Atmosphere and School Culture
What kind of school do you want? What does your Ideal School look like?
Back in the 80s when School Improvement was gaining greater attention, I did an extended training on the steps for developing continuous school improvement. This training was focused on all school that did not have a systemic procedure for setting academic goals and determining to what degree students were reaching those goals. From this training, one of my favorite activities to do with large and small groups of school stakeholders (teachers, support staff, parents, and community members) is the Ideal School. The activity is a precursor to defining beliefs and crafting a mission statement.
The concept is simple. You give the participants some basic guidelines on what an Ideal School could contain - the physical plant, the equipment, tools and resources, the students (behavior and academic learning), the teachers (behavior and academic teaching), the administrators and administrative staff, the support staff (anyone doing anything in the building), the parents (behavior and support), and the community (behavior and support). The participants work in groups of 4 – 6 to design with pictures and few words their version of the Ideal School. After about 30 minutes, each group shares with the total group their Vision of the Ideal School.
During the sharing, members of the facilitating team take notes and construct “belief statements” related to reoccurring statements. Example: Most of the groups state that they what a curriculum which required students to solve real world problems. A possible belief statement might read: “We believe that all students will be given many opportunities to work on solving real world problems in all subjects.”
If time permits or in a follow-up session, the Belief Statements are displayed for all to see. As each is read, the groups clarifies the statement then gives a thumbs up or thumbs down to the belief. If significant numbers give a belief statement a thumbs down, it is restated or dropped. Not everyone has to give a statement a thumbs up. It is the consensus of the group. (Yes, this requires some guidelines at the beginning of the exercise.)
Through this procedure our schools create their first Belief and Mission Statements. It was a solid beginning with much work to follow.
We have now done this activity with the teachers at our school in Doha. The teachers and coordinators were absolutely enthusiastic to be asked to give their ideas. They came up with creative ideas which addressed current needs and went beyond individual experiences. They addressed the physical layout of the school, extensions of the curriculum, needs of the staff (Child Care Center), etc. It was wonderful.
If you are truly looking to discover what kind of school your staff, students and parents want, may I suggest such an activity? Just be prepared to hear some pretty excited people sharing some ideas which with will work to bring to fruition.
Back in the 80s when School Improvement was gaining greater attention, I did an extended training on the steps for developing continuous school improvement. This training was focused on all school that did not have a systemic procedure for setting academic goals and determining to what degree students were reaching those goals. From this training, one of my favorite activities to do with large and small groups of school stakeholders (teachers, support staff, parents, and community members) is the Ideal School. The activity is a precursor to defining beliefs and crafting a mission statement.
The concept is simple. You give the participants some basic guidelines on what an Ideal School could contain - the physical plant, the equipment, tools and resources, the students (behavior and academic learning), the teachers (behavior and academic teaching), the administrators and administrative staff, the support staff (anyone doing anything in the building), the parents (behavior and support), and the community (behavior and support). The participants work in groups of 4 – 6 to design with pictures and few words their version of the Ideal School. After about 30 minutes, each group shares with the total group their Vision of the Ideal School.
During the sharing, members of the facilitating team take notes and construct “belief statements” related to reoccurring statements. Example: Most of the groups state that they what a curriculum which required students to solve real world problems. A possible belief statement might read: “We believe that all students will be given many opportunities to work on solving real world problems in all subjects.”
If time permits or in a follow-up session, the Belief Statements are displayed for all to see. As each is read, the groups clarifies the statement then gives a thumbs up or thumbs down to the belief. If significant numbers give a belief statement a thumbs down, it is restated or dropped. Not everyone has to give a statement a thumbs up. It is the consensus of the group. (Yes, this requires some guidelines at the beginning of the exercise.)
Through this procedure our schools create their first Belief and Mission Statements. It was a solid beginning with much work to follow.
We have now done this activity with the teachers at our school in Doha. The teachers and coordinators were absolutely enthusiastic to be asked to give their ideas. They came up with creative ideas which addressed current needs and went beyond individual experiences. They addressed the physical layout of the school, extensions of the curriculum, needs of the staff (Child Care Center), etc. It was wonderful.
If you are truly looking to discover what kind of school your staff, students and parents want, may I suggest such an activity? Just be prepared to hear some pretty excited people sharing some ideas which with will work to bring to fruition.
posted by Gari at
10:53 AM
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