Its about Learning and its about time

1
Its about Learning(and its about time)

• Dr. Dean Fink
• Educational Development Consultant
• Ancaster Ontario Canada
• Phone - [phone]
• Fax - [phone]
• e-mail -dfink_at_interlynx.net

• Heads Conference
• Herfordshire LEA
• October 9, 2002

2
Going Deeper
The Two Hungers
In Africa, they say there are two hungers, the
lesser hunger and the greater hunger. The
lesser hunger is for the things that sustain
life, the goods, and services, and the money to
pay for them, which we all need.
Handy, C. (1997). The Hungry Spirit. London
Hutchison, p.13.
3
The Lesser Hunger
G l o b a I i s a t i o n

• The market ideology - the unseen hand
• unfettered markets, competition, efficiency
• private interest/ private sector
• individualism
• human capital/technology
• rational/technicist
• the new orthodoxy- tests as the bottom line

4
(No Transcript)
5
Going Deeper
The Two Hungers
In Africa, they say there are two hungers, the
lesser hunger and the greater hunger. The
lesser hunger is for the things that sustain
life, the goods, and services, and the money to
pay for them, which we all need.
The greater hunger is for the answer to the
question why, for some understandingof what
life is for.
Handy, C. (1997). The Hungry Spirit. London
Hutchison, p.13.
6
The Global Village
57 Asians 21 Europeans 14 from the Western
Hemisphere, both north and south 8 Africans 52
would be female 48 would be male 70 would be
non-white 30 would be white 70 would be non
Christian 30 would be Christian 89 would be
heterosexual 11 would be homosexual 6 people
would possess 59 per cent of the entire world's
wealth and all 6 would be from the US 80 would
live in substandard housing 70 would be unable to
read 50 would suffer from malnutrition 1 would
be near death 1 would be near birth 1 would
have a college education 1 would own a computer
Harter (2000) 37 lack basic
sanitation 15 make less than 1.00 a day 40 have
no electricity 64 have never used a
telephone
7
Children in Poverty in Industrialized Societies
U.S.A. -26.3 United Kingdom - 21.3 Italy -
21.2 Australia - 17.1 Canada - 16 Germany -
11.6 France - 9.8 Switzerland - 6.3
UNESCO 1999
8
The Greater Hunger
We hunger to be recognized by others to be
cherished for our own sakes and not for what we
have accomplished or possess, and to be
acknowledged as people who care about something
higher and more important than our self interest.

Lerner (1997)
9
The Greater Hunger

• Identity (who am I, what is my purpose?)
• society (things we hold and need in common)
• fairness (equity)
• public interest (public sector)
• Democracy (collective aspirations)
• citizenship (not consumerism)
• effectiveness (doing right things)
• non rational, non linear (law of unintended
• consequences)

M e a n I n g

10
Leaders'Choices
1. Maintain and wait for orders)
2. Xmas Tree approach
3. Focus on a few goals and stay with them
4. focus on learning (pupils, teachers,
leaders community)?
11
Going Deeper

• Learning for understanding is not just a
  cognitive and psychological matter, . . . . Deep
  learning and teaching are also cultural and
  emotional processes. They entail contextualizing
  students learning in what they have learned
  before, in what other teachers are also teaching
  them, and in students own culture and lives.

Hargreaves Fink, (2000)
12
Learning the Treasure Within
Learning to know
Learning to do
Learning to get along with others
Learning to be
UNESCO International Commission on Education
for the 21st Century
13
Its about Learning
Leaders learning
Teachers learning
Students' learning
Organizational Learning
The Learning Community
Its About time
Stoll, Fink, Earl (2002). Its about Learning
(And Its about Time. LondonRoutledge/Falmer.
14
It's about Time
Media time
Policymaker time
Pupils Learning time
Bureaucratic time
Practitioner time
Cuban, 1995
15
Leadership for Learning
Leadership for learning is not a destination with
fixed coordinates on a compass, but a journey
with plenty of detours and even some dead ends.
Effective educational leaders are continuously
open to new learning because the journey keeps
changing. Their maps are complex and can be
confusing. What leaders require for this journey
is a set of interrelated learnings that look at
school leadership in a holistic rather than
reductionist way. These learnings can be
deepened, elaborated, nurtured, abandoned, and
connected and related to other learnings as the
journey progresses.
Stoll, Fink Earl (2002) Its about Learning and
Its about Time. LondonRoutledge/Falmer
16
Ways of Knowing
IMAGINATION
INTUITION
Equilibrium
REASON
ETHICS
MEMORY
COMMON SENSE
John Ralson Saul, (2001). On Equilibrium.
Toronto Penguin/Viking
17
Leaders Learnings
Understanding learning
Contextual knowledge
Critical thinking
Futures thinking
Political acumen
Emotional understanding
Making connections
15
Stoll, Fink Earl (2001). Its About Learning
(Its about Time). Routledge/Falmer.
18
Going Longer
1. Making connections
9. Finding time
2. Attending to Motivation
8. Enabling practice
3. Understanding and expressing emotions
7. Fostering creativity
4. Believing in success
6. Engaging in inquiry
5. Being a community
19
Going Wider

• Recognize the importance of learning for all

• Respect and promote professionalism

• Support continuous professional learning

• Get to know your school(s)

• Understand all schools are not the same

• Be critical friends

• Create new designs for working and
• networking schools

• Make time for deep learning

Stoll, Fink Earl, (2002) Its about Learning
(and Its about Time).London Routledge/Falmer.
20
Work like you dont need the money
Love like youve never been hurt
Dance like nobodys watching
Satchel Paige quoted in Sports Ilustrated July
16, 2001, p. 34.