vision in place. This is the final takeaway: I will not give up on any relationship.