The Listening Leader
Newsletter
This week we review the first responses from the book we are reading together, The Listening Leader by Shane Safir.
In our first post, I explore why inequity may be such a persistent issue in education.
Equity is defined by Shane as “providing every student with the resources he or she needs to learn and thrive”. (You can find many of the resources from The Listening Leader on her website here.)
Personalized learning has shown promise as one pathway to equity. Elena Silla shares her story of a traditional school moving toward this instructional approach in this EdSurge article.
Paige Bergin, an instructional coach from Oklahoma, wrote a response to the book about beginning with the brain.
Safir offers many “Make it Mindful” subsets throughout the text, asking the reader to pause, reflect, and take action toward a more equitable experience.
To address exam stress, some schools are incorporating t’ai chi - mindful movement - into their days.
Ryanne Deschane, a 1st grade teacher from Wisconsin, wrote a post about learning by listening more.
Two related books were referenced and recommended by Ryanne: We Got This by Cornelius Minor and Being the Change by Sara Ahmed.
Understanding our language choices and habits is critical for transforming schools toward more equitable learning environments. I recommend Opening Minds by Peter Johnston as an essential resource for this work.
Last year I wrote a post about my faculty examining our beliefs, which included facilitating productive conflict as a source of professional learning.