Operating a school and being responsible for the day-to-day operations is a job that belongs to a special kind of person. Having an open-door policy is good, but principals who want to get out and interact with their students and staff might find their hands tied because they simply have too much to do. They will not have the chance to get out into the hallways as much as they would like to, and that can leave them frustrated. Principals also face obstacles when they try to befriend their staff and students, because there are rules for interaction that must be followed. It would be inappropriate for the principal to date a teacher, for example, and principals have to be careful about touching students, even if they are trying to console or comfort. Society requires principals to be very careful what they say and do, and that can get in the way of a principal trying to do his job and show students and staff that he cares. Finding a balance is difficult for principals, because they want to get along with their students and staff, but at the same time they are the ones...
Long hours and frustration with things like budget issues can cause some principals to retreat to their office, become distracted and inwardly-focused, and avoid the interaction with others in the school that is important to the workings of an organization. To keep the school moving forward and succeeding takes a team effort, and principals who show that they are part of the team earn the respect of teachers, support staff, and students much more easily than principals who are too focused on the disciplinary side of leadership and appear to lack the understanding that school can also be fun. The less like work a principal makes things while still accomplishing goals, the more will get done overall - and the more fun it will be.
49). That goes for leaders in the learning community as well. Thessin asserts that while it is important to teach students to solve problems, there is a lack of focus on another important, related goal: "the need for teachers to learn to do the same" (49). Teachers are leaders and they must be given the training to develop problem solving skills along with the other important skills mentioned in
Businesses are now pushing more so than ever before for schools and educators to adopt a community or learning community based approach to student education, in the hopes students will graduate with more applicable skill sets they can apply to the immediate global workplace. Where did they originate? Learning communities originated from "theory-drive evaluation" research focusing on school reform initiated by education policy specialists (Felner, et al., 1997:520). The idea was
Professional Learning Community"? Professional learning communities: Article review DuFour, R. What is a 'professional learning community?' Educational Leadership, 2004. A popular idea in the field of education today is the need to develop a 'professional learning community' of educators to facilitate the goals of the institution. One of the 'big ideas' of a professional learning community is the responsibility for educators to come together and to determine how students really learn and
Professional Learning Community within an Educational Context Peter Senge's learning community is one where all of the team members work together within in a fluid, supportive atmosphere that is future based and oriented around critical, open thinking. His five principles of learning communities are: Systems thinking -- namely seeing a problem in terms of its long-term holistic perspective and ramifications. Seeing different connections among the problem or studied material Personal mastery -- includes
Women in Film Noir Teaching is in many ways a solitary profession: A teacher in his or her own classroom spends hours in contact with students but often relatively little time talking to other teachers and educators. Administrators are also in many ways isolated from the teachers. Perhaps because of this fact, the administrators interviewed for this project emphasized the personal importance of collaboration with other members of the professional and
Leadership in Action My Thinking about Professional Development Talking about professional development has enabled me to rethink my definition of personal development by looking at it from a different angle. Reflecting back on my internship program, I have realized that my thinking of professional development has been transformed as occasioned by the different variables in the workplace. It continues to change as it encounters intense and competitive learning strategies that employees apply
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