Successes, Challenges, and Resolutions

So the year has ending.  I have had some great things happen in my career and now I have been asked for my reflections for this past semester with a focus on my successes, challenges, and resolutions. Here we go:

Successes

I have had a many great successes this past semester, not all in the classroom but it was all a part of my education. Here is a few successes:

• I have an amazing assistant principal this school year which has enhanced the success of this school year.  She has a knack of complementing me in all the areas where I need to grow.  I am amazed at how her energy and positivity has assisted in transforming the school so far.  Together we have created an environment where all teachers are willing to go the extra mile for their students.

• We have moved to using a lot of cloud based resources instead of the hundreds of emails and notes. The teachers have embraced using Google Drive to share files with each other and with students, and more and more are seeking to use Google Classroom with their students.  

• Working with various PLNs to improve teaching and learning across the country has also been a success. I have had the opportunity to work with educators in various fields across the globe to discuss, develop, and implement some amazing things in classrooms.  This has been thanks to a running Podcast, various Voxer groups, Twitter chats, and face to face meet ups.  

Challenges

Although I am not always a fan, there are always challenges within any line of work.  Here are what some of mine were:  

• Time is perhaps the major challenge that I encountered this semester.  Many people see this challenge as one we can never overcome and must always bow to it   There never appears to be enough time to spend on the things that you believe matters most.  This includes ones family, kids, lesson plans, soccer matches, whatever.  To become "unstuck in time" as Billy Pilgrim has suggested is a wish for many, and I am included in that list.  

• The amount of assessments that the teachers must give is another challenge I take personally. It never fails that the programs that are prescribed create the growth in student learning are filled with assessments.  When some local educators were speaking with state officials about the assessments they were unaware of the amount of assessments that were required from their mandates.

• The final challenge of the semester I'll mention is readiness.  I am still amazed at the lack of readiness that some students face over others when they come through the doors of a school.  As we move into the time of testing students on devices within the next two months, we are working with some students that entered school without know their letters, numbers, or colors and have never used a device.  Now these same students must be assessed on these devices when they were not only unprepared for formal schooling but also not adapted enough in the devices to get a true understanding of their knowledge.  

Resolutions

With these issues I must create some resolutions for the situations.  My hope for the immediate future is as follows:  

• I would like to use digital resources to assist teachers in capturing more of their time back.  I will (continue to) hack faculty and administrative meetings so that the teachers can have more time to work on their craft during the school day. This will occur through virtual meetings, flipped meetings, and Google hangouts to give teachers more flexibility with their time. 

• As for the amount of assessments that are given, there is little I can do aside from continually voicing my opinion about the amount and working with the local administrative group to seek change.  At my school I will do all that I can to ensure the teachers are not stuck in assessment mode. When the opportunity arises, I will make sure that the educational assistants and others are doing as much as they can to free the teachers up for instruction as long as possible while others work on assessment readiness. 

• Next semester I will be working directly to increase the digital readiness for the students and parents in my community.  My school will become a "Tech Goes Home" site where students and parents from the community will be able to take a free technology course to learn about Google apps and other local applications and services to increase their digital literacy.  My hope is that this will pave the way to be a permanent site for such work. I want to be able to educate all that enter and assist in the growth of educating my community.  

This is just a portion of my plan to assist in making the world a little bit better while I am here.  I hope that I can do this and a lot more.