Leadership+Design
"We design experiences for the people who create the future of teaching and learning."
In our work, we build capacity, create conversations, and make connections.
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Plan your professional learning adventures with L+D in 2019.
Design Studio
May 16 and 17
Indian Wells, CA
Human Centered Design for Admissions Professionals
(with AISAP)
Wonder Women
June 24-27, 2019
Oakland, CA
Uncovering your Superpowers and Leadership Presence
UnMastered
July 15 - August 1, 2019
Online
Early Decision- Closed
Regular Decision- Ends May 15
Because the game has changed.
Design Studio
October 2-3, 2019
Washington, DC
Designing for Student Civic Engagement
The Santa Fe Seminar
November 13-16
Santa Fe, NM
Reconnect. Reflect. Renew.
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L+D Board of Directors
Ryan Baum
VP of Strategy
Jump Associates, CA
Matt Glendinning
(Secretary)
Head of School
Moses Brown School,
RI
Trudy Hall (Board Chair)
Director of Strategic Initiatives
Forest Ridge School, WA
Brett Jacobsen (Vice Chair)
Head of School
Mount Vernon Presbyterian
, GA
Barbara Kraus-Blackney (Treasurer)
Executive Director
Association of Delaware Valley Independent Schools (ADVIS), PA
Brenda Leaks
Head of School
Seattle Girls School, WA
Karan Merry
Retired Head of School
Brooklyn, NY
Jeanette Moore
CFO
The San Francisco School, CA
Natalie Nixon
Founder
Figure 8 Consulting, PA
Kaleb Rashad
Principal
High Tech High School, CA
Carla Robbins Silver (ex-officio)
Executive Director
Leadership+Design, CA
Matthew Stuart
Head of School
Caedmon School, NY
Brad Weaver
Head of School
Sonoma Country Day School, CA
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L+D Fellows
2018-19
RIPL Designer
McGillis School, UT
Michael Ecker
Principal
Calavera Hills Middle School, CA
Kristen Erickson
History Department Chair and Art Gallery Director
Greenwich Academy, CT
Jon Freer
Director of Technology and Innovative Teaching
Solebury School, PA
Rhonda Hewer
Learning Services Consultant
Waterloo Region District School Board, Ontario, Canada
Louise Lindsay
Innovation Coach
Knoxville Jewish Day School, TN
Sonja McKay
Teacher
Exploris School, NC
Stephanie Mendrala
Director of Professional Development
STEM School Highlands Ranch, CO
Ingrid Moore
Director of Lower School
The Steward School, VA
Brian Mull
Innovation and Learning Design Coordinator
Trinity Episcopal School, NOLA
Hannah Nelson
Science Teacher and Academic Dean
Watershed School, CO
Gwenyth Nicholson
8th Grade Humanities Teacher
Saco Middle School, ME
Bobby Pollicino
Upper School Principal
Bullis School, MD
Sara Slogesky
K-12 Social Studies Curriculum Specialist
Capital Region Education Council Magnet Schools, CT
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| Becoming the Anthropologist |
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Carla Silver, Head L+Doer
Leadership+Design
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Tom Kelley in the book
The Ten Faces of Innovation
writes about the 10 "personas" or mindsets that successful innovators embody. He says that the single most important of those personas is the Anthropologist. Individuals who spend time observing - watching and listening - for extended periods of time and can derive insights and needs from those observations are more likely to come up with new ideas and solutions to problems both big and small. I'd like to 10x Kelley's hypothesis and suggest that anthropology is the most important habit, mindset or skill that any school leader can adopt and practice. Intentional, thoughtful and consistent
seeing and hearing,
followed by sense-making, leads to proactive and impactful ideas and actions. Anthropology is the opposite of snap-judgment and the antidote to hasty decisions.
For those of you who have adopted "data-informed decision making" as a new manifesto for leading, don't forget the qualitative data that is the output of anthropology. It's really where the good stuff lives.
This month, we asked our writers to complete the prompt "I spent a day observing ___________in my school and now I'm going to_____________." How did a day of simple observation in their schools provide them with new insights? They all took this prompt in different directions, but all shared one common conclusion: It's amazing what you can see when you approach things with curiosity and a beginner's mind. It's as if suddenly the ordinary, un-noticed moments of school are presented in vivid technicolor.
In the work of L+D, my team members and I spend a lot of time in other people's environments watching and listening. We try to bring open minds and hearts to that work and to be present without judgment and instead ask lots of questions. This isn't easy. We all have pretty strong opinions about what good teaching and learning and positive human interaction look like. We also know that those things come in different packaging and can show up in many different forms. We also have our biases, the way we see the world, personal values and our own experiences as students and teachers that can derail our efforts to be true anthropologists. It's even harder to do it in your own community where you are bound to meet up with loads of confirmation bias and where familiarity can make cultural idiosyncrasies challenging to see.
If you want to do some observing - of your school or other school communities - here are a few important tips that can help channel your inner Jane Goodall.
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Get an UNLINED notebook where you can capture your observations and even some sketches. These will be your field notes. No self-respecting anthropologist is without a notebook. You might add a camera (that one on your phone, it's not just for snapchat) and a voice recorder (also on your phone). But the notebook is key.
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Separate out what you see and hear from what you interpret. From our friends at Jump Associates, we have learned this is one of the most important rules of doing this work. Write down what you see and hear and be sure you aren't paraphrasing or interpreting in that moment. You can do that later once you actually see some patterns, but don't do that in the moment.
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Write down questions about what you are observing, and, if possible, ask the people you are observing to help you understand their actions and words better. "Why do you say that?" "Why do you do it that way?" "What does that feel like?" Because you are observing humans and not chimps, take advantage of the evolution and the fact that people can speak. It's not cheating.
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Be aware of when you might be looking for things that confirm pre-existing beliefs. This is called confirmation bias, and we all have it. How do you avoid it? Pay attention. Are you going in with a hypothesis or are you open to new perspectives? If you see something confirmatory, check for frequency. Seeing something once is not really data. Seeing something over and over again suggests a pattern.
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If you are interviewing people, avoid asking them what they want. Instead try to
collect stories
that illuminate values, motivations and perspectives. "Tell me about a time when..." or "Can you share a specific moment or story that will help me to understand something better?"
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Look for artifacts. Sometimes we focus entirely on people and what they say may reflect opinion. Sometimes artifacts are more honest and tell you what is really going on. We once worked with a school that really felt like it was making strides on becoming a more racially diverse community. In the dining hall there were beautiful and professional photographs of all the student leadership - club leaders, student government, and team captains. There was not a single student of color. There may have been other types of diversity represented there, but when it came to racial diversity, it seemed pretty indisputable that there were no students of color who had formal leadership roles. To be able to look at that and without judgment ask questions like "Why is that happening?" "What might be obstacles for students of color to reach these positions?" "Are there leaders of color in our professional community?" Artifacts can also include things like report cards, posters in classrooms, bulletin boards, the placement of the college counseling office. These artifacts are on display for everyone, and they are manifestations of a school's culture and values.
It's illuminating and even fun to be the Anthropologist, even for a day, but it is even better and more helpful when it becomes a habit, and it is powerful when it becomes a part of the culture.
One of the things I love about our newsletter is that we offer a topic but school leaders respond to the challenge from such different voices and perspectives. This month we have stories about how observation of a day or moment (or possibly the LACK of attention) has led to profound insights and sometimes transformation. Thanks to April writers Gail Sonnesyn, Graland Country Day School (L+D Fellow 2019-20), Louise Lindsay, Stanford Eisenberg Knoxville Jewish Day School (L+D Fellow 2018-2019), and Dan Frank, The Steward School (fellow disruptor, friend, and host of L+D programs).
If you are still thinking about Professional Learning Adventures in the coming months, look no further. If you are an admissions professional join us May 16-17 in Indian Wells, CA in collaboration with AISAP for Human Centered Design for Admissions Professionals. Our women's leadership program, Wonder Women! , is filling up, but we still have a few spots so come out to Head-Royce School in Oakland, CA June 24-27 and unleash your signature leadership presence! Past participants describe it as deeply impactful. We are also offering a new online learning experience this summer. UnMastered is an opportunity to build your creative disobedience and change management muscles in new ways. Expect to be challenged in this three week intensive program. And we are expecting this to feel like no other online learning. Finally, if you are looking for a place based experience that will give you a chance to reflect and renew, join us in November for The Santa Seminar. We have a lot of people who come to Santa Fe and say to us, "I waited too long for this!" Don't be that person.
May is just around the corner so take a deep breath, be good to yourself, look around and watch and listen to your colleagues and to the sound of your own beating heart and see what you learn!
Warmly,
Carla Silver
Executive Director
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| Interviews Build Empathy and Connection |
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Gail Sonnesyn, Associate Head of School, Graland Country Day School
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I spent the day observing empathy interviews done by students in my school, and now I'm going to create more opportunities for faculty to practice empathy.
Last week, young students were enthusiastically engaged in empathy interviews on the day I dropped into our Gates Innovation Lab for a visit to the Tinker Time class. Graland students from kindergarten to fourth grade were busily connecting with one another through conversations aimed at understanding another's perspective in order to design something their partner would use, enjoy or appreciate. During my visit, kindergartners were charged with designing the ideal vacation for their partner, while fourth graders were figuring out how to redesign the homework experience. Students had previously learned that empathy is a learned skill so they were working hard on building their "empathy muscles." The interviews helped students realize their kindergarten peers may not enjoy the same type of vacation they would and that not all fourth graders have identical feelings about homework.
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| Kindergarten students practicing empathy interviews at Graland. |
Empathy interviews are the cornerstone of design thinking, ensuring the final product actually meets the needs of the user. It's the first, and I think, most critical step in the process. As students conversed with one another, I wondered how could I use such interviews with the adults on our campus? Could they help
enhance our professional development program, community-building efforts and leadership teams?
As educators, we recognize that social-emotional needs must be met prior to students being able to access new information. Yet with adults, we often dive directly into professional trainings without addressing faculty members' basic need for connection and relationship. Consider back-to-school orientation meetings. Often the week is filled with endless back-to-back meetings so that we feel "ready" for the return of students. However, after a long summer hiatus, faculty crave the chance to reconnect with one another. While community-building activities are always part of the original plan, they are also the first to be cut as additional meetings, trainings and safety drills are added to the schedule. Thanks to my recent experience observing students, I'm going to make our August faculty community-building activities non-negotiable.
Since teachers appreciate connection, this year, during professional development days, teachers met in what I call "peer cohorts" made up of a diverse mix of faculty from various grade levels with different subject area expertise. Cohorts came together on every professional development day and always began their meetings with an activity aimed at getting to know one another, a critical exercise since these faculty members rarely crossed paths with one another on campus. Cohort success relied on a foundation of trust as members were also charged with observing each another throughout the year, providing feedback on instructional practices. One cohort group stopped by my office just last week to thank me for organizing this model for professional growth. More important than the feedback component, they expressed gratitude for the bond they had built with one another during the year. Preschool teacher, Sara Flansburg noted, "
I probably never would have had a relationship with these faculty members without the cohort and now I count them as friends." I believe adding empathy interviews to next year's cohort agendas could lead to even stronger connections between cohort members and greater impact overall.
Like other dedicated administrative teams at semi-large schools, we constantly grapple with issues related to student well-being, faculty growth and managing programmatic change as we work to create an engaging, evolving and safe learning community. What sometimes gets overlooked is the chance for administrators to connect and learn more about each other. Intermittent empathy interviews could be a quick and easy way for us to better understand the challenges and joys we each experience in our various roles at Graland, thereby making our leadership team even stronger. Brene Brown says it best: "Empathy is simply
listening, holding space, withholding judgment, emotionally connecting and communicating that incredibly healing message of 'You're not alone.'"
Empathy interviews have many applications, and I'm grateful to have stopped by Tinker Time on a day when our students were busily learning about another's perspective. Making empathy the main objective of the innovative lessons that day allowed students to connect on a deeper level, and I'm sure sparked creative ideas about designing a perfect vacation and homework experience for their classmates. For me, I learned that empathy interviews can also improve collegial interactions. Consequently, I've set a professional goal to infuse our professional development days and leadership team meetings with more opportunities to practice empathy so that we can better understand our colleagues' experiences around campus and therefore appreciate each other even more.
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Louise Lindsay, Innovation Coach, Stanford Eisenberg Knoxville Jewish Day School
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I spent the day observing boys in my school, and now I'm going to play more.
Boys love to play. That's what I learned while watching them. They play as they gather before school starts and during every transition. They love playing at recess and in aftercare. The lunch table is rife with jokes and pure silliness. Boys have fun together. They laugh, a ton.
During the day I spent observing boys, watching them without expectation or evaluation, I kept finding myself smiling. Their fun interactions and laughter were contagious. At some point, I realized even I was having a great time.
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| Boys at KJDS going all in on play. |
And, there is much fun to be had at my school. Joy is the first word in our tagline. It's part of our mission statement. We have all kinds of planned and spontaneous events and daily routines that assure that our students love coming to school. But, a day spent watching boys taught me that even my school has more room for fun. The reason being that when the boys are having fun, they are all in. When they play, the social hierarchy dissolves, they don't care if they get sweaty or messy, their concept of time disappears, and they are existing strictly in the moment; all of their effort is focused on what they are doing. Boys playing hard in any form, digging, building, or playing ball looks a lot like being in a state of flow.
"A state in which people are so involved in an activity that nothing else seems to matter; the experience is so enjoyable that people will continue to do it even at great cost, for the sheer sake of doing it."
If you have ever watched an intense game of dodgeball on a school playground, you know that neither hunger, nor thirst, nor injury, nor heat are deterrents for the players; they are playing hard, no matter the cost. Csikszentmihalyi claims that more flow leads to greater happiness and life satisfaction. I wonder how we can bring more flow into our schools to increase educational happiness and satisfaction. And it's not just about the bliss, flow can impact academics. According to Csikszentmihalyi, while unengaging activities may lead to students briefly knowing but not holding on to taught material, a state of flow inspires students to love learning and seek it out.
Csikszentmihalyi lists the 8 characteristics of flow as:
- Complete concentration on the task
- Clarity of goals and reward in mind and immediate feedback
- Transformation of time (speeding up/slowing down of time)
- The experience is intrinsically rewarding
- Effortlessness and ease
- There is a balance between challenge and skills
- Actions and awareness are merged, losing self-conscious rumination
- There is a feeling of control over the task
As I thought about what I saw in the boys, I had definitely observed the characteristics of flow in their play, so I began to look for it in other places too. I recognized it during a multi-grade project on health. Students were using design thinking to answer the question, How might we create better games for Field Day? I noticed it when the students became vendors in an Israeli-styled market, serving parents, community members, and classmates as part of their Hebrew learning. I recognized flow when jazz was playing during the fourth and fifth graders' free write period. And, second and third graders were most definitely in a state of flow as they engaged in a round of the improv game, Hitchhiker. I am glad to see students entering a state of flow, or at least demonstrating some of flow's characteristics. I know that this enhances their learning and motivates them to come back for more.
When I decided to spend a day observing boys, I wasn't sure what to expect. I'd picked them as a group to observe because I'd noticed, like many other educators, that they are disciplined more often than girls. I wondered what an already progressive school could do to mitigate this issue. Now, I think the answer is to do more of what boys do. I plan to play more, encourage them to play more, embrace risks, and go all in. I plan to use more challenging project-like assignments, games, improv, and choice. I plan to head outside as much as possible and to find the fun and get into the flow. I encourage you to as well. Spending a day learning through play feels outstanding. And by the way, while I was watching, I just happened to notice that the girls who were playing dodgeball with the boys were having a pretty great time too.
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| I Read the River Wrong, and It Changed the Way I Feel about the Stars |
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Dan Frank, Head of School, The Steward School
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Last year, May 22, 2018, we were out on the James River for our annual Headmaster's Holiday rafting trip with the senior class. There were about 10 boats (rafts) on the water, each with 4-5 kids, a faculty member, and a guide. It had been raining hard for the past week, and the river was running at 12 feet; we'd been out in past years as high as 14 feet. The river runs faster; the rapids are more thrilling.
Something happened. That day, I learned a lot about risk-about the difference between activities that are high probabilities with low impact, such as school field days where we will definitely have bruises and scrapes, and activities that are low probabilities with high impact, such as taking a grade level of students on rapids with trained, experienced guides. I can tell you that once you see something a certain way, you can't unsee it. I put children in harm's way that day, and I can't again.
At The Steward School, we've talked about guideposts and north stars. Guideposts are the signs you look for to let you know you are on track with a goal. A north star is not merely your goal; it is your purpose.
When we were in the water, all of the boys I was with, and all the other people in all of the other boats, followed our guideposts. The safety training and processes we had learned all worked exactly as they were intended. When our boat flipped over just before the rapids, there was heightened attention, but there was no panic. We all did what we had been trained to do, and that's why the outcome in the end was so positive. We followed our guideposts, and they carried us to safety.
We had been warned before the trip never to try to grab hold of a sieve, pockets of sticks and debris that collect like islands against rocks and bridge columns, but which are unstable and invisible below the water line; they can trap you in the water. Four boys and I were floating separately in the water. I learned later that two had been plucked out relatively quickly by other boats. The other two boys and I could not swim against the fast moving current, and we had lost our paddles. We did everything we could, without communicating, to avoid the sieve that was looming ahead of us. We succeeded in averting it, but that put us in the path of a dam. I do not remember floating over it, nor being dropped over the other side. My memory returns in a vivid cacophony of sound-- a loud, echoing, whoosh of water. I was utterly disoriented and looked up to see a tall wave about to come crashing down on me. "A wave?! I'm on a river. . ." I was trapped in a hydro, which as I understand it, is a river feature somewhat like a whirlpool, but which runs vertically instead of horizontally. I had no idea such a thing existed or what to expect.
We were pushed and pinned underwater over and over again-I do not know how many times. If not for my life vest, I would not have found the surface; the water was an angry, dark, muddy swirl. There were no guidepos
ts here, only north star. I was at the mercy of the river. As I went down for perhaps the third or fourth time, my strength flagging, I knew that I could not last much longer. I was resigned; I was going to drown today. As can only happen in delirious states, I flashed. Trapped underwater, unresisting, not knowing which way was up, I saw my children, and I remember thinking, "There's to
o much left to do."
Then, in the same murk and confusion, I flashed on the faces of all our students, and I thought, "What will they do?
This cannot happen to them."
The next thing I can remember is the sight of a paddle handle being extended toward me and being heaved into a boat.
When I could breathe again, the first thing I did was lay eyes on each of the boys who had been in my boat, and thankfully each was in a different boat, looking as stunned as I'm sure I did.
Our guideposts carry us through the day to day. Our north star gives us direction when everything else is stripped away.
I was not courageous that day. I only went about my business. I work with so many fine and truly courageous people; people who have faced much greater adversity than I. But, that day I learned, or rather, confirmed, my north star. It is the children we serve.
I will fight through hardship; I will take on any challenge; I will entertain any conflict to make the school's dreams come true, in service of our kids.
Not every day is a win. Not everything we do comes easy. We can't even always see the point in what we do, but we have to have faith that a gift awaits in the end. Like Sisyphus, we will roll the rock to the top of the mountain, and tomorrow, we will do it all over again. We can't always succeed, but we must embrace the work.
The mountain you climb every day, the river you ride, the path you walk: I hope it leads you to your north star.
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