Wagner's Learning Walks overall seem to be more beneficial than not. The concept of getting an overall glimpse, a summary, of what is happening in a school is so powerful. The Learning Walks essentially take you into multiple classes for about 10-15 minutes. Wagner points out that when goes on a Learning Walk, "rather than look only at what teachers are doing, (he tries) to assess what students are being asked to do: the specific skills and knowledge that students are expected to master and the level of intellectual challenge in the lesson. What the teacher does is the means by which the students learn - not the end" (Wagner, 2008, p. 52).
I think one of the most valuable insights that a Learning Walk provides is the patterns of positive and negative, in both teaching patterns and student behavior patterns. Often times building and district administrators will join Wagner on the Learning Walks. So this is a perfect opportunity to see what is happening in a school that is having a positive impact on the students. Are the students actively engaged? Are the teachers challenging the students? It's also helpful to see some of the practices in school that are not helping the students. Is the focus the standardized test? Are teachers "lecturing" and not engaging? But knowing what is happening is the first step to figuring out what changes need to be made. So regardless of what is being seen, it's positive.
The Learning Walks don't only provide valuable insight. Some things to keep in mind are that they are not 100% accurate. You are only seeing a sampling of the not only the teachers, but the lessons as well. Additionally, noting what is seen in the Learning Walks doesn't identify the root cause of any concerns. For example, Wagner talks about the fact that the majority of teachers come to school genuinely wanting to make a difference. Perhaps, rather than blaming the teachers, we should look at "the quality of teachers' preparation, continuing professional development, and supervision (it's) very low in our nation's schools" (Wagner, 2008, p. 52).
When I first started taking my notes for this question, my answer consisted mainly of Wagner wanting to see students answering open ended questions, are the teachers asking follow up questions, who is answering the questions - the teachers or the students - and are only select students answering or is everyone engaged. However, I went back and reread a section that hit me as more what I would want to focus on when looking at what was happening in classrooms. Wagner talks analyzing how are we preparing our most academically well-prepared students? "Are they learning how to think critically, solve problems, work collaboratively, take initiative, communicate effectively, access and analyze information, be curious and imaginative" (Wagner, 2008, p. 46).
Discuss how these two additional articles connect to the ideas Wagner puts forth about what learning should look like?
When I read Eric Sheninge's article "It's Not a Technology Issue" I was struck when he noted schools' lack of willingness to adapt and/or evolve to a digital world. Wagner initially states that our current school system is obsolete. When you are looking at why a school system is obsolete, why anything is obsolete really, it comes down to the lack of adaptation. Technology can be an incredibly powerful tool to be one way that we can start adapting education to our current world. "Even with the proliferation of technology across all facets of society, we still see schools moving at a snail's pace (if at all) to adapt, or better yet evolve, to a digital world. In my opinion, sheer ignorance is to blame. From this ignorance a plethora of excuses arise" (Sheninger, 2015, Huffpost).
George Couros is a fantastic bloggers and author and always provides educators points to really ponder. His article, "Connecting Professional Learning and Leadership" just seemed to drive home the point that Wagner discussed regarding professional development. As I stated above, Wagner said "the quality of teachers' preparation, continuing professional development, and supervision (it's) very low in our nation's schools" (Wagner, 2008, p. 52). Couros' article discussed the problems of providing professional development to a small group of teachers. This particular approach was met with success with the small group. There was a good variety of choice, the teachers could do the PD on their own time, and there was an incentive at the end to complete the PD. The downfall came when the PD ended and there was no ripple effect. The teachers that went through the PD weren't expected to continue to share the wealth of knowledge. Professional development for all teachers is critical. We must be life long learners in order to continue to grow and improve. Couros said it perfectly, "what if you adopt the idea that if you teach someone to fish you could also teach them to lead others to fish as well?" (Couros, 2016, The Principal of Change).
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