I have a friend who convinced me, despite my protests, to record regular Marco Polo videos back and forth with her on a weekly and sometimes daily basis. One thing that we try to do on Fridays is share some joy from our work week and something we are proud of, which can be surprisingly hard for us, and for many educators that I know. Why is it hard to admit we are proud of our work? Why is it hard to toot our own horn?
Throughout my 30 years in public education, I have met very few educators who are comfortable with praise about their work, comfortable being in the spotlight, or even able or willing to name and share their greatest strengths and gifts as educators. What happens to us in this career that makes it so hard us for us to honor what we do? Is it because the world at large doesn’t often respect education? It is because we entered this career not for honors bestowed on us, but to see our impacts through the actions of those we teach? Is it because so many of us have received little to no feedback on our work?
As a school leader, I am passionate about being a life-long learner and an instructional coach. I believe that one of the best things I can do as a leader is provide feedback to the educators with whom I work. I believe that everyone deserves honest, specific, timely feedback on their work. Yet, each year I meet educators, from systems all across the United States, who have rarely or never gone through a formal evaluation and rarely or never receive feedback of any kind from a peer or a supervisor.
I still make it a goal to visit every classroom in my district every year. Every time I visit a classroom during one of my site visits, I follow up with a specific, personal email to each teacher. I continue to be amazed by how often teachers will thank me profusely for this small gesture, as it is more feedback than they usually receive. Just this week I had a teacher say to me, “Thank you for your reflective feedback; one of my favorite parts about your visits is your thoughtful follow-up email.” I don’t share this to brag (although I guess I could count this as something I’m proud of this week!), but to illustrate my point.
Every year our district holds one large professional development event we call “Teachers Teaching Teachers”. We have a two hour afternoon where we offer sessions created by teachers for teachers. Every teacher in the district comes together and have the chance to choose two sessions to attend, based on their own interests and professional goals. This event is something that I am very proud of! However, what happens every year is that when we first send out the email inviting teachers to submit their ideas for sessions, we get very few responses. Then, my team and I brainstorm who we want to reach out to and encourage to participate. I personally invite people to share sessions based on their strengths, their talents, the work I see them doing so well in their classrooms, and I try to be as specific as possible. Because, after 30 years of working with humble educators, what I know is that most teachers think they are ordinary, that everyone teaches just like they do. I know this is not true and I name the attributes that make one teacher unique from their peers. So many teachers do not know that what they do is special. They have never been given specific feedback about their strengths.
I have had the privilege, as an instructional coach and an administrator for the last 20 years, to visit thousands of classrooms. That is not an exaggeration. I visit more than 100 classrooms a year, so I been in well over 2,000, but probably closer to 4,000 throughout my career (and it’s not over yet!). I will brag about myself and say that I am very skilled at recognizing talented instructional strategies, key teacher moves, and evidence of successful student learning. I pride myself in being able to see evidence of high quality teaching and learning, even in very short visits in classrooms. If I could wave a magic wand and change one thing in schools, I would wish for every teacher to receive the direct, honest, specific feedback they deserve. I would wish for every teacher to be proud to name what they are exceptional at in their classrooms, to shout from the rooftops what they do that makes a positive impact on students, and for them to be paid a salary that matches these incredible strengths.
If you are an educator reading this, I encourage you to provide a fellow educator feedback in the coming week. Tell someone what you admire about their work, what you see them do that is impressive, be bold and generous with your praise!
This post is part of a series called Explorations in Instructional Leadership. I plan to use this series to dive into some of the topics that are rising to the surface in my work, topics that I am researching for future study, and topics that impact student learning and pedagogy.
Reflections on Leadership and Learning 