THE STRENGTH OF OUR TEAM
How do you bring a group of individuals together to work towards a common goal when the goal itself seems almost unattainable? Even better, when you successfully accomplish this, how do you capture and explain the feeling that is created?
For over 200 years, men, women, and children have been coming together to take part in a competition that sees teams of 300 – 400 people working together to build human towers. These towers, known as Castells, can reach incredible heights, as high as 15 meters. The goal of this competition is to create and carefully disassemble the tallest tower, however, the mission is to do this carefully. What is so incredible is that the members become smaller and younger the higher up the tower reaches, children as young as four years old have been invited to scale the human structure while their parents watch from the stands.
As a father of four children aged 15, 11, and 8 (twins), I cannot even imagine the feeling parents must have as their little ones climb higher and higher. To achieve such an incredible feat requires an unwavering commitment to the process and a belief in the team. I think about how each member must commit to the people beside and above them while trusting those people supporting them. It is a shared belief that as a group they can achieve the seemingly impossible.
When I think about these builders and their mission, I reminded of our team at #WaldheimSchool. Every year we welcome new members to our family, and I think about how we support our new custodians, teachers, EAs, bus drivers, counsellors, etc. as they figure out what it means to be a part of such a committed group of professionals. I see how seamlessly new folks become part of the fabric of our learning community and I recognise how this reveals character. It shines a light on who they are and demonstrates their will to be a part of this larger family. It also speaks to the character of the rest of the staff that has welcomed them with open arms. We are a strong family that supports one another, believes in one another, and counts on one another.
This year we have been reflecting on and discussing how we can support our students and our adults. We are thinking about ways to impact our work in the areas of reading and writing. We are wondering about ways to support our students as they transition from one grade to another, or into life after high school. We are also focusing on ways we support ourselves so we can be there for our colleagues.
As a staff, we have continued to look at ways to deepen our understanding of our students, trying to develop a clearer picture of who we are working with, and in which zone they are operating. Together, we continue to try to know our students. As a staff, we are continuing to learn how to work together and continue to learn how to learn together.
In his Visible Learning Study, John Hattie has revealed that collective teacher efficacy (CTE) has significant impact on student learning. This year we have been involved in the heavy lifting of reflecting on and refining our practices to strengthen our CTE. In doing so, we are finding that together we can accomplish incredible things. I’m so excited to see how we ‘flex our CTE muscles’ as we seek to deepen our understanding and strengthen our practices as they relate to things like parent engagement, reconciliation, student engagement, literacy & numeracy rates, inclusion, and graduation rates.
An experienced builder, Michael Entecott, was asked why he is a Castell builder. It was his response that made me smile. He said, “this is a very complex question, and I don’t really have an answer. You can’t explain it. It is impossible to explain. You have to feel it. If you feel it, you understand it.”
I have had opportunities this year to explain our adult learning process to other people. I have been able to share with others the incredible work every single adult at our school is waist deep in. I have been able to highlight some of the fantastic things we have done and some of the dreams we have for the future. What I have noticed, however, is that I am unable to adequately explain how it has all come together. I can share the why, what, and how, but I can’t really get them to understand the power of what we are doing as a team. I can tell them about the conversations that are happening; how adults and students are talking about learning and the impact it has. I can say all these things to them; tell them how a group of individuals has come together to accomplish incredible things. But I can’t make them understand it.
If they could feel it, then they could understand it.
