EPISODE #309

You're listening to the School Leadership Reimagined podcast, episode 309. How do builders like us make a dramatic difference in the lives of our students in spite of all the obstacles we face? How do you keep your vision for your school from being held hostage by resistant teachers, uncooperative parents, ridiculous district policies, or a lack of time, money or resources? If you're facing those challenges right now, here's where you'll find the answers, strategies and actionable tips you need to overcome any obstacle you face. You don't have to wait to make a difference in the lives of the people you serve. You can turn your school into a success story right now with the people and resources you already have. Let's get started. Hey builders.

Welcome to another episode of the School Leadership Reimagined Podcast. 

I'm your host, Robyn Jackson and today we're going to talk about a complaint that I hear from administrators and instructional coaches all the time. People always say how much they wish that teachers would be more reflective. And to be honest, whenever I hear that wish, I understand the sentiment. But then I always think like when do teachers ever have an opportunity to be more reflective? They can't do it during the post observation conference because that thing, the power dynamic in a post observation conference is so imbalanced that it's very, very hard to be reflective when you're just trying to survive the conference. I know people tell me all the time, but my teachers trust me, but we have a great relationship. But when you are in an evaluative role, the power dynamic is there.

Whether you want to acknowledge it or not. You have the power to determine in many cases people's rating, their pay raise, their assignment, their self esteem. So how are teachers supposed to be truly reflective in a post observation conference? In most cases, post observation conference is very performative. Teachers may have a moment or spark of reflection if they feel very secure. But in most cases that reflection is performative. They are showing you that they can be reflective. Because in many cases being reflective is one of the things you're judging them on.

So is it true reflection or is it a performance? Right. So we say, well, I have short conversations in the hall. If I'm standing in the hall and you're talking to me about something, am I really going to be reflective? Sure, it's great. I love hall conversations. Don't get me wrong, they're great for checking in and sharing information very quickly and connecting. But true reflection?

No. Then some people say, well, we should be reflection. We reflective in PLCs but so many PLCs are overly scripted and they're in front of their colleagues and sometimes it's a competitive environment or they're working with people they don't always trust. It's very hard for people to be vulnerable in front of their colleagues like that. Especially the way that we mostly do PLCs at some point. I'm working on something now, a training inside of BU and inside of the collective around PLC meetings because they're just bad. But PLC meetings do not create reflection the way that we typically do it. And so then people say, well, maybe it's data meetings.

You know, we can be reflective in data meetings. I know data meetings are supposed to be reflective, but in most cases people feel very defensive because you're showing their data to them and saying what are you gonna do about it? And that automatically puts people in a defensive posture. So when are people supposed to be reflective? And when do teachers really ever have the opportunity to be reflective? And so today I wanna talk to you about a 15 minute meeting that changed everything for me. And I think it will change everything for you as well. Because I believe you when you say you want teachers to be more reflective.

I believe you when you say you want teachers comfortable to be vulnerable. 

I believe you when you say you want to support teachers. But the traditional leadership structures that we're provided, like post observation conferences or walkthroughs or drop bys or casual conversations in the hall or Data meetings or PLCs, the way that they are structured does not create an environment for true reflection. So today I want to share with you something that will, right? Because to be honest, none of those conversations give you the clarity that you need to really understand what's really happening in your building. So I'll go back to when I was an assistant principal and I was in charge of seventh grade. I think it was my first or second, it was my first year. And so I was doing everything that they taught me to do, right?

So I was doing, you know, I was trying to get into three classrooms a day. I went to the team meetings which were the PLC meetings. I, you know, did my post observation conferences. But I always felt like there was this, this disconnect, right? Like, you know, when you go into do an observation, it's performative, right? People jump to attention when you're in a classroom and yes, you can get a lot of insight about that teacher's practice and giving that teacher feedback on their practice, but you really don't have any insight on how the kids are doing. You don't really have any insight on which kids are the teacher struggling with or what, what challenges the teacher is facing. You just see their practice.

So, you know, micro slicing and observations are great for looking at the teacher's practice. I would go to team meetings and they would all, you know, I didn't run the team meetings, the team leader did. I was just there as a resource. But a lot of times they were trying to get through that agenda. They had specific things they were doing. They're trying to kind of coordinate what's happening as a team. You know, we started adjusting the team meetings and the PLCs differently. Like I said, I'll just share that with you another time.

That helped us, you know, kind of problem solve around kids and it helped us as a team. Gave me insight to how the team was doing and how the kids were doing. But it didn't give me insight into individual teachers. It didn't, it didn't provide the kind of environment for teachers to do that deep reflection that I was craving. And we did data meetings and you know, those people get defensive. You know, I've already talked about that. And so I was trying to figure out what to do.

And I came up with this idea.

I was reading, you know, you know, I like to read outside of education, but I was reading some business books and they were talking about one on ones that they had regularly with employees. And so I thought, is there a way to do a one on one with my teachers? So I sent out a message and I said, hey, listen, in the next two weeks I'm going to be meeting with each of you individually. You're not in trouble. It's just a 15 minute meeting. You drive the agenda and it's a check in. And so I gave them, you know, some simple prompts to kind of think about, talked about the purpose of the meeting, announced it in the team meeting, set it up so people could set up, but on the schedule. And then I started having these one on ones.

Now I'll be honest, at first the teachers were really suspicious. They were like, are we in trouble? They were really nervous. And so I was strategic about starting the one on one process with teachers with whom I already had pretty good rapport. And that way that, you know, we could, I could get the kinks out because I didn't know what I was doing and the word could spread. And so the teachers could really see that I was being sincere, that they ran the meeting, they ran the agenda. It was really an opportunity for them to reflect for me to offer support. And so I started the one on ones, and they were great.

You know, all I did was I asked the teacher, I said, we want to talk about what's going on in your classroom with your kids right now. And, you know, you can bring your data however you want to bring it, and you can talk about it however you want to talk about it. I'm just there to listen, and I really just want to get a sense of what's happening for you and how can I support you. And so the first few meetings were really great because, of course, I'd frontloaded those meetings with people who were already kind of, you know, on board. And then I remember the first meeting I had with a teacher with whom I didn't have a great rapport. She treated me with a lot of suspicion. She's kind of aloof. We weren't fighting.

There was something like that. But she always was very aloof with me. And when she came in, she looked almost angry, like, why do I have to be there? This is a waste of my time, you know. And so we sat down and I said, okay, so let's, you know, let's talk about your kids. She says, well, what do you want me to do? I said, well, you're driving the meeting.

What I want to do is check in with you.

And I started using some of the reflection prompts that I, you know, given her and, you know, asking questions about, you know, things like, you know, how are your kids performing? What's your data showing you? What are you noticing? What are you doing about it? You know, went through the whole prompt. And so she just kind of gave me yes and no answers. And then I said, you bought your great book with me. Do you want to share some of your data with me?

And she said, you know, she just kind of opened her grade book and just said, I mean, you can look at it. And I said, well, I'm not inspecting your grade book. I just, you know, talk me through what's going on with your kids. Where are they right now? How are they doing? And, you know, she kind of went through it, and then I just asked the question. I said, so these kids here, there's two kids right now who look like they haven't turned in any work. And she goes, yes, those kids.

And she was very dismissive about those kids. And I said, okay, so what's your plan for those kids? Because, you know, we're 100%, we're focused on every kid succeeding. And she said, well, I don't Know what I'm gonna do with those kids? I said, well, would you like to brainstorm? Because, you know, since we're all committed to 100%. And she immediately got defensive. And I said, okay, remember, this is a supportive meeting.

I'm not taking notes. This is not going into my file. I'm here to support you. And then, you know, now it's a 15 minute meeting, right? So we're 10 minutes into the meeting and we haven't gotten anywhere. And then she goes, I just don't know what to do with these kids. I said, well, talk to me about them. What have you tried and where are you?

And we just kind of talk through, and then, you know, we're making some traction and it gets to the 15 minute mark. And I say, listen, we're at 15 minutes and I know your time is precious, but I feel like we're having a really good conversation here. Would you like to, you know, to schedule more time to talk about it? Do you have what you need? I just want to respect your time. And she goes, no, I'm good. And she leaves. So I'm thinking, well, that was a bust.

And so I go out the rest of my day. A couple of days later, she comes to me and she goes, I've been thinking a lot about the conversation we had about those two kids. And I realized that I've kind of written them off, and I can't do that. So here's what I'm doing with those kids. That's when I knew we hit it, we nailed it. And so that's what I did. Every quarter, I met with the teachers. Now when you do that, when you meet with teachers this way, and it's a part of the rhythm of your school, they know it's coming.

It gives you a chance to have an individual conversation with each teacher where you can give them support, where you can really find out what's happening with them, what's going on in their classroom, how are kids doing? It's. Teachers start opening up because they know that you're really there to support them. They don't see it show up anywhere. They don't see it weaponized someplace else. Those conversations became sacred, and teachers started opening up about not just what was going on with their kids, what was going on with them. I remember one time having a conversation with the teacher, and she's just like, I don't love it anymore like I used to. And it was early in the year and we talked about why, and then it allowed me to get her repositioned in the building before that turned into bitterness and cynicism.

What else was great was that a lot of times the teachers who never talked in meetings, they will talk during those one on ones. 

They'll open up and they have insight that they've been holding that they haven't felt comfortable for whatever reason sharing in the bigger meetings. But they'll tell you it was a great opportunity to spot misalignment like I did with that other teacher. Like, hey, just a reminder, we're focused on 100% without being scoldy and without guilting her. Just offering her an opportunity to reflect and to get her realigned with where we were headed as a school. And I get a real time sense of what's going on in classrooms. Teachers who would admit that they're struggling in a particular area, that I could get them support and help before it spiraled out of control. Teachers who were really doing an incredible job.

And for me to be able to encourage them and challenge them to think more deeply so that. But even outside of the one on ones, teachers would come to me and say, hey, I've been thinking about the conversation. Here's what I've done. Or do you have a moment? I just want to talk something through with you. We got true teacher reflection and it gave me a really good sense of what was going on. So that when I was in admin conversations and things were going on, I could speak authoritatively about what was happening with the teachers I was serving. When parents called about their kids, I could speak with, you know, I knew what was going on with our kids because we'd have the conversations in team meetings and in these one on ones so I could help intervene with kids early.

It just, it just makes everything else that we do work so much better that I am a firm believer in these one on ones. Now here is the challenge, right? So if you do one on ones the wrong way, it becomes just another task that you do in your school, right? It's no different than any of the other stuff you do. If you do one on ones like a leader, you are just going to create more compliance, right? You have to do ones in a very specific way. So the first thing is that the one on ones have to be teacher led, right? You can't lead them.

And so you have to set teachers up to be successful in the meeting and to help teachers lead the meeting. So, you know, you need to make sure that you are setting them up in a way that puts the teachers in the driver's Seats. Teachers drive these meetings. You don't drive the meetings. That being said, you can put parameters around the meeting. Right?

I always say structure gives you freedom. 

So the more, the better you, the better job you do of structuring these meetings, the more the meetings will encourage teachers to drive, for teachers to take control over the meeting.

And I love that because it flips the power dynamic. In most meetings we have with teachers, we have the power and the teachers don't. When you have the one on ones, the teachers have the power. And so they get to drive the meeting, they get to drive the agenda. And it empowers your teachers to take more ownership over their work, over their data, over their craft, instead of just waiting for you to tell them what to do. It gives the teachers an opportunity to show you what they're doing in a way that gives you true insight and in a way that isn't encumbered by that power dynamic. Right. Hey, builders, real quick, before we get on with the rest of the episode, I want to talk to you about the 100% collective.

If you are interested in becoming a builder and developing that 100% mindset, then the 100% collective is for you. Not only do we have monthly masterclasses, live masterclasses, where I show you how to take some work that you are are already doing, but do it like a builder. Do it in a way that's more effective, more efficient, in a way that takes the work and stops it from being drudgery and makes it actually something that feels meaningful, that moves you forward. We also have done for you toolboxes with all the tools you need to be able to implement. And we have step by step playbooks that lay out the entire process for you so you don't have to even think about it. You just take the playbook and you can can implement it right away in your schools. And we have a supportive community. So this is a safe place where you can bring your challenges.

And there are other people, other builders just like you, who are encouraging you, who are applauding you when you win, and who are giving you their experiences as well so that you can learn from each other. If you are tired of just kind of going through and doing the work the way you've always been doing it, and you're ready to stop being a leader and to start building something amazing, the 100% collective is where you need to be. Join us@brewershipuniversity.com community now back with the program. The second thing that you have to do in order to set it up right, is you have to set it up so that it creates authentic reflection if it becomes an interrogation. You know, a lot of times we're trying to get people to reflect. So we have this list of reflection questions, you know, and the reflection question is always set up. This is my favorite one.

How might you have found a way to do what?

Are you serious? All you're doing is you're scolding people because they chose something that you wouldn't have chosen or what do you think you should have done? A lot of times they don't know what to do, and so that's. You're not helping them be reflective. You're making them feel bad because they don't know what to do. So we want to kind of throw away a lot of the reflective questions that we've been given because they feel more like an interrogation. And you got to make sure that you're structuring the question questions the right way so that it creates true reflection. Now, when you do this, when you.

When you do structure things the right way, structure the meeting the right way, and then you're. You have the questions structured the way right way, you create a lot of space for teachers to talk, and your job is to listen and to keep them talking because you're trying to extract insight from that conversation. And so you've got to get out of the way. And so how you set up the meeting and the kind of questions you ask will make the difference between whether it feels like just another hoop that teachers have to jump through or if it feels like an opportunity for teachers to be truly reflective. Right. So the third thing is that you always want to keep your 100% vision as the focus. The purpose of this meeting is really about making sure that we all stay in alignment with that 100% vision. So you're not scolding people or beating them over the head with the vision, but you want to anchor every conversation in the vision.

And that. That takes some nuance. Like it's not just, you know, you say, okay, we're here to reflect, and here's our vision. So tell me, how are you achieving our vision? That puts me in a defensive posture right away. But if you can, if you do this right, you can. This is an opportunity for your teachers to take ownership of that vision for themselves. It's not just a big vision out there for the school, that vision.

We're looking at how we can make that vision happen in their classrooms. 

And if you do this right, it can be so empowering for teachers. It can help teachers see the vision through the lens of their students. And it can help teachers feel like they have a part to play in that vision, which means they take more ownership over that vision, which means your school reaches your vision much more quickly. And then the last thing that it does is that, that when you do one on ones, right, it's gonna take some time, but it saves you a lot of time, right? So we spend our time chasing, checking and correcting and trying to convince and cajole people to do the thing, the right thing. But when you have this rhythm of one on ones and you know, there are ways that you can schedule it so that it doesn't take up a lot of time. And what you get out of that 15 minute time period is way more valuable than what you can often get doing these random drop bys that everybody tells you you need to be doing, right?

So you know, think about it. You, you try to get into three classrooms a day. How long does that take you? An hour, 45 minutes. During that hour or so, you can get three really rich conversations with teachers that give you way more insight than the, you know, the 10 minutes you spent wandering around their classroom looking at their bulletin boards and leaning over kids shoulders and asking them what they're reading. You know, so those. I just, I just feel like random classroom visits where you just show up because you want to be visible doesn't really tell you what's happening in your school. You need to have a concerted walkthrough.

Those of you inside the collective and in bu, we know we just did the whole walkthrough thing a couple of months ago. And so you've got that playbook in there. I would ditch those random drop bys, period. And if you did that, you'd have time for these one on ones. And remember, you're doing them once a quarter. So the way that you typically set it up is you get, you know, you take one to two weeks once a quarter and you set up your calendar and I'm gonna do a masterclass on this next week inside a collective. So I'll show, you know, I've got the tools for you and I'll show you how to set up the schedule. But you set up this schedule and you know, for those two weeks you're just spending time reflecting with teachers.

But think about what happens, right? You're not doing it all day every day, you know, you do cause it, you know, it gets overwhelming. So you do two or three a day. But think about what happens when as a school, you are in the middle of a quarter and somewhere around the middle of the quarter everybody just takes a moment and they stop and they're reflecting about what's happening and how things are going. It gives you time to intervene with teachers before interims go out, before the quarterly grades go out. It gives you time to help people get on the right track before the end of the quarter. And so everybody is taking this time to pause midway through the quarter to really think seriously about how our kids are doing and how we could be serving them better and how we're aligning with our vision, mission and core values and what trends we're noticing in the data and how do we address it.

It's more powerful than many data meetings, than many post observation conferences and drop bys.

And you're doing it at the individual level, but it is having an impact school wide. So if you want your teachers to be more reflective, if you are frustrated that everything feels very performative and, and you don't really have a good, you're not really tapped into how teachers are really feeling. If teachers are having the meeting after the meeting and they're talking about stuff, but they're not talking to you about it, if you feel like you're trying to get a sense of the pulse of your school, but you don't really have that sense that you feel like there's other stuff happening and you don't quite know what it is. If you really want to spend time working with teachers and diving deep into their practice and supporting them, if you really want to know how your kids are doing, not just because you're looking at data sheets and grades, but because you're talking to their teachers and you're hearing the stories that, that you can't hear by just looking at an observation. And if you want to create a more reflective culture in your building, then you need to start doing these one on ones. Now remember I told you you gotta be careful, right? Like don't just run out and start doing one on ones. Because if you do it with a leadership lens, you will destroy all those things that I just talked about.

What you need to do is you need to be strategic. And so we're having a masterclass. So those of you in BU or in the 100% collective, this is, you're gonna get this. You'll, you know, you'll, you're, this is a part of it. We're doing the masterclass next week. But for those of you who are not in the collective or In BU and you want to start doing one on ones. We have a few tickets available for people outside of BU and the collective, and you're welcome to get one of those tickets. Now, here's the thing.

We cap all of these meetings at like 75 people because we want to keep it intimate, because we do a TR training takes about an hour. I'll give you a playbook. I'll give you all the stuff you need. You know, like all the tools, the reflection prompts, what topics you need to be covering from one quarter to the next. I'll give you the quarterly rhythm. I'll give you strategies for when the conversation goes off the rails. I'll give you all the tools you need to set teachers up to be successful so that they can think about things ahead of the meeting and come to the meeting prepared. I'll give you the scheduling stuff, all of that in the training so that you have it.

But after we do the training, I also leave time for questions so that you can figure out how to take this information and really figure out how you can make it work in your school, right? Cause the goal is not for you to get information, but to do this right. Like you still have time before the end of the year to start setting up one on ones. And that end of the year, one on one can be so just. I mean, there's so much potential for what you can accomplish, right? So this is something that you can do right now. And it can set you up for assignments for next year and can set you up for thinking about how you can start shifting your culture. It can help you to intervene before the end of the year for kids who are struggling.

I mean, there's so much you can accomplish with these one on ones. 

So the idea is in the training. The idea is that we want to give you all the tools you need so that if you decided you wanted to start doing one on ones the next day, the day after the training, you've got everything you need to hit the ground running. But to do it right so that it doesn't become just another compliance thing, it actually becomes an opportunity for people to reflect and think about it. What happens to your school? What information could you get if you had teachers being reflective? Now, as the school year is coming to a close, think about the insights that could inform your master schedule. Think about the insights that could help you start thinking through your summer plans.

This is, this now is the perfect time to be doing one on ones. So anyway, all that to say we got to cap it at 75 people so that we have time to make sure everybody's questions get answered. We keep it intimate enough that people feel free to kind of speak up and ask questions. And you know, you can really get this customized. So what you need to do if you want to get a ticket to the one on one training is you need to go to buildershipuniversity.com Masterclass buildershipuniversity.com MasterClass I'll also put the link in the show notes and then go to there. If the, if the website is open, you can still grab your ticket. If it says it's closed, it means we've hit our cap and so there are no more tickets available. So if you want a ticket, go to buildershipuniversity.com masterclass if you are in Buildership University or in the 100% collective, this you still need to sign up, right?

Like, so you'll get an email that tells you how to sign up and then if you can't make it live, we will have the recording available. So even if you can't make it live, I suggest you go ahead and sign up anyway so you can get the recording, get all the materials, and this is the only time that'll be available in public. After the live, it just goes straight into the collective and it's in the vault in the collective, for the people inside of the collective and beautiful. All right, so here is my challenge for you this week. I want you to really think about how often teachers have an opportunity to be genuinely and authentically reflective in your building. I want you to pay attention, look around, take a look. You know, many of you doing post observation conferences right now and I know you want to flatter yourself and say teachers are being genuinely reflective with me. But I want you to pay attention to that power dynamic of that meeting.

I want you to pay attention to who has the power in that meeting and then ask yourself, can teachers truly be reflective? If the power dynamic looks the way that I'm guessing it's looking right, then I want you to as you look around and see what opportunities teachers have to be genuinely reflective. My challenge for you this week is to start finding ways to give teachers space to be truly reflective. Because it's really hard for teachers to continually improve and for your school to get to 100% success if you don't have space to be reflective. And so it's really important whether you use strategic one on ones or you try to do something else. It's really important that you provide opportunities for teachers to Be genuinely and authentically reflective. And that means you're going to have to flip the power dynamic.

It means that you're going to have to create a structured space for reflection.

It means that often we're going to have to shut up and let the teachers drive the meeting and talk. It often means that then we have to make sure we're using the right prompt so it doesn't feel like an interrogation. But when you do those things, you can dramatically shift your culture so that everybody is more reflective. And as they are more reflective, they begin to move you closer and closer to your vision, mission, and core values. Because you've been intentional about creating safe spaces for true, authentic, genuine reflection. Like a builder. I'll talk to you next time. Hey, if you're ready to get started being a builder right away, then I want to invite you to join us at Buildership University.

It's our exclusive online community for builders just like you, where you'll be able to get the exact training that you need to turn your school into a success story. Right now, with the people and resources you already have inside, you'll find our best online courses, live training with me, tons of resources, templates and exemplars, and monthly live office hours with me where you can ask me anything and get my help on whatever challenge you're facing right now. If you're tired of hitting obstacle after obstacle and you're sick of tiny little incremental gains each year, if you're ready to make a dramatic difference in your school right now, then you need to join Buildership University. Just go to builders leadershipuniversity.com and get started writing your school success story today. Hey, real quick, before you go, if you enjoyed today's episode and you know someone who would really benefit from what you heard here today, maybe they're struggling with the thing that we talked about in today's episode. Would you take a moment and share this episode with them? You see, not only will it help us get the word about Buildership out to more people, but you're gonna look like a rock star because you're gonna give people something really use to help them get unstuck and be better at building their schools. Plus, it would mean the world to me.

Thanks so much and I'll see you next time.