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by Heather M. F. Lyke
— This piece was first published in May 2020 by RPS Secondary Curriculum & Instruction --
There is an old adage that, “It takes a village to raise a child.” This year, I thought I’d try and grow the population of the specific village raising ‘my children’ (or, in my case, the 174 students I taught first semester) by widening the access my students have with adults in our community.
The First Community Collaboration
Some might assume—because I’m married to a social studies teacher or because I once had a job supporting social studies teachers—that I am well-versed in all things historical. This is far from true. While I love reading historical fiction and I’m well versed in certain literary and philosophical movements, that’s where my historical expertise ends. For this reason, when a colleague of mine pointed out that a local expert on the orphan trains of the early 1930’s was going to be giving a Community Education Class on the topic, I decided to reach out—see if she’d come in and work with my students.
My sophomores and I had started the school year off reading the novel Orphan Train by Christina Baker Kline. Not only do students love the snarky zest of the protagonist who happens to also be in high school, but this character’s world-view ties in well with our Native American Indian Literature state standards. Simultaneously, however, the other protagonist navigates a part of history my students and I knew very little about… So why not bring in a community expert? My students loved Dorothy Lund Nelson’s visit. She had done a lot of research and was passionate about her topic. She had students wear name tags and she talked to them as if they themselves were orphans in the early 1900’s. For the rest of the book, and occasionally throughout the rest of the year, students would reference her visit. Plus, she left a copy of The Home We Shared: History and Memoir of the North Dakota Children’s Home at Fargo, North Dakota behind for our students to share, and when we were still together in the classroom it was checked out often. 
The Next Community Collaboration
Working with Dorothy Lund Nelson is what got me started—and it led to a community connection that just keeps on giving: our Mayo High School collaboration with the Rochester Public Library (RPL).
We stumbled into this collaboration naturally because every Tuesday, when I would meet one-on-one with roughly a half-dozen students throughout the period to talk about what they were reading, I kept finding myself recommending audiobooks to my more reluctant readers and to my students struggling with fluency when reading aloud. Personally, being addicted to audiobooks, I was surprised by how many students were not aware of the audiobooks they had access to for free via our school library and via RPL. This prompted me to reach out to RPL and see if they’d have any interest coming and getting my students connected with library cards. Sarah Joynt, their librarian who does student outreach, was instantly on board. Joynt spent the day with me and my students. Each period, she shared with students some of the many online resources RPL provides, discussed some of the in-person opportunities that teens often enjoy at RPL, answered a wide variety of questions that students had, and then got those who wanted them set up with library cards (which she delivered to us about a month later). A high-energy presenter, students leaned in and listened to her every word. They ask questions about the Bookmobile and the BookBike, they wanted to know how to get jobs at RPL, they even wondered aloud if there were ways to get overdue fines waved (yes, by the way, there is). In fact, this collaboration went so well, that now all 10th graders at Mayo High School—not just those who have me as a teacher— have had Joynt come into their American Literature and Composition classrooms to share about RPL’s free resources. 
Here are a few snapshots of the magic that Joynt brought into my students’ lives:
Future Community Collaborations
There was a time in my teaching career where I though bringing in community members wasn’t worth the effort it would take. Well, color me a different color now. In both cases this year, reaching out was fast, easy, and simple. The benefits far outweigh any negatives that came with scheduling these visitors. In fact, I’m already making plans for next year—and I’m not just planning to bring back Lund Nelson and Joynt: I’ve already started lining up community experts in the field of writing to work with my Creative Writing students in the school year 2020-2021!
If nothing else has been verified by the pandemic, it is indeed that it does “take a village to raise a child.” I am heartened by, and lucky that, this year I took the time to expand my students’ village this past fall, because it certainly made this pandemic-spring a bit easier for them to navigate. We never know what the future has in store, so why not give our students as many connections as possible? And those connections can easily extend far beyond our classroom doors. UPDATE:
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by Heather M. F. Lyke
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As soon as Dessa’s voice hit the word slay in the third paragraph, I knew I had them. Even my most skeptical sophomore sat up a bit taller—took note. Clearly, this narrative exemplar was not what he and his classmates had been expecting. We were just about to finish our Telling It Like It Is unit in American Literature and Composition, and the grand finale was to craft a nonfiction, mini-memoir overflowing with description and—ideally—cleverly framed. What exemplar could be better than the chapter “Household Magnets” from Dessa’s book My Own Devices? Oh. Wait. The audio version where Dessa herself reads her own words.  image from www.dessawander.com
Honestly, most were leaning in, highlighters poised, right from the first sentence: “Mayo Clinic is a world famous hospital in Rochester, Minnesota.” After all, at the time I was teaching in Rochester, Minnesota, at a high school named after the famous clinic where many of my students’ parents were gainfully employed.
But, to hear the author herself use language like what students used in the hallways--slay, punk kid, s’pose—in an American Literature class was novel enough that even the cynical took note. Success!
My own students discovered what many educators know, and yet that many educators forget.
“The world is not organized like a university, with its sharply demarcated departments. There is one world, which we can (and should) approach from many perspectives. Dessa’s work is a great illustration of this principle.”
My students were expecting American Literature to be something that it is not. Stagnant. Isolated. Lacking soul.
The “transdisciplinarity of Dessa’s art and work make it well suited for rich conversation and analysis” that “allows educators to cross boundaries.”
In showing students how interlaced learning, content areas, and personal interests can be, it allowed them to break down their preconceived notions. This boundary-crossing approach is part of what makes learning “sticky” for students. According to John Hattie’s research, “Integrated Curricular Programming” has the effect of producing approximately a year and a quarter of growth, and “Creativity Programs” have an effect of producing over a year and a half of growth, when compared to an average school year. This is not how Hattie is meant to be read, but is our best approximation of simplifying his data.
“I teach English, but through that, my students learn Psychology, History, Cultural Context, and how everything ultimately connects together. The more connection between material we can make for our students, the more they will be able to see the full picture...It is not my job to tell them what to think, it’s my job to teach them how to think so they can make critical and informed decisions/ not be taken advantage of due to ignorance.”
In the same chapter I shared with my students, Dessa notes that for that day her “job was to talk about life as an indie musician, hopefully sparking some cross-disciplinary insights.” Yet, as the renaissance person that she is, Dessa manages to ‘spark cross-disciplinary insights’ even when she’s not necessarily trying to. As a rapper with a philosophy degree who once worked as a medical technical writer, it’s not surprising that her polymath skillset has her interweaving inspiration from across a wide spectrum into her vast portfolio of works.
Dessa’s work is beautiful, intellectual, witty - it speaks to me personally and is a great example to my Alternative Ed learners that you can weave your interests and your passions into your work. That the things we enjoy, like Rap, don’t have to be 180 degrees different from schoolwork, or your life’s work.
At the time I used “Household Magnets” with my students, I leaned on her references to local geography, to biological science, to kickdrums, as a way to ensure student interests. (You don’t like writing creatively, but you enjoy science? Well, maybe this will keep you listening! -- You don’t want to read a long piece by a dead white guy? Well here is a work of art created by a living, breathing, female rapper: so there!)
However, when I return to the classroom, I suspect I will do things differently. I missed a golden opportunity with this chapter. Rather than just hook the science-loving learners, what if I had collaborated with Mr. Devine on an analysis of the accuracy of Dessa’s biological descriptions in this section? Rather than simply connecting with the musicians in the classroom via the content covered, what if instead we had worked with Mr. Cole and Mr. Devine to do a side by side analysis of how a kick drum sounds in comparison to the beating of a heart? Perhaps, this is one of the most inspirational ways in which Dessa can push us to be better educators. She is never locked into the confines of one content area, so why should we be? Classroom Application Suggestions
by Third Eye Education, consolidated by Nick Truxal
Third Eye Education’s Core Collaborator’s February discussions have been rotating around “Human-Centered Design.” It’s been a blended conversation: covering the threads of voice, disparity, equity, practices of application, training, and onward. The following is our attempt at a concise representation of these discussions.
Overview
First, if you are new to the ideas of Human-Centered Design (HCD)…
Application
To return to the dangling click bait of an introductory quote, we do have a chance to establish new normals as we emerge from the pandemic. For example, Rochester Public Schools in Rochester, Minnesota is exploring establishing a Design Team: a group with diverse viewpoints and skill sets designated to solve problems from the large to the small in innovative ways. In exploring this idea with the Third Eye Collaborative, John Alberts pointed out the obvious: “We were attempting to solve the problem of how this team might function with traditional tools, while the team itself would be functioning through the lens of HCD.” This idea can apply to this article, and to Third Eye Education, as well. Why discuss Human-Centered design when we can apply it?
The Rules of the Room
The Third Eye
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My concept of storylining blends the phenomena-based storylining that science curriculums are moving towards (Illinois example), with the Montessori principles of a three-period lesson, the Visible Learning work of learning intentions and success criteria, and student inquiry-based, place-based, and experiential learning. I taught four sessions to interested teachers in our district this summer. Our teachers are using this as a tool for human-centered design in learning. All students have a voice in the storyline as they explore their interests and perspectives with success criteria.
Storylining Folder with Professional Development Links and Step-by-Step Guidance In our meeting, I recommended not thinking about just having one design team, but setting up a system where educational stakeholders rotate in and out of the design lab. Then, by using storylining as a tool the different stakeholders map the Ideate, Iterate, and Implement steps of Human-Centered Design in a way that tells a story of growth, voice and equity. Here is an example of how we are starting to track our story and growth. This is the skeleton of what we are building: Experience Mapping - Coaching and Transformational Documentation Tool |
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iteration
For the Iteration portion, we’ll share a tool that has been used with great success for improving specific lessons, but can be used on a systematic basis as well. Dover-Eyota Public Schools has been piloting it’s use for structured professional development communities for the last year.
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Step 1:
Identify a specific, actionable “teaching problem.” Use the above Ideation process, or others, to choose the problem.
Step 2:
Research why:
Step 3:
Design a lesson around a hypothetical fix with your instructional coach or with your team.
Step 4:
One teacher in your group teaches the hypothetical lesson; others come to observe...
Step 5:
Come back together with the entire team to make tweaks and improvements. Then, repeat steps 2-4 as needed. This is the true definition of iteration. |
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implementation
In January, Third Eye’s Core Collaborators explored the challenges of implementation. We’re still learning in this area, but consider checking out our initial thoughts in Five Steps for Successful Change: What We’re Trying to (Hopefully) Make Lasting Change.
The TLDR Takeaway
One of our Third Eye collaborators captured the crux of the issue this way: “Let’s not return to normal, because we all know it was terrible.”
Third Eye Education is a cohort of midwestern educational leaders seeking and sharing insight from educators, districts, & learner-focused communities.
Nick Truxal is the Teaching & Learning Director for Dover-Eyota Schools and the bass player for a number of Minnesota-based bands. |
by Victoria Gillis
Classrooms need to be safe places where students and teachers can teach and learn. One way to create a culture of caring in your classroom is to get to know the students and let them get to know you. Taking the time to create an atmosphere of trust helps you save time later in the year. Collaborative learning activities and small group work are more effective and efficient if you have taken the time to create a strong foundation for productive student interaction.
Two strategies that help students get to know each other as well as get to know themselves are featured below: the 'Biopoem' and 'What’s Easy/What’s Hard'.
Two strategies that help students get to know each other as well as get to know themselves are featured below: the 'Biopoem' and 'What’s Easy/What’s Hard'.
The Biopoem
This is an excellent creative writing strategy that can also be used to have students summarize their knowledge about a topic. An example of a Biopoem used to get acquainted is provided in this issue along with a pattern for the Biopoem. Feel free to adapt the Biopoem pattern to your own needs.
What’s Easy/What's Hard
Another strategy that is very helpful for both teachers and students is What’s Easy/What’s Hard. This is a kind of Think/Write that asks students to consider what is easy for them about a particular academic subject and what is hard. The act of reflecting on their own learning will help students to become more aware of their own learning and thus more metacognitive.
How to Use Relationship Building Strategies
When using any new writing strategy, provide students with an example of a good response. This helps students understand the task. With “Get to Know You” strategies, we are using writing to learn about students. Providing them with an example helps students get to know you. I always provide my own 'Biopoem' as well as my own 'What’s Easy/What’s Hard' for students when I introduce these strategies to students. They are provided for you above.
Some teachers like to use the 'Biopoem' or 'What’s Easy/What’s Hard' in a 'People Search' after students complete the assignment. To do a 'People Search', give students a specified amount of time, dependent on the number of students in class, and have them find one or more students with something in common with them. You could have students introduce each other, if time permits. In any case, some walking around and conversation time sets an expectation that students will participate.
Some teachers like to use the 'Biopoem' or 'What’s Easy/What’s Hard' in a 'People Search' after students complete the assignment. To do a 'People Search', give students a specified amount of time, dependent on the number of students in class, and have them find one or more students with something in common with them. You could have students introduce each other, if time permits. In any case, some walking around and conversation time sets an expectation that students will participate.
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Literacy for All | with Dr. Victoria Gillis & Dr. Lisa Jones-Moore | 2.15.2021
Gillis, Jones-Moore, and the Third Eye podcast team discuss shifting the thinking to students, reading in any discipline, and why literacy helps break out of educational silos. |
Victoria Gillis is a renowned discipline-specific reading researcher and co-author of Content Area Reading and Literacy: Succeeding in Today's Diverse Classrooms. Gillis taught disciplinary literacy courses at Clemson University for 20 years (now retired) and is currently the Wyoming Excellence in Education Literacy Chair at the University of Wyoming.
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What We’re Trying to (Hopefully) Make Lasting Change
by Third Eye Education, consolidated by Heather M. F. Lyke
A few years ago, my parents made a request: they wanted to celebrate their 50th anniversary not with a large party but with a family vacation. They wanted all three of their children along with each of their spouses, and their four grandchildren, to settle on one place to travel to together--much like the original five in the clan had done decades before with road trips to Michigan, Duluth, and Niagara Falls.
It took us two years to agree on what that vacation would look like and where it would take place.
One common struggle with any organization--education-based, familial, or otherwise--is to get the collective whole on board when there is a new initiative or a looming shift. This was one of the key items discussed by Third Eye Education's core collaborators this January. Together, we ended up creating a simple checklist to help us all move forward as we navigate future changes in each of our districts and organizations.
It took us two years to agree on what that vacation would look like and where it would take place.
One common struggle with any organization--education-based, familial, or otherwise--is to get the collective whole on board when there is a new initiative or a looming shift. This was one of the key items discussed by Third Eye Education's core collaborators this January. Together, we ended up creating a simple checklist to help us all move forward as we navigate future changes in each of our districts and organizations.
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Show Action Quickly on Something
When a goal seems far off, it’s sometimes hard to get traction. In Pine Island, for example, they celebrate as many ‘instant wins’ as they can when trying to make systemic and lasting change. Some changes may need workshopping, funding, or significant troubleshooting, but there are often at least pieces that can be acted on instantly. It can be something simple, like replacing the scented soaps in the bathroom with unscented or swapping out a keyboard to help mitigate a staff member’s arthritis pain.
In the case of a 5oth Anniversary celebration, we learned early on that most of us wanted to end up vacationing near water: the ocean, a river, a great lake, whatever. We discovered that almost the moment the idea was brought up by our parents, but we didn’t formalize it nor celebrate it. I can’t help but wonder how things would have materialized differently if we had.
In the case of a 5oth Anniversary celebration, we learned early on that most of us wanted to end up vacationing near water: the ocean, a river, a great lake, whatever. We discovered that almost the moment the idea was brought up by our parents, but we didn’t formalize it nor celebrate it. I can’t help but wonder how things would have materialized differently if we had.
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Elevate All Voices
This is in part why it took us so long to come together on a vacation plan: we weren’t communicating as a whole. It wasn’t clear who was to make the final decision and our planning conversations were often pocketed. Had we established from the beginning that all would have a say in the final decision, and had there been more collaborative conversations, I am certain we could have come to an agreement sooner.
When all know they were at least listened to, heard, and considered, it’s much easier and faster to get on board with the final product. Quick surveys, listening posts, feedback loops, or the creation of sub-committees are all little things that make a big impact. (Although, be wary of sub-committees, as sometimes the “divide and conquer” approach can create a false sense of collaboration and end up derailing the overall goal.)
When all know they were at least listened to, heard, and considered, it’s much easier and faster to get on board with the final product. Quick surveys, listening posts, feedback loops, or the creation of sub-committees are all little things that make a big impact. (Although, be wary of sub-committees, as sometimes the “divide and conquer” approach can create a false sense of collaboration and end up derailing the overall goal.)
Pro-tip: If too quick to wash away some individual’s ideas, it often feels the same as if that voice had not been heard at all. This is commonly seen when an initial idea or reaction is perceived as negative and is swept aside with a positive response (toxic positivity). Consider validating hesitations and struggles first, while also indicating how it could lead to a positive outcome.
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Get Others Involved in the Work
It’s been said that it’s hard to justify tearing down a fence you once helped to build.
My family ultimately decided, after years of back and forth, to have all four of our households meet in Glenwood Springs, Colorado for the anniversary celebration. What tipped the scale to a final decision? We started working together. When we started, each household was working on one idea, while each of the other households was doing the same: occasionally one household would share an idea with one other household. It wasn’t until all four households got together that we were able to come to a consensus.
When we work together as a cohesive team to create, to advance, and to change paths we share in the feeling of success. Often a more complex process, especially in the early stages of creating systems and laying groundwork, the long-lasting nature and self-sustaining elements that comes with this methodology is well worth the added work.
My family ultimately decided, after years of back and forth, to have all four of our households meet in Glenwood Springs, Colorado for the anniversary celebration. What tipped the scale to a final decision? We started working together. When we started, each household was working on one idea, while each of the other households was doing the same: occasionally one household would share an idea with one other household. It wasn’t until all four households got together that we were able to come to a consensus.
When we work together as a cohesive team to create, to advance, and to change paths we share in the feeling of success. Often a more complex process, especially in the early stages of creating systems and laying groundwork, the long-lasting nature and self-sustaining elements that comes with this methodology is well worth the added work.
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Be Sure there is Trust and Transparency
Perhaps this is the failure point in so many complex plans: sometimes all cards just have to be laid on the table, but that doesn’t often happen without trust. Limiting factors often have to be noted for success to be obtained. Is there a tight budget? Are there laws, codes, or regulations that need to be followed? Is there a specific timeline that needs to be followed?
Turned out, this was the tripping point that inevitably got in the way of us settling on a unifying satisfactory vacation location. For the longest time, none of the four households were transparent on how much they were comfortable spending. Plus, some members were envisioning all 12 of us in a house or cabin with shared common spaces while others expected separate hotel rooms where one could escape for downtime. In a family that never talked about money out in the open, and with us being half introverts and the other half extraverts, these invisible issues needed to be seen before moving forward.
But, how does one establish the trust needed for transparency to occur?
Turned out, this was the tripping point that inevitably got in the way of us settling on a unifying satisfactory vacation location. For the longest time, none of the four households were transparent on how much they were comfortable spending. Plus, some members were envisioning all 12 of us in a house or cabin with shared common spaces while others expected separate hotel rooms where one could escape for downtime. In a family that never talked about money out in the open, and with us being half introverts and the other half extraverts, these invisible issues needed to be seen before moving forward.
But, how does one establish the trust needed for transparency to occur?
- Individualized appreciation: thank you notes, individualized gift baskets, candy at a staff meeting--they all add up
- Authenticity: keep it real--appreciation isn’t felt if it’s inauthentic
- Vulnerability: if you want others to lay their cards on the table, you might have to lay yours down first
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Have a Public Celebration of Success
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For our family, we ultimately took that vacation: four flew, six drove, and two took the train but no matter how we got there, ultimately there were breakfast gatherings and family dinners, water slides and soaks in the hot springs, whitewater rafting and browsing in local shops. In the end, there was a celebration of my parents having spent 50 years together and a celebration of our growing family. It was a vacation I am certain none of us will forget.
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Heather's family in Colorado
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In the workplace, you’ll not likely all take a vacation together, but there are other ways to celebrate success. Pine Island commonly has large picnics offsite to celebrate the completion of a large initiative. Dover-Eyota loves doughnuts and delivers them to the classrooms of those who helped make greatness happen. From drawings to doughnuts, from meals to a morning coffee run there are many ways to celebrate a collective win.
We at Third Eye Education hope these five steps help you navigate your next big move. I know I’m certainly going to use these tips the next time we plan a collaborative, multi-family vacation.
Third Eye Education is a cohort of midwestern educational leaders seeking and sharing insight from educators, districts, & learner-focused communities.
Heather M. F. Lyke is the Teaching & Learning Specialist for Dover-Eyota Schools and author of numerous articles focusing on quality education.
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by Myron Dueck
I grew up in a small Canadian farming community about an hour and a half north of Grand Forks, North Dakota. The landscape was pretty flat--I could’ve sung along with the Who: “I can see for miles and miles and miles.”
I came to like two notable landmarks that broke the monotony: grain elevators and farm silos. Most dictionaries cite two definitions for silos. One, of course, is the tall cylindrical farm feature that is used to store grain or silage--a feature of many cattle farms. The second, which also has ties to my community and its proximity to the Canada-US border, is the military connotation of a silo: the underground chamber used to store a guided missile and the equipment used to fire it. According to the Grand Forks Herald (2015), by the late 1960s, northeastern North Dakota was home to 300 nuclear silos. I was born in 1972, and like so many others in my generation, I was inundated with news stories and movies that allowed me to, “grow up strong and proud, in the shadow of the mushroom cloud.” Thanks, Freddie.
As I looked around for various definitions of silos, I came across a third, metaphoric definition. Beyond food storage for domestic bovines and apocalyptic subterranean nukes there is:
I came to like two notable landmarks that broke the monotony: grain elevators and farm silos. Most dictionaries cite two definitions for silos. One, of course, is the tall cylindrical farm feature that is used to store grain or silage--a feature of many cattle farms. The second, which also has ties to my community and its proximity to the Canada-US border, is the military connotation of a silo: the underground chamber used to store a guided missile and the equipment used to fire it. According to the Grand Forks Herald (2015), by the late 1960s, northeastern North Dakota was home to 300 nuclear silos. I was born in 1972, and like so many others in my generation, I was inundated with news stories and movies that allowed me to, “grow up strong and proud, in the shadow of the mushroom cloud.” Thanks, Freddie.
As I looked around for various definitions of silos, I came across a third, metaphoric definition. Beyond food storage for domestic bovines and apocalyptic subterranean nukes there is:
An isolated grouping, department, etc., that functions apart from others especially in a way seen as hindering communication and cooperation
Wait a second…this sounds much more related to my contemporary existence--education
It’s time for me to admit it: too much of my educational career has been spent in the ‘school silo’. “Isolated, functioning apart from others, hindering communication…” was I the model for that definition? Was my classroom bugged?! Sure, I’ve read books, watched documentaries, and engaged in many conversations that were ‘outside’ of education per se, but somehow my NORAD radar was not homed in on the array of themes and lessons from the ‘real world’ that were applicable to my role as an educator. I was shielded by the walls of my classroom and set in my scholarly ways.
In their fascinating and relevant book A Beautiful Constraint: How To Transform Your Limitations Into Advantages, and Why It's Everyone's Business by Barden and Morgan (2015), we’re challenged to identify and break our ‘path dependence’ in order to solve seemingly unsolvable problems and, well, make our constraints beautiful. The authors point out that ‘path dependence’ can be formal, such as the myriad ‘how-to’ manuals and long-standing protocols and procedures to which we all adhere. On the other hand, ‘path dependence’ can “exist in a more informal, pervasive sense of “the way we do things around here”—the learned best practices, processes, values data sources and partners that people pay attention to” (page 38). Breaking path dependence requires us to look outside for new ideas.
I suppose there is a sort of collision occurring in my thinking that prompted me to write this article now, in January of 2021.
In their fascinating and relevant book A Beautiful Constraint: How To Transform Your Limitations Into Advantages, and Why It's Everyone's Business by Barden and Morgan (2015), we’re challenged to identify and break our ‘path dependence’ in order to solve seemingly unsolvable problems and, well, make our constraints beautiful. The authors point out that ‘path dependence’ can be formal, such as the myriad ‘how-to’ manuals and long-standing protocols and procedures to which we all adhere. On the other hand, ‘path dependence’ can “exist in a more informal, pervasive sense of “the way we do things around here”—the learned best practices, processes, values data sources and partners that people pay attention to” (page 38). Breaking path dependence requires us to look outside for new ideas.
I suppose there is a sort of collision occurring in my thinking that prompted me to write this article now, in January of 2021.
- We are living in the COVID silo, and the endless array of constraints brought upon by it. I don’t know of a year in my life that’s been more punctuated by the phrase, “we can’t do … like we used to”.
- I’m working once again in my school district as an administrator and we’ve had to look outside of our school for solutions, ideas, and support like never before.
- I am a dad of two high school students, and I am caught in a see-saw of emotions. On one hand, I’m frustrated that my kids, and their peers, are missing out on so many things they’d normally do. On the other hand, I catch myself thinking of Mark Barden’s recent comment to my leadership class that, “we may one day look at 2020 as a real gift--a time to world came together to solve a common problem…a dress rehearsal for how we can solve much bigger problems yet to come our way” (Zoom presentation, Summerland Secondary Schools Leadership class, October 22, 2020).
In any event, I think we need to look outside our school walls a little more often, rethink our constraints, in order to overcome the challenges inside those walls. When feeling there is no way out of a gripping limitation, instead of repeating, ‘we can’t…we can’t…we can’t’, Barden and Morgan offer nine strategies using the phrase, ‘we can if…’. One of these approaches suggests we venture outside of the silo:
WE CAN IF . . . WE ACCESS THE KNOWLEDGE OF . . .
In my latest book from ASCD entitled, Giving Students a Say: Smarter Assessment Practices to Empower and Engage, every chapter starts with an account of something outside of the education silo. One of those ideas would fall under the heading:
WE CAN IF . . . WE ACCESS THE KNOWLEDGE OF ADVERTISERS.
Take the ‘elevator pitch’--often defined as the encapsulation of an idea in time it would take to ride an elevator from one floor to another. Steve Jobs described Apple as “having the ability to take really complex technology and make it easy to understand and use by the end user” (Arthur, 2014). Imagine for a moment you were tasked with coming up with an elevator pitch for your classroom, department, school, or district and it had to be simple--a sentence or two. In 30 seconds or less, how would you sum up your purpose, your reason for being, your ‘why’? Perhaps we’d be tempted to launch into what we do--teach, conduct classes, offer extra-curricular activities. Terry O’Reilly, the host of the enlightening advertising podcast Under the Influence, would be quick to interrupt. O’Reilly argues that the most successful companies have figured out a few really important lessons, and all of them center on why they do what they do.
Here are three to consider:
Here are three to consider:
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Know What You're Selling
Without glancing a few lines down, do you recall Michelin Tires’ iconic advertising slogan of the 80s and 90s? (Don’t look until you guess…).
Did you recall it? Maybe you remembered, “Michelin…because so much is riding on your tires.” O’Reilly argues that the French tire giant wasn’t selling tires, it was selling safety (O’Reilly, 2017). The late Tony Hsieh founded Zappos as a ‘customer service’ company that just happened to sell shoes (Alcantara, 2020). Heineken commercials over the past few years have shifted from flogging beer to the selling of inclusion, tolerance, and surprisingly--moderation!
Observe this remarkable evolution in beer ads here:
Did you recall it? Maybe you remembered, “Michelin…because so much is riding on your tires.” O’Reilly argues that the French tire giant wasn’t selling tires, it was selling safety (O’Reilly, 2017). The late Tony Hsieh founded Zappos as a ‘customer service’ company that just happened to sell shoes (Alcantara, 2020). Heineken commercials over the past few years have shifted from flogging beer to the selling of inclusion, tolerance, and surprisingly--moderation!
Observe this remarkable evolution in beer ads here:
What might happen if we took a serious look at what we are ‘selling’ in our schools. Is it something more than information, knowledge? U.S. Representative and civil rights leader Barbara Jordan famously declared, “Education remains the key to both economic and political empowerment.” If you think about it, throughout history education is inextricably tied to empowerment. Maybe, just maybe, we might rebrand ourselves as providing empowerment, engagement, and equity through our delivery of education.
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Coin Your Own Elevator Pitch
As an educator, what are you selling? Really, what is at the heart of what you do? For the longest time, I defined myself as a ‘social studies teacher’, then after a while, I switched it to ‘educator’. Now I have challenged myself further, to take lessons from the world of advertising to hone my elevator pitch. When faced with the question, ‘So, what do you do?’, what if teachers described their purpose more than their actions…
I empower and engage learners to push the boundaries of their own competencies.
I strive to prepare today’s students to be tomorrow’s citizens--ready for challenges seen and unseen.
By focusing on why I can only imagine the changes that might occur with what I do and how I do it! In Giving Students a Say, I focus the book on this elevator pitch for assessment:
In every aspect of assessment, we will engage and empower the student by offering opportunities for student voice, choice, self-assessment, and self-reporting.
Maybe our debates over retesting, homework, or the choice of performance scales would shift if our elevator pitch centered on empowerment, choice, and student ownership.
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How Will You Know if Your Pitch is Working?
Scott Cook, the co-founder of Intuit, said, “a brand is no longer what we tell the consumer it is--it is what consumers tell each other it is.” This notion is rocking the advertising world in ways never imagined. As GM has found out around their Tahoe commercials, to its immense frustration and embarrassment, it’s the consumer who can redefine the product through platforms such as Youtube. If some of the videos weren’t so offensive, I’d suggest you search ‘Chevy Tahoe Parody’ on Youtube.
Scott Cook’s idea, from well outside my silo, inspired me to try something I never imagined doing. I transformed Cook’s line into my own inquiry:
Scott Cook’s idea, from well outside my silo, inspired me to try something I never imagined doing. I transformed Cook’s line into my own inquiry:
Is a school no longer what we tell the student it is--it is what they tell each other it is?
I instantly recalled telling incoming grade 9s my impression of the school, but suddenly I wondered if my perception was anywhere close to that of our students. I designed a question and set off to ask students the following:
So let’s say you’re at a party or something in the summer and a new kid is talking about moving into our area. In trying to decide which high school to attend, they ask, So tell me about Summerland Secondary…I mean really, what do you think of it?
The responses were incredibly diverse, ranging from very complementary (our teachers are great and so helpful!) to what we need to work on (there’s a lot of homophobic comments in our hallways). The intention was never to publish the results but rather to use the data as feedback for us and how we run the school and our programs. One thing I am certain of, however, is that Scott Cook is absolutely correct.
The bottom line...
We have much to steal…I mean learn…from companies, other organizations, the world out there. First, look at the farm silos you can see, and the underground ones you might imagine, and then challenge yourself to not fit the third description of ‘isolated’. Secondly, explore the why of your school—through an elevator pitch activity, asking students to describe your school, or whatever tools you might employ. If nothing else, it will challenge your path dependence and just possibly ease the constraints you currently feel.
So, whether you are stepping out of your silo to the sound of cows, or squinting into the North Dakota sun as you exit your atomic catacomb, be sure that the silo is not one of your own making. There's a lot for us to learn out there.
So, whether you are stepping out of your silo to the sound of cows, or squinting into the North Dakota sun as you exit your atomic catacomb, be sure that the silo is not one of your own making. There's a lot for us to learn out there.
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Airport Stories: Piloting Students Beyond the Silos | with Myron Dueck | 2.2.2021
Myron Dueck and the Third Eye podcast team discuss how to help students navigate beyond the silos, in which we educators and our students frequently dwell. |
Myron Dueck is a teacher and administrator from BC, Canada. Published four times in EL Magazine, he is also the author of the best-selling book, Grading Smarter, Not Harder– Assessment Strategies that Motivate Kids and Help Them Learn and Giving Students a Say: Smarter Assessment Practices to Empower and Engage. Connect with him at @myrondueck.
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Third Eye Education posts weekly articles focusing on education and innovation.
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