News, Views, and Clues 

June, 2004

  Structure and Culture, June 8, 2004
  At Your Finger Tips-- Pre-Service, June 17, 2004

Structure and Culture
June 8, 2004
 

A manager’s job includes creating a structure and culture where continuous improvement happens.  This practical and insightful Kappan article is a head-scratcher and may lead you to reconsider the structure and culture you and your local program managers want to create.

Below are the brief and the URL to the article.   

(By the way, “feckless” means “ineffective”—I had to look it up)

FROM FECKLESS REFORM TO SUBSTANTIVE INSTRUCTIONAL IMPROVEMENT

Even though we already know the best way to improve instruction, we
persist in pursuing strategies that have repeatedly failed. Mike Schmoker urges us to break free of our addiction to strategic planning and large-scale reform. Current models of reform and improvement planning have failed, chiefly because they have very little impact on teaching or its improvement. To truly improve schools, we must modify or abandon these models in favor of a far better, proven strategy for promoting improvements in teaching: putting teachers in "learning communities" where they learn the complex craft of teaching from each other. http://www.pdkintl.org/kappan/k0402sch.htm

 
At Your Finger Tips-- Pre-Service
June 17, 2004

 You will not believe what is at your finger tips.  Suppose you were in need of some ideas for pre-service training for new teachers in your state.  In your NEW AND IMPROVED NAEPDC web site Resource Library is a listing with many links to pre-service video, on-line and CD training options developed by other states—with contact information. 

 Take a look:

 1.  Go to NAEPDC homepage  http://www.naepdc.org/

2.  Click on “Resource Library” http://naepdc.org/resource_library/resource_library_home/resource_library_home.html 

3.  Scroll down and click on “Professional Development” http://naepdc.org/resource_library/professional_development/PD_home.html

4.  Click on “Pre-service training”http://naepdc.org/resource_library/professional_development/teacher%20training/preservice_training.html

The states who list their resources here are willing to share—sometimes for a reproduction cost.  But, you do not need to start from scratch when one of your colleagues has already developed a resource. 

We continue to add state resources to the web site.  Look around the web site when you get a few minutes. 

If you have resources you want to share, zap them to Kathi Polis at polis123@adelphia.net.

Contact us: Dr. Lennox McLendon, Executive Director; 444 North Capitol Street, NW; Suite 422; Washington, DC 20001
Phone: 202-624-5250; Fax: 202-624-1497; Email: lmclendon@naepdc.org