Birds, Bees, & Benchmarks: National Sexuality Education Standards - Annual Conference Preview

By Kurt Conklin, MPH, MCHES (SIECUS) and Nora Gelperin, M.Ed (Answer)

While the nation was busy enduring months of election-year primary campaign stumping and two major party conventions throughout 2012, a small announcement in Education Week this past January quietly shifted America’s sexuality education landscape.

For the first time ever, curriculum planners, teachers, local and state school board members, and parents have a set of uniform, national sexuality education standards to measure the content of their schools’ programs: The National Sexuality Education Standards. The goal of the Standards is “to provide clear, consistent, and straightforward guidance on the essential minimum, core content for sexuality education that is age-appropriate for students in grades K-12.”

The Standards are the result of a two-year effort spearheaded by five national organizations: The American Association of Health Education, The American School Health Association, The National Education Association Health Information Network, The Society of State Leaders of Health and Physical Education and The Future of Sex Education (FoSE) Initiative. (FoSE includes three national sexuality education organizations, including two of our own: Answer, SIECUS, and Advocates for Youth.)

The National Sexuality Education Standards join a growing body of national standards for other academic subjects, such as math, reading and health, which only benefit our national education system. The Standards are based on research-driven evidence and developmental- and age-appropriate norms. Yet we’ve heard some school stakeholders express concern that the Standards could generate controversy.

We’ve heard some educators, parents, and politicians argue that school sexuality education programs should teach only abstinence until marriage, and remain silent about topics such as contraception, sexual orientation, and relationships outside of marriage. In their view, the sole purpose of school-based sexuality education is marriage promotion, not intellectual growth or skills development.
As a mom (Nora) and an uncle (Kurt), we respectfully disagree. The education and health professionals who helped to develop the Standards took a comprehensive view based on their real-life experiences with parents, students, and school personnel from myriad walks of life in diverse communities around the U.S. Given the median age of first marriage as 26.9 for U.S. females and 28.9 for U.S. males, and the fact that 63% of U.S. 12^th-graders have already had sexual intercourse, school-age youth need more information than ever to make informed decisions about healthy relationships that have the potential to involve sexual activity. Sound sexuality education includes information on why (and how) young people can benefit from postponing sexual involvement until they are mature and ready, and the Standards account for this—without neglecting many other skills that parents say their children want and need.

The new National Sexuality Education Standards can help you respond to students’ informational needs with age- and developmentally-appropriate instruction that is relevant to young people’s lives. The Standards are voluntary and no school district should be expected to swallow them whole. You can make the most of them by inviting your school stakeholders to explore them and discuss them in community meetings where parents, teachers, curriculum planners, and the students themselves can ask hard questions and seek common ground to make the Standards work for everyone. Implementation can begin with elements that find the widest buy-in. The more difficult and potentially controversial topics can be placed on the sidelines for further study and adopted at a later date.

The Standards are a major step forward in standardizing, normalizing, and improving sexuality education throughout the nation. If widely implemented, our youths’ well-being, health and academic achievement can dramatically improve. Programs modeled after the Standards could lower the nation’s unacceptably high rate of teen pregnancy and sexually transmitted infections (especially in states hostile to sexuality education, where those rates are highest). Emphasis, of course, is on the “if”—improvement is achievable if curriculum planners, staff development specialists, teachers, parents and school board members make the most of this new resource.

In an election year when the course of history may well be changed at the polls, we hope the course of history in your local school districts will change for the better when you take the National Sexuality Education Standards and make them yours. Are you ready?

Attend this session at the Learning Forward 2012 Annual Conference in Boston

G15 – Birds, Bees, & Benchmarks: National Sexuality Education Standards

Tuesday December 14, 9am-12pm.

Facilitation Skills to Maximize Group Effectiveness - Annual Conference Preview

This year the Learning Forward Conference in Boston will feature a session entitled “Facilitation Skills for Group Effectiveness,” co-presented by Carolyn McKanders from Houston, Texas, and Michael Dolcemascolo from Skaneateles, New York. Carolyn and Michael have been invited back to Learning Forward after their presentation in Anaheim, CA last year, and they’ve been invited to next year’s 2013 Learning Forward conference  in Texas as well. Michael and Carolyn’s work is based in the Adaptive Schools Seminars, described below.

Session PC 102 Saturday, December 1, 2012

Robert Garmston and Bruce Wellman are the co-developers of the Adaptive Schools Seminars, based in their text The Adpative School: Developing Collaborative Groups, 2009.

Adaptive Schools consulting, coaching and seminars provide skills development in dialogue, discussion, exceptional meeting management, advocacy, inquiry and other skills sets of collaboration. The seminars provide concepts, models and research for building capacities for organizational development, professional development, conflict resolution, data-based decision making, and working with intractable or wicked problems. Of four distributed leadership hats (facilitating, presenting, coaching and consulting) the Adaptive Schools seminars' primary focus is on the hat or function of facilitating group work.  Learn more about seminars on Adaptive Schools models for improving schools by visiting our website, www.adaptiveschools.com.

Four Hats of Shared Leadership

In an adaptive organization, leadership is shared; all the players wear all the hats. All participants have the knowledge and skills to manage themselves and manage and lead others. Leadership is distributed in meetings, in examining student work, in staff development activities, in action research and in projects. Recognizing the hats and knowing when and how to change them is shared knowledge within the organization, because when values, roles and work relationships are clear, decisions about appropriate behavior are easy.
The Four Hats are:

·      Facilitating

·      Presenting

·      Coaching (Adaptive Schools uses the Cognitive Coaching^SM  model developed by Arthur Costa  and Robert Garmston)

  ·      Consulting

How Do We Know They’re Getting Better? - Annual Conference Preview

The Chicago teachers’ strike is over, but we hear questions about teacher evaluation across the country.

For example, how can we effectively assess teachers’ performance? The thought of having one’s teaching weighted so heavily on students’ one-time snap-shot evaluation using high-stakes, or Scantron-type tests for which they were not designed is unsatisfactory.

Secretary of Education Arne Duncan urges that we craft “multiple measures” for teacher assessment and these should include how we currently assess students’ performances in any subject:

Teacher observations, students’ journals and postings on paper and in the cloud--Google Docs, Groups, Plus, wikis, Twitter--project reports, performance tests, self-reflections and the like.

These direct, long-term, reliable measures become more important when we consider not only the subjects we teach, but our school mission statements as well:

“We hold high academic standards for all students and expect each will become a responsible citizen of our American democracy. We want all students to dream, achieve and contribute to a global society.”

One school district (Greenwich, CT)  paints a portrait of the graduate that calls for her to be able, assuming content knowledge, “to pose and pursue substantive questions” and then engage in the problem solving, critical thinking and ethical, collaborative behaviors required.

To become responsible, active contributors to our society we need students to become good inquirers who pose problems and think critically and creatively.  It is not sufficient to understand Newton’s Three Laws of Motion and determine theme in Charlotte’s Web.  We need students to be able to ask good questions, identify/solve problems and analyze information critically.  Process is content.

But how do we assess these all important intellectual processes?  How Do We Know They’re Getting Better? reflects recent research on assessment of 21st century skills, K-8.

John Barell

www.morecuriousminds.com

Learning Forward Session Tuesday 12/4 @ 3-5, I26

Supporting Adult Development: Advancing School and System Practices by Ellie Drago-Severson

Note: This is a overview of the presentation by Ellie Drago-Severson at Learning Forward Annual Conference in Anaheim 
Session number: G02
Tuesday, 12/6/11, from 9 to 12noon and 2:30 to 4:00pm

Supporting adult learning and development is important for building adults’ internal capacity and also because it is directly linked to increasing children’s academic achievement. Implementing practices that support adult growth can also build school and system-wide capacity. In this day-long session you will: explore adult-developmental theory and how it supports adult growth and capacity building; learn about and apply four key developmentally-oriented pillar practices for sustaining adults’ development: teaming, inviting adults to take leadership roles, engaging in collegial inquiry, and mentoring (developmental coaching); understand developmental principles informing this new learning-oriented model, why they are essential to personal and professional development and how to build growth-enhancing school and district learning communities.

This interactive workshop provides principals, AP’s, teachers, professional developers, curriculum developers, coaches, district leaders, policymakers and all educators with an opportunity to develop a deeper understanding of how to support other adults’ growth and one’s own by learning about and applying adult developmental theory and a new learning-oriented model of school leadership that centers on supporting adult growth and offers promising practices for that can be implemented in your school or system. You will learn about:

• Adult-developmental theory (Kegan, 1982, 1994, 2000) and apply it to supporting development, building internal capacity, and improving practice (through mini-lecture, writing, and applying understanding to case exercises);
• A new learning-oriented model of school leadership (Drago-Severson, 2009, 2011, 2012) that centers on supporting adult development; and promising pillar practices for that can be implemented in your school, district and coaching practice to build growth-enhancing communities that attend to adults’ developmental diversity and improve student achievement. More specifically, through mini-lecture, private reflection, writing, dialogue, case discussion, action planning for your school/system/coaching, you will learn about and apply: (1) a new learning-oriented model of school leadership and apply it to your particular context and individuals; (2) four pillar-practices-for sustaining adult growth, comprising this model; (3) engage in applying ideas and practices (action planning), and (4) understand adult learning principles that inform this model, and why they are essential to effective personal and professional development.
• Enhancing capacity for shaping school and district communities that sustain continuous adult learning and positively impact student achievement; and
• How developmental theory and pillar practices can enhance leadership, teaching and improve practice.

Making the Most “Sit and Git”, Richard Jones, Executive Director

We all have been there! I am referring to those large group presentation workshops that are all presenter talk to a passive audience. There are very few presenters who are so highly engaging that we enjoy listening to them for a long period of time. Our mind drifts; we think about other things and suffer through the presentation. Another weaknesses of large-scale workshops is that it assumes that everyone in the audience has exactly the same needs for information. When confronted with these situations, today we have the convenience of smart phones that we can browse the Internet, text our colleagues and friends, or even play games.

But large-scale workshops persist, not because they're effective but because they are efficient as a form of professional learning. We can serve large numbers of people and everyone gets the same message. This is important for establishing a common language around an initiative or communicating to an entire group personally in building a common vision. When confronted by a large-scale workshop, whether as a participant or more importantly as a presenter, here are some tips for making the most out of this “sit and git” session.

• Create a Back Channel Conversation. Instead of having everyone use their smart phones for personal use, create a Twitter list or threaded discussion where participants can actively engage in feedback and share comments right during a presentation.
• Smart Phone Polling. If you want to see how the audience is reacting or learning, set up a online poll that participants can respond to via smart phone with “real time” display of results.
• Provide Frequent Movement. We all need to move. Our mind begins to drift when our body fails to move. If the session is long, be sure to put in movement breaks every 20 to 30 min., giving participants an opportunity to stand, move their hands stretch and stimulate their brains.
• Turning to a Shoulder Partner. Avoid overloading people with too much information. After a concept or important piece of information is presented, ask participants to turn to a person next to them and restate in their own words what they've learned or the reactions to that new piece of information. When turning an audience loose to talk, be sure to have a specific chime or mechanism to bring people back together and end their conversations.
• Share Materials. There are always more expensive materials around a particular workshop topic; share these materials in advance. But, don't expect everyone to read them in advance. Also share the materials afterwards so people can follow up and read more information. This may allow having a shorter presentation in providing information in written form.
• Use Card Reflections. When people write, it reinforces their ideas. Give people cards on which to write their reflections. Actually collect these cards as an “exit ticket” to ensure that everyone has written down some information. Cards can also be used for participants to write down questions for the presenter and these can be collected, screened and answered as part of the presentation. Writing and reflecting are important learning tools that can be done within a large-scale workshop.
• Follow-up Discussions. Whenever possible try to create an opportunity for audience members to move from a large-scale presentation to small-scale discussions. Train facilitators around the topic, so that they may lead small groups to discuss and reflect on a topic from the large-scale presentation.
• Reflect and Write via Technology. It's important for individuals to have the opportunity to reflect. We often do this by writing on the handout and taking notes. However this can be extended into other forms of writing by using the technology. Create a wiki or threaded discussion that everyone has access to and continue to share thoughts around a particular topic.

Following some of these suggestions can enable us to have a better quality learning experiences both as a presenter and participant in “sit and git” sessions. Sometimes we can’t avoid a large-scale workshop is professional development activity. However, we can make it effective by having less sitting and more getting.

Seeing Teaching and Learning With New Eyes- Richard Jones, Executive Director

Most of us are visual learners. We gather information when watching video. We appreciate lectures with high-quality visuals and we brainstorm through graphic organizers.

However when we create professional development we often forget about our preference for visual learning. We require teachers to read books and articles and suffer through lectures and workshops. My often used statement about limited effectiveness of presentations is, “I have never seen a teacher change his or her teaching as a result of sitting through a workshop or reading a research report.” I am convinced that teachers only change instruction through emotionally connected experiences that cause them to reflect about their own teaching or the opportunity they have to watch someone else teach. We need to acknowledge the value that observation presents to continuous professional learning.

I was recently working with the high school engaged in an innovative activity that reminded me how important observation can be to professional learning. This high school is in the process of creating career academies and in preparation for that required an activity where each teacher was to observe two classes. A mechanism was provided for coverage of their existing classes with substitutes and teachers were allowed to choose which colleagues they wanted to observe. They were held accountable for the visits with a specific deadline and a reflection form in which they were asked to identify teaching practices that they found applicable to their own teaching. One requirement was that they were asked to observe at least one teacher in a completely separate instructional area. For example academic teachers were required to observe career and technical education teachers and vice versa.

The reflections on this activity revealed powerful professional learning among the staff. Teachers commented that they had never seen the students so engaged, or observed the creative work that students were able to do or observed the positive relationships among teachers and students and how hard students worked to please some teachers. These observation experiences gave teachers an opportunity to look at their own teaching and learning through new eyes. They saw students they knew, or at least they thought they knew, working very differently in their colleagues classrooms. They saw colleagues, who they thought they knew, at least socially, using highly effective teaching techniques. Teacher cited examples about how they would look at their own teaching differently.

I’m reminded of the old fable of the blind men observing an elephant and depending upon whether you felt the trunk, the tail, or the leg, your descriptions of the elephant were very different. When teachers look at teaching and learning in their own discipline and from their own experience which they are very familiar with, they are actually blinded because they are continuing to see teaching and learning as it has always existed. However, but by making observations of other teachers working with their students in a different content area, it gives them new lives to reflect on their own teaching and learning. This is a powerful professional learning opportunity, not generated by research or an outside expert, but with teachers working with one another in the school to see and reflect about teaching and learning through the power of observation. 

21st century Personal Learning Network - Richard Jones, Executive Director

I still remember my first year as a teacher. It was one of the most exciting, challenging and frustrating experiences of my life. I survived my first year and realized that I was beginning to make a difference in the lives of several young people. It convinced me that my career should follow a path in education.

One of the people that helped me survive my first year of teaching was an elderly teacher named Joe, who worked across the hall. Joe always welcomed me to wander into his classroom at the end of the day to vent my frustrations and seek his advice. He always had time for me, constantly offered encouragement and wisdom from his 30 years in teaching. Looking back, I realize Joe was part of my personal learning network that enabled me to become a competent teacher.

We all have our personal learning networks of colleagues in our school, mentors from previous jobs, or family members who work in education. These people offer advice, a sympathetic ear, or new ideas enabling us to continue to improve in our craft.

The challenges in education continue to mount with so much expected of us on a daily basis. Teachers work hard satisfying an ever-increasing number of administrative requests and increasingly complex demands from the dozens of students we see on a daily basis. To meet these, we all must be continual learners, acquiring new skills, trying new approaches and contributing to our schools collective success. It is becoming increasingly difficult to find time for the casual chats with people face-to-face that may be part of our personal learning network. However, social networking tools and the Internet allows us to develop a unique 21^st-century personal learning network.

Over the last several months I have become convinced that Twitter is a powerful professional learning tool. Twitter is not about pumping out marketing  information to the masses like a web site or email. Twitter gives individuals the choice to read information that meets his or her immediate needs. This is empowering professional development where you can listen to experts anywhere in the world. You can ask questions and receive advice from talented educators. Whether you are reading short messages from a leading author or reading blogs from other 3^rd grade teachers, there is a wealth of knowledge to be gained.

We all enjoy reading books by popular authors such as Dan Pink (@DanielPink) or Stephen Covey (@StephenRCovey), Ken Robinson (@SirKenRobinson) or watch TED Talks (@TED_TALKS). We are eager to attend presentations by education thought leaders like Heidi Hayes Jacob (@HeidiHayesJacob), Steve Barkley (@stevebarkley) or Diane Ravitch (@DianeRavitch). These talented authors not only write books periodically but they use twitter and they write and offer advice every day. If you’re interested in what they have to offer you can tune in and listen to their advice. Every moment hundreds of teachers are writing and sharing advice about their effective teaching. Any teacher can seek out these individuals and listen to their advice.

Will Richardson, (@willrich45) and Rob Mancabelli (@RobMancabelli) have created a new book; Personal Learning Networks available from Solution Tree in May. 

Twitter may be in the popular media as a way to follow entertainment personalities or it can be used by companies to market their products. But, you control and decide who to follow and pay attention to.  

You can create your own personal learning network and listen to educators who will help to make you a better teacher. Join twitter, create your network and follow learning forward New York (@LFNewYork) where you will learn about cutting-edge practices in professional development.  BTW, I tweet under @RDJLeader