What is Teacher Leadership? – Our First Week

This summer I was asked to facilitate our first run with a new Additional Qualification course, teacher leadership with OISE. I was excited for the opportunity as well as a little nervous. My mind went back to our open space activity at OCT as we were writing the guidelines and the richness and diversity in the conversation. I found the hardest part those days was defining teacher leadership. It meant something slightly different to each of us. What could we all agree upon?

So as we tackled just that question of what is teacher leadership and the various roles it can take on on Tuesday, I thought I would send the question out on Twitter. I am so grateful for a PLN that is so willing to jump in and support. Check out all the responses here.

Going through the responses and knowing a bit about each path, I can see that uniqueness come through. I loved how Maddie jumped in after Chris had done his reflection. It was interesting to see the two words broken down and Maddie working through the definition.

Going through the clips there are so many different skills we tap in to as teacher leaders from modelling to listening, leading to supporting. Mike pulled out a great set.

As I listened to the responses and reflected on our conversations this week and the various readings/clips in the course I realized it may always be hard to define teacher leadership but there will always be common skills we can agree upon.

Teacher leaders

• understand the power of relationships
• they listen attentively
• provide support when needed
• share a passion for learners
• are always learning and they show it

What does teacher leadership mean to you? Leave a comment or add to our flipgrid collection. 

“That’s how you get it wrong but right sometimes”

I was scrolling through my Facebook page one day when I stumbled on a clip of Jamie Foxx on the Graham Norton show, talking about his first encounter with Kayne West.  A line at the end of the clip caught my attention

“That’s how you get it wrong but right sometimes.”

After planning and chatting with the classroom teacher, we started our 3 part design task with a grade 6 class creating games in Hopscotch. Convincing friends of any age to design a game is usually not a hard task but this time around there was a friend that didn’t quite seem to buy in. He wasn’t really causing a rukus so it was all good. I was a little bummed but I was reassured by educators who knew him better than me that he was engaged. Fast forward to our last session together. Our games were starting to come together and I looked over to see my friend’s game. I looked over to see random shapes across the screen. Like Jamie in the clip, my brain was thinking “what is this?” but instead of jumping in I decided to ask a question. One simple question and I was blown away. Not only were the random shapes not random, but he had figured out code we never chatted about. We even chatted about how we could improve the game.

This is why we ask ❓what seemed a mess to me was an intricate maze. Listen to my friend from @GlenhavenSr explain his code #peel21st pic.twitter.com/AiQvEJLTf6

— Tina Zita (@tina_zita) June 20, 2017

A lesson learned: sometimes things aren’t as they seem, sometimes my first thought can be wrong, sometimes a simple question can teach you so much more.

“That’s how you get it wrong but right sometimes.”