March 4, 2024 • 42 mins
Welcome to episode 166 of the Leader of Learning Podcast. In this episode, we delve into the heart of educational innovation and growth. with Tom Murray, the Director of Innovation for Future Ready Schools and a renowned expert in the field of education. In this episode, we're going to tackle some of the most pressing issues facing educators today, from the readiness and challenges of innovating within our school systems to understanding the unique learning styles and needs of our students. We'll discuss the importance of a mindset shift, embracing change, and breaking free from cycles of negativity.
Tom Murray will draw upon his vast experience as a teacher, principal, and district administrator to share insights on creating authentic learning experiences, building leadership capacity, and ensuring that all students have access to an inclusive and equitable learning environment. Additionally, we will dive into the dichotomy of structure and flexibility in education systems, with an emphasis on the delicate balance between fostering student voice and adhering to societal norms and standards.
Expect to walk away with practical advice, a heightened understanding of leadership in education, and an array of free resources available to support educators in their quest to become future-ready. So, whether you're a teacher, administrator, or just passionate about the future of teaching and learning, this episode is packed with value and insight that you won't want to miss.
Guest Information:
Tom serves as the Director of Innovation for Future Ready Schools®, a project of All4Ed, located in Washington, D.C. He has testified before the United States Congress and has worked alongside that body, the US Senate, the White House, the US Department of Education and state departments of education, corporations, and school districts throughout the country to implement student-centered learning while helping to lead Future Ready Schools® and Digital Learning Day. An ASCD best-selling author, Murray serves as a regular conference keynote, was named the "2018 National/Global EdTech Leader of the Year," by EdTech Digest, the "2017 Education Thought Leader of the Year," one of "20 to Watch" by NSBA in 2016, and the "Education Policy Person of the Year" by the Academy of Arts and Sciences in 2015. His best-selling book, “Learning Transformed: 8 Keys to Designing Tomorrow’s Schools, Today,” co-authored with Eric Sheninger and published by ASCD, was released in June 2017. His most recent book, “Personal & Authentic: Designing Learning Experiences that Impact a Lifetime,” was released in October of 2019. Prior to moving to his role in Washington, D.C., Murray served as an elementary teacher, middle school teacher, middle school principal, elementary principal, and at the district level in Bucks County, Pennsylvania. He is most passionate about creating cultures of innovation where teachers are empowered to create the types of learning experiences today's modern learners need to thrive.
Episode Resources:
Tom's Website
Tom's Books
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Tom Murray will draw upon his vast experience as a teacher, principal, and district administrator to share insights on creating authentic learning experiences, building leadership capacity, and ensuring that all students have access to an inclusive and equitable learning environment. Additionally, we will dive into the dichotomy of structure and flexibility in education systems, with an emphasis on the delicate balance between fostering student voice and adhering to societal norms and standards.
Expect to walk away with practical advice, a heightened understanding of leadership in education, and an array of free resources available to support educators in their quest to become future-ready. So, whether you're a teacher, administrator, or just passionate about the future of teaching and learning, this episode is packed with value and insight that you won't want to miss.
Guest Information:
Tom serves as the Director of Innovation for Future Ready Schools®, a project of All4Ed, located in Washington, D.C. He has testified before the United States Congress and has worked alongside that body, the US Senate, the White House, the US Department of Education and state departments of education, corporations, and school districts throughout the country to implement student-centered learning while helping to lead Future Ready Schools® and Digital Learning Day. An ASCD best-selling author, Murray serves as a regular conference keynote, was named the "2018 National/Global EdTech Leader of the Year," by EdTech Digest, the "2017 Education Thought Leader of the Year," one of "20 to Watch" by NSBA in 2016, and the "Education Policy Person of the Year" by the Academy of Arts and Sciences in 2015. His best-selling book, “Learning Transformed: 8 Keys to Designing Tomorrow’s Schools, Today,” co-authored with Eric Sheninger and published by ASCD, was released in June 2017. His most recent book, “Personal & Authentic: Designing Learning Experiences that Impact a Lifetime,” was released in October of 2019. Prior to moving to his role in Washington, D.C., Murray served as an elementary teacher, middle school teacher, middle school principal, elementary principal, and at the district level in Bucks County, Pennsylvania. He is most passionate about creating cultures of innovation where teachers are empowered to create the types of learning experiences today's modern learners need to thrive.
Episode Resources:
Tom's Website
Tom's Books
**************************************************************
TAKE MY NEW LEADERSHIP STYLES QUIZ!
https://dankreiness.com/quiz
**************************************************************
ACCESS MY INSPIRING RESOURCES:
SUBSCRIBE TO MY YOUTUBE CHANNEL
Sign up for my email newsletter
The Teacher’s Guide to Becoming a School Leader
“Lead to Inspire Growth” eBook
FREE “Unlock Your Leadership Potential” course
**************************************************************
Consider Becoming an Official Show Sponsor!
I can help promote your product or service -
Email me at dan@leaderoflearning.com
Media Kit - https://dankreiness.com/media
Talk Studio is my recording platform of choice for video, audio, and even live streaming. For more information about Talk Studio and to receive 20%
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
You know, to create schools thatare future ready, We've got to create
cultures where people actually want to be, where innovation can thrive, where people
can fail forward, where they cantake risks, not places that are ruled
by fear and compliance and thou shaltnot. And by the way, I'm
not just talking about our kids.Welcome to the Leader of Learning podcast.
I'm your host, doctor Dan Krinis, and this is where I help educators
(00:23):
grow their impact as instructional leaders becausemy research and leadership experiences have led me
to understand that someone like you,regardless of your role or your title,
can have a tremendous impact on yourorganization. I chat with inspiring guests who
are truly making an impact as instructionalleaders. Whether this is your first time
(00:45):
listening or you come back for more, I hope you've subscribed to this show
on your preferred podcast app so youdon't miss any of the great episodes,
topics, or guests. Anyway,I'm so glad you've tuned in. Now
let's get started. Hello, Leaderof Learning, and welcome into episode one
(01:10):
sixty seven of the Leader of Learningpodcast. I have a really great one
for you, but before that,I just wanted to mention that I've actually
created a new tool that I thinkyou're gonna love. It's a leadership styles
quiz. If you've ever taken oneof those personality quizzes to tell you what
type of personality you have, it'spretty similar, but this one will actually
(01:32):
help you determine what kind of leaderyou are if you're interested. It's only
ten questions and it'll just take afew minutes, but it'll give you a
lot of really great insights and informationinto what your style of leadership is.
So if you are interested in findingout, head to Dan Krenz dot com
slash quiz and take that brief tenquestion quiz to find your leadership style.
(01:56):
All right now, onto the episode. In this episode, I have a
very special guest, none other thanTom Murray, who's the director of Innovation
for Future Ready Schools and a renownedexpert in the field of education. In
this episode, we're going to tacklesome of the more pressing issues facing educators
today, everything from the readiness andchallenges of innovating within our classrooms and our
(02:20):
school systems, to understanding the uniquelearning styles and needs of our students.
And we'll discuss the importance of reallyembracing a mindset shift around change and breaking
free from cycles of negativity. SoI can't wait for you to listen because
I know you are going to getso much value out of this episode.
(02:42):
Coming up after these messages is myinterview with Tom Murray. Welcome back,
Leader of Learning. I have anexciting guest on in this episode, someone
who I met up with in personrecently at Fetc. Really enjoyed some time
there getting together in person, butI've loved listening to and consuming the content
that this guy has put out fora long time. So I'm excited to
(03:05):
welcome on Tom Murray. If youdon't know Tom, he currently serves as
the director of Innovation for Future ReadySchools. Prior to that, and prior
to moving into this role in Washington, he was an elementary teacher, middle
school teacher, middle school principal,elementary principal, district level administrator. He's
done a lot, including writing somebooks. He's created a lot of content,
(03:30):
best selling book with co author EricScheneger, Learning Transformed, and his
most recent book, Personal and AuthenticDesigning Learning Experiences that Impact a Lifetime that
was released in twenty nineteen. Sofirst off, Tom, thanks so much
for joining us, and if youcould elaborate a little bit more on who
(03:52):
you are, where you are andwhat you do awesome. Well, thank
you so much, Dan, whatan honored is to join the podcast.
Thanks for that quick overview. Ilike to say, with all those different
positions, like I obviously couldn't keepa job, so now I work out
of Washington, d C. Right, Like makes total sense though. You
know, I was in a schooljust today and I spend a good amount
of time in an early elementary precater to different classrooms, and just man,
(04:15):
I the work that I'm doing nowis incredible, and I get to
work with amazing people across the country. But I share that because there's nothing
like just this morning, being beingwith the little ones, having them come
up, giving a big hug,and I'll tell you I missed that.
And so you know, after spendingtime as a teacher, as an administrator,
having the privilege to now work nationally. No matter where I go,
Dan, there's amazing people working incrediblyhard for kids. Some days I get
(04:40):
to work with teachers, maybe it'sa convocation, maybe it's a professional learning
day. Some days I'm working withprinciples, superintendents getting to coach them a
little bit on that end, andyou know, just it's an honor to
work with educators. They are someof the most giving, hard working,
dynamic people on the planet. Butlet's be real, there's a lot of
challenges out there, and so howdo we continue to see challenges as opper
coortunities and so get to run futureready schools? As you mentioned, I
(05:02):
encourage you to check out futureready dotorg, but I'll sell anything. Bipartisan
nonprofit out of Washington, DC.We raise money to do the work that
we do each and every day forschool and district leaders and so it's an
honor to connect with folks with thatand as you mentioned, I get to
write and speak and do that kindof stuff. And again, no matter
where I go, there's great people. So thanks for having me on the
podcast and excited to dive in absolutelyAnd I think it would only be apropos
(05:28):
if if I got started by askingyou about future readiness. Right, So,
future Ready Schools do a lot ofwork to get teachers, educators,
administrators, students of course, tobe future ready. I'm going to hit
you with a little bit of achicken in the egg or the egg kind
of a question, right, chickenor the egg? Which came first?
Are we do we need to putin? I know it's all important,
(05:54):
all right, but what's the toppriority? Is it getting teachers future ready?
Is it really understanding and getting studentsto get those skills that you know,
you hear everybody talk about they're goingto get jobs that don't even exist
yet, Like what comes first?Yeah, So it's a good question,
(06:14):
you know. I think when wetalk future ready, we talk there's so
many different facets of it. Butfirst would also be mindset. Are we
creating experiences for kids that are remotelyrelevant for today's learners? Right? I
think we can all agree anybody that'sever spent more than a day in a
classroom can hear kids asking like,why are we learning this? Why are
we learning this? And to me, that's a sign of one of two
things. Number one, maybe it'sjust a really good question, and maybe
(06:35):
we need to evaluate some of thethings that we've traditionally done. But number
two, there's no connection to thewhy. And so taking a look when
we look at future ready, it'sreally a mindset first and foremost around creating
experiences that are going to be relevantfor today's kids. You're right, it's
a chicken or egg question, likewhich one can we do first? And
let's be real, like we recognizethere's no true arrival point of like,
(06:58):
hey, we're here, we didit. We're not, Like, that's
not feasible, and so it's acontinuous work of progress of how do we
build on the great things that districtshave been doing for decades, right,
and how do we continue to preparestudents for that world that is constantly evolving,
that is constantly changing. So partof it and looking at, you
know, the curricular side. Weare not here to be at a national
(07:18):
level telling people like, here's whatyou need to teach. Nobody would have
that and totally understand why, right, That's not our role. But our
role is to help school and districtleaders make sure that they're making decisions,
to make sure that the learning isrelevant for kids, that the opportunity and
access are there for all groups ofkids, especially traditionally marginalized groups of students,
and making sure that the workforce readypiece that you referenced as an area
(07:44):
that we focused on as well.We see a lot of things across the
country with pathways and redesign for skills. I think, you know, for
a good period of time in ourcountry, I think we put kids in
this four year college box and ifthey didn't fit inside that box, it
was like we failed or something wasn'tright with them, and man, what
a travesty that is and recognizing thatand looking back at that. So,
(08:05):
how do we create experience for kidsthat leverage their interests, their passions,
their strengths to give them the skillsto ultimately be what they want to be
in life, to be whatever versionof success they want to be. And
maybe it's entering that workforce, enteringthe military, maybe it is going to
a four year college, and howcan we best support them with that?
So, you know, our workat future Ready is supporting school and district
(08:26):
leaders to help build capacity to makethat. I really believe that every educator
does their best and the best thatthey know how, but we try to
build some capacity for leadership to createthe cultures where people want to be,
you know, to create schools thatare future ready. We've got to create
cultures where people actually want to beschools and where innovation can thrive, where
(08:48):
people can fail forward, where theycan take risks, not places that are
ruled by fear and compliance and thoushalt not. And by the way,
I'm not just talking about our kids. I'm also talking about putting our staff
in these boxes that they have tobe contained over yere and they're fearful to
do anything different. And well,how can we ask our staff to take
risks when we're promoting it with ourkids, but then not allowing our staff
(09:09):
to do so? And so alot of those pieces around mindsets, around
experiences, and around environments ultimately createthe what we would call future ready.
We have an entire framework for itand lots of different ways that we could
talk through it and talk about it. But how do we create relevant learning
experiences for kids? How do weprovide the access and the opportunity that's needed.
How do we build the leadership capacityand the cultures where people want to
(09:33):
be so all of it can thrive. I'm going to take that and run
with it. I have to piggybackoff what you just finished with. So
you talk about a culture of innovationand the opposite, let's say, of
a culture of fear and intimidation andworry that a teacher might feel like they
(09:54):
can't take risks, try new things, they can't innovate, And it's a
really timely conversation and a really timelyquestion. I'll tell you why quick aside.
Literally just today I was I havethe fortune as a digital learning coach,
but but a former literacy coach toactually kind of tag team with the
(10:16):
literacy coach in my school to meetwith teachers sometimes. And I was in
a meeting today with a grade levelof ELA teachers and this exact concept and
aspect of the school culture came up. And the way that it came up
was that a teacher said, I'mparaphrasing, but the teacher was like,
I really want new ways to getstudents to show what they're learning. I
(10:41):
don't just want them to write anessay. And of course I felt like,
you know, that's well, that'swhere I come in as the digital
learning coach, Like I got allthese tricks and things up my sleeve that
I can show you, and I'ma former ELA teacher, former literacy coach,
like this is right up my alley. But still the I don't want
(11:01):
to say the argument, but thehesitation was, but what if I get
observed doing something that's not really inthe curriculum. And so it really was
that that aspect of the intimidation andthe fear, like you said, it
was there, and I was happythat this teacher wants to, you know,
(11:22):
think outside the box, wants todo some things differently. But I
also felt like, man, we'restill at a stage where teachers are so
worried about where they have to bein the curriculum and doing the exact culminating
task that it says that they haveto do, and not being able to
get themselves or their students outside thebox. Yeah. So there's so much
(11:46):
unpack with what you just said,and a lot I can connect to Number
one. I think you see justin that story the impact of leadership,
right. I referenced earlier being ina building this morning that I was reflected
on and hanging with some of theseyoung elementary students, and conversations that I
had with teachers that were almost theopposite in that one of the things we
really appreciate our principle is he letsus run, he lets us try new
(12:07):
things. He encourage us to thinkoutside of the box. And so just
those two contrasting pieces, First ofall, I think you could find in
any district or any place. Youknow, it's not anything unique about two
different schools there. I think you'dhear that story over and over and over.
But what we're pointing at is theimportance of leadership, the ability for
leadership to say I'm going to modelfor you what innovation can look like.
(12:30):
I'm going to model for you failingforward. I'm going to own things when
I screw it up as your principle, and I'm going to find a way
to pick up those pieces and moveforward to model to you. Hey,
when I mess this up, here'show you pick up the pieces and move
forward. And it's okay. Asgood as you are, you're human and
you're going to make mistakes. Ithink you're pointing to a lot of times
where it is this fear. Andlet's also be very real, there's very
(12:52):
toxic leadership out there. I'll bethe first to see it and admit it.
And I don't believe any principle getsup in a given day and says
like I want to be the dinnertable conversation tonight in a negative way.
I think it's rooted in people believingthey're doing the right thing you know,
even in toxic environments. And I'mnot saying what you were referring to is
(13:13):
totally toxic, but I'm thinking ofthe extremes out there for folks that are
listening that may be feeling like,yeah, that is a principle where if
I step one word out of thatguide in that given day, I'm going
to get my hand slapped. AndI know people that really feel like that.
And so I think recognizing, youknow, from a leadership end,
I really think those pieces come fromthose principles, feeling like to do the
(13:35):
best we can for kids, ithas to be exactly here, and I'm
doing my best to help you stayin there. I think it comes out
of a good place ninety nine outof one hundred times, I really do.
However, the problem becomes when that'smy mindset. As a principle,
I'm doing the opposite of what I'masking them to do with kids. If
I'm going to ask kids to takerisks, I've got to create environments where
(13:58):
my teachers can take risks. IfI'm want to recognize that failure is a
part of learning, I've got torecognize that when I'm asking my teachers encouraging
them to try new things. It'snot going to always work. They're going
to fall in their face at times. And you know what, that's okay.
I'm not talking about not planning oryou know, being not prepared.
I don't mean that at all.That's a different issue. But if we're
asking people to try a new assessment, try a new instructional strategy, and
(14:20):
it doesn't go okay, and thenI'm the first person barking down their neck
being like you wasted seven minutes ofinstructional time, that person will never take
a risk again, right, youknow? I think back to one of
my early principles when I was anelementary teacher give a shout out to a
guy named Bill Gretzula. Was whenI was an early teacher, I had
no idea what I was doing.I was trying to figure it out.
(14:43):
He was somebody that created a culturewhere we really wanted to be. He
had really high expectations and high standards. It wasn't just a free for all,
do whatever you want. But atthe same time he would definitely really
push instructionally. And I can thinkabout some supervision conversations that I had where
the lesson was like so so probablynot great. And you know he didn't
just sugarcoat everything like everything's wonderful.You don't have to ever change anything because
(15:05):
then he's not helpful as an instructionalleader, right, And you get that
in your role as a coach.But the flip side is every signal time
I walked out with my dignity,every single time I walked out feeling like,
you know what, maybe I willtry that. I see why I
could do that differently. To me, that comes down to the culture piece,
the relationship piece, and the trust. Like as admin with teachers,
(15:26):
if I've got that trust, ifmy teachers know I've got their back and
we've built that trust, I'm goingto be much more willing to try something,
to step out, try a differentway of working with kids. But
if I don't, or if it'sthis constant game of gotcha and not I
gotcha, right, then people won'tdo that. To me, I don't
(15:46):
know why. That's not rocket science, right, Like what we're asking our
teachers to do with kids, weneed to be doing with our staff.
Honestly, anything else is hypocritical AndI don't know how to say that.
It's kind of like that and Isay this as a former principle as somebody
that works with principle, and principlesare some of the best people on the
planet on the whole, for sure. But it's kind of like the principle
that tells teachers, you know,I expect you to get back to back
(16:07):
to parents within twenty four hours,but when you email me, I get
like a six week grace period,right, And so I think my question
for ADMIN is going along this pointis how do we model the type of
experiences we want our kids to havewith our teachers. If we want our
teachers to communicate clearly, we needto communicate clearly. If we want our
parents to be in constant understanding ofunderstanding with all the different things that are
(16:30):
going on, well we as principlesbetter be doing a darn good job for
that for our staff as well.And so lots of facets to what you
said. But I think underlying ourculture, relationships and trust, and you
know, I think those kinds ofthings take a while to build. You
know, if I'm a new principlein a building, recognize you're coming at
it with people with decades of experiencethat maybe a time or two felt burned.
(16:55):
Maybe their time or two felt like, hey, they were tried something,
they were vulnerable, and then theygot chastised the next day in a
postop. Well like that can sitwith people for decades unless the trust is
there, And so we've got todo it repetitively to show them that we
can build that trust, because trustis such a delicate thing, isn't it.
I Mean, that's something that cantake a really long time to build,
(17:15):
and it can be shattered overnight inan email. And so I think
creating those environments and all of thatrelates to when we talk about creating inclusive
cultures with future ready schools. Therelationship and the trust or the foundation of
that, just like it's the foundationof the classroom, just like it's the
foundation of a faculty meeting, justlike it's also the fact of the foundation
of a faculty room conversation with noadministrators in it. This podcast is a
(17:41):
proud member of the Teach Better PodcastNetwork, Better Today, Better Tomorrow,
and the Podcast to Get You there. Explore more podcasts at www dot Teach
Better podcastnetwork dot com. Now let'sget back to the episode. I love
so much of what you said,and I'm really glad that you pulled in
that that leadership piece talking about howschool leaders administrators really need to model their
(18:08):
expectations of their staff, but youknow, and through their own actions.
Really really shameless plug here, andI almost apologize to do it. But
for my listeners, if you don'tknow already, I have a free online
course. It's it's I market itas what's it called Unlock your Leadership Potential.
(18:30):
But that whole course came out ofthe idea of building trust and building
this culture in your school where andI go through like do's and don'ts right,
do this if you want to buildtrust and have a really great culture
of innovation, and don't do thisif you want to basically u break the
(18:53):
trust of everyone near you building.So shameless plug. If you want to
take that course, it's so muchof what we're talking about out right now,
But it's at Dan Krenz dot comslash free course. Enough of that,
let's move forward. I wanted toask you as you were talking.
I think it's only natural for educatorsto I guess naysay a little bit.
(19:15):
Maybe when we're so optimistic right about, hey, we need to innovate,
we have to build this culture wherewe are free to take risks and all
this stuff, Like it sounds greatat the end of the day, as
you alluded to before, there's stilla lot of challenges out there, and
(19:36):
I don't want to sway you inany one direction. I really just want
to get your honest opinion about this. Are we in early twenty twenty four,
Like, are we in a systemin education where we can say we're
ready to really move forward? Likeare we being supported enough yet to really
(20:00):
be able to do this stuff?I don't want to I don't want to
sway your answer, like I said, but I just I think of all
the we've already talked a little bitabout curriculum that that kind of you know,
traps people in makes them feel likethey don't have a lot of room
to interpret and to and to innovate. Testing is still there, all these
(20:22):
you know, accountability measures. SoI'm just wondering how you feel about that.
Yeah, So my shirt answer isabsolutely yes, because I see it
all the time. I think oneof the best things we can do,
is educators is go out and seethings that are way outside of our comfort
zones and our bubbles. You know, I spent a number of years my
whole career in one school district throughoutin Pennsylvania, Great District. We were
(20:42):
recognized all over the place for innovativestuff. And then when I left and
started looking at things nationally, Ican't tell you the amount of times I
was like, holy crap, weweren't remotely doing that. Wow, Like
look at that over there. Andso on one hand, I personally get
to see a lot. I'm inprobably eighty places a given year, so
(21:03):
I get to see a lot ofdifferent things, and there's awesomeness and excellence
all over the place. In fact, most things that districts struggle with,
I guarantee you there's a district withinthree or four hours that's crushing it somewhere
by the way, with higher levelsof need and less of a budget,
because I see those arguments in thosethings all over the place. So to
answer your question, absolutely, becauseI see it. However, let me
(21:26):
put the caveat not necessarily at scale, and what I mean by that is
there's a ridiculous amount of roadblocks inpublic education that we put in everything from
budgets, which are very very realissues, to things that get in the
way like politics, Right, Likethe average tenure of a superintendent before COVID
(21:48):
was three and a half years.Post COVID, I just heard yesterday is
two point nine years, which meansour captain of the ship changes every three
years. Do we understand the culturalimplications for that? Do we understand that
we put teachers in positions that it'soften like start stop start stop, start
stop, Yes, nope, we'renot doing that anymore. Nope, do
(22:10):
this over here and not try thisoff. We're now do this, And
then we wonder at times why theybecome skeptical, right, and so on.
Sometimes I think some of the skepticism, to use your word that's there,
I get it is justified. Likethe human mind can only take somebody
like yes, do don't do itthis way? Dope, do it this
way, Dope, do it this, Nope, can't do it that.
Now we're gonna use this, andlike people start to naturally shut down because
(22:33):
your brain is wired for safety,and so to get at the root of
your question as also, you alsohave to look at the way your brain
is wired. Your brain wired forsafety means your brain is wired for comfort,
which means you're going to do thingsthat are comfortable for you. Stepping
out of your comfort zone, tryingbrand new things is actually not inherently a
normal thing, and your brain doesn'treally want to do it. It's an
(22:55):
interesting thing. You look at thelearning sciences, it's fascinating on that.
So I think when we look atthe safety component of the brain, knowing
that like we're not necessarily wired tojust try all this brand new stuff and
do all those things, I thinkit's just as a component to recognizing like
growth and stuff like that takes time. So on one hand, we see
it all over the place, andI would challenge listeners to like get out
(23:17):
of your districts, get out ofyour schools, go find things across the
country that are happening or you know. I think that's an advantage to social
media and those things. You getto see these great things. A future
ready part of our role is tospotlight great things like this Digital Learning Day,
like on February fifteenth that we justhad, like taking a look like
spotlighting different things across the country.Those are examples that I think can help
(23:38):
push our own mindset with that.The other piece that I would say to
mindset and the way the brain isis your brain sticks, and I need
to look up the exact statistics here, but there's connections and studies that show
like how many positives you need comparedto a negative, right, And it's
why like negativity drive sales, It'swhy negativity you'll see far more on the
(24:00):
front of a newspaper because people willpick it up than just the positive.
But I think that also connects withmindset, and I think that also connects
with systems change, where it's alot easier to get a cycle of negativity
in a school than get the cycleof positivity. It's a lot harder to
break that cycle of negativity than itis to break things that seemed to be
going pretty well. And so toanswer your question, I would say,
(24:21):
I know it's very possible because Isee it every day and just working ghost
to ghosts, But to scale itis really a challenge because there are many
things stacked against us. The amountof the amount of assessments and those pieces
and things take very very real amountsof time. And also just again going
back to some of just the realconstraints that we've had obviously throughout COVID,
and just some of those pieces arejust vast realities and I think it's naive
(24:45):
to neglect those, but I alsothink we need those can do mindsets like
we will figure this out mindset,because I think that's what our kids deserve.
But I will also say the vastamount of educators that I know and
work with, that is their mindset, and so I know they're working with
the best that they have. I'dlove to kind of give my own answer
here. I don't let me.Let's turn the table. I appreciate that,
(25:10):
and watch what I do here.All you podcasters or want to be
podcasters, watch how I segue thisinto my next question. I love everything
you said. I don't want totake away from your answer at all.
But the one thing that I thinkwhen it comes to like are we there
yet? Can we do this?I always go back to yes and and
(25:32):
singularly my reason is because our studentsare ready. And again, I'll give
you a really quick story. II'm I actually facilitate a student tech team
at my school. And again timelyconversation that we're having. Just today I
met with the tech team, andmy tech team president eighth grader at my
school said to me, doctor Crinis, I visited another school recently I think
(25:56):
it was a private school, maybesomewhere where he's considering going and are applying
to for high school. And hesaid, I noticed that a difference between
our school and their school is thattheir school seems to and I'm paraphrasing again,
turn a lot more time over tostudents to do the work. And
it was a pretty cool teaching teachablemoment for me to kind of bring him
(26:18):
into the mind space of an educator. I was using terms like stage on
the stage and guide on the side, and I was telling them about how
we want our teachers to be facilitators. But for an eighth grader to really
put that into perspective and put thatinto his own words, I was really
proud of him. But again,like it was just an example of what
(26:38):
I say all the time is thatour students are ready. And so for
me when it comes to can wedo the work, like you said,
people are doing it right. Andmaybe it's not whole scale change yet in
terms of some of the things thatwe want to see, but change is
happening, and I love how youput that positive spin on it. So
(27:00):
here's my segue, all right,So can I jump back in there and
say go ahead. I love torespond to your thoughts. I actually the
moment you started talking about kids,my first thought was I just went on
for five minutes about all the things, and all I talked about was adults.
And so kudos to you because Iactually defer to your answer because I
(27:22):
couldn't agree more. Where when welook at so many times, and I'm
talking about myself here, I'm notthrowing any other educator out of the bus,
how many times is it me thatwas holding back kids? How many
times was it me thinking like,well, they're only nine or ten,
they'll probably only be able to Andhow many times did I put the lid
on what my kids were capable ofbecause of my limited mindset? And so
(27:45):
yeah, when you step back andyou look what kids are doing, I
mean, and I'm not just talkingabout the random board presentation that comes up
for a particular program or whatnot,but man, our kids today are absolutely
amazing, and I think giving themthe opportunities to run to try things,
to tap into their interests and theirpassions and the strengths, like they're going
to find a way to be successfuland do things differently because they already are
(28:07):
and so so kudos to your answerthere. So what was your next one?
What do you got? Yeah?Thanks, No, So that that's
where I wanted to use that asa as a launching point too. So,
you know, we talk about students, we talk about that they're ready.
A lot of them are hungry forchange, for learning in ways that
they want to learn, learning aboutthings that they want to learn. And
(28:29):
I know that that's a lot ofwhat you have written about and preach about
and talk about when you're out thereon the speaking circuit. So you know,
when we talk about personal and authenticlearning experiences for students, take us
down that path a little bit too, because again, I think it was
natural how we got into that,right, talking about our students are ready,
we want I just had that meetingtoday where a teacher was like,
(28:52):
I want to create new activities,new tasks for students that are not just
writing an essay on paper, right, And I think although he didn't say
it, I'd like to think thatthe rationale was I know that it's going
to be more engaging and authentic fromhigh students, you know, So let
me bring in on that one too. Yeah, So you know, I
(29:15):
think my first lens comes as adad. Here. So my daughter's in
eighth grade. She's your compliant kid. She plays school well. She can
sit in a traditional classroom, She'llbe quiet, she'll raise her hand,
she'll do her homework every night,she gets a's every time. That's just
who she is. She's a reallysmart kid. She struggles to think outside
the box. She struggles to dothings differently if she wasn't told to do
(29:38):
it that. Let me introduce youto my son. He's the opposite of
everything that I just said. He'sthe one that struggles to sit sill more
than five minutes. He's the onethat's like, what day of the week
even ask him about homework? Homework? We don't have Do we have homework?
I don't even know. He isone of the most creative thinkers that
I've ever seen. He's the onethat will take anything in the house,
(30:00):
take anything there, and say like, can I do this differently? Can
I find a better way to doit? If I were to look at
who would I deem successful twenty fiveyears and of course that term is going
to be very, very careful.She will absolutely find a job I know
it where she'll be passionate about.But like a job that's very orderly in
finding the rules. My son willprobably start three companies. He'll probably fail
(30:21):
miserably in the first two and thencrush it in the third and probably employ
one hundred people. So when Ilook at these two, and again not
to say one's more successful, becauseI'm not defining it just by money on
that end, but they are totallydifferent kids. Yet they have the exact
same upbringing, the exact same resources, the exact same parenting structure, the
exact same grandparents, all of it. And they are completely different children,
(30:48):
completely different learners. And so ifthey're coming from the same DNA and they're
that different, how much more differentare twenty five kids that come from different
households, different parents, structures ina sitting in a classroom. And so
when I talk personal and authentic,and part of my goal in writing that
is recognize, if my two childrenare that different, how much more different?
But with that difference in diversity anddiversity and differences, how many more
(31:12):
strengths do we have when we lookat a community of learners, we look
at all that different opportunity. Andso I think, you know, when
I look at I created the personaland authentic framework to help people, and
what are the different ways that wecan explore some of this, exploring interests
and passions and strengths, looking atsome of the moments of AWE the social
emotional side of things, right,recognizing that it goes beyond math, reading
(31:34):
and writing that, yeah, wecan graduate a student with this perfect GPA
get into all the Ivy League schools, But can we be real, like
if they hate life and are reallyreally struggling here and don't have any friends
and are really struggling all across here, Like, are we totally successful and
celebrating that to recognize that, Like, kids are far more complex than any
(31:55):
sort of test scores in that regard. And so when I talk personal and
authentic, how do we see thatchild for who they are? How do
we recognize that child for being beautifullyunique? How do we get to know,
as I call in personal and authentic, the hidden stories within, to
recognize every child that walks into ourclassroom each day has stories on their hearts
that we're not going to ever know. And some of them are really really
great things, and some of themcan be struggles. And so I think
(32:19):
that goes back to earlier conversation oncreating environments where people want to be relationships
and trust and all those pieces.But how do we make sure that we
see that every learner in our classroomis beautifully unique and finding ways to tap
into those interests and passions and strengths. Now, I'm not one that's so
far out there saying, you know, kids should learn whatever they want at
any point in time and be ableto do whatever they want all day long.
(32:43):
I recognize that's just not a scalablestructure. And let's be real,
if I could do whatever I wantedto do all day long, I would
probably naturally go to things that Ilike, that I enjoy, that i'm
strong at strong with, But thereprobably be a lot of things left that
i'd leave out that I really doneed in life. And so we do
need structures, We do need systemsthe only way to scale it, but
(33:07):
we also want to in that offerthem opportunity, offer them voice. You
were talking about tools and different assessmentsand things like that earlier, and sometimes
it's saying like, here's the standard, here's the way you've got to show
me that you learn this that I'llunderstand it. But here's five different ways
that I'm okay with you showing thatyou want to write a play about it.
Write a play about it, youwant to write an essay about it,
Let's write an essay about it.You want to do a speech to
(33:28):
the class on it, Let's dothat. And so sometimes as teachers we
look at it like, well,how in the world could I ever do
this? And yeah, if youwere trying to let every kid do whatever
they want every day and every way, you couldn't. There's only twenty four
hours in the day. But sometimesjust giving them the voice to create choice,
to say here's the way that Iwould love to do that, you
can get kids so much more investedas opposed to here's my only one size
(33:52):
fits all. The other piece tothat is recognizing, like we're all going
to enter a workforce that's going tohave some parameters, some guidelines. Even
if it's hey, I'm creating myown business, I can do it how
I want. I mean, that'sall well and good, which is true,
but you also have to work witha public that have some social norms
about interacting with people the way I'mgoing to communicate, being responsive in all
(34:15):
of that. And so I think, how do we create environments going back
to what are we saying earlier withthe future ready side, that are relevant,
that are also accessible. And Ithink the equity side of this conversation
is really really important. We're notjust talking about our white suburban kids walking
into computer science and classrooms that alot of the kids happen to look like
us. We're crawking about how dowe create experiences that for each child and
(34:37):
that and I think that's where wetalk about the scale being really really important.
That's where we talk about the experienceitself not being something that's just done
too, but something that they're avital part of. And I think going
back to the voice, I thinkthere's a lot of opportunity to give kids
voice in the mix. To goback to our previous conversation. If we're
going to talk about giving kids andI shouldn't even I don't even like the
(34:58):
term giving them voice because they haveit. Sometimes we just shut it down.
I guess it's a better way tosay it, right, like when
we say, like, you know, empower them with voice, like they've
got it. Sometimes we just don'tlisten or we don't care. And so
I think bringing that out. Butif we're going to ask our teachers to
do that, we need to dothe same for them in professional learning.
So where do you start with that? Ask kids and then don't be upset
(35:19):
with their feedback their thoughts. Now, granted, take it with the grain
of salt of sometimes they're sixteen orseventeen, and seventeen year olds can be
pretty interesting creatures. They're probably notgoing to hold back, but their voice
matters, right, and so askthem what they want. Ask them what's
missing as they finish up a gradelevel? Ask them what were the best
parts of learning? What did youwish we did this year? What wasn't
(35:43):
any fun this year? What wouldyou do differently if you became the teacher
tomorrow? And I think, andI said, you know, at the
end of the year, because aswe think about approaching that, but you
know, I think I wouldn't justask that at that point in the year.
I think asking kids all the time, how do we design that differently?
What would that look? And justget some feedback to show them that
they're voice matters and that you reallydo care. So it's not just something
done to them, but something they'repart of. I want to kind of
(36:07):
offer I'm just taking all sorts ofliberties on my own show tonight, I
answered my own question before. Iwant to kind of offer a parting thought,
final thought if I might, andit's based on a lot of what
you just said. You use theword several times strengths. You talked about
interests and passions, but you usethe word strength several times. And one
(36:31):
of the big takeaways that I thinkI have from this conversation is when we
talk about future readiness, when wetalk about innovation in schools, when we
talk about giving students voice, asyou were just saying, I think what
I would love to see down theroad right as we get future ready is
(36:52):
more of a strength based approach,so that we are valuing and empowering the
part of a student where they arereally thriving. And I know you said,
like you use your own experience whereit's like, yeah, if you
gave me time, I would wantto explore what I'm really interested in,
(37:13):
and I know it still needs tolearn other things, and obviously that's what
school is going to do for studentstoo, but we got to stop just
working so much on bringing up whatstudents are not doing well in and really
find what they're thriving in and emphasizethat and provide more opportunities for that too.
(37:34):
So thank you for allowing me toget up on my high horse again.
It's just I got to think inas you were talking, and I
just felt like I needed to addthat. Yeah, no, Dan,
I love that. And actually thismorning was having a conversation on exactly that
topic of how easy it is tolook at kids through a deficit mindset.
We're sitting in the data team meetingand listen, there's a great purpose for
those but we've got to be reallycareful. It doesn't become here's the forty
(37:57):
seven things Johnny's missing, and weever talk about what he's good at.
If all we're looking for is deficits, we're gonna find them all over the
place. If we're primarily looking forstrengths, we're gonna see them all over
the place. And so I usethe word strengths purposefully in the personal and
authentic framework to recognize even our needieststudents have incredible strengths. And at times
(38:19):
if all we do is focus onthat negative, if I'm working with a
teacher and all I'm focusing is onwhat they're lacking, they're gonna burn out
real quick. And guess what kidsare too, And so seeing the greatness
choosing our lens and seeing that thestrengths that they do have are such a
vital aspect to creating those personal andauthentic experiences for kids. I don't even
(38:40):
have anything else to say or askat this point. Out it was this
was a great conversation, Tom.I really appreciate I appreciate your time,
all your thoughts. Could we coulddefinitely keep going for a long time,
but that's a great way to wrapup. But before we really go,
if you could just one more timeshare with the listeners a little bit more
about your work. They can findyou and connect with you and learn even
(39:01):
more about future Ready schools and everythingthat you're doing. Awesome. So yeah,
So if you want to check outmore on future Ready, check out
futuready dot org. Pretty easy there. I encourage you to check out the
framework future ready dot org slash frameworkto look at some of the pieces we
mentioned the curriculum, instruction assessment piece, but personalized professional learning and budget resources,
all the other different facets with that, and we've got dozens and dozens
(39:22):
of free resources to support all thosedifferent things we're constantly highlighting case studies through
podcasts or just different avenues really practicalways to make this stuff happen, And
so encourage you to check those out. Check out on social media, follow
future Ready and all those different pieceson all your major channels. On personally,
you can check out Thomas C.Murray dot com. It's going to
(39:43):
link to a lot of it ifyou're listening. If you're still listening to
the podcast, however, many minutesin, let me give you almost two
hundred resources that I've put together,videos, articles, things that go along
with personal and authentic totally free.If you go to Thomas C. Murray
dot com slash resources the Last whoyou Are, and it'll give you lots
of stuff that I use when Itrain folks, and videos and articles and
things that might be able to supportyour next faculty meeting, your next in
(40:05):
service day, your next book study, whatever it might be. With that,
so I encourage you to check thereout as well. But Dan,
my final word to folks would be, even for those folks that are still
listening and listen to any part ofthis, a simple thanks for their work
each and every day. I seeyou I recognize how challenging it is to
teach second grade every day or tobe a superintendent every day, and thanks
for your work. Thanks for lovingand caring about kids. Thank you for
(40:27):
the late nights in the early morningsand the days where you feel like you
can't go on, or the dayswhere you come home and you've got nothing
left to give to those people thatmatter most to you because you've left it
all in the field. I justwant to say thank you to the educators
who give so much every single day, and a quick reminder to make sure
they take care of themselves in theprocess as well. Thank you for that.
Thank you teachers, Thank you listeners. Thank you no matter what your
(40:51):
role is in this great field ofeducation and the line of work that we're
in. Thank you Tom for yourtime tonight. I knew when we can
in person. I think we've seeneach other in person before, but it
was like the first real connection Ithink that we made in person. I
knew I had to get you onhere, and I can safely say,
as well as I think my listenerstoo, that this was value packed and
(41:14):
thirty eight minutes worth of some reallyreally amazing stuff. So thank you so
much. Thanks for the opportunity toagain. Well that's it for this episode.
Thank you so much for listening.If you haven't done so yet,
don't forget to subscribe to this showon your favorite podcast app. If you
(41:35):
enjoy the content covered on this show, I want to ask you to do
this one thing for me. Pleaseshare it. The biggest favor you could
ever do for me is to pleaselet others know about what I'm doing and
how I'm helping educators grow their impactas instructional leaders. I hope you can
share this podcast with other educators,leaders, friends, or anyone you think
(41:57):
would love listening and learning. Ifyou're interested in leaving a positive rating and
review of this show, links todo so or always in the show notes
for every episode. For more informationabout me or this show, and to
access the great content that I share, please visit my website at Leader of
Learning dot com. That's where youcan find my online courses, YouTube channel,
(42:19):
blog, how to connect with meon social media, and even ways
that you can support the show likedonating or purchasing Leader of Learning merchandise.
Thanks again, and remember, nomatter who you are or where you are,
you are a Leader of Learning.
You know, to create schools thatare future ready, We've got to create
cultures where people actually want to be, where innovation can thrive, where people
can fail forward, where they cantake risks, not places that are ruled
by fear and compliance and thou shaltnot. And by the way, I'm
not just talking about our kids.Welcome to the Leader of Learning podcast.
I'm your host, doctor Dan Krinis, and this is where I help educators
(00:23):
grow their impact as instructional leaders becausemy research and leadership experiences have led me
to understand that someone like you,regardless of your role or your title,
can have a tremendous impact on yourorganization. I chat with inspiring guests who
are truly making an impact as instructionalleaders. Whether this is your first time
(00:45):
listening or you come back for more, I hope you've subscribed to this show
on your preferred podcast app so youdon't miss any of the great episodes,
topics, or guests. Anyway,I'm so glad you've tuned in. Now
let's get started. Hello, Leaderof Learning, and welcome into episode one
(01:10):
sixty seven of the Leader of Learningpodcast. I have a really great one
for you, but before that,I just wanted to mention that I've actually
created a new tool that I thinkyou're gonna love. It's a leadership styles
quiz. If you've ever taken oneof those personality quizzes to tell you what
type of personality you have, it'spretty similar, but this one will actually
(01:32):
help you determine what kind of leaderyou are if you're interested. It's only
ten questions and it'll just take afew minutes, but it'll give you a
lot of really great insights and informationinto what your style of leadership is.
So if you are interested in findingout, head to Dan Krenz dot com
slash quiz and take that brief tenquestion quiz to find your leadership style.
(01:56):
All right now, onto the episode. In this episode, I have a
very special guest, none other thanTom Murray, who's the director of Innovation
for Future Ready Schools and a renownedexpert in the field of education. In
this episode, we're going to tacklesome of the more pressing issues facing educators
today, everything from the readiness andchallenges of innovating within our classrooms and our
(02:20):
school systems, to understanding the uniquelearning styles and needs of our students.
And we'll discuss the importance of reallyembracing a mindset shift around change and breaking
free from cycles of negativity. SoI can't wait for you to listen because
I know you are going to getso much value out of this episode.
(02:42):
Coming up after these messages is myinterview with Tom Murray. Welcome back,
Leader of Learning. I have anexciting guest on in this episode, someone
who I met up with in personrecently at Fetc. Really enjoyed some time
there getting together in person, butI've loved listening to and consuming the content
that this guy has put out fora long time. So I'm excited to
(03:05):
welcome on Tom Murray. If youdon't know Tom, he currently serves as
the director of Innovation for Future ReadySchools. Prior to that, and prior
to moving into this role in Washington, he was an elementary teacher, middle
school teacher, middle school principal,elementary principal, district level administrator. He's
done a lot, including writing somebooks. He's created a lot of content,
(03:30):
best selling book with co author EricScheneger, Learning Transformed, and his
most recent book, Personal and AuthenticDesigning Learning Experiences that Impact a Lifetime that
was released in twenty nineteen. Sofirst off, Tom, thanks so much
for joining us, and if youcould elaborate a little bit more on who
(03:52):
you are, where you are andwhat you do awesome. Well, thank
you so much, Dan, whatan honored is to join the podcast.
Thanks for that quick overview. Ilike to say, with all those different
positions, like I obviously couldn't keepa job, so now I work out
of Washington, d C. Right, Like makes total sense though. You
know, I was in a schooljust today and I spend a good amount
of time in an early elementary precater to different classrooms, and just man,
(04:15):
I the work that I'm doing nowis incredible, and I get to
work with amazing people across the country. But I share that because there's nothing
like just this morning, being beingwith the little ones, having them come
up, giving a big hug,and I'll tell you I missed that.
And so you know, after spendingtime as a teacher, as an administrator,
having the privilege to now work nationally. No matter where I go,
Dan, there's amazing people working incrediblyhard for kids. Some days I get
(04:40):
to work with teachers, maybe it'sa convocation, maybe it's a professional learning
day. Some days I'm working withprinciples, superintendents getting to coach them a
little bit on that end, andyou know, just it's an honor to
work with educators. They are someof the most giving, hard working,
dynamic people on the planet. Butlet's be real, there's a lot of
challenges out there, and so howdo we continue to see challenges as opper
coortunities and so get to run futureready schools? As you mentioned, I
(05:02):
encourage you to check out futureready dotorg, but I'll sell anything. Bipartisan
nonprofit out of Washington, DC.We raise money to do the work that
we do each and every day forschool and district leaders and so it's an
honor to connect with folks with thatand as you mentioned, I get to
write and speak and do that kindof stuff. And again, no matter
where I go, there's great people. So thanks for having me on the
podcast and excited to dive in absolutelyAnd I think it would only be apropos
(05:28):
if if I got started by askingyou about future readiness. Right, So,
future Ready Schools do a lot ofwork to get teachers, educators,
administrators, students of course, tobe future ready. I'm going to hit
you with a little bit of achicken in the egg or the egg kind
of a question, right, chickenor the egg? Which came first?
Are we do we need to putin? I know it's all important,
(05:54):
all right, but what's the toppriority? Is it getting teachers future ready?
Is it really understanding and getting studentsto get those skills that you know,
you hear everybody talk about they're goingto get jobs that don't even exist
yet, Like what comes first?Yeah, So it's a good question,
(06:14):
you know. I think when wetalk future ready, we talk there's so
many different facets of it. Butfirst would also be mindset. Are we
creating experiences for kids that are remotelyrelevant for today's learners? Right? I
think we can all agree anybody that'sever spent more than a day in a
classroom can hear kids asking like,why are we learning this? Why are
we learning this? And to me, that's a sign of one of two
things. Number one, maybe it'sjust a really good question, and maybe
(06:35):
we need to evaluate some of thethings that we've traditionally done. But number
two, there's no connection to thewhy. And so taking a look when
we look at future ready, it'sreally a mindset first and foremost around creating
experiences that are going to be relevantfor today's kids. You're right, it's
a chicken or egg question, likewhich one can we do first? And
let's be real, like we recognizethere's no true arrival point of like,
(06:58):
hey, we're here, we didit. We're not, Like, that's
not feasible, and so it's acontinuous work of progress of how do we
build on the great things that districtshave been doing for decades, right,
and how do we continue to preparestudents for that world that is constantly evolving,
that is constantly changing. So partof it and looking at, you
know, the curricular side. Weare not here to be at a national
(07:18):
level telling people like, here's whatyou need to teach. Nobody would have
that and totally understand why, right, That's not our role. But our
role is to help school and districtleaders make sure that they're making decisions,
to make sure that the learning isrelevant for kids, that the opportunity and
access are there for all groups ofkids, especially traditionally marginalized groups of students,
and making sure that the workforce readypiece that you referenced as an area
(07:44):
that we focused on as well.We see a lot of things across the
country with pathways and redesign for skills. I think, you know, for
a good period of time in ourcountry, I think we put kids in
this four year college box and ifthey didn't fit inside that box, it
was like we failed or something wasn'tright with them, and man, what
a travesty that is and recognizing thatand looking back at that. So,
(08:05):
how do we create experience for kidsthat leverage their interests, their passions,
their strengths to give them the skillsto ultimately be what they want to be
in life, to be whatever versionof success they want to be. And
maybe it's entering that workforce, enteringthe military, maybe it is going to
a four year college, and howcan we best support them with that?
So, you know, our workat future Ready is supporting school and district
(08:26):
leaders to help build capacity to makethat. I really believe that every educator
does their best and the best thatthey know how, but we try to
build some capacity for leadership to createthe cultures where people want to be,
you know, to create schools thatare future ready. We've got to create
cultures where people actually want to beschools and where innovation can thrive, where
(08:48):
people can fail forward, where theycan take risks, not places that are
ruled by fear and compliance and thoushalt not. And by the way,
I'm not just talking about our kids. I'm also talking about putting our staff
in these boxes that they have tobe contained over yere and they're fearful to
do anything different. And well,how can we ask our staff to take
risks when we're promoting it with ourkids, but then not allowing our staff
(09:09):
to do so? And so alot of those pieces around mindsets, around
experiences, and around environments ultimately createthe what we would call future ready.
We have an entire framework for itand lots of different ways that we could
talk through it and talk about it. But how do we create relevant learning
experiences for kids? How do weprovide the access and the opportunity that's needed.
How do we build the leadership capacityand the cultures where people want to
(09:33):
be so all of it can thrive. I'm going to take that and run
with it. I have to piggybackoff what you just finished with. So
you talk about a culture of innovationand the opposite, let's say, of
a culture of fear and intimidation andworry that a teacher might feel like they
(09:54):
can't take risks, try new things, they can't innovate, And it's a
really timely conversation and a really timelyquestion. I'll tell you why quick aside.
Literally just today I was I havethe fortune as a digital learning coach,
but but a former literacy coach toactually kind of tag team with the
(10:16):
literacy coach in my school to meetwith teachers sometimes. And I was in
a meeting today with a grade levelof ELA teachers and this exact concept and
aspect of the school culture came up. And the way that it came up
was that a teacher said, I'mparaphrasing, but the teacher was like,
I really want new ways to getstudents to show what they're learning. I
(10:41):
don't just want them to write anessay. And of course I felt like,
you know, that's well, that'swhere I come in as the digital
learning coach, Like I got allthese tricks and things up my sleeve that
I can show you, and I'ma former ELA teacher, former literacy coach,
like this is right up my alley. But still the I don't want
(11:01):
to say the argument, but thehesitation was, but what if I get
observed doing something that's not really inthe curriculum. And so it really was
that that aspect of the intimidation andthe fear, like you said, it
was there, and I was happythat this teacher wants to, you know,
(11:22):
think outside the box, wants todo some things differently. But I
also felt like, man, we'restill at a stage where teachers are so
worried about where they have to bein the curriculum and doing the exact culminating
task that it says that they haveto do, and not being able to
get themselves or their students outside thebox. Yeah. So there's so much
(11:46):
unpack with what you just said,and a lot I can connect to Number
one. I think you see justin that story the impact of leadership,
right. I referenced earlier being ina building this morning that I was reflected
on and hanging with some of theseyoung elementary students, and conversations that I
had with teachers that were almost theopposite in that one of the things we
really appreciate our principle is he letsus run, he lets us try new
(12:07):
things. He encourage us to thinkoutside of the box. And so just
those two contrasting pieces, First ofall, I think you could find in
any district or any place. Youknow, it's not anything unique about two
different schools there. I think you'dhear that story over and over and over.
But what we're pointing at is theimportance of leadership, the ability for
leadership to say I'm going to modelfor you what innovation can look like.
(12:30):
I'm going to model for you failingforward. I'm going to own things when
I screw it up as your principle, and I'm going to find a way
to pick up those pieces and moveforward to model to you. Hey,
when I mess this up, here'show you pick up the pieces and move
forward. And it's okay. Asgood as you are, you're human and
you're going to make mistakes. Ithink you're pointing to a lot of times
where it is this fear. Andlet's also be very real, there's very
(12:52):
toxic leadership out there. I'll bethe first to see it and admit it.
And I don't believe any principle getsup in a given day and says
like I want to be the dinnertable conversation tonight in a negative way.
I think it's rooted in people believingthey're doing the right thing you know,
even in toxic environments. And I'mnot saying what you were referring to is
(13:13):
totally toxic, but I'm thinking ofthe extremes out there for folks that are
listening that may be feeling like,yeah, that is a principle where if
I step one word out of thatguide in that given day, I'm going
to get my hand slapped. AndI know people that really feel like that.
And so I think recognizing, youknow, from a leadership end,
I really think those pieces come fromthose principles, feeling like to do the
(13:35):
best we can for kids, ithas to be exactly here, and I'm
doing my best to help you stayin there. I think it comes out
of a good place ninety nine outof one hundred times, I really do.
However, the problem becomes when that'smy mindset. As a principle,
I'm doing the opposite of what I'masking them to do with kids. If
I'm going to ask kids to takerisks, I've got to create environments where
(13:58):
my teachers can take risks. IfI'm want to recognize that failure is a
part of learning, I've got torecognize that when I'm asking my teachers encouraging
them to try new things. It'snot going to always work. They're going
to fall in their face at times. And you know what, that's okay.
I'm not talking about not planning oryou know, being not prepared.
I don't mean that at all.That's a different issue. But if we're
asking people to try a new assessment, try a new instructional strategy, and
(14:20):
it doesn't go okay, and thenI'm the first person barking down their neck
being like you wasted seven minutes ofinstructional time, that person will never take
a risk again, right, youknow? I think back to one of
my early principles when I was anelementary teacher give a shout out to a
guy named Bill Gretzula. Was whenI was an early teacher, I had
no idea what I was doing.I was trying to figure it out.
(14:43):
He was somebody that created a culturewhere we really wanted to be. He
had really high expectations and high standards. It wasn't just a free for all,
do whatever you want. But atthe same time he would definitely really
push instructionally. And I can thinkabout some supervision conversations that I had where
the lesson was like so so probablynot great. And you know he didn't
just sugarcoat everything like everything's wonderful.You don't have to ever change anything because
(15:05):
then he's not helpful as an instructionalleader, right, And you get that
in your role as a coach.But the flip side is every signal time
I walked out with my dignity,every single time I walked out feeling like,
you know what, maybe I willtry that. I see why I
could do that differently. To me, that comes down to the culture piece,
the relationship piece, and the trust. Like as admin with teachers,
(15:26):
if I've got that trust, ifmy teachers know I've got their back and
we've built that trust, I'm goingto be much more willing to try something,
to step out, try a differentway of working with kids. But
if I don't, or if it'sthis constant game of gotcha and not I
gotcha, right, then people won'tdo that. To me, I don't
(15:46):
know why. That's not rocket science, right, Like what we're asking our
teachers to do with kids, weneed to be doing with our staff.
Honestly, anything else is hypocritical AndI don't know how to say that.
It's kind of like that and Isay this as a former principle as somebody
that works with principle, and principlesare some of the best people on the
planet on the whole, for sure. But it's kind of like the principle
that tells teachers, you know,I expect you to get back to back
(16:07):
to parents within twenty four hours,but when you email me, I get
like a six week grace period,right, And so I think my question
for ADMIN is going along this pointis how do we model the type of
experiences we want our kids to havewith our teachers. If we want our
teachers to communicate clearly, we needto communicate clearly. If we want our
parents to be in constant understanding ofunderstanding with all the different things that are
(16:30):
going on, well we as principlesbetter be doing a darn good job for
that for our staff as well.And so lots of facets to what you
said. But I think underlying ourculture, relationships and trust, and you
know, I think those kinds ofthings take a while to build. You
know, if I'm a new principlein a building, recognize you're coming at
it with people with decades of experiencethat maybe a time or two felt burned.
(16:55):
Maybe their time or two felt like, hey, they were tried something,
they were vulnerable, and then theygot chastised the next day in a
postop. Well like that can sitwith people for decades unless the trust is
there, And so we've got todo it repetitively to show them that we
can build that trust, because trustis such a delicate thing, isn't it.
I Mean, that's something that cantake a really long time to build,
(17:15):
and it can be shattered overnight inan email. And so I think
creating those environments and all of thatrelates to when we talk about creating inclusive
cultures with future ready schools. Therelationship and the trust or the foundation of
that, just like it's the foundationof the classroom, just like it's the
foundation of a faculty meeting, justlike it's also the fact of the foundation
of a faculty room conversation with noadministrators in it. This podcast is a
(17:41):
proud member of the Teach Better PodcastNetwork, Better Today, Better Tomorrow,
and the Podcast to Get You there. Explore more podcasts at www dot Teach
Better podcastnetwork dot com. Now let'sget back to the episode. I love
so much of what you said,and I'm really glad that you pulled in
that that leadership piece talking about howschool leaders administrators really need to model their
(18:08):
expectations of their staff, but youknow, and through their own actions.
Really really shameless plug here, andI almost apologize to do it. But
for my listeners, if you don'tknow already, I have a free online
course. It's it's I market itas what's it called Unlock your Leadership Potential.
(18:30):
But that whole course came out ofthe idea of building trust and building
this culture in your school where andI go through like do's and don'ts right,
do this if you want to buildtrust and have a really great culture
of innovation, and don't do thisif you want to basically u break the
(18:53):
trust of everyone near you building.So shameless plug. If you want to
take that course, it's so muchof what we're talking about out right now,
But it's at Dan Krenz dot comslash free course. Enough of that,
let's move forward. I wanted toask you as you were talking.
I think it's only natural for educatorsto I guess naysay a little bit.
(19:15):
Maybe when we're so optimistic right about, hey, we need to innovate,
we have to build this culture wherewe are free to take risks and all
this stuff, Like it sounds greatat the end of the day, as
you alluded to before, there's stilla lot of challenges out there, and
(19:36):
I don't want to sway you inany one direction. I really just want
to get your honest opinion about this. Are we in early twenty twenty four,
Like, are we in a systemin education where we can say we're
ready to really move forward? Likeare we being supported enough yet to really
(20:00):
be able to do this stuff?I don't want to I don't want to
sway your answer, like I said, but I just I think of all
the we've already talked a little bitabout curriculum that that kind of you know,
traps people in makes them feel likethey don't have a lot of room
to interpret and to and to innovate. Testing is still there, all these
(20:22):
you know, accountability measures. SoI'm just wondering how you feel about that.
Yeah, So my shirt answer isabsolutely yes, because I see it
all the time. I think oneof the best things we can do,
is educators is go out and seethings that are way outside of our comfort
zones and our bubbles. You know, I spent a number of years my
whole career in one school district throughoutin Pennsylvania, Great District. We were
(20:42):
recognized all over the place for innovativestuff. And then when I left and
started looking at things nationally, Ican't tell you the amount of times I
was like, holy crap, weweren't remotely doing that. Wow, Like
look at that over there. Andso on one hand, I personally get
to see a lot. I'm inprobably eighty places a given year, so
(21:03):
I get to see a lot ofdifferent things, and there's awesomeness and excellence
all over the place. In fact, most things that districts struggle with,
I guarantee you there's a district withinthree or four hours that's crushing it somewhere
by the way, with higher levelsof need and less of a budget,
because I see those arguments in thosethings all over the place. So to
answer your question, absolutely, becauseI see it. However, let me
(21:26):
put the caveat not necessarily at scale, and what I mean by that is
there's a ridiculous amount of roadblocks inpublic education that we put in everything from
budgets, which are very very realissues, to things that get in the
way like politics, Right, Likethe average tenure of a superintendent before COVID
(21:48):
was three and a half years.Post COVID, I just heard yesterday is
two point nine years, which meansour captain of the ship changes every three
years. Do we understand the culturalimplications for that? Do we understand that
we put teachers in positions that it'soften like start stop start stop, start
stop, Yes, nope, we'renot doing that anymore. Nope, do
(22:10):
this over here and not try thisoff. We're now do this, And
then we wonder at times why theybecome skeptical, right, and so on.
Sometimes I think some of the skepticism, to use your word that's there,
I get it is justified. Likethe human mind can only take somebody
like yes, do don't do itthis way? Dope, do it this
way, Dope, do it this, Nope, can't do it that.
Now we're gonna use this, andlike people start to naturally shut down because
(22:33):
your brain is wired for safety,and so to get at the root of
your question as also, you alsohave to look at the way your brain
is wired. Your brain wired forsafety means your brain is wired for comfort,
which means you're going to do thingsthat are comfortable for you. Stepping
out of your comfort zone, tryingbrand new things is actually not inherently a
normal thing, and your brain doesn'treally want to do it. It's an
(22:55):
interesting thing. You look at thelearning sciences, it's fascinating on that.
So I think when we look atthe safety component of the brain, knowing
that like we're not necessarily wired tojust try all this brand new stuff and
do all those things, I thinkit's just as a component to recognizing like
growth and stuff like that takes time. So on one hand, we see
it all over the place, andI would challenge listeners to like get out
(23:17):
of your districts, get out ofyour schools, go find things across the
country that are happening or you know. I think that's an advantage to social
media and those things. You getto see these great things. A future
ready part of our role is tospotlight great things like this Digital Learning Day,
like on February fifteenth that we justhad, like taking a look like
spotlighting different things across the country.Those are examples that I think can help
(23:38):
push our own mindset with that.The other piece that I would say to
mindset and the way the brain isis your brain sticks, and I need
to look up the exact statistics here, but there's connections and studies that show
like how many positives you need comparedto a negative, right, And it's
why like negativity drive sales, It'swhy negativity you'll see far more on the
(24:00):
front of a newspaper because people willpick it up than just the positive.
But I think that also connects withmindset, and I think that also connects
with systems change, where it's alot easier to get a cycle of negativity
in a school than get the cycleof positivity. It's a lot harder to
break that cycle of negativity than itis to break things that seemed to be
going pretty well. And so toanswer your question, I would say,
(24:21):
I know it's very possible because Isee it every day and just working ghost
to ghosts, But to scale itis really a challenge because there are many
things stacked against us. The amountof the amount of assessments and those pieces
and things take very very real amountsof time. And also just again going
back to some of just the realconstraints that we've had obviously throughout COVID,
and just some of those pieces arejust vast realities and I think it's naive
(24:45):
to neglect those, but I alsothink we need those can do mindsets like
we will figure this out mindset,because I think that's what our kids deserve.
But I will also say the vastamount of educators that I know and
work with, that is their mindset, and so I know they're working with
the best that they have. I'dlove to kind of give my own answer
here. I don't let me.Let's turn the table. I appreciate that,
(25:10):
and watch what I do here.All you podcasters or want to be
podcasters, watch how I segue thisinto my next question. I love everything
you said. I don't want totake away from your answer at all.
But the one thing that I thinkwhen it comes to like are we there
yet? Can we do this?I always go back to yes and and
(25:32):
singularly my reason is because our studentsare ready. And again, I'll give
you a really quick story. II'm I actually facilitate a student tech team
at my school. And again timelyconversation that we're having. Just today I
met with the tech team, andmy tech team president eighth grader at my
school said to me, doctor Crinis, I visited another school recently I think
(25:56):
it was a private school, maybesomewhere where he's considering going and are applying
to for high school. And hesaid, I noticed that a difference between
our school and their school is thattheir school seems to and I'm paraphrasing again,
turn a lot more time over tostudents to do the work. And
it was a pretty cool teaching teachablemoment for me to kind of bring him
(26:18):
into the mind space of an educator. I was using terms like stage on
the stage and guide on the side, and I was telling them about how
we want our teachers to be facilitators. But for an eighth grader to really
put that into perspective and put thatinto his own words, I was really
proud of him. But again,like it was just an example of what
(26:38):
I say all the time is thatour students are ready. And so for
me when it comes to can wedo the work, like you said,
people are doing it right. Andmaybe it's not whole scale change yet in
terms of some of the things thatwe want to see, but change is
happening, and I love how youput that positive spin on it. So
(27:00):
here's my segue, all right,So can I jump back in there and
say go ahead. I love torespond to your thoughts. I actually the
moment you started talking about kids,my first thought was I just went on
for five minutes about all the things, and all I talked about was adults.
And so kudos to you because Iactually defer to your answer because I
(27:22):
couldn't agree more. Where when welook at so many times, and I'm
talking about myself here, I'm notthrowing any other educator out of the bus,
how many times is it me thatwas holding back kids? How many
times was it me thinking like,well, they're only nine or ten,
they'll probably only be able to Andhow many times did I put the lid
on what my kids were capable ofbecause of my limited mindset? And so
(27:45):
yeah, when you step back andyou look what kids are doing, I
mean, and I'm not just talkingabout the random board presentation that comes up
for a particular program or whatnot,but man, our kids today are absolutely
amazing, and I think giving themthe opportunities to run to try things,
to tap into their interests and theirpassions and the strengths, like they're going
to find a way to be successfuland do things differently because they already are
(28:07):
and so so kudos to your answerthere. So what was your next one?
What do you got? Yeah?Thanks, No, So that that's
where I wanted to use that asa as a launching point too. So,
you know, we talk about students, we talk about that they're ready.
A lot of them are hungry forchange, for learning in ways that
they want to learn, learning aboutthings that they want to learn. And
(28:29):
I know that that's a lot ofwhat you have written about and preach about
and talk about when you're out thereon the speaking circuit. So you know,
when we talk about personal and authenticlearning experiences for students, take us
down that path a little bit too, because again, I think it was
natural how we got into that,right, talking about our students are ready,
we want I just had that meetingtoday where a teacher was like,
(28:52):
I want to create new activities,new tasks for students that are not just
writing an essay on paper, right, And I think although he didn't say
it, I'd like to think thatthe rationale was I know that it's going
to be more engaging and authentic fromhigh students, you know, So let
me bring in on that one too. Yeah, So you know, I
(29:15):
think my first lens comes as adad. Here. So my daughter's in
eighth grade. She's your compliant kid. She plays school well. She can
sit in a traditional classroom, She'llbe quiet, she'll raise her hand,
she'll do her homework every night,she gets a's every time. That's just
who she is. She's a reallysmart kid. She struggles to think outside
the box. She struggles to dothings differently if she wasn't told to do
(29:38):
it that. Let me introduce youto my son. He's the opposite of
everything that I just said. He'sthe one that struggles to sit sill more
than five minutes. He's the onethat's like, what day of the week
even ask him about homework? Homework? We don't have Do we have homework?
I don't even know. He isone of the most creative thinkers that
I've ever seen. He's the onethat will take anything in the house,
(30:00):
take anything there, and say like, can I do this differently? Can
I find a better way to doit? If I were to look at
who would I deem successful twenty fiveyears and of course that term is going
to be very, very careful.She will absolutely find a job I know
it where she'll be passionate about.But like a job that's very orderly in
finding the rules. My son willprobably start three companies. He'll probably fail
(30:21):
miserably in the first two and thencrush it in the third and probably employ
one hundred people. So when Ilook at these two, and again not
to say one's more successful, becauseI'm not defining it just by money on
that end, but they are totallydifferent kids. Yet they have the exact
same upbringing, the exact same resources, the exact same parenting structure, the
exact same grandparents, all of it. And they are completely different children,
(30:48):
completely different learners. And so ifthey're coming from the same DNA and they're
that different, how much more differentare twenty five kids that come from different
households, different parents, structures ina sitting in a classroom. And so
when I talk personal and authentic,and part of my goal in writing that
is recognize, if my two childrenare that different, how much more different?
But with that difference in diversity anddiversity and differences, how many more
(31:12):
strengths do we have when we lookat a community of learners, we look
at all that different opportunity. Andso I think, you know, when
I look at I created the personaland authentic framework to help people, and
what are the different ways that wecan explore some of this, exploring interests
and passions and strengths, looking atsome of the moments of AWE the social
emotional side of things, right,recognizing that it goes beyond math, reading
(31:34):
and writing that, yeah, wecan graduate a student with this perfect GPA
get into all the Ivy League schools, But can we be real, like
if they hate life and are reallyreally struggling here and don't have any friends
and are really struggling all across here, Like, are we totally successful and
celebrating that to recognize that, Like, kids are far more complex than any
(31:55):
sort of test scores in that regard. And so when I talk personal and
authentic, how do we see thatchild for who they are? How do
we recognize that child for being beautifullyunique? How do we get to know,
as I call in personal and authentic, the hidden stories within, to
recognize every child that walks into ourclassroom each day has stories on their hearts
that we're not going to ever know. And some of them are really really
great things, and some of themcan be struggles. And so I think
(32:19):
that goes back to earlier conversation oncreating environments where people want to be relationships
and trust and all those pieces.But how do we make sure that we
see that every learner in our classroomis beautifully unique and finding ways to tap
into those interests and passions and strengths. Now, I'm not one that's so
far out there saying, you know, kids should learn whatever they want at
any point in time and be ableto do whatever they want all day long.
(32:43):
I recognize that's just not a scalablestructure. And let's be real,
if I could do whatever I wantedto do all day long, I would
probably naturally go to things that Ilike, that I enjoy, that i'm
strong at strong with, But thereprobably be a lot of things left that
i'd leave out that I really doneed in life. And so we do
need structures, We do need systemsthe only way to scale it, but
(33:07):
we also want to in that offerthem opportunity, offer them voice. You
were talking about tools and different assessmentsand things like that earlier, and sometimes
it's saying like, here's the standard, here's the way you've got to show
me that you learn this that I'llunderstand it. But here's five different ways
that I'm okay with you showing thatyou want to write a play about it.
Write a play about it, youwant to write an essay about it,
Let's write an essay about it.You want to do a speech to
(33:28):
the class on it, Let's dothat. And so sometimes as teachers we
look at it like, well,how in the world could I ever do
this? And yeah, if youwere trying to let every kid do whatever
they want every day and every way, you couldn't. There's only twenty four
hours in the day. But sometimesjust giving them the voice to create choice,
to say here's the way that Iwould love to do that, you
can get kids so much more investedas opposed to here's my only one size
(33:52):
fits all. The other piece tothat is recognizing, like we're all going
to enter a workforce that's going tohave some parameters, some guidelines. Even
if it's hey, I'm creating myown business, I can do it how
I want. I mean, that'sall well and good, which is true,
but you also have to work witha public that have some social norms
about interacting with people the way I'mgoing to communicate, being responsive in all
(34:15):
of that. And so I think, how do we create environments going back
to what are we saying earlier withthe future ready side, that are relevant,
that are also accessible. And Ithink the equity side of this conversation
is really really important. We're notjust talking about our white suburban kids walking
into computer science and classrooms that alot of the kids happen to look like
us. We're crawking about how dowe create experiences that for each child and
(34:37):
that and I think that's where wetalk about the scale being really really important.
That's where we talk about the experienceitself not being something that's just done
too, but something that they're avital part of. And I think going
back to the voice, I thinkthere's a lot of opportunity to give kids
voice in the mix. To goback to our previous conversation. If we're
going to talk about giving kids andI shouldn't even I don't even like the
(34:58):
term giving them voice because they haveit. Sometimes we just shut it down.
I guess it's a better way tosay it, right, like when
we say, like, you know, empower them with voice, like they've
got it. Sometimes we just don'tlisten or we don't care. And so
I think bringing that out. Butif we're going to ask our teachers to
do that, we need to dothe same for them in professional learning.
So where do you start with that? Ask kids and then don't be upset
(35:19):
with their feedback their thoughts. Now, granted, take it with the grain
of salt of sometimes they're sixteen orseventeen, and seventeen year olds can be
pretty interesting creatures. They're probably notgoing to hold back, but their voice
matters, right, and so askthem what they want. Ask them what's
missing as they finish up a gradelevel? Ask them what were the best
parts of learning? What did youwish we did this year? What wasn't
(35:43):
any fun this year? What wouldyou do differently if you became the teacher
tomorrow? And I think, andI said, you know, at the
end of the year, because aswe think about approaching that, but you
know, I think I wouldn't justask that at that point in the year.
I think asking kids all the time, how do we design that differently?
What would that look? And justget some feedback to show them that
they're voice matters and that you reallydo care. So it's not just something
done to them, but something they'repart of. I want to kind of
(36:07):
offer I'm just taking all sorts ofliberties on my own show tonight, I
answered my own question before. Iwant to kind of offer a parting thought,
final thought if I might, andit's based on a lot of what
you just said. You use theword several times strengths. You talked about
interests and passions, but you usethe word strength several times. And one
(36:31):
of the big takeaways that I thinkI have from this conversation is when we
talk about future readiness, when wetalk about innovation in schools, when we
talk about giving students voice, asyou were just saying, I think what
I would love to see down theroad right as we get future ready is
(36:52):
more of a strength based approach,so that we are valuing and empowering the
part of a student where they arereally thriving. And I know you said,
like you use your own experience whereit's like, yeah, if you
gave me time, I would wantto explore what I'm really interested in,
(37:13):
and I know it still needs tolearn other things, and obviously that's what
school is going to do for studentstoo, but we got to stop just
working so much on bringing up whatstudents are not doing well in and really
find what they're thriving in and emphasizethat and provide more opportunities for that too.
(37:34):
So thank you for allowing me toget up on my high horse again.
It's just I got to think inas you were talking, and I
just felt like I needed to addthat. Yeah, no, Dan,
I love that. And actually thismorning was having a conversation on exactly that
topic of how easy it is tolook at kids through a deficit mindset.
We're sitting in the data team meetingand listen, there's a great purpose for
those but we've got to be reallycareful. It doesn't become here's the forty
(37:57):
seven things Johnny's missing, and weever talk about what he's good at.
If all we're looking for is deficits, we're gonna find them all over the
place. If we're primarily looking forstrengths, we're gonna see them all over
the place. And so I usethe word strengths purposefully in the personal and
authentic framework to recognize even our needieststudents have incredible strengths. And at times
(38:19):
if all we do is focus onthat negative, if I'm working with a
teacher and all I'm focusing is onwhat they're lacking, they're gonna burn out
real quick. And guess what kidsare too, And so seeing the greatness
choosing our lens and seeing that thestrengths that they do have are such a
vital aspect to creating those personal andauthentic experiences for kids. I don't even
(38:40):
have anything else to say or askat this point. Out it was this
was a great conversation, Tom.I really appreciate I appreciate your time,
all your thoughts. Could we coulddefinitely keep going for a long time,
but that's a great way to wrapup. But before we really go,
if you could just one more timeshare with the listeners a little bit more
about your work. They can findyou and connect with you and learn even
(39:01):
more about future Ready schools and everythingthat you're doing. Awesome. So yeah,
So if you want to check outmore on future Ready, check out
futuready dot org. Pretty easy there. I encourage you to check out the
framework future ready dot org slash frameworkto look at some of the pieces we
mentioned the curriculum, instruction assessment piece, but personalized professional learning and budget resources,
all the other different facets with that, and we've got dozens and dozens
(39:22):
of free resources to support all thosedifferent things we're constantly highlighting case studies through
podcasts or just different avenues really practicalways to make this stuff happen, And
so encourage you to check those out. Check out on social media, follow
future Ready and all those different pieceson all your major channels. On personally,
you can check out Thomas C.Murray dot com. It's going to
(39:43):
link to a lot of it ifyou're listening. If you're still listening to
the podcast, however, many minutesin, let me give you almost two
hundred resources that I've put together,videos, articles, things that go along
with personal and authentic totally free.If you go to Thomas C. Murray
dot com slash resources the Last whoyou Are, and it'll give you lots
of stuff that I use when Itrain folks, and videos and articles and
things that might be able to supportyour next faculty meeting, your next in
(40:05):
service day, your next book study, whatever it might be. With that,
so I encourage you to check thereout as well. But Dan,
my final word to folks would be, even for those folks that are still
listening and listen to any part ofthis, a simple thanks for their work
each and every day. I seeyou I recognize how challenging it is to
teach second grade every day or tobe a superintendent every day, and thanks
for your work. Thanks for lovingand caring about kids. Thank you for
(40:27):
the late nights in the early morningsand the days where you feel like you
can't go on, or the dayswhere you come home and you've got nothing
left to give to those people thatmatter most to you because you've left it
all in the field. I justwant to say thank you to the educators
who give so much every single day, and a quick reminder to make sure
they take care of themselves in theprocess as well. Thank you for that.
Thank you teachers, Thank you listeners. Thank you no matter what your
(40:51):
role is in this great field ofeducation and the line of work that we're
in. Thank you Tom for yourtime tonight. I knew when we can
in person. I think we've seeneach other in person before, but it
was like the first real connection Ithink that we made in person. I
knew I had to get you onhere, and I can safely say,
as well as I think my listenerstoo, that this was value packed and
(41:14):
thirty eight minutes worth of some reallyreally amazing stuff. So thank you so
much. Thanks for the opportunity toagain. Well that's it for this episode.
Thank you so much for listening.If you haven't done so yet,
don't forget to subscribe to this showon your favorite podcast app. If you
(41:35):
enjoy the content covered on this show, I want to ask you to do
this one thing for me. Pleaseshare it. The biggest favor you could
ever do for me is to pleaselet others know about what I'm doing and
how I'm helping educators grow their impactas instructional leaders. I hope you can
share this podcast with other educators,leaders, friends, or anyone you think
(41:57):
would love listening and learning. Ifyou're interested in leaving a positive rating and
review of this show, links todo so or always in the show notes
for every episode. For more informationabout me or this show, and to
access the great content that I share, please visit my website at Leader of
Learning dot com. That's where youcan find my online courses, YouTube channel,
(42:19):
blog, how to connect with meon social media, and even ways
that you can support the show likedonating or purchasing Leader of Learning merchandise.
Thanks again, and remember, nomatter who you are or where you are,
you are a Leader of Learning.
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