TeacherDrivenChange

Is Imagination Dead?

In the Movie Six Degrees of Separation, Will Smith explains how imagination is an integral part of our individuality.  The film discusses the importance of imagination and how we have lost our sense of purpose and direction.  Many teachers believe that imagination and creativity have been eliminated in our schools and replaced with state mandates.  Watch the film, discuss it with your colleagues, and comment below.

Applying Appreciative Inquiry to Testing and State Standards

Appreciative Inquiry (AI) is a strength-based approach that is very popular. AI's fundamental approach is to discover, honor, and amplify what works in a system or organization. AI can be used with individual students, one-on-one student-teacher relationships, classrooms, schools, school districts and school communities. AI has also been found to be a positive force for creating success for students that have known only failure. By focusing on student strengths over deficits, teachers have been able to help students gain the necessary confidence and commitment to be successful. Click here to find how one teacher changed the lives of students. Other resources include:

Leading Strength-Based School Change

A Conversation on the Future of Education

Student Discipline: A Strength-Based approach

If your school is experiencing high suspension and expulsion rates, you and your colleagues may want to consider practices and procedures based on student assets and strengths?   Click here to learn how a school task force made up of adult and student stakeholders devised a series of interventions that included student-led efforts to improve discipline policies and procedures. These interventions increased personal accountability, leadership, resiliency, self-management, and social competence in students as opposed to merely reducing student deficits in the form of undesirable behaviors.

Creating Positive Classroom Management

A shift towards recognizing positive student behaviors -- rather than focusing on disruptive behaviors -- vastly improved the culture in educator Marti Schwartz's classroom.  Schwartz, who is the creator and co-facilitator of Brown University's Novice and Experienced Teachers Working Together program, recounts her attitude-changing experience in both for and finding more positive behaviors to reward.  Continue reading.

Pacific Coast Teacher Innovation Network Grants

The University of California at Davis CRESS Center, Humboldt State University and West Sac Early College Prep are pleased to announce the Pacific Coast Teacher Innovation Network grants program.

Grants for Teachers  -  PacTIN is awarding grants of up to $30,000 each to 24 teams of K-12 teachers. The grants will allow teachers to identify and participate in professional development aligned with their own interests and the needs of their students and to translate that experience into a classroom or school project. Funding for this two-year project comes from the California Postsecondary Education Commission's Improving Teacher Quality program.  Continue reading.

Mini-Grant Details

The CTA Institute for Teaching Board of Directors has established a competitive grant program for CTA members and chapters to support strength-based, teacher-driven change initiatives. The application process for the initial round of mini-grants will begin in the spring, 2010 and will be open to individual CTA members, small teams of educators and affiliated local chapters.

Grant applications will be available soon on the IFT website.  Competitive teacher grants will be awarded in amounts up to $5,000 and competitive chapter grants will be awarded in amounts up to $20,000. All applications must reflect innovative efforts to achieve school and district change initiatives that are strength based and teacher-driven.  Applications must specify how the proposal would improve teaching and learning conditions, how student outcomes will be improved and what the overall benefit of the proposal is for teachers and the teaching profession. Look for detailed information in the coming days.