Edcamp for Cherry Street ~ Differentiation for Staff -- SAVMP #22

After reading the assignment for SAVMP #22, I feel this is a great opportunity for me to do some planning ahead for Year THREE at our school.

Year ONE was about establishing the vision, assembling the right crew, and setting up the infrastructure and the processes and procedures that would facilitate the vision becoming real. Year TWO has been about improving the curriculum and cultivating the human capital on campus. Year THREE is going to be about leveraging the power of data to precisely alter instruction, polishing our craft, and improving, improving, improving. Over the course of this time, we are periodically picking up new riders on the bus. As new riders join us, they have missed the visioning process that occurred during year one. If the new rider has been in education for a while, they bring a certain knowledge base with them. However, if the new rider is an entirely new teacher, they are arriving with a novice level knowledge base, far different than all other educators on campus. This layering of experiences causes a staff with three different levels of knowledge about the vision, expectations, and general foundation for progress at our site. With that said, I was overjoyed when I read Amber's post about differentiating for staff. I love the ideas she proposed for staff development and making it relevant for the faculty! It is clearly my new goal to press forward toward this type of staff development during different times of the school year.

Amber's suggestions in her words:

1. Grouping teachers is one way of differentiating.
2. Give options in what your teachers are discussing, #edcamp style. I’ve even “prepped” teachers with a couple of topics that I knew that I wanted to see covered, but left most of the board blank, for their input.
3. Allow conversations, not just “sit & get” sessions.
4. Flip your meetings, to make the discussions more valid & transparent. Allow teacher voice!
5. Let your groups of ability leveled learners be led by members of your own staff. Call on the experience in your building!
6. Create a bucket list of activities you’d like to see in classrooms.

I especially like #1, #2, and #5. My mentor in Canada, Paul McGuire, flips his faculty meetings by sending out videos of the concepts prior to the meeting and then has faculty do the "work" of exploring the concepts at the faculty meeting.

Whatever the case, this is what I would like to begin doing for staff development during year THREE. Half way through Year TWO I can tell who the campus experts and teacher leaders are for our school. I will tap into their expertise to begin growing the new teachers and the rising leaders for our school.

I think it is exciting to think we may be able to start this in about 6 months. I would LOVE to get really brave and try an #edcamp style faculty meeting at some point next year. That is SUPER EXCITING. I met another principal at FETC this year who raved about edcamp. I hope to attend one prior to trying it out with our faculty. What is an #edcamp, you may ask?

From Wikipedia:

An edcamp is a user-generated conference - commonly referred to as an "unconference". Edcamps are designed to provide participant-driven professional development for K-12 educators.^[1]Edcamps are modeled after BarCamps, free participant-driven conferences with a primary focus on technology and computers. Educational technology is a common topic area for edcamps, as are pedagogy, practical examples in instructional use of modern tools, and solving the problems technology can introduce into the classroom environment.

Edcamps are generally free or very low-cost, built around ad hoc community participation. Sessions are not planned until the day of the event, when participants can volunteer to facilitate a conversation on a topic of their choice.^[2] Edcamps operate "without keynote speakers or vendor booths, encourage participants to find or lead a conversation that meet their needs and interests."^[3]

The first edcamp was held in May 2010 in Philadelphia.^[4] Since that time, there have been over 200 edcamp events held throughout the world. The Edcamp Foundation was formed in December 2011 to help teachers and other stakeholders who organize edcamps. The vision of the Edcamp Foundation is to "promote organic, participant-driven professional development for K-12 educators worldwide."

I look forward to growing myself and my staff when it comes to Differentiated Staff Development. Edcamp Cherry Street, here we come!