Ross Cooper

What Is School For?

The other day, one of my former fourth grade students, who is now a high school sophomore, posted something on Facebook that struck a chord with me. And of course, as her former teacher (and as an educator), I saw it as my duty to appropriately respond.

Yesterday (about a week later), Faline followed up with another post, and I couldn’t help but smile.

So, here are a handful of thoughts that come to mind:

In Seth Godin’s must-see TEDx Talk – Stop Stealing Dreams – he repeatedly asks, “What is school for?” And in my opinion, one of the top priorities of school should be to help students accomplish exactly what Faline is asking – turning passions into careers. Seriously, if this isn’t our goal, what are we doing?
If students are able to turn their passions into careers, we have to ask ourselves, “Is this happening because of or in spite of school?” In other words, do students play the game of school and then go home to do what’s worthwhile and relevant? Or, does the worthwhile and relevant take place within our learning spaces?
In a previous post, I declared, “Not only should student be learning how to do their work, they should be learning and experiencing how to share and market their creations.” Why hasn’t this approach become the norm in our schools? Do students fear making their work public, or are teachers’ comfort zones serving as the main barrier?
Is school truly failing our students and/or entrepreneurs? (much like Gary Vaynerchuk tells us in this one-minute video)
In classes in which entrepreneurship is being taught (in isolation or integrated with other subject areas), could works by the likes of Vaynerchuk, Godin, Eric Ries, and Tom and David Kelley serve as “textbooks?” (much like I recommended today, at a middle school planning meeting for our project based learning school-within-a-school, which is scheduled to open next year)

And finally, if you haven’t read Crush It! (the book I recommended to Faline), make sure to check it out. Also, I can highly recommend Empower by John Spencer and A.J. Juliani (the guys responsible for the quote in this blog post’s featured image).

How can we help our students turn passions into careers?

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How Do Our Learning Beliefs and Project Based Learning Intersect?

By Ross Cooper 1 Comment

As mentioned in my previous post on how to promote student agency…in my school district we adopted the five learning beliefs from Education Reimagined to help drive our district vision: competency-based; personalized, relevant & contextualized; learner agency; socially embedded; open-walled.

This year, one of the main ways in which we are tackling these learning beliefs is through are innovation initiative, #YourSalisbury (formerly, Innovate Salisbury). The #YourSalisbury team consists of 15 teachers (3-4 from each of our four schools) and all of the district’s administrators. Throughout the year we meet for three all-day whole group sessions. After each of the first two, each school’s team follows up with their own full day of learning and planning at the building level. This entire initiative/framework was originally conceived of by my Superintendent, Randy Ziegenfuss, and Assistant Superintendent, Lynn Fuini-Hetten, and this is our third year of implementation.

About a week ago we held our first all-day session. In the afternoon I facilitated a one-hour activity with the goal of having participants uncover the various ways in which project based learning (PBL) provides us with a more concrete approach to realizing the learning beliefs in our learning spaces. In other words, PBL is our means; the learning beliefs are our end.

Here’s the activity, verbatim (and a printable version can be found here).

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My 3 Goals for This School Year

By Ross Cooper 2 Comments

As a classroom teacher, every year I had a small handful of self-imposed goals that I chose in order to fill in my gaps. Some of these goals included: becoming proficient in the teaching of inquiry-based mathematics, engaging my students in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) units on an ongoing basis, and better use of essential questions throughout our project based learning (PBL) experiences.

Now, as an administrator, I still have these same types of self-imposed goals, but I also have three “official” goals that are monitored on a regular basis.

Here are my three goals for this school year.

5 Questions for Leaders to Ask Themselves

By Ross Cooper 2 Comments

As I head into my fourth year as an administrator – one as an assistant principal and three as a curriculum supervisor – I’ve spent some time reflecting upon what I believe, and what type of attitude I bring with me into work on a daily basis.

At this point in time, here are the five questions that I consistently try to keep in mind – five questions I suspect all leaders could benefit from asking themselves.

1. Am I Modeling What I Want to See in Others?

This question is inspired by Jimmy Casas, former high school principal, who says, “What we model is what we get.”

As an administrator (teacher, educator, person, etc.), if I’m not liking what “I’m getting,” I do believe I should first and foremost ask myself If I am leading by example. And, if my expectations for others don’t match my own actions, I’m potentially being hypocritical. Here, a possible pitfall involves the belief that, because of a title, rules don’t apply. However, I would argue that the rules apply even more, partly because, as George Couros explains, “The higher up we go in the traditional hierarchy, the more people we serve; not the other way around.”

Final thought: The best educators with whom I’ve worked are able to excel regardless of what’s being modeled for them.

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Project Based Learning in Math Class: Easier Than You Think

By Ross Cooper 6 Comments

When working with educators to implement project based learning (PBL) in their districts/schools/classrooms, the one subject area that is consistently met with hesitation is math. On a regular basis, math teachers (across all grade levels) ask something to the effect of, “Yeah, this is great. But how does it work in math class?”

Here are two reasons why I believe this skepticism may exist:

Math textbooks are the curriculum, when they shouldn’t be. From my experiences, math is the subject area in which teachers are most likely to march through the textbook from beginning to end, treating the book as if it’s the curriculum (and yes, I have been guilty of this mistake). In reality, the textbook is one tool or resource that a teacher should leverage to meet the needs of students. However, veering away from the textbook (potentially in the direction of PBL) can be uncomfortable.
Math is inaccurately viewed as black and white. In other words, answers are either right or wrong, and a deep conceptual understanding of content simply doesn’t matter (or, for one reason or another, it’s not even on the teacher’s radar). And therefore, PBL (which is commonly leveraged to promote deep conceptual understanding), on the surface appears to be nothing but a roundabout way to get to the same old answers. So, why bother with it?

So, what does project based learning look like in math class?

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3 Inspiring Quotes and a Video to Start the School Year!

By Ross Cooper 7 Comments

Check out this inspiration…

via Danny Steele

Early in my career as a fourth grade teacher, whenever I got my new class roster, I inevitably inspected each and every name, hoping I didn’t get any of “the problem students.” But, as I gained more experience, rather than looking at these students as an inconvenience, I started to view them as opportunities. (After all, we’re here to serve our students, not the other way around.)

For me, the above quote definitely hits home because often times I was one of the problem students. And, it has never been difficult for me to differentiate between the teachers who shuddered when they saw my name on their list, and those who embraced my strengths while working with me to improve upon my areas of growth.

via David Geurin

This quote jumped out at me when I initially saw it on Twitter. And, while the word attitude can potentially come with negative connotations, in the context of this quote I believe it’s entirely appropriate; it’s a word that encompasses the manner in which we carry ourselves and how others may feel as a result of interacting with us.

On a more personal note, the quote forces me to reflect upon my attitude, and what my district would be like if everyone’s attitude mimicked my own. At the same time, I wonder – Across an organization, are discrepancies in attitudes necessary to maintain a balanced workplace?

via Tom Murray

Yes, as a central office administrator, scrutinizing what takes place in faculty rooms can feel like a low blow. But, without hesitation, I can say that this quote easily applies to any space, room, or place of work. (However, I did hear one principal say he was going to hang it up on the door to his faculty room.)

Interestingly enough, as a teacher, I rarely ate in the faculty room. I usually preferred to eat in my classroom so I could get work done and/or be with students who wanted to have lunch with the teacher.

via John Spencer

Check out this video and read what John has to say about it! Seriously. No words can do the video justice. Just watch it.

What are your favorite quotes and videos?

Connect with Ross on Twitter.

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Book Review: Empower #EmpowerBook

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There are a few education blogs I read on a consistent basis, and two of them belong to A.J. Juliani, who generally blogs about innovation, and John Spencer, who mostly blogs about creativity. Currently, A.J. is the Director of Technology and Innovation for a public school district in Pennsylvania, and John is a full-time professor of educational technology for a college in Oregon.

In May 2016, the due released their first book together – LAUNCH: Using Design Thinking to Boost Creativity and Bring Out the Maker in Every Student. In short, LAUNCH (which I highly recommend), takes the increasingly popular design thinking process and makes it accessible and fun through A.J. and John’s LAUNCH Cycle. In fact, not too long ago I wrote a post – “Reimagining Learning Spaces with Design Thinking #HackingPBL” – which outlines how the LAUNCH Cycle can be leveraged by teachers to have students design their classroom at the beginning of the school year.

Then, last February, A.J. informed me that he and John would soon be releasing their second book together – Empower: What Happens When Students Own Their Learning. Empower was published towards the end of June, and in early July I was able to get my hands on a copy when I rant into A.J. at the National Principals Conference in Philadelphia.

I finished the book not too long ago, and here are some of my initial thoughts.

Professional Development: 5 Ways We Broke Out of Isolation #tcrwp

By Ross Cooper 3 Comments

“Isolation is now a choice educators make. If you feel alone, it is because you are not willing to connect.”

This quote from George Couros first appeared in 2013 (according to a Google search), and due to various technologies, including social media, this quote is even more appropriate now than it was four years ago. At the same time, (1) it was also true long before 2013, although to a lesser extent, and (2) this idea could apply to any profession, not just education.

Nonetheless, many educators (for one reason or another) still generally work in silos. This fact is surprising, considering there are countless studies in which former teachers cite “lack of support” as one of the main reasons why they quit the profession. (Seriously, for related articles, Google “why teachers quit” and click around.)

That being said, whenever I facilitate professional learning, I try to model the notion of breaking out of isolation, by showing (explicitly and implicitly) that the days of one person having all the answers are long gone (if they ever existed in the first place).

For the past two years, the majority of the professional learning I’ve facilitated has focused on Writing Workshop K-5. Here are five ways we intentionally broke out of isolation during this time.

5 Conversations from the National Principals Conference #NPC17

By Ross Cooper 3 Comments

Earlier this week I attended the National Principals Conference in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.

The more I’ve immersed myself in interacting with other educators on a regular basis (through such means as social media), the more the conferences I attend have become about the who, and not so much the what. In other words, if I need an idea or resource, I don’t necessarily have to wait for a conference as I can reach out to someone whenever I want. At the same time, conferences are now primarily about connecting with old friends, making new ones (who I probably initially met on social media), inspiration, and conversations.

To illustrate the point, here are five conversations from the National Principals Conference that pushed my thinking, all of which took place on the same day.

Book Review: Learning Transformed #LT8Keys

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It was about a year ago when I was first told that Eric Sheninger and Tom Murray were writing a book for ASCD, based on eight specific ways to make our schools current and relevant. (Eric is a former High School Principal, now a senior fellow with the International Center for Leadership in Education. Tom is a former Director of Technology and Cyber Education, now the Director of Innovation for Future Ready Schools.)

Since this announcement, (1) the book was named Learning Transformed: 8 Keys to Designing Tomorrow’s Schools, Today, and (2) and it has been endorsed by educators and influencers that include: Sir Ken Robinson, Arne Duncan, Linda Darling-Hammond, Daniel Pink, Robert Marzano, Michael Fullan, Andy Hargreaves, and Heidi Hayes Jacobs.

When Learning Transformed came out about a month ago, I was able to get my hands on a copy, and it immediately moved to the top of my pile of books to read (given the reputations of its two authors, as well as the endorsements).

Yesterday I finished the book, and here are some of my initial thoughts.

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