Thursday, March 30, 2017

Week 17 - Introduction into Research in Education

What is research?
There is much debate surrounding definitions of research and more particularly education research. Here are some useful concepts related to research:
"Educational research is not just a way to come up with new ideas about teaching and learning, but most often it is a way to convince us that the ideas we already have are worth exploring - that they are worth buying into" (Morrell & Carroll, 2010, p.2).
and
"Research is a process of steps used to collect and analyze information to increase our understanding of a topic or issue. At a general level, research consists of three steps:

Pose a question.
Collect data to answer the question.
Present an answer to the question." (Creswell, 2011, p.3) For more information on research in education, including how research projects are designed, you could take a look at the first chapter of Creswell (2011) which you can find in the reference list.
The main things you should take away from this reading are:
What research is and the roles that it can play
The basic steps in the research process
The nature of quantitative and qualitative research
Different types of research design in education

How Research can Support Teachers – Evidence Informed Practice
You may have heard the term evidence-informed practice or evidence-based practice used in relation to schools and education. Evidence-informed practice refers to the ways in which teachers and schools use research evidence, in conjunction with other sources of evidence (such as student data) and their own expertise to make decisions and to support their teaching. It is based on the idea that to be their most effective teachers should engage with research and keep up to date with the latest developments in their curriculum areas and in the discipline of education more generally.
For further reading on evidence-informed practice, read Coe's (1999) short but incisive article, available in this week's media, which makes the point that "The only really sound evidence about what works comes from actually trying it." (p.5)

Choosing a Research Topic
This week you should focus on identifying an area that you would like to research and develop for the Teacher Inquiry project. It is anticipated that you will focus on this topic area for the two main assessments. The list below provides possible areas to focus on. You may select a topic outside of this area, however, we suggest that if you do so you get advice from the postgraduate team about whether it will be suitable for the assessments.


Suggested Topic Areas (with links to the first 16 weeks’ topics)
Assessment – Creative Ways of Assessing (DIGITAL Week 9)
Key Competencies of 21st Century Skills (DIGITAL Week 2)
Leading Change (LEADERSHIP Week 8)
Innovative Leadership Practice (LEADERSHIP Week 3, Week 6)
Growth Mindset (LEADERSHIP Week 5)
Design Thinking (DIGITAL Week 14; LEADERSHIP Week 14)
Entrepreneurship (DIGITAL Week 10; LEADERSHIP Week 10)
Blended Learning (DIGITAL Week 7)
Game Based Learning/Gamification (DIGITAL Week 15; LEADERSHIP Week 15)
Inquiry or Problem Based Learning (DIGITAL Week 10, Week 13; LEADERSHIP Week 13)
Agile and/or Lean Concepts in Education (DIGITAL Week 11; LEADERSHIP Week 11)
Collaborative Learning (DIGITAL Week 4)
Technology Practices (Coding, Robotics, 3D Modelling & Printing, Game Development etc.) (DIGITAL Week 3, Week 5, Week 8, Week 12, Week 15, Week 16)
Digital Media Tools and Pedagogies (DIGITAL Week 6)
Innovative Learning Environments (LEADERSHIP Week 12)

Note that it is possible that you might want to focus on a specific aspect of one of these topic areas (e.g. for blended learning you might focus specifically on the flipped classroom model or the station rotation model).
How Your Chosen Topic Maps to the Course Assessment
During this course, you will:
Engage with the research literature to explore your chosen area for the Teacher Inquiry project and what is already known about in the area
Analyse how the research literature could help to support and inform the project and your practice
Identify ideas, opportunities or gaps within the research literature that you could build upon in the project
Use the research literature as a basis to develop and justify an Teacher Inquiry project plan, which engages with your community in addressing the chosen area/topic
Demonstrate how you will utilise evidence from your Teacher Inquiry project in your practice and evaluate the potential influence this evidence will have for you and your community.

How to Select Your Topic Area
Decide on the topic area you want to focus on for this course. You may choose a topic from the list or select your own topic. To help you to decide on your topic it might be helpful to think about:
a question you have about your practice
an issue that you are currently facing
an area of your practice that you would like to develop
a particular initiative or intervention that you would like to trial in your practice.

Pine (2009) suggests some ways to identify your topic:
conversations with your colleagues; professional literature; examination of your journal entries and teaching portfolio to identify, for example, patterns of teacher/student behavior or anomalies, paradoxes, and unusual situations; dissonance between your teaching intentions and outcomes; problematic learning situations in your classroom that you want to resolve; a new teaching strategy you are eager to implement; an ambiguous and puzzling classroom management concern; or your curiosity about testing a particular theory in the classroom.
Caro-Bruce, Flessner, Klehr & Zeichner (2007) suggest some questions that might help you to identify an area:
What would I like to improve?
What am I perplexed by?
What am I really curious about?
What do I think would really make a difference?
What is something I would like to change?
What would happen to my students’ learning if I did _______?
How can I implement _________?
How can I improve _______?

Kaupapa Maori Research
According to the Rangahau website, there are 8 key elements or principles of Kaupapa Māori research:
Tino Rangatiratanga - The Principle of Self-determination
Taonga Tuku Iho - The Principle of Cultural Aspiration
Ako Māori - The Principle of Culturally Preferred Pedagogy
Kia piki ake i ngā raruraru o te kainga - The Principle of Socio-Economic Mediation
Whānau - The Principle of Extended Family Structure
Kaupapa - The Principle of Collective Philosophy
Te Tiriti o Waitangi - The Principle of the Treaty of Waitangi
Ata - The Principle of Growing Respectful Relationships


Manifesto for Evidence-Based Education" Robert Coerefers to an approach which argues that policy and practice should be capable of being justified in terms of sound evidence about their likely effects.
The notion of "evidence" is not without problems. Many will say that one person's "evidence"may be another's opinionated nonsense.
We need a culture in which evidence is valued over opinion, in which appropriate action (or in action) is valued over just action for the sake of being seen to do something. By advocating such a culture, we hope to reclaim debates about policy and practice for the professionals who know most about them. In this way we hope to be able to do justice to the enormous responsibilities and hopes that are attached to education.
The only worthwhile kind of evidence about whether something works in a particular situation comes from trying it out
The results of experiments can sometimes be disappointing, and this has led to some rejection of the experimental method of enquiry. However, this is a version of "shoot the messenger": if the method is sound but fails to demonstrate the success of a particular strategy, then perhaps the strategy is at fault. Educational researchers are often disappointed if they get negative results, but negative results, particularly if they were to prevent us from wasting time and money on ineffective policies, might actually be more useful than positive ones.
There are three main ways in which education could become more "evidence-based". These concern, firstly, the development of evidence-based policies, secondly, of evidence-based practice and, thirdly, the general promotion of a "culture of evidence".

Friday, March 24, 2017

Assignment 1 Digital and Collaborative Learning

20% Identify and analyse the 21st Century skill and/or Key Competency / He Tikanga Whakaaro related area for improvement based on a critical reflection of your practice, considering the viewpoints of the main stakeholders
30% Explain what pedagogical outcomes you hope to achieve by addressing your identified problems / challenges, using supporting evidence (e.g. research literature, policies/guidelines, current practice, quantitative/qualitative data etc.)
10% Use and present suitably cited and referenced source material in APA format, including peer reviewed journals
10% Deliver and present content effectively, considering structure, narrative and presence. Include reflections on your learning.



IDENTIFY AND ANALYSE THE AREA FOR IMPROVEMENT: You have analysed a problem area for improvement, informed by a critique of relevant aspects of practice, skills and competencies. The importance of the area of improvement is future focused and considers different stakeholders.
PROPOSE A PLAN FOR AN INNOVATION: You have analysed a plan that relates characteristics to specific requirements identified in the area for improvement. You have considered alternatives.
EXPLAIN PEDAGOGICAL OUTCOMES: The choice and design of the desired pedagogical outcomes is inforned by relevant evidence from more than one source.
SOURCE MATERIAL: You have provided a good list of references that are cited and discussed.
PRESENTATION AND REFLECTION: Your presentation is well-argued with a narrative structure that relates themes together and explains what has been learned.
Feedback/forward: Thank you for your submission! You identified collaboration as your area for improvement, presented your plan/alternatives and discussed the pedagogical outcomes. Also, well done on reflecting on your current practice and your learning! In order to take your Digital 2/Leadership assignments to the next level you could try to show a more critical approach throughout your video/essay, e.g. by highlighting the limitations in your approach and by debating with your sources. But well done for this excellent video!30% Propose a plan for a digital and collaborative innovation and explain how it addresses the identified area for improvement, compared with alternative approaches
82%

Assignment 2 Leadership

10% Explain and justify the need for your change initiative, with reference to the context
10% Identify your main stakeholders and profile the early adopters and subsequent groups
20% Reflect on your own leadership practice in digital and collaborative innovation and analyse it in the context of this change initiative
20% Develop an implementation plan explaining how you will lead your stakeholders through the milestones of a digital and collaborative innovation
20% Explain the influence that relevant research, current practice, policies and guidelines have had in planning your initiative
10% Use and present suitably referenced source material, including peer-reviewed journals
10% Deliver and present content effectively, considering structure, length, narrative and presence. Include reflection on learning.


EXPLAIN YOUR CHANGE INITIATIVE: You have described a change initiative with explicit links to the context.
PROFILE STAKEHOLDERS, EARLY ADOPTERS AND GROUPS: Your stakeholder groups are described and compared.
REFLECT ON YOUR OWN LEADERSHIP: You have presented and discussed relevant aspects of leadership, linked with the change initiative.
DEVELOP AN IMPLEMENTATION PLAN: You have developed an implementation plan that includes the requirements of stakeholders and milestone deliverables
EXPLAIN EXTERNAL INFLUENCES: You have identified external influences, described some connections between them and related these to leadership of the initiative.
SOURCE MATERIAL: You have cited and discussed a good list of references.
PRESENTATION AND REFLECTION: Your presentation is adequate but largely descriptive.

Thanks for sharing the implementation in gamification in your classroom. I do believe that your students will be far more engaged and have a great deal of fun at the same time. You have provided a very clear narrative that focuses on addressing all elements of the assessment goals, well done. I could suggest two ideas going forward. First, remember to focus your limited time/word count on the immediately relevant. This is a leadership assignment, therefore lengthy discussions of the benefits of gamification in this context might be seen as pedagogy and therefore less relevant. Next, you discussion of the theories around change management started to debate and reflect. These are the skills required at the higher grade boundaries. More of this please.

Assignment 2 Digital and collaborative learning

30% Explain your implementation of a digital and collaborative learning innovation that addressed an identified area for improvement in your practice
20% Document your evidence for the impact of your innovation using methods appropriate to the context (for example student feedback, student work, observations, results, etc.)
30% Critique the successes and failures of your innovation and how you might have done things differently
10% Use and present suitably cited and referenced source material in APA format, including peer reviewed journals
10% Deliver and present content effectively, considering structure, narrative and presence. Include reflection on your learning.

EXPLAIN YOUR INNOVATION: You have described the implementation of your digital and collaborative innovation.
EVIDENCE OF IMPACT: You have documented more than one source of evidence for the impact of your innovation and they are related to one another.
CRITIQUE SUCCESS AND FAILURE: You have analysed successes and/or failures, with direct reference to different options.
USE AND PRESENT SOURCE MATERIAL: You have provided a good list of references, which are cited and discussed.
DELIVER AND PRESENT REFLECTIVE CONTENT: Your presentation describes and combines themes, with a narrative structure that reports on what has been learned.
FEEDBACK/FORWARD: Thanks for sharing your work on collaboration in your classroom. Collaboration permeates everything your students have done, right from the think, pair, share to the co-constructed rubric. The different ideas and tools you have used is very impressive teaching, you have given me ideas that I will use in future work. You may be a little disappointed that your grade here may not match the teaching. Your assignment does move away from the higher level of the TML rubric. For example, you seemed to have selected collaboration through personal choice rather than linking it to a problem in your practice. You also need to evaluate possible solutions to the problems you faced. Looking forward, you need to focus on the demands of the TML assessment rubrics, thinking what would this look like in relation to your initiative. In this case, it seems your focus you have allowed too much time to describe your initiative, leaving less to investigate its impacts in depth. Video
70%




Assignment 1 Leadership


Google Doc Assignment
20% Describe the change initiative, its intended outcomes, your own leadership roles within it, and the leadership of others where relevant.
20% Critically reflect on the success of the overall leadership within a change initiative by evaluating the influences and effectiveness of the different leadership styles and attributes
20% Critically reflect on your own leadership and possible followership within that change initiative(past/present/future idea)
20% Demonstrate a critical understanding of multiple leadership theories and key principles, including their strengths and weaknesses
10% Use and present suitably referenced source material, including peer reviewed journals. Include a Turnitin originality report
10% Deliver and present content effectively, considering structure, narrative and presence. Include reflection on your learning

DESCRIBE INITIATIVE AND LEADERSHIP ROLES: You have described the change initiative, its intended outcomes and leadership roles within it in an integrated manner, and identified links to wider context and practice.
CRITICAL UNDERSTANDING OF OVERALL LEADERSHIP: You have critically reflected on leadership success, styles and attributes with reference to evidence and clearly related these to one another.
CRITICALLY REFLECT ON OWN LEADERSHIP: You have analyzed your own leadership or followership and discussed principles, strengths and weaknesses.
CRITICALLY REFLECT ON LEADERSHIP THEORY: You have evaluated leadership theories in terms of the extent to which their principles, strengths and weaknesses apply to the change initiative.
SOURCE MATERIAL: You have provided a set of well integrated and constructed references that are cited and debated. You provided a Turnitin originality report.
PRESENTATION AND REFLECTION: Your presentation is well-argued with a narrative structure that relates themes together and explains what has been learned.
FEEDBACK/FORWARD: This is a great essay! These are small suggestions, if a chart or table is inserted into the body of the text its relevance needs to be explained. There is a quote from your team leader that has at its end a Hallier reference… where does one quote stop and the other begin? You have stated your strengths and weaknesses. Maybe in the weakness section more explanation around how you envision doing things such as building community could have been helpful.
86%










Week 15 - Gamification

Gamification
Gamification is a concept, which is not exclusive of education. Some researchers generically defined it as “the use of game design elements and game mechanics in non-game contexts” This broad definition has been further refined to reflect the most common objective of gamification: increase user experience and engagement with a system. It is important to note that Games and Gamification are two different things! (Deterding, Dixon, Khaled & Nacke, 2011).
Gamified Services
Huotari & Hamari (2011) outline some ways in which services have been gamified

Core serviceEnhancing serviceGamified service
  • LinkedInprofile
  • Progress bar measuring progress in filling personal details
  • The enhancing service increases the perceived value of filling all details by invoking progress-related psychological biases.
  • Cafe
  • Mayorship competition in Foursquare  
  • The enhancing service creates a competition between customers where they have to visit the cafe frequently enough → competition
  • Dry cleaner
  • Loyalty stamp card - 1 stamp for every visit
  • The enhancing service invokes the psychological biases related to progress and thus increases the perceived value of using the same dry cleaner service.
  • Gym
  • Heya Heya
  • Gym experience that sets goals and help to monitor the progress of the training.

Game mechanics
In his video (on the portal) Seth Priebatsch described the four game mechanics of appointment, influence and status, progression and communal discovery. Badgeville (n.d.) outline a large number of game mechanics:

  • Achievements 
  • Appointments 
  • Behavioral Momentum 
  • Blissful Productivity 
  • Bonuses 
  • Cascading Information Theory 
  • Combos 
  • Community Collaboration  
  • Countdown 
  • Discovery 
  • Epic Meaning 
  • Free Lunch 
  • Infinite Gameplay         
  • Levels 
  • Loss Aversion 
  • Lottery  
  • Ownership 
  • Points 
  • Progression 
  • Quests 
  • Reward Schedules         
  • Status 
  • Urgent Optimism 
  • Virality 


Professional leadership games
Gamification has been applied to leadership in some organisations One example is the NTT Data Ignite Leadership Game that addresses five key skills for leaders
negotiation
communication
time management
change management
problem solving


Deloitte's Leadership Learning Motivator includes sharing badges on professional networks such as LinkedIn and Twitter. Meister (2013) provides some more detail on both games, while Bodnar (2014) explores some of the key concepts in more depth, including some discussion around whether the same motivational game mechanics work across cultures.
Seven principles of game-based design
These principles are outlined on the Quest to Learn website (Quest To Learn, n.d.)
Everyone is a participant
Challenge
Learning happens by doing
Feedback is immediate and ongoing
Failure is reframed as “iteration”
Everything is interconnected
It kind of feels like play






Game thinking
Marczewski (2016) explores the following types of game thinking:
Game inspired design: This is where no actual elements from games are used, just ideas such as user interfaces that mimic those from games, design or artwork that is inspired by games or the way things are written.
Gamification: Extrinsic gamification is the sort that most people are used to, where game elements are added to a system. Things like points, badges, progress bars etc.Intrinsic gamification is more about using motivation and behavioural design to engage users.
Serious games: These may be teaching/learning games that teach you something using real gameplay, simulators that provide a virtual version of something from the real world that allows safe practice and testing, meaningful games that use gameplay to promote a meaningful message to the player, or purposeful games that create direct real world outcomes.
Play (games / toys): Play is free form and has no extrinsically imposed goals. It is done for fun or joy. Games add defined goals and rules to play (such as challenges). Toys are objects that can be used in play or games.
Some examples of serious games
Sparx (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9pfzCKt0FyA )
Quest2teach (http://quest2teach.strikingly.com/ ).
Tinnitus game (http://www.uniservices.co.nz/Portals/0/All%20One%20Pagers/Tinnitus_game.pdf)
Cancer Research UK's game Play to Cure: Genes in Space (http://scienceblog.cancerresearchuk.org/2014/02/04/download-our-revolutionary-mobile-game-to-help-speed-up-cancer-research/)
Educational game model
According to Amory (2007), Educational computer games should:
Be relevant, explorative, emotive and engaging
Include complex challenges, puzzles or quests
Be gender-inclusive and non-confrontational
Provide appropriate role models
Develop democracy and social capital through dialogue
Support authentic learning activities
Support the construction of tacit knowledge


Educational games need all the usual qualities of games, plus they should not contain any socially undesirable features (racism. sexism, violence, etc) but provide positive models, plus they have to have some embedded pedagogy. Maybe this explains why successful educational games are so hard to create.
Kupu Hono
You can try out a basic demo of Tyne Crow’s Kupu Hono Maori language learning game at www.kupuhono.co.nz
This is an example of a learning game designed for mobile devices that uses a virtual game world.
Flow theory
Flow experience is widely accepted to be one of the fundamental reasons that people play games. It is the essence of games. For game designers, the question is not whether flow is important, but, rather, how long you can keep your players in flow (Murphy, 2011).
Game creation tools
One of the tools that could be used with students to create their own games is Gamefroot. There is a video in the portal about how one teacher used Gamefroot for assessment.
Mobile Learning Tools
A number of tools have been developed for mobile devices that support game-like learning experiences linked to exploring outdoor environments. They include such features as competing individuals / teams, ‘treasure hunt’ style activities, scores/ badges for achievement and leader boards. Some examples of this type of tool include:
Seppo
Wikitude
ARIS
ActionBound
Layar 










Week 14 - Digital Design Thinking in the Classroom

Change by DesignTim Brown, CEO of IDEO, has written the book about Change by Design (2009). According to him Design Thinking is Human-centered: ‘The basic problem is that people are so ingenious at adapting to inconvenient situations that they are often not even aware that they are doing so. Our real goal is helping people to articulate the latent needs they may not even know they have’.
Observation is important too: ´When we observe people going about their daily lives, what is it that they don’t do or don’t say?´ as well as empathy, or as Brown calls it: 'Standing in the shoes of others'. Brown talks a lot about the importance of prototyping, because:‘Like every other kid, I was thinking with my hands…’. If you want to hear him talking about his book, we recommend you listening to this radio show.
Teaching Practices that encourage Design ThinkingImmersion:Have students work together in small collaborative groups to do a deep dive into the subject/topic area. Ask the students to undertake research, observation and develop questionnaires or evaluate data to gain a technical, personal and community views on a topic.
Inquiry-based Feedback:Instead of value-based feedback, inquiry based feedback coupled with observation encourages a more open-ended and in-depth approach to learning. Students are encouraged to minimise expressing their likes and dislikes, and encouraged to first spend time silently observing, and then asking questions prefixed by phrases such as "I noticed that...," "why," and "how."
Before this process begins ensure students brainstorm ways to gather information. For example:
Research that includes eBooks, case studies, experiments, data, academic papers etc
Observation that includes personal viewing, filming, online videos, documentaries, recorded interviews
Questionnaires that includes personal questionnaires, online surveys, research and data including census, government agency information, non-government organisation data, OECD reports etc.
Synthesis:
Have students deduce interesting gaps to explore, problems to solve or opportunities to solve, using the information they have gathered from their immersion process.
Ideas on how to gain a new perspective
Put visuals on the wall which relate to the topic but at the fringes of the core subject.
Ask new questions. Create a how, when, why, what, who question and define the answers.
Note: Ask "thinking" questions – don’t make suggestions. Instead of asking questions to which there is a correct answer, ask students to create the problem. For example instead of saying"Does your girl need ears?" A thinking question would be, "What kind of music does your girl like to listen to? How can she hear the music?"
Students should pose their problem by first tapping into their own wishes and goals that might have real-life results or be largely theoretical and in end in the modeling stages. Such questions such as "How can we grow vegetables without using pesticides?" And, "How can we feed the world's population in a sustainable way?" Both encourage students to think divergently.
Questions, not suggestions, allow personal ownership based on observing, on experiences and on the imagination.
Zoom out:Put the subject/topic in the centre of focus and scale out to the next logical layer. For example if the topic was endangered tigers of India, scale back and look at the life of poachers, the local communities, the black market skin/medicine customers etc. Explore each logical layer of influence as you scale back from the heart of the topic to develop a macro view of the subject.
Ideation, Prototyping and Feedback:Have your students test ideas, solve a problem and extend their understanding without focusing on the ‘right’ answer. This part of the Design Thinking process
helps student to 'hold their ideas lightly' in order to review and gain feedback from other student groups and their teacher/s.
The emphasis is on thinking skills and mindsets that allow students to create early and often, adjusting the course of their learning and applying an iterative approach to outcomes that is tweaked from the input of feedback.
Note: Nurture a culture of divergent thinking. Encourage students to be choice makers. Ask students ‘what their work needs’. If a student asks for help, assist by asking the child to give several of their ideas to discuss..
Implementation or Display:As ideas and defined the Design Thinking process moves to the celebration stage where concepts are shared. In this stage have students talk to the group about the changes they applied in their approach, what they reflected on, what evidence they found to support their findings and what new knowledge they gained or shared.





Week 14 - Design Thinking in Leadership

Design Thinking in LeadershipDesign Thinking argues very convincingly that we would need to provide more time for the discovery, interpretation, ideation, experimentation and evolution of ideas, both for students and for teachers.
Instead of looking at what assets a company has to create a product, leaders who use design thinking first ask what their clients require and then identify how the organisation can fulfill those needs. Research, interviews and first-person observation identify problems that need solving, which in turn inform the products and services a company develops using creative thinking and diverse perspectives. For learning, design thinking could apply to how programs and learning tasks are developed and delivered. We shouldn't just teach design thinking to our students, but we should use it to create our projects and learning tasks.
This approach is said to help leaders by removing the taboo of creativity. According to Dr Jeffrey Sanchez-Burks, Design Thinking shrinks innovation to something that doesn’t require a massive strategic change in an organization, but can be applied every day; from how might we better communicate within a team to how might we increase our ability to identify new learning potentials and trends.

Organisational Focus on DesignKeep in mind that design thinking doesn’t solve all problems. Like Kolko in this Harward Business Review article suggests, it helps people and organizations cut through complexity. It’s great for innovation. It works extremely well for imagining the future. An organisational focus on design offers unique opportunities for humanizing technology and for developing emotionally resonant products and services. Adopting this perspective isn’t easy. But doing so helps create a workplace where people want to be, one that responds quickly to changing business dynamics and empowers individual contributors. And because design is empathetic, it implicitly drives a more thoughtful, human approach to business.

'How Might We'? According to IDEO (http://www.designkit.org/) every problem is an opportunity for design. By framing your challenge as a How Might We question, you’ll set yourself up for an innovative solution.
Start by looking at the insight statements that you’ve created. Try rephrasing them as questions by adding “How might we” at the beginning.
The goal is to find opportunities for design, so if your insights suggest several How Might We questions that’s great.
Then take a look at your How Might We question and ask yourself if it allows for a variety of solutions. If it doesn’t, broaden it. Your How Might We should generate a number of possible answers and will become a launchpad for your Brainstorms.
Finally, make sure that your How Might We’s aren’t too broad. It’s a tricky process but a good How Might We should give you both a narrow enough frame to let you know where to start your Brainstorm, but also enough breadth to give you room to explore wild ideas.

Design Thinking Mindsets
Human-centered design is as much about your head as your hands. IDEO suggests that how you think about design directly affects whether you'll arrive at innovative, impactful solutions. These 7 Mindsets explore and uncover the philosophy behind Design Kit’s approach to creative problem solving.
Learn from Failure
Make it
Creative Confidence
Empathy
Embrace ambiguity
Optimism
Iterate, iterate, iterate

Four principles to Design Thinking (According to Plattner, Meinel and Leifer) The human rule – all design activity is ultimately social in nature
The ambiguity rule – design thinkers must preserve ambiguity
The re-design rule – all design is re-design
The tangibility rule – making ideas tangible always facilitates communication

Rogers’ adoption of Innovation Adoption LifecycleLike innovations, also adopters have been determined to have traits that affect their likelihood to adopt an innovation. A bevy of individual personality traits have been explored for their impacts on adoption, but with little agreement. Ability and motivation, which vary on situation unlike personality traits, have a large impact on a potential adopter's likelihood to adopt an innovation. Unsurprisingly, potential adopters who are motivated to adopt an innovation are likely to make the adjustments needed to adopt it.
Rogers outlines several strategies in order to help an innovation reach this stage, including when an innovation adopted by a highly respected individual within a social network and creating an instinctive desire for a specific innovation. Another strategy includes injecting an innovation into a group of individuals who would readily use said technology, as well as providing positive reactions and benefits for early adopters.




Innovators, Early Adopters and Early MajorityAccording to Rogers (2002), whereas innovators are cosmopolites, early adopters are localites. This adopter category, more than any other, has the highest degree of opinion leadership in most systems. Potential adopters look to early adopters for advice and information about an innovation.
Early majority are pragmatists, comfortable with moderately progressive ideas, but won’t act without solid proof of benefits. They are followers who are influenced by mainstream fashions and wary of fads. Majorities are cost sensitive and risk averse. They are looking for simple, proven, better ways of doing what they already do. They require guaranteed off-the-shelf performance, minimum disruption, minimum commitment of time, minimum learning, and either cost neutrality or rapid payback periods. And they hate complexity.
Robinson (2009) has summarised Rogers' ideas in of the Diffusion of Innovations and he suggests that when working with early adopters one should
Offer strong face-to-face support for a limited number of early adopters to trial the new idea.
Study the trials carefully to discover how to make the idea more convenient, low cost and marketable.
Reward their egos e.g. with media coverage.
Promote them as fashion leaders (beginning with the cultish end of the media market).
Recruit and train some as peer educators.
Maintain relationships with regular feedback.
Robinson describes the early majority as pragmatists, comfortable with moderately progressive ideas, but won’t act without solid proof of benefits. They are followers who are influenced by mainstream fashions and wary of fads. Majorities are cost sensitive and risk averse. They are looking for simple, proven, better ways of doing what they already do. They require guaranteed off-the-shelf performance, minimum disruption, minimum commitment of time, minimum learning, and either cost neutrality or rapid payback periods and they hate complexity.

Leading in a Culture of ChangeIf you haven't yet read Michael Fullan's book "Leading in a Culture of Change", we warmly recommend it. Fullan has written expansively about educational change and how to manage it. Since "Change is a double edged sword... for better of worse, change arouses emotions", it hopefully helps in your LDC2 planning that you are ok with your and others emotions.
He has proposed (2001) that leaders would become more effective with their efforts to lead in a culture of change if they would be constant in their efforts to establish these five components of leadership:

Moral Purpose: A commitment to betterment and improving life
Understanding Change: A culture of change consists of great rapidity and non-linearity on the one hand and equally great potential for creative breakthroughs on the other. The paradox is that transformation would not be possible without accompanying messiness.
Relationships, Relationships and Relationships: How people interact with each other and the trust and loyalty they are able to create is essential to the success or failure of a change.
Knowledge Building: The process of a person taking information in and creating an understanding that is then used in society.
Coherence Building: Accepting that change is inevitable and can be positive, this is helping everyone make sense of the ’messiness’ that comes along with the changes that are being experienced.

























OptimismJohn Bielenberg
Founder, Future Partners
You need to believe its possible.
The bigger the challenge the more important optimism is
Is the thing that drives you and makes it possible.
“Optimism is the thing that drives you forward.”
We believe that design is inherently optimistic. To take on a big challenge, especially one as large and intractable as poverty, we have to believe that progress is even an option. If we didn’t, we wouldn’t even try. Optimism is the embrace of possibility, the idea that even if we don’t know the answer, that it’s out there and that we can find it. Human-centered designers are persistently focused on what could be, not the countless obstacles that may get in the way. Constraints are inevitable, and often they push designers toward unexpected solutions. But it’s our core animating belief that shows just how deeply optimistic human-centered designers are: Every problem is solvable.

Iterate, Iterate, Iterate
Gaby BrinkFounder, Tomorrow Partners
Gain validation along the way that we are working towards better solutions as we are hearing from the people we are designing for. Pay off is when people are implementing in their lives.Moving through concepts more quickly. We arrive at better solutions more quickly. Able to test ideas so we aren't investing in a single idea that might not be the right one.“What an iterative approach affords us is that we gain validation along the way...because we’re hearing from the people we’re actually designing for.”Human-centered design is an inherently iterative approach to solving problems because it makes feedback from the people we’re designing for a critical part of how a solution evolves. By continually iterating, refining, and improving our work we put ourselves in a place where we’ll have more ideas, try a variety of approaches, unlock our creativity, and arrive more quickly at successful solutions.
We iterate because we know that we won’t get it right the first time. Or even the second. Iteration allows us the opportunity to explore, to get it wrong, to follow our hunches, but ultimately arrive at a solution that will be adopted and embraced. We iterate because it allows us to keep learning. Instead of hiding out in our workshops, betting that an idea, product, or service will be a hit, we quickly get out in the world and let the people we’re designing for be our guides.

EmpathyEmi KolawoleEditor-in-Residence, Stanford University d.school
putting yourself in someone else's shoes. Its a chance to be completely other than you are.
understanding - true human centred design
New solutions i have to get to know new people and new situations.
Dive into something completely different
“I can’t come up with any new ideas if all I do is exist in my own life.”Empathy is the capacity to step into other people’s shoes, to understand their lives, and start to solve problems from their perspectives. Human-centered design is premised on empathy, on the idea that the people you’re designing for are your roadmap to innovative solutions. All you have to do empathize, understand them, and bring them along with you in the design process.Immersing yourself in another world not only opens you up to new creative possibilities, but it allows you to leave behind preconceived ideas and outmoded ways of thinking. Empathizing with the people you’re designing for is the best route to truly grasping the context and complexities of their lives. But most importantly, it keeps the people you’re designing for squarely grounded in the center of your work.

Creative Confidence
David KelleyFounder, IDEO
Lots of people say that they aren't creative.
People have fear that is blocking there confidence.Have to go through lots of iterations.“Creative confidence is the notion that you have big ideas, and that you have the ability to act on them.”Anyone can approach the world like a designer. Often all it takes to unlock that potential as a dynamic problem solver is creative confidence. Creative confidence is the belief that everyone is creative, and that creativity isn’t the capacity to draw or compose or sculpt, but a way of approaching the world.
Creative confidence is the quality that human-centered designers rely on when it comes to making leaps, trusting their intuition, and chasing solutions that they haven’t totally figured out yet. It’s the belief that you can and will come up with creative solutions to big problems and the confidence that all it takes is rolling up your sleeves and diving in.

Week 13 - Inquiry Learning and Teacher Inquiry

Teacher Inquiry into Student LearningThis week, in this course we are covering Teacher Inquiry into Student Learning, and in the digital and collaborative course we are covering inquiry learning. Team Solutions (2009) make the distinction between them as follows:
Inquiry Learning (DIGITAL)
Teacher Inquiry (LEADERSHIP)
A process where students co-construct their learning in an authentic context
Where teachers inquire into their own practice and use evidence to make decisions about ways to change that practice for the benefit of the student
Critical InquiryIn the Practising Teacher Criteria (Professional Knowledge in Practice), critical inquiry is part of the criteria (Education Council (n.d.)
Criterion 12 is "use critical inquiry and problem-solving effectively in their professional practice"
The key indicators are:
systematically and critically engage with evidence and professional literature to reflect on and refine practice
respond professionally to feedback from members of their learning community
critically examine their own beliefs, including cultural beliefs, and how they impact on their professional practice and the achievement of ākonga
Further details can be found on the Education Council Website.

Teaching as InquiryThe NZ Ministry of Education also has a series of web pages explaining what they define as Teaching as Inquiry
The Spiral of Inquiry

This is described on the MoE's TKI website as “a fresh rethink on the structure of teaching as inquiry.” (Ministry of Education, 2015). It emphasises involvement of learners, their families and communities and developing learner agency. It states that engaging in inquiry is a process of developing collective professional agency either within a school or across a cluster of schools. The approach is described in Timperley, Kaser & Halbert (2014). They emphasise agency and collaboration: "Engaging in inquiry is a process of developing collective professional agency either within a school or across a cluster of schools”, and “Nor can leaders decide what the focus of their inquiry should be. It is the collaborative inquiry process that matters”
A number of teachers use this approach rather than the Teaching as Inquiry cycle, described in more detail on the Ministry web site.

Spiral Playbook




Thursday, March 23, 2017

Week 12 -Innovative Learning Spaces / Maker Movement


Innovative classrooms reflect new ways of teaching and learning and they remove the focus from a teacher led environment to a space where teachers and learners collaborate.

These learning environments are much more creative, flexible and supportive of technology and are ideally designed to facilitate a more creative approach to content, and new ways to deliver the curriculum that encourages connections in content, encourages excitement and makes learning a transformational experience.

Our classrooms should support new ways of accomplishing the desired outcome that is more active and enables students to retain knowledge and expand on concepts beyond what is taught in the classroom.

Modern learning spaces should be bold and encourage risk taking and original thought through breaking rules around what a classroom should look like.



Week 11 Agile and Servant Leadership/ Lean education

Agility means the capability of rapidly and efficiently adapting to changes.
Agile leadership It is the art of being flexible under the influence of rapidly changing external conditions. It means being flexible, responsive to change, and willing to learn and adopt new ways, leading to effectively survive and succeed in the complex modern competitive business environment."It is not the strongest or the most intelligent who will survive but those who can best manage change." - Charles Darwin.
Agile Leadership Style
Agile leadership is situational, adaptive, empowering and inspirational. The most important leadership theory applied to agile is that of servant leadership (Highsmith, 2009).“For the Agile Leader, servanthood is the strategy. Situational actions are the tactic” (Filho, 2011).The key characteristics of the servant leader include awareness, listening, persuasion, empathy, healing, and coaching. Situational leadership means that the servant leader may act as a democratic leader, a laissez-faire leader, or an autocratic leader in different situations (Koganti, 2014).
Servant Leadership
The originator of the servant leadership concept (though inspired by a Herman Hesse story) was Robert Greenleaf. “The best test, and difficult to administer, is: Do those served grow as persons? Do they, while being served, become healthier, wiser, freer, more autonomous, more likely themselves to become servants? And, what is the effect on the least privileged in society? Will they benefit or at least not be further deprived?” (Greenleaf, 1970
Teachers as Servant Leaders
Servant leadership has been applied by a number of authors to teaching. “The teacher as servant leader functions as a trailblazer for those served by removing obstacles that stand in their path. Part of unleashing another’s talents is helping individuals discover latent, unformed interests. Art, music, and science teachers are prime examples of educators whose genius lies in leading students to discover unarticulated interests.” (Bowman, 2005),



Agile methods
The Agile movement proposes alternatives to traditional project management. Agile approaches, such as Scrum and eXtreme programming were designed for the software development to help businesses respond to unpredictability. Aspects of Lean production (from the Toyota Production System) are also increasingly utilised by agile practitioners, for example Kanban boards, where limiting the number of current work items elegant workflow. Kanban's 'pull' model makes the flow of work visible across the team. In software development, 'Scrumban' is a populate fusion of Scrum and Kanban.
Nowadays Agile and lean practices are used in industries outside of manufacturing and software development. Agile is recognized more generally now as simply a great way of getting things done in rapidly changing and highly unpredictable situations.
Agile and Lean Ideas in Learning
In this week's classes we ponder what Agile and Lean methods can offer to the education sector. Even though Agile was developed within the software industry, the bridge is that it is fundamentally about learning, people, and change - three things we struggle with in education. Many are amazed at how easily Agile and lean ideas translate into education, and how perfectly-suited they are, for example, to running schools.

Week 10 Digital - Real World Learning and Crowdsourcing

Problem-solving tasks require students do some or all of the following investigate the parameters of the problem to guide their approach
generate ideas and alternatives
devise their own approach, or explore several possible procedures that might be appropriate to the situation
design a coherent solution
test the solution and iterate on improvements to satisfy the requirements of the problem.

Real-world problems are authentic situations and needs that exist outside an academic context
Real-world problems have all of the following characteristics:
Are experienced by real people. For example, if students are asked to diagnose an ecological imbalance in a rainforest in Costa Rica, they are working with a situation that affects the real people who live there.
Have solutions for a specific, plausible audience other than the educator as grader. For example, designing equipment to fit a small city playground could benefit the children of the community.
Have specific, explicit contexts. For example, developing a plan for a community garden in a public park in their town has a specific context; learning which vegetables grow best in which parts of one’s country does not.
If students are using data to solve a problem, they use actual data (for example, real scientific records of earthquakes, results of their own experiments, or first-person accounts of an historical event), not data developed by an educator or publisher for a lesson


Source: Innovative Teaching and Learning Research. (2013). 21st Century Learning Design. Microsoft. Retrieved from: http://www.itlresearch.com/itl-leap21


Supporting Diversity for Problem Solving
Set up a task with space for a variety of viewpoints
Help students access the existing established knowledge as and when it is needed to help solve their shared problem
Support students to build knowledge and capabilities
Provide opportunities for students to work with others
Ensure group diversity
Provide opportunities for diverse ideas to emerge and collide
Provide opportunities for collective knowledge building
Provide opportunities to revisit ideas over time
Source: Hipkins, R., Bolstad, R., Boyd, S., & McDowall, S. (2014). Key competencies for the future.


Where to start your search? Idea Springboard
Use this search tool (created for the Google Science fair) to help you come up with a project that you'll love working on. https://www.googlesciencefair.com/springboard/en/

Thingful
Thingful® is a search engine for the Internet of Things, providing a unique geographical index of connected objects around the world, including energy, radiation, weather, and air quality devices as well as seismographs, iBeacons, ships, aircraft and even animal trackers

Instagrok
Their mission is to help everyone discover the joy of learning and empower them to be lifelong learners. So we are dedicated to building innovative technology to enable engaging, safe and personalized learning. https://www.instagrok.com

Crowdsourcing for Problem solvingCrowdsourcing is the practice of engaging a ‘crowd’ or group for a common goal, such as innovation, problem solving or efficiency. It can take place on many different levels and across various industries. Thanks to our growing connectivity, it is now easier than ever for individuals to collectively contribute, whether with ideas, time, expertise, or funds, to a project or cause.
If you want to learn when 'crowdsourcing' became a trend, maybe you'd like to look at a real data Google shares with us? You could also combine that with other search trends? www.google.co.nz/trends/explore#q=crowdsourcing
Examples of Crowdsourcing platforms and projectsOpenideo
Uses the ideas of Design Thinking. Join a global community to solve big issues “How might we…” challenges for social good in different phases
InnocentiveTheir goal is to crowdsource innovation solutions from the world’s smartest people, who compete to provide ideas and solutions to important business, social, policy, scientific, and technical challenges.
Hackidemia
A mobile invention lab that enables future changemakers to access and create a hands-on STEAM education that will enable them to solve specific challenges by developing and testing creative solutions and physical artifacts. Global workshops fostering collaboration between schools, tech companies and kids in the development of 3D-enabled curricula, tools, and learning environments for the 21st century learner.
DemocrasyOS
An open-source platform for voting and political debate that political parties and governments can download, install, and repurpose much like WordPress blogging software.
Global Lives ProjectA collaboratively produced video library of life experience around the world. Global Lives exhibits showcase unedited footage of daily life around the world, and they encourage students and teachers to study, discuss and reflect upon the startling differences and similarities between people from around the world.
HacKIDemiaA mobile invention lab that enables future changemakers to access and create a hands-on STEAM education that will enable them to solve specific challenges by developing and testing creative solutions and physical artifacts.
ZooniverseThis one claims to be the world’s largest and most popular platform for people-powered research. Research is made possible by volunteers—hundreds of thousands of people around the world who come together to assist professional researchers. Our goal is to enable research that would not be possible, or practical, otherwise. Zooniverse research results in new discoveries, datasets useful to the wider research.
Zooinverse projects have two distinct aims, (Masters, Oh, Cox, Simmons, Lintott, Graham, Greenhill, & Holmes, 2016) the first is to solve specific scientific problems through the use of citizen scientists. The second aim is to engage members of the public with real world science to educate and change attitudes towards science. Citizen scientists are members of the general public that volunteer their time to work and collaborate with professional scientists to collect data and solve problems on real scientific research questions. Citizen science is not a new concept but has become more accessible to people around the world through the use of the Internet. Edmund Halley used citizen science in 1714 when he got members of the public to report the total eclipse of the Sun across England.

Citizen Science"Engaging in citizen science allows people to experience first-hand the scientific process and engage scientific thinking at the same time as increasing their knowledge of the specific research topic (i.e. their knowledge of scientific content.(Masters, et al., 2016, p.1)"
Through platforms like Zooinverse citizen scientists are able to view, record, analyse, process and answer incredibly large amounts of data that would not be possible by the scientists doing the research alone. The first project Galaxy Zoo received 70,000 classifications per hour and more than 50,000,000 classifications in the first year (Graham, Cox, Simmons, Lintott, Masters, Greenhill, & Holmes, K, 2015)

Week 9 - Student Engagement and Multicultural perspective

EngagementIs Kahoot! engaging?
In the leadership activities for this week, we played a Kahoot! quiz. In what sense is this 'engaging'?
"Students should be enticed by the competitive nature of the game if it is going to be a valuable learning experience for the students. They benefit from using digital games in the classroom by learning how to handle success and failure as well as how to use critical thinking and problem-solving skills." (Icard, 2014).

Engagement and Flow
Fredericks, Blumenfeld and Paris (2004) proposed a framework for considering engagement that distinguishes between cognitive, behavioural and emotional engagement. It is important to clarify the scope of the term ‘engagement’. Policy discussion has long focused on the negative consequences of disengagement, such as school dropout, and clear behavioural indicators, such as absenteeism and disruptive classroom behaviour. This often overlooks the complexity of engagement, especially the cognitive engagement of students who may be otherwise attending class and behaving well. A short paper form the Australian Institute for Teaching and School Leadership. (2016) gives an interesting view point and summary about those three types of engagement in schools - what does engagement mean and how can you measure it?
Shernoff (2013) states that engagement always connotes a relationship, one of involvement to something, and defines it as a heightened, simultaneous experience of concentration, interest, and enjoyment in the task at hand. His definition includes no presumptions about how students should think, feel, behave, or relate to school. You might notice that his definition includes no mention of school whatsoever so that engagement in learning can be viewed as on par and comparable to that experienced in other less formal contexts. That definition is based completely in the experiences of students, so that engagement may be considered as a learning experience, one to be valued in its own right. This definition is rooted in Csikszentmihalyi’s (1990) conceptualisation of 'flow experience.' Flow is an optimal state of cognitive and emotional engagement, so absorbing that one may lose track of time and awareness of the self. Although the nature of schoolwork can vary, the ideal state of engagement could maybe be an active attentiveness and problem solving or the fashioning of products that promotes learning and the development of new skills, an ideal that flow experiences encapsulate.
Research tends to converge on the observation that meaningful engagement is composed of two independent processes; academic intensity and a positive emotional response. Optimal learning environments provide academic intensity through environmental challenge characterized by clear goals and high expectations for performance with complex tasks found to be relevant to students’ lives and the community at large. They also support students to succeed through motivational support, positive relationships, feedback, and opportunities for action and collaboration.
Flow and engagement can be contagious, having the potential to cross over from teacher to student, student to teacher, and permeate an entire group participating in a shared activity. New immersive technologies also show promising signs of enhancing student engagement to learn in the future. Indeed, there are many routes to engaging youth; creating meaningful engagement requires attention to a variety of contextual, instructional, developmental, and interpersonal factors beyond the preoccupation with narrowly defined educational “outcomes.”

Student Agency
Martin (2004, p. 135) characterises agency as "the capability of individual human beings to make choices and act on these choices in a way that makes a difference in their lives”.
Lindgren and McDaniel (2012, p.346) on the other hand underline that “giving students the sense that they have control and the power to affect their own learning is one of the great challenges of contemporary education”. Even if also the Piagetian (1967) notion of constructivism says that “the most transformative learning experiences will be those that are directed by the learner’s own endeavors and curiosities”.





The figure above from Nakata (2014) suggests that agency builds on self-regulation, but student agency is then the basis for autonomous learners. Further, teacher autonomy is a pre-condition for learner autonomy.

MULTICULTURAL PERSPECTIVE
School CultureAccording to the Ministry of Education (2016), a school's culture consists of the customs, rituals, and stories that are evident and valued throughout the whole school. An effective school culture is one in which the customs and values foster success for all; and where clear boundaries are set, known, and agreed to by everyone. In developing a positive culture, effective principals ensure that educational practices are inclusive. They make certain that students and their families do not feel alienated either from their own culture or from the culture of the school.
Hauora - Well-being
Hauora is a Māori philosophy of health unique to New Zealand (Ministry of Education, 1999). Could Hauora be one of the key concepts on defining a positive school culture? It encompasses the physical, mental and emotional, social, and spiritual dimensions of health. The concept is recognised by the World Health Organisation. Maybe that could be the key to personal, national or even global success?
Hauroa comprises the following types of well-being:
Taha tinana - Physical well-being - the physical body, its growth, development, and ability to move, and ways of caring for it
Taha hinengaro - Mental and emotional well-being - coherent thinking processes, acknowledging and expressing thoughts and feelings and responding constructively
Taha whanau - Social well-being - family relationships, friendships, and other interpersonal relationships; feelings of belonging, compassion, and caring; and social support
Taha wairua - Spiritual well-being - the values and beliefs that determine the way people live, the search for meaning and purpose in life, and personal identity and self-awareness (For some individuals and communities, spiritual well- being is linked to a particular religion; for others, it is not.)

Kura Culture
Te Aho Matua is the foundation document for Kura Kaupapa Māori. According to Tākao, Grennell, McKegg & Wehipeihana (2010), the six sections of Kura Kaupapa Māori are
Te Ira Tangata (the human essence)
Te Reo (the language)
Ngā Iwi (the people)
Te Ao (the world)
Āhuatanga Ako (circumstances of learning)

“our tamariki are able to go out into the world standing strong in who they are and where they are going and enjoying ongoing education along the way in whatever they choose. – Whānau, Te Ara Hou" (Tākao, Grennell, McKegg & Wehipeihana, 2010 p.3),





Week 8 - Leadership Leading Change

Leading change (Kotter)
“The simple insight that management is not leadership is better understood today, but not nearly as well as is needed. Management makes a system work. It helps you do what you know how to do. Leadership builds systems or transforms old ones.” (Kotter, 1996)
Kotter's 8 step process
Kotter (1996) suggests that there is an 8 step process for leading change.
Create a sense of urgency
Build a guiding team
Develop a vision and strategy
Communicate the vision
Enable action by removing barriers
Celebrate wins
Sustain change by building on gains
Embed the change in culture
There is a useful diagram that summarises Kotter's process on the Leading Change course blog

Coherence
Effective leadership, rather than focusing primarily on a specific aspect of change, focuses on creating the conditions in which everyone in the group is able to envision and enact cohesion:
“Coherence consists of the shared depth of understanding about the purpose and nature of the work” (Fullan & Quinn, 2016, p.1).
In challenging situations, people are motivated primarily by intrinsic factors: having a sense of purpose, solving difficult problems, and working with peers on issues that are of critical importance to the group (Fullan & Quinn, 2016, p.4).
Fullan & Quinn identify the elements contained in the diagram below (from Michael Fullen's website) as the ‘right drivers to bring about system change’ - as opposed to the ‘wrong drivers’ (such as rewarding individual teachers, national standards).

Why are these wrong drivers still being implemented? Here are some of their suggestions:Our wrong driver analysis showed how politicians were making matters worse by imposing solutions that were crude and demotivating for the very people who have to help lead the solution … You might ask why politicians endorse solutions that don’t work. The answer is not complicated: because they can legislate them; because they are in a hurry; because the remedies can be made to appeal superficially to the public; because (and unkindly on our part) some of them really don’t care about the public education system, preferring that education to be taken over by the private sector; and (more kindly) because they do not know what else to do (Fullan & Quinn, 2016, p. 3).

Simplexity means that you take a difficult problem and identify a small number of key factors (about four to six) – this is the simple part. And then you make these factors gel under the reality of action with its pressures, politics, and personalities in the situation – this is the complex part (Fullan & Quinn, 2016, p. 127).
Leaders build coherence when they combine the four components of our Coherence Framework to meet the varied needs of the complex organizations they lead. Coherence making is a forever job because people come and go, and the situational dynamics are always in flux …The main threat to coherence is turnover at the top with new leaders who come in with their own agenda. It is not turnover per se that is the problem, but rather discontinuity of direction (Fullan & Quinn, 2016, p.128).