10 Sof

I wasn’t expecting Sof’s response to what to take out of school. - judgement! 

Right. Sof talks about how grades are judgements. As I read through educational research, especially in an era where ‘evidence based practice’ is expected, the evidence is nearly always spoken of in terms of student outcomes - in other words grades. I wonder if that increases teacher tendency to push for better grades, and the inevitable judgement that comes. 

Sof brings nuance and humanity to our thinking around school based education. She appreciates the complexity teachers move in, and invites us to consider meeting the humans in the room where they are to ignite their natural curiosity.

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:24

First, I think I want to just give a shout out to all the teachers because I know what um a demanding job it is to be a teacher. And I think as much as the teacher can affect your school experience, it's the whole job is not theirs. Like policymakers and the curriculum makers are they have a big responsibility.

SPEAKER_00 0:56

Was the 13 years or so that you spent in school-based education well spent? Today's guest is Danish, and this is my first Zoom call. So my L plates are on in terms of sound quality with Zoom. I think we're okay with it. I have used Zoom, so my L plates are definitely on in terms of sound quality. I think we got there. And I also wanted to tell you that I am going to make some videos simply with my phone, a little bit of a pilot. If there's anyone who is in education who would like to use those videos, see what they're like, see where you could use them. It will be about 10 minutes per video, one about text, one about financial literacy. The other ones I haven't quite finished my planning for yet. So just updating you on that big very audacious goal. So the idea of 13 years well spent came from Guy Claxton, who wondered on the ARR, the Education Research Reading Room podcast, if adults would say it is 13 Years Well Spent. I'm Susan Taylor, a teacher of Japanese and leader of languages, but this is not about me or any of the organizations I am, have been or might in the future be associated with. If you would like to share your story and all stories are part of the picture, and you're 18 to 30, please email me. 13 Years Will Spend as OneWord with 13 as a word, not a number, at gmail.com. So before we get into this episode, I would like to acknowledge the Ganai, Kernai, and Banerong people as the traditional owners of the unceded land where I live. I appreciate the knowledge and stories of all First Nations people and thank them. I'd like to thank my partner Gary for much joy in our life and for the beautiful intro and outro music. I am grateful to all the stars of this podcast, the generous people who have shared their stories with such depth and vulnerability. And not least to you, the listener, who has chosen to spend this time with us. Please do share it with others so that we might all consider how these stories might impact school-based education in the future. Let's get into it. Our guest today is Sof. Sof is Danish, so English is not her first language. The Danish school system has different categories within it. Sof went to a public school for most of her schooling, although she moved schools a few times. In year eight, she went to a sports school, and in year nine, Sof went to a private school. Sof is 25.

SPEAKER_01 3:59

Yeah, I think I've I've listened to podcasts sometimes where the guest was a teacher and they were talking about how it is to be a teacher. Because we don't know what like we don't learn about that in school. We don't know what their experience is because we're kids and we're just not developed. We don't think about it. We only think about our own experiences. I will say I think some of the years, um, some of the 13 years were well spent. But overall, I think many of them could have been spent better because of many different reasons. I think. I think, yeah, that's that's my first answer.

SPEAKER_00 4:42

Okay, so some yes, some no. Could you tell us more about what was happening in the years that were good and what was happening in the years that could have been better?

SPEAKER_01 4:53

Yeah, so I I loved school, I loved learning, and I am a very curious person. So I would say like until grade zero six, so sorry, until grade seven, I loved school so much. I was taking part in the classes, I did extra homework, I did as much as I was allowed to, uh, and I had fun and I had like I would say like an easy time with school probably. Uh when I went to the eighth grade in this different school, it was all like sports jogs in my class, especially the footballers and the people doing handball were very loud and they took up a lot of space and attention and that was very overwhelming for me. And at the same time, they would also laugh sometimes at uh people who would uh raise their hands and answer questions and stuff like that. So I felt I felt very on the outskirts of this um class and this school, I didn't feel welcome, I didn't feel confident in my um learning anymore. Yeah, I was uh really hard, I had a really hard time, uh which is why I went to this boarding school in the ninth grade, because I was supposed to go in the tenth grade. But because it was devastating to be there, it was better for me to to spend time elsewhere. So the first seven years with eight years with the grade zero, I think we're very well spent, and I really, really enjoyed school and learning. I still enjoy learning, and I think that is like the me, the big the biggest part of what made my school experience good.

SPEAKER_00 6:48

Yeah, I'm so sorry to hear that the people in the room made you feel like that. It sounds like it wasn't exactly the teacher's fault that that was happening, but do you think that there could have been more done in the school setting that might have helped?

SPEAKER_01 7:10

I definitely think some of the responsibility uh falls on I would say the people who were like making this or part of the school because it was on an it was like in a ordinary primary school, and then they just had like different school class had various different people. So I think a lot of the responsibility falls upon the people who were managing um these classes because there was interviews to get into these classes, and I think maybe there should have been some meeting maybe of each other before the school started to see if people could get along and if yeah, people were nice to each other. I do believe that some of the responsibility also fell on some of the teachers. Um, our like head teacher was also a very, very fortunate fanatic kind of person, and he would sometimes I feel like encourage them, even though they also talked really poorly about him behind his back. And it was yeah, it was just the whole energy in the classroom was just too much for me.

SPEAKER_00 8:31

Yeah, gosh, that really sounds tricky. Um thinking about the actual sport though, was there anything that you got out of the time in that school in terms of the sports?

SPEAKER_01 8:47

Um we did have uh like my sports, which was um athletics, we had uh like gym sessions. I think it was twice a week in the morning before classes. And I do believe that time was well spent in terms of our athletics goals. I have a bad knee uh still because I did weightlifting and stuff like that too too much too early. I don't know, I don't want to call it a waste of time because it was still school and I didn't learn things.

SPEAKER_00 9:28

Okay, that's really interesting. So even though you went to that school for sport, there were still aspects of the sport side that were not completely perfect either. What about academically? Did you feel successful academically?

SPEAKER_01 9:46

I I think I I did somewhat. I think I have always been very hard on myself. It's not that I was a perfectionist, it's more that I always felt I could do better. So I think until at least the seventh grade I felt very successful, but that was also before we started getting grades. Until that point, we only had we had like testing where you would get like just an estimate if you were like average, above average, a lot above average, or below average, or a lot below average, which was mostly I think in Danish, maybe maths as well. That was the only grades we had until the seventh grade. Um, in the eighth grade we started getting um grades, and I just felt so insecure in the s in the eighth grade. So I I was not uh thriving uh academically either because I was scared to raise my hand because they would laugh.

SPEAKER_00 10:50

They would laugh. Oh gosh. Let's go to the ninth grade and beyond that eighth grade experience. How was the academics then?

SPEAKER_01 11:04

So in the ninth grade, we it was different because you live on school, you live at school with all your classmates and everyone else. Um I think we were only one ninth grade. We were like 39 graders, ninth graders, and the rest were tenth graders. And I think I really loved school at that point as well. It was also there was also a lot of sports jobs, um, football, handball mostly were like the domin dominating ones, but I had a really good friendship group where people loved school and they all thrived and also academically were doing really good. I was not I think I was doing the the worst of the five of us, um, but I still um really loved school. I think I felt somewhat confident academically, but still because I could see my friends getting better grades than me, I still felt like I could do better.

SPEAKER_00 12:17

Yeah, it makes such a difference to have a good supportive friendship group, doesn't it?

SPEAKER_01 12:23

Yeah, it does. It does definitely.

SPEAKER_00 12:26

What were the teachers like in that period?

SPEAKER_01 12:28

Um, so uh this kind of boarding school, some of the teachers would live at the school as well. And you also just, you know, you had lunch and dinner and weekends with the teachers, so you just have a very different relationship to them. I don't remember like specific teachers that much. I think there's one I remember which I who I really liked, but I think the difference is also that the teachers are more present and so they know you better, like a full person, not just us your grades. And I think that makes a big difference in the relationship. So you trust them more and you feel more comfortable being who you are as you are learning who you are in those years. Your teachers are kind of your friends also, and interesting, like it's an interesting relationship when you think about it.

SPEAKER_00 13:22

That is so interesting. I actually went to a school where we were allowed, we were actually asked to call our teachers by their first name too. And it was quite a different relationship that it set up. It was more like you were in a learning team with your teachers instead of being told what to do so much. Now I'm thinking about it. It was such a lot, long, long time ago. It did make me feel like more of a human being in that relationship. And I can really relate to what you're talking about, that your teachers are not exactly friends, but they're people that you can talk to. I'm wondering if that relationship with your teachers where you felt more like a human being than um somebody to be taught, did that help with your learning? Did you feel more comfortable being vulnerable in your learning and to put up your hand? How did that go?

SPEAKER_01 14:27

I don't remember. We were like 15, 16, so a lot is happening in the brain and the body, and all the hormones are everywhere, and you're living with all the teenagers, and it's just a whirlwind. Like I really don't remember, but I think I need to say that uh in Denmark you always call your teacher by the first name, you never say miss or um Mr. or something like that. I I think I've I I've always taken it for granted because I didn't know it was different elsewhere. But then I think I don't know, maybe watching American and English TV, you learn that they say the last name or they say Miss or something, and I'm like, this was just in the movies for me at this age, but it's something I've learned I think later, like much later, like after high school. Um, maybe when I was traveling in the UK or something, I learned that that's normal. And also school uniforms, it's also normal. We don't have either. There's like very, very exclusive boarding schools that have uniforms, but it's very much the exception throughout the whole school system.

SPEAKER_00 15:43

I'm still got all my head in the experience that I also had where I didn't have to wear a uniform at the school that I was just talking about. And then I think about the children that are in front of me who are expected to wear a school uniform. It's there's a casualness about it, particularly at primary school. But as a teacher, I already have in my head that I'm trying to deliver a particular lesson with these particular words to all of the people in the room all at the same time. So already there's a sense that they are a clump rather than individual humans. And while I do completely understand that each person sitting there has their own thoughts and feelings and experience this morning, it still as a teacher tends to have a clumpishness about it. So my personal preference, and it's only me, would be to have no school uniforms, and also my personal preference would be to have the children talk to me as Susan, not as Miss or Mrs. Taylor or even Taylor Sensei, because I teach Japanese, that's what I usually get. So I'm interested in pivoting now and talking a little bit more about what is it in life that school has taught you that you've been able to use.

SPEAKER_01 17:11

Yeah, so I think I thought about this. Like you mentioned like basic human being behavior because you are growing up going to school. And of course you learn the alphabet, you learn to read and write, and um you learn some maths that is useful in real life. And we also had like cooking classes, and I wouldn't say that you learn how to cook, but you kind of I think for me I really loved it. I like learning with my hands, like having that's how I learn best is through like having it in my hands and be more practical, practical. And I also think a lot of people love those classes, like cooking classes and woodwork and stuff, because it was not school, it was fun, like gym class or something. You also learn in school by thinking you learn a lot about human relationships and working together, doing group work and stuff like that, which I think is very useful in real life. I think just you use so much that you learn in school that you don't realize. Like you learn about how people work, but you also learn about different cultures, even if everyone is completely native Danish. There are different uh home cultures that you learn about maybe without knowing it. Of course, you learn about it in school when you have different answers for questions and different perspectives on things. But part of school is also the social part, so you like go home to your classmates for birthdays or something like that, and then you learn a lot about what goes on in different households. Of course, if you have people from other ethnic backgrounds in your class, it's it's also very I think you learn a lot, like a whole lot. We had a kid in my class who was a Thailand background as well. So when we went there, we had like sticky rice with um chicken wings or something, which was not something um we had at other birthdays. So this was also something always that everyone looked forward to because it was different. And I think for me also, uh what I've learned later on is that I really enjoy learning about other cultures. Um, so this might also just be something that I have like unconsciously taken in a lot um from other people. But I think, yeah, I don't know, like I can't say specifically I used this and this and this from school, but I think we unconsciously use so much of what we learn in school in navigating um the world as it is now.

SPEAKER_00 19:51

Thank you for saying it like that. I have actually been wondering if through doing this podcast, it makes it quite easy to notice, for example, that we learn English and mathematics, and obviously being able to read and write is important in our life, but there's things that happen at school, like those relationships, like that cultural understanding, which don't necessarily come across as being um it's not as obvious, it's a little bit more invisible, and I'm quite interested in the conversation beginning to pick up some of those less visible aspects. I'd also like to appreciate how you put into words what the learning about other cultures might be, because it's not just naming a country or somebody who speaks a different language or somebody who eats a different type of food. It's very much about the different ways families run and how we as human beings choose to approach the feeling of anger and how we act on that sort of thing. So there's a lot of subtlety to culture, and I think you really understand that. I'm also going to pop in a shout out here to Soph for being a Danish speaker and using English in this episode. There have been times when Soph has needed to pause. She's obviously thinking things, and we all need to pause when we're thinking things, but in addition to that, Soph is working with a language which is not her first language. So I really appreciate that work. Let's flip the question. Instead of what things did you learn at school that you use in life, what things have you had to learn in life that school could have taught you?

SPEAKER_01 21:44

I think there are many things. First of all.

SPEAKER_00 21:48

All right, let's go into that one.

SPEAKER_01 21:50

Yeah, I think for me, so I have had I have an autism spectrum diagnosis which I only got last year, and I am 25. So I think this has definitely uh affected a lot of how I have interacted with people specifically. Also, of course, how I learn and stuff like that. But I think it was more it was diff more difficult maybe after the in the eighth grade and after that. Um it was more visible in lack of a better word. But um I think in for example in Denmark we use a lot of irony and sarcasm, which is something I have never understood. I still have a hard time. It's it's easier when I know the people who I'm talking to, but still I can be like, what? What happened? And do you really mean that? Like, would you really do that? I think that has affected a lot of how I see the world and how I especially navigate the Danish culture. I think something I I have learned about myself is that because I love to travel, and I think the reason one of the reasons, at least, that I love to travel is because when you are traveling in a different culture, living in a different culture, but you are very obviously not born there, um, and they're like thus not part of the culture, there is not the same expectations for you to live up to the norms of that culture. This is something that I have struggled with a lot in Denmark. I have not felt like I'm not in on everything, if that makes any sense. Yeah. And when I, for example, have been in the UK visiting uh Lucy, we've also talked about this, and she is feeling the same way when she's in the UK. She's like, oh yeah, so I don't have to abide to the cultural norms because they know you're not from there. And it just makes it for me, I just feel more free to be myself because there's not these expectations on my shoulders of who I am supposed how am I supposed to navigate in that culture and within those people. Something also different that I think I have missed in school is also something I I listened to some of the previous episodes where people are also talking about like budgets and tax and stuff like that. But for me, also specifically like especially social skills is something that I have missed learning about because it's I think it's it's a bit taken for granted at school. Like you don't have a class where you learn to socialize, you just are in the setting and then you have a break, and then naturally there's gonna happen some socializing. But when you have a neurodivergent brain, it's not as easy. And again, this is not all up to the teachers to fix this. And I think what would help a lot is also if the schools have a more intimate relationship with the parents because the parents know their kids so well, they have seen them grow up, they have maybe given birth to them and held them throughout their life.

SPEAKER_00 25:23

I don't think that's maybe. Oh, I see because sometimes parents uh yeah, I get that. Okay, sorry.

SPEAKER_01 25:33

But I think it's it's something I've thought about more recently. Um, because I I live in a neighborhood where there's a lot of new families, so there's a lot of strollers and babies, and I just I look at the the parents who probably have given birth to their kids, and I'm like, I can't believe that you make that person. Like they were inside your body, like it's so surreal to me. Like, I don't I can't really comprehend like what that means.

SPEAKER_00 26:04

It it's so wild. I have a grandson, a very new grandson, he's 13 months now, and the joy he brings is amazing. But to be a mother, to have given birth to my own child, which is completely nuts all by itself, to not only know that somebody else is growing a human in them, but to experience that for yourself, and then to see her having that experience, and then to have all the joy of being part of raising this beautiful little child, most of the time, beautiful little child. Um, it's just incredible. So I totally get that. So I do want to let you know too that in Victoria, the Victorian curriculum has threads, if you like, that go through the main eight learning areas. And one of those is personal and social capabilities. So there is, in fact, a curriculum in Victoria for teachers to follow to teach personal and social capabilities. And it is done. It's definitely done because that is our mandate is to teach the curriculum. How that translates and how that gets integrated is very much up to each school and each teacher to work with. So while the curriculum is there, sometimes I wonder if the intentions of that curriculum actually translate to what the children are doing. Especially, I'm in a primary school, you see the children running outside, and it's like everything that they've just learned is completely left behind them, and they're just after the football or finding their friends, or just running because they're running, whatever it is. Um, I think there is sometimes a little bit of a disconnect between specialized area subjects and what you're teaching when you're teaching English and the intentions of those, and then these threads that come through are not necessarily as front and centre. But that might just be my perception. I'm really keen to hear from other teachers and see what their feelings are. But what I'm hearing from you and what I've heard from other people is that personal and social capability doesn't always seem to land in terms of practice for the experience of some of our school children. So I'd like to just explore a little bit more. Is there anything else that you feel schools could have been teaching?

SPEAKER_01 28:49

So I I definitely appreciate that. Um, like I could never fathom all the things that teachers have to juggle um every day and every minute um of the day with um their students. So I I do really appreciate now how much work that takes and how much is an often how much of an overview is needed to like see the bigger picture and if these human beings are developing into good human beings or like at least decent in the games. I I think for me Lucy talked a lot about values and how you can learn from that and encourage um the kids to learn from that angle and to understand um what's important to them and why. I think that this is not for the teachers again, this is for the people who make the decisions, the curriculum, uh, the policymakers. I think it's really important to meet the kids where they are. For kids to learn the best, I think you need to embrace their curiosity. So, what are they curious about? Like, do they play with the dolls in kindergarten or do they play with the sand? Do they build stuff? Do they run around chasing each other? Do they tease everyone else? Like, what is what is their way of learning? And what are they curious about? Because that way you like you just said, they probably forget everything they just learned in the classroom, they leave it in the classroom and then they go out to play. But if you embrace that curiosity, you also meet the kids where they are, you meet the students in their own learning and you encourage that to be played with. Because it's not about just sitting at a table uh eight hours of the day to read the books, to do the maths, to cook the things, whatever it might be. It's about you know developing full human beings. And I think as you say, like there is this threat of socializing in the curriculum, but maybe it shouldn't just be a threat. Maybe that should be not the subject necessarily, but maybe the the point of where you learn from yeah, yeah, really interesting.

SPEAKER_00 31:20

Thank you for saying that to curriculum designers and policymakers. Is there anything that's already in the curriculum that you would take out?

SPEAKER_01 31:31

I had a thought about this. I had a really difficult time thinking about what it might be, I think. Let me see what question was it? Yeah, so I have written um in my notes, I have said to take out judgment and ideals, like ideal students, uh the image of an ideal student or the image of success. Because it's like one of some of the other people talked about grades, and I think there is some need, of course, of trying to understand where the kids are at with their learning. But I believe the way we judge them and what is it we are judging them against? Like, is it as a human being, or is it just like you can do this test so you know maths, but are you becoming a full human being again? Because as it is with grades, for example, the success criteria is to get A's in everything. That is how you are a good student. But there is just so much more to a human being than to what their knowledge is about maths, for example, or how well they read out loud. Of course, it's part of them, but maybe we can create a system where we don't judge them, but where we meet them and learn with them. Don't try and say you have to be this way to be successful. Success looks so different from every point of view, from every person. So maybe ask the students what would be a success, a successful class for you today. Yeah, just like have the kids think about what what is it I want to learn and when have I learned it? What is success for me?

SPEAKER_00 33:34

Wow. I actually asked my grades the other day what they thought success was, and they told me that it's being quiet, sitting down and doing what the teacher tells them to do. That is so sad. Yeah, exactly. It comes from a researcher, Professor John Hattie, who I think I listened to this one on the ERR podcast where he was talking about asking students exactly that question, and the answer was to be quiet and watch the teacher work effectively. It's a little bit sad to think that students think that. So I've now spent a lot of time with the classes that I teach talking about what success might look like and how it's not the best person in the grade necessarily, the person that gets the highest marks, but what I'm interested in is how they can grow from what they were before. So I'm really trying to bring that concept of personal bests, and I do connect it to sports metaphors and running a race because that often is where a lot of the people in the grade get engaged, they can understand the sports metaphor. And one of the boys pushed back quite strongly because he really did want to be the winner of whatever competition he was involved with. And so I spent some time talking to him about well, if you're not the winner, what sorts of things would you do to become better? Or even if you were the winner, what would you do to make sure that you continued to be a winner? And it still ultimately he agreed in the end that it came back to being that growth in your your personal competence. It's not necessarily just who you are compared to somebody else. And the more you can focus on that personal growth, the more satisfying it is in some ways to be the better person than you were yesterday, or even just a little bit better than you were at the beginning of the class. So I do a lot of talking about that. And sometimes I wonder if they really believe that that's what I mean. But when I ask them these days, they definitely come back to me with, you want us to be better than we were. And that's the message that hopefully I've got through now. But it wasn't obvious, so it's pretty interesting.

SPEAKER_01 36:04

I think that is that is a really good starting point. Yeah, how can you be better than what you were yesterday? Because the society is also just encouraging everyone to compare with their neighbor, with the next person, with the person on the billboard or whatever it is. And it's just so toxic. It's just not what it means to be a good person, it's just it's not to be better than everyone else, it's to be better than the person you were yesterday or the student you were yesterday. Um, I do understand though that what they think is success is sitting down, be quiet, and listen to the teacher. Because that is something they're told a whole lot. Again, it's not it's not your fault that your grade feels like that. It's it's a systemic change that needs to happen. Because I would say overall, everything that is wrong with society, it all is connected and it's all systemic change that needs to happen, especially within capitalism, because in my opinion, capitalism is the root of all evil, it is what is telling everyone to earn more money, to be better than the next person, to have more things than the next person. And it's just not I don't know, is that really what life is about?

SPEAKER_00 37:36

To have more Yeah, I really appreciate the depth that you bring because even if we're talking about personal bests, it's still in terms of test results and academic results and so forth, and really that's not the whole human being. The whole human being is more about can you look in the mirror and be okay with who you are and who you see, and what sorts of choices do you make when somebody irritates you? And a lot more of those personal, it's not even a capability like the Victorian curriculum calls it. It's really about figuring out who you are as a person. Actually, your phrase earlier of growing into being a human being, that's exactly what I'm thinking about. Okay, so let's pivot again. What's next for Soph?

SPEAKER_01 38:34

Yeah, so currently I'm um studying journalism at um what you would call university or college, maybe. Yep. And the next step for me is internships. We have a year and a half of internships as part of my study. And I just got an internship in Kenya because for me, again, like learning is about following your curiosity and what is it that drives you. And I went to Kenya um for the first time last year, and within a day, I would say, I was in love with this country and their people, and that is that is what I want to do. And I I work with an organization, I'm volunteering at an organization called uh Animals Alliance, which is a Danish animals' rights organization. And I hope to get a job with them where I do projects in in Kenya. Um, and we are already working on a project, and this is yeah, this is what I want to do right now.

SPEAKER_00 39:46

I am so excited. I am so thrilled for you. That's awesome. Thank you. Thank you for talking to us. I imagine that it's been quite a lot of energy that you've put into this conversation because of the difference in languages and also with your autism. And the depth that you've brought to this conversation is really quite extraordinary. So I really, really appreciate it.

SPEAKER_01 40:13

It's been, yeah, it's been really lovely. I think I have one thing I want to say. It is just thank you to all the teachers. I know how much work uh takes, I don't know, but I can imagine how much work it takes to, I don't know, like also as a person with on the spectrum of autism, the the overview of your students is so incomprehensible for me. Because you just know you know your students, you know, and it's so impressive to me. And it's it's just such it makes such a difference um to the students when you feel your teacher has goals for you um and wants to help you. And it's just been really lovely too. I have been so much looking forward to meeting you because this has talked uh so greatly about about your work, and it's just it's super interesting to me, and I'm very uh curious. As I also wrote to you, I um I got an idea for a podcast. Um one day where I couldn't fall asleep. I was like, oh, maybe I should do a podcast. Um but this is the first experience with podcasts, I have to say. Um and I think it's just such uh I don't listen to many podcasts because it's such a minefield, and I really enjoy being able to read along with what I hear. But I think there's so much, there's so many podcasts, and I hope this one also reaches all the people that you hope to reach because I think this this would give such an insight for for policymakers and for parents and for students and for teachers. I also think something I wrote down was that for the policymakers, I want to tell them like go out there, be on the ground. It's like politicians, you know, they they make all these rules and laws, but they haven't um been a nurse or they haven't been working on the ground as a teacher, so they don't really know what's needed. So go out there and talk to the people because they know that they know their students, you know, talk to the teachers, they know what they need, talk with the parents because they know their kids. And there is so much potential in young people, and they just need the proper tools to find it in themselves as well.

SPEAKER_00 42:47

Yeah, yeah. I'm in a situation at the moment, it's an incredibly fortunate situation where I get to work three days a week at a system level, and for one day a week I'm in the classroom doing all of the normal classroom activities, the reports, the management, the yard duty, and so on. And it keeps me really, really grounded. It keeps me very in touch with what other teachers are doing so that when I'm in any sort of conversation with other teachers, they know that I know. And I also make a choice to not try and suggest things that I know that I haven't tried myself or I couldn't do myself. So ideally, I think it would be incredible if all system level people and principals and school leaders were in a classroom at least once one day a week. I think that would be ideal, but I think I'm dreaming of that one at the moment. Yeah, thank you for those thoughts.

SPEAKER_01 43:54

I get that, of course. It's also about resources, and I know here at Denmark there's a lot of

SPEAKER_00 44:00

budget cuttings in uh the government schools and I can't even like I don't know how how the public workers are still um keeping up with um everything yeah that's exactly exactly right well so nice to meet you through Zoom perhaps one day you might come to Australia and we can meet in person as well and have a great day your day has just started sof was a delight to talk to I felt that there were a whole range of things that perhaps until now in the podcast have been relatively surface level and Soph took really quite deeply. The first one is about thank you to teachers. I'm little worried now that it's come across so far that I've been too critical of teachers because we can always improve. I have been reading the book Good to Great by Jim Collins which is more about industry and particularly American industries and businesses. It's a phrase without having actually read the book that some educators have been using as a way of moving teachers from their space where they have felt doing pretty well to the possibility of doing even better. And it doesn't matter where you are or who you are as a teacher there's always possibilities of being even better. But the whole process of trying to improve and push an improvement agenda all the time sometimes not so great for our mental health and sometimes not so great for just saying it's okay it's okay to be who you are right now and that's for students as well as teachers as well as everybody everywhere it's there's a nice quote on one of the school's walls that says it's okay for you to be perfect and a work in progress so to be okay with who you are now. And then another one around this has been if you're comparing yourself with perfection which would be 100% and you're let's say 70% which would be pretty good it's not actually a reasonable comparison because that perfection is not achievable and especially if it stops you from doing things if you're worried about not doing things because you won't be perfect anyone noticed I haven't been perfect in these podcasts? Hmm I have the difference between that 70% is not 70 to 100% but actually 70 to zero because if you don't go ahead and have a go at doing something being imperfect then your comparison is not 100% your comparison is zero. So be proud of that 70. Yeah so the way Sophie introduced the whole podcast in terms of a shout out to teachers teachers you are doing an amazing job already you do not need us to tell you here's another way to be a little bit better. So it's kind of created for me a another layer of reflection of why am I so keen to gather the stories of people who are young adults about their school not students themselves that are in school but somebody who's got that little bit of life perspective that can then look back and reflect on those. And I think the answer for me is that the voice the voice of a person who's lived the experience of being a student relatively recently provides for me as a teacher a sense of ah okay so that might be the sorts of things that this student or that student might be thinking about. And it gives me a more direct heartfelt connection to people in the room who don't actually have a lot of opportunity to talk to me about what they're feeling and what they're thinking and how they're enjoying or not enjoying the lessons that I help to create. Yeah. So I hope other teachers and educators are also enjoying that sense of an actual voice. So another piece that I really want to highlight from this podcast was the piece about judgment. It came up quite quickly when Soph was asked about what are the things that could be taken out of school. I was imagining she was going to tell me about curriculum items so let's not do algebra which I can understand the meanings behind that and other guests have spoken quite nicely about those things. Soph said judgment right I think she's right obviously I'd love to find ways of taking some curriculum items out so that we could put more of those personal and social capabilities that we talked about during the podcast in but ultimately it's not necessarily a content question it's actually a heart question too and that sense of judgment is huge. There are a lot of spaces that are quite judgmental in a school there's definitely judgment between the students there's their competition which sometimes teachers leverage in terms of trying to engage students in learning through some healthy competition as we like to call it which basically monitoring the type of competition and making sure that there's a certain amount of encouragement between the students but ultimately that also is competition. There's judgment in terms of grades every single guest has been talking about grades and how they feel as a person when they identify themselves in terms of what the grades say. There's the sense of who is the best and who is not so great in the room in terms of grades and not so much about the personal bests which we also talked about in that one judgments of people's behaviour judgments of oh so much. So if we weren't judging what might we do meet people where they are was Zop's phrase meet people where they are and perhaps engage with people about where they would like to go to next there I I completely realize that that's not completely realistic. There is a curriculum there are a lot of moving parts of the puzzle that teachers are putting together every single day and being able to enable any particular human being in the room to actually follow their passion project assuming they have one and that they want to follow one which is also not a given it's just not necessarily possible but there are ways I believe within the teaching climate within the teaching oh let's call it an ecosystem where teachers are able to give a little bit more choice to students and the further we can depth those choices the more we can listen to students I think the better we're going to be so the message of this reflection I guess is less judgment of ourselves for ourselves and less judgment of students and less judgment between students so that we can really do the best that we can within the ecosystem that we work inside to bring out the personal best growth of each human in the room and that does include the teacher. So thank you Soph and thank you to to you the listener for giving 13 years well spent the podcast your time. If you found it interesting please let others know about it and let me know too what in this episode resonated for you and what might you do as a result. I warmly invite you to contact me through emailing 13yearswellspent at gmail.com that's 13 as a word not a numeral or lowercase in no spaces. Also if you are or if you know somebody who is 18 to 30 ish and would be willing to share their story please also get in touch via email. Thanks for listening and I hope you'll tune in to the next episode too. Bye for now.