Nikki B. Sweeney

The learning Space is a third teacher providing the setting to nourish creativity, motivation, reflection, and collaboration as much as the teacher or parent. While teachers create conditions by which students develop meaningful projects tied to real pursuits, the learning space should be inviting enough to inspire students to roll up their sleeves and work together to develop ideas and solve problems that matter to them. When students learn and work, their projects evolve through an iterative process much the way spaces must do. So what do these modern constructionist spaces consider and look like?

When I think about where I began with students when we designed the space for the House of Technology, a modern constructionist space, and how that has evolved, I can’t help but stress the importance of defining the intent of what happens in the space and having students involved in the design process. How you design the space will affect the behaviors, culture, and priorities of the people who use it. IDEO, an innovation design firm, offers a useful way that I used with the students to think about the design in four categories including places, properties, actions, and attitudes. Places are spaces that share an overall purpose like hallways, properties are components of a space that can be modified to impact behavior, actions are the behaviors that will occur in the space, and attitudes are the values that are central to the space. Each of the four categories are investigated deeply to identify how the space should look, feel, and function.

There can be overlap in all of the categories. When examining the place category one can determine which of four areas will best support the desired behaviors. Will there be a place where people meet or gather? How will the place connect to other places to set the tone or mood of the place? Will there be a place or individuals or groups to call home to create, store things, or share their projects? What kind of support structures will be necessary to support the behaviors in the room? There are many things to consider that come to light when setting the stage for creative collaboration and many voices to include and consider.

Even today, the space in the House of Technology is in an iterative process as students configure areas to pursue mindful endeavors and recommendations are shared to invest in and continue to improve the space as new ideas and technologies become available to empower students to transform and improve the world in which they live.

This weekend I attended a hockey tournament with my husband, Kelly, who volunteered to coach a PeeWee A team this year. He coached for many years when our own children played youth hockey before our son played college and professional hockey; therefore, I thought I knew what to expect as a spectator and avid supporter of athletics for children. I was wrong because I observed situations that are quite different from the extensive hockey parent experiences I have had in the past, and am working to understand one major change I observed.

In light of Angela Duckworth’s research on the growth mindset, expectations for success with appropriate scaffolding improve outcomes for children. Children’s abilities are not fixed, and can dynamically trend upward when provided experiences where they have to “stick with it” when things get challenging. She explains that ability is not the only thing separating successful children from those who struggle. Her theory emphasizes the importance of “grit” as a predictor of success. Why is it then, that parents are running interference for their children to help them have advantages without providing them the opportunity to work through challenging situations? In fact, I actually observed one parent making notes of the mistakes a player, who was not her son, was making on the ice. To add to that newly observed behavior, I observed a team parent express negative information about a player to the other team to induce punitive actions against one of her child’s teammates. Why on earth would adults behave like this at an athletic event to support the growth and development of children? I wondered if child athletes were provided the opportunity to work through any challenges that they experience without their parents trying to “fix” things through confrontational emails, negative communication with others about children, and organizational threats sent to the adults who voluntarily coach their children. Shouldn’t all of these adults be working together to help children grow into successful young adults with greater skill and grit? I could not believe what I observed and think this unfortunate change in sports is a huge disadvantage to children.

I believe that children/teammates should be encouraged to communicate and workout misunderstandings together understanding the expectations defined by the coach and organization. The structure and expectations are vital to developing a common sense of mission and helping each child grow individually while working together and improving success for the entire group. As a classroom teacher and dean, I have seen successful applications of this pedagogical approach for decades and truly hope that parents begin to see the advantages that skinned knees can provide children in helping them develop into successful young adults who can work through adversity in healthy and positive ways.

December 7, 2014Leave a reply

Students from the House of Technology, a technology solutions center on campus that they designed and created, have found a way to use Strengths + Passions + Service to

Others = Mission/Work. This winning formula for success was shared with me by JoeSweeney while he was writing his newest book, Moving the Needle, and it has helped me to frame why students in the House of Technology at University School of Milwaukee are thriving in life as learners and leaders. The students who participate in the House of Technology spend at least one hour in the program space daily during community and flex times on challenging work that helps others at USM significantly. Their work provides them mastery of content, autonomy to investigate things that interest them, and purpose because they serve others in their technology endeavors, three elements Daniel Pink proposes as motivational factors.

Some of the problems these students solve are extremely high-level and require substantial collaboration to find the best solutions. It is not uncommon to see them using old technology to brainstorm and problem solve. They have a budget to consider and know that cost effective solutions result in a better bottom line and that is another key to the program’s success. Students are given opportunities to find solutions that lead to consequences that are their own, one of the best learning tools I have seen for students that are use to memorizing content to acquire skills and earn a grade that has little real significance to the broader community. Their results affect a bottom line they manage to grow their program and serve others they go to school with.

Yesterday, I presented with the students in the House of Technology at a national conference called ISACS, attended by primarily independent schools, and they surpassed any expectation we had set together for the group’s work.

The intent of the presentation was to share the three components of the program including

• technology support in a 1:1 school with wireless projectors, Apple TVs, multiple networks, and Smart Boards,
• repairs of virtually any IOS device or computer
• project work: setting up servers, building 3-D printers, designing labs, and building apps,

so that other schools can go back and implement similar programs in their schools to engage students in learning, improve the community, and generate revenue. They were glowing in their leadership and impressed many administrators by the sheer love of their work and expertise. Their passions, strengths, and service to others were highlighted in their efforts igniting excitement in the independent school community.

Last night, as a result of their efforts, I responded to a large number of email requests to visit the students on campus and learn more about the House of Technology. When I shared the communications this morning with the students, they were excited to help the schools begin their work. Their efforts to help others by sharing their work have opened up many unexpected opportunities. I feel certain that the House of Technology will continue to blossom because of the original formula from which it originated.

A great number of people don’t like to begin the day with problems, but the students that work in the House of Technology at USM seem disappointed with there is nothing going wrong, blowing up, and they can’t dive headfirst into solving a real, complex problem that they know will directly improve something at school. While there are a great deal of other activities the kids can engage in when iPads are not broken, Smart technology and laptops are working, and everyone can get their work done with technology, there is something inherently engaging for the kids when they know their work is real, that it matters, and will require critical thinking, and higher-level problem solving. If they have to research, contact experts, take apart systems, and price parts to put something together in a way that improves outcomes, they really come to life. Sure this is messy and difficult to grade. Yet it is real and challenging and full of the twenty-first century skills we know our graduates will need when they leave school. It is what I see my college graduates doing in occupations that are evolving before their very eyes.. The question in my mind these days is, “How can every student participate in an applications model where they solve real problems on topics that matter?” Content is vital to solving the problems these kids face, but does it need to be memorized and spewed back on tests? We have got to stay the course and continue to press for better demonstrations of learning to prepare students for a world that is dramatically different than the one most schools are preparing them for. 

As I worked with the Upper School faculty at University School of Milwaukee this morning, I was impressed by the marriage of student-lead pedagogical practices to the use of technology. I have to use the word “work” lightly here because when I leave a teacher/student meeting I have consistently learned something and feel even more inspired to delve more deeply to support teachers and students in their ever-growing and changing technological endeavors. Whether the teacher or class I was working with was using Skype, Google Hangouts, or Facetime to communicate with students in partner schools on year-long community-based projects, or listening to and responding to original written works shared in second and third languages using Voicethread, or scheduling and conducting writers’ workshop conferences virtually, teachers at USM are leading the way when it comes to guiding their students and it is evident in the enthusiasm students show in their work and with each other.

What also amazes me is the level of tool integration the teachers use, so it is not just the sound, student-lead creation practices with technology, but how they use tools, like Google docs, for example, to provide feedback to students while they are writing and then use shared groups in Voicethread for them to publish, share and receive feedback on their written works! The entire process of learning supported by technology is a solid marriage!

It seems like much of school leaders’ time is spent supporting rather than challenging ways of thinking. In that behavior and attempt to support teachers, professionals are robbed of their own ability to grow and learn. Growth calls on teachers to develop the capacity synthesize new information within the context of their work, make meaning of new information through reflection to reduce the mental dissonance, and then construct mental models that have the potential to improve outcomes with students. This is a learning-focused relationship and one that many in today’s world are not accustomed to. Perhaps this is because it requires change and that is a process in itself that many are more comfortable with than others. Lifelong learning, though requires change or continuous improvement. It suggests that teachers are also learners, and that while supporting teachers is important, so is challenging them.

Ideas and thoughts collide at times creating incredible dissonance in the mind as it makes sense of the information in a more coherent and understandable way. It could take minutes, days, weeks, or even years for this to occur and it’s uncomfortable and necessary to grow personally and professionally. The outcomes, or insights that result from this mindful discomfort impact the direction schools and organizations move. There are many initiatives a school has on its radar at any given time and information regarding how schools are managing them is accessible 24/7 through the many social media tools educators, businesses, and consultants are using to communicate content to the world.  When peering down at the relationships between and within the initiatives like scheduling, project based learning, assessment, technology integration, professional development, parent education, curriculum design, and personnel, it becomes crystal clear that they are intricately related to one another. The goals identified to improve one without considering how it is related to the other can have a crippling effect on the system. That is where the mission of the organization has to be carefully examined. Do the goals for each initiative support the school’s mission? Is the mission even clear? Is it so wordy that one can’t extrapolate what it really means because it has to cover everything as not to leave something out that “might” matter?

As I make sense of things I am often left with questions to reflect on, talk with my colleagues about, and construct meaning from. This week there were many of these occasions and the content that has been streaming through Twitter and ISED indicates I am not alone in contemplating such issues. @GrantLicthman has been sharing his journey through over 60 schools where he’s examining how they are tackling innovation to meet the challenges facing today’s schools. There are broad themes that emanate from his travels, and right now, the ones that are colliding in my mind include pedagogy, scheduling, personnel, and technology.  Block scheduling means the examination of pedagogical practices. Can technology enhance course offerings through blended-learning and online offerings? How can that impact the schedule positively without diminishing the amazing relationships teachers have with their students? Clearly, additional research and reflection are needed and everyone needs to be part of that process because it is bound so deeply in the mission of the school and the pedagogy that has made it such a success. It is time to begin this journey, and I have never been more excited to work with my colleagues on making sense of this web of intricately related initiatives.