Innovation in O and M

Innovation is happening all around us at all times. But is this even a good thing? How do we know how much to lean into it without losing a sense of who we are? That's exactly what we're talking about today in this super fun solo episode. So let's dive in.

Transcript of the Episode:

Hi, Friends, welcome back to the podcast. I'm so glad that you are here! A few weeks ago, we had the one and only Emily Coleman on and her episode was mind blowing. We've had some other great people on the podcast as well. And oh my gosh, this season is turning out to be my absolute favorite thus far. You have to tell me which episode you like the most. Hit me up on Instagram, because there are so many good ones.

Today, it's just you and me, friend. We're chit chatting about something that's a little esoteric, a little out there, but it really needs to be talked about. Now. It's really all about how do we lean into innovation without losing a sense of who we are now? Like things that are we're doing right now are working pretty well. How do we even know what to let go of, where we're gonna go, and what we even want to pay attention to since there are so many new things. We're gonna get into all of that. And just raise some questions. I don't have any answers. There's no black and white, we’re just sitting down, grab your coffee, grab your tea, sparkling water, whatever, earbuds, however you like to listen to this episode, because it's going to be a super fun one.

But first, it's been a minute since I updated you on what's happening behind the scenes. It's October, and I'm loving this school year, it seems like we've passed… the past few years, things are getting a little less bumpy. And are things the same as they were? No. Did I think that they would be? Absolutely not. And I would never want to go back to where we were, I think education in and of itself is at a crux, at like this crucial point or things are getting really hard. And the people who surpass this and stay in education or come after, are going to be able to change the face of education as we know it. And when we know that the whole system was created so long ago, in the 1980s, 1910s, early 1920s for the industrial revolution. We are not in the Industrial Revolution anymore.

So it's no wonder that we're having so many issues, it's no wonder that our admins are stressed out and that's stressing us out. They don't know what's going on, we oftentimes do know what's going on because we have boots on the ground. But it can be hard to get our admins to listen, and especially when even higher than them, there seems to be like a need for control. And this need for control and the need for innovation are often at two opposite ends. And they're like in a relationship with one another but it's like tug of war. And we can see whether it's generational or you're in different places in your actual job. Whether it be a teacher or an admin, there's a… like this divide… there’s a little bit of conflict that a lot of us go through. Because while we say we're here for the kids, and we all generally are, we have a different idea of what that looks like and we have a different agenda behind us. And we have different ideas and stressors. And thus far there hasn't been a meeting of the minds, a communal conversation.

We're having a big teacher shortage as you know, and no wonder. But I kind of see this teacher shortage as a good thing. And here's why. The generation that is going through this teacher shortage as students, right, they don't know any better, any different, anything. This is just their paradigm. And we see how we went through the school system as better. But can you think of a generation before us that saw what was happening after they left the school system as better, and what they went through as worse, or just in general, like, think about music, think about TV, think about movies. I mean, even when my kids try to listen to their music, I'm like, Oh, my God, this… this is horrible.

If you ever want to get a headache, turn on Perry Grip on Spotify. My kids love this artist. I find it despicable. And it just kind of goes to show that, you know, maybe it's not bad, maybe it's not wrong, maybe it's the step that we need in order to make the change. Because as a lot of teachers are leaving, it's creating situations where we really have to think through what we're doing. And admins are making decisions that we may not like. And we get to advocate for what we think is best. And we get to be the ones to say, hey, what if we did it this way?

Now, I'm not saying it's perfect scenario. I'm also not saying that things are going to get better tomorrow, as far as the teacher shortage. But what I am saying is that maybe we can look at this from a different perspective. Instead of just saying, Oh, we have this problem! We can say, Oh, we have this problem, how can we overcome those challenges as people who have boots on the ground with limited time and resources but we have a lot of ideas? And I think it's going to be shown soon. I really do.

Anyway, I'm hopeful. And that has been really fun. I've really enjoyed this new school year, I'm teaching a lot more and oh my god, I missed it so much. I love it. I'm really good at O and M and I just love teaching. And I love getting to have such eclectic days. You guys don't really see on the back end of my day or my week but I can go easily from teaching a student with multiple impairments in a residential environment. Like they live on campus kind of residential environment, to coming home and having a team meeting with my team, talking to our bookkeeper about things like lead reports, and then hiring a new team member or having a crucial conversation with somebody else. And then a quarter of my day, my kids are home for it. So if you’re trying to reach me after 330. Well, good luck, because my sentences may not make sense. But I'm here and I'm… I’m working and I'm trying. But I am multitasking at the same time. We've got snack and first grade homework and emails, and so on and so forth. And it's just a really great life. And I… I absolutely love it.

I also love October because this is blindness Awareness Month. And there are so many white cane day activities going on and so many things that we get to educate our learners and their families about and that is always fun. Another thing that I'm really looking forward to and I'll wrap this up is November 10. We are hosting our fall live training and it is so fun. Oh my gosh, Jeremy Hill came up with the name of this. It's a working title. And it is called What is in my car boot? Because in Australia, they call the trunk a boot and I'm just here for it. Like let's diversify our language. I want to call my car trunk a boot. But anytime I say car boot here in the United States, it's like… it's something that the tow truck company puts on your car to make it so that your car can't move. So boot is bad. It's very funny.

Anyway, working title aside. We're going to be learning what Jeremy Hill and Joan Broadbeck keep in their cars, and how they organise their cars to be the most efficient so that they don't forget anything. And to help their learners succeed without them, like losing their marbles, so to speak. Jeremy, if you don't know him, he teaches in Australia, and he actually travels all around Australia. So he stays away from his home for days and days at a time. And if he forgets something, there's no, I'll bring it tomorrow. He's not going back often for weeks to a month or two months at a time. And it becomes really crucial and really important. And Joan also covers a wide area, and she is in here, in the United States in Kansas. So I'm looking forward to it. It's going to be at 8pm, Eastern Standard Time, when we get the information up, I will let you know, make sure you get on our email list, you can just go to alliedindependenceonline.com, get on our email list, and I will send out that information. Or you can slide into my DMs on Instagram at @alliedindependence and again, I will get you in on that information. So very exciting.

And sometime around white cane day, we're going to be opening up early bird registration to the symposium that will be to the public. And it's also going to be really fun, because the symposium is shaping out to be amazing, we have so many great presentations, I can't even begin to share them with you because we haven't narrowed them all down yet at the time of this recording. Well, so great. And speaking of that leads us right into innovation. I did not even plan that. One of the coolest things about the symposium is that we really lean into innovation with this symposium. We're really not just looking at was the research that you did, like, Oh, that's cool, but like, how can I use this strategy right now? Because we know that using innovative strategies in our lessons is the most effective way to increase our teaching skills and skyrocket our learners independence, right? So when we formulate the symposium, we're not just looking at like, Oh, this is your dissertation? Or oh, this is a cool product. But what are the teaching strategies all around the world? And how can we use that to our advantage? But it kind of begs the question like Why do we even need new strategies? Why should we even lean into innovation, and I'm not personally telling you that you have to. You are an adult. You make up your own mind, friend. But I'll explain why I do. It's one of my core values as a professional.

And here's what I've learned just about humans is that we love the momentum of the growth curve. So as long as we do not feel like we are out of control. Like we like to move, but not so fast that we feel like any of the pieces of what we already have are going to fall off. And I'm going to actually say that it's the fear of losing control that makes us burn out more than it is that things are going too fast. It's this idea that we have to have control over every aspect of our lives. And everything that we're doing, everything has to be successful at every single moment, in order for everything to be okay. When in reality, life is not like that. And if we can open up ourselves, I'm talking a little bit more mentally, spiritually, kind of selves, to the idea that we are here for all of it. We are here for the experience, and we're here to get better. But the only way to get better is to fail. Because growth does not happen in our comfort zone.

Let's just think about it in terms of a lesson. We'll put ourselves in a little metaphor here. If we were standing on the street corner, in anticipation of crossing the street, we are going to feel much more alive, it's going to be a much more enriched experience than if we're literally just standing on a street corner for no reason, just waiting… waiting for nothing. Because we want that momentum. We want to know where we're going. It helps us to avoid the redundancy that causes burnout. And the younger that you are, studies have shown the less, you know, patience we have for our job in general and for our attention span in general. And I think, again, that's not a bad thing. The fact that we often don't stay in a job for 30 years by doing the same thing, day in and day out, is a good thing. We need diverse experiences. And the way to get those diverse experiences is to allow ourselves to take that step forward.

If you think about what's happening, as you step forward, you are losing balance, you are losing a little bit of that control, and you're opening yourself up to what could happen. And when you first start walking, if we're staying with that metaphor, it's not pretty. It's not easy, you're not graceful, it's clumsy, you fall down a lot. Because it's hard to trust that. And if you're new at this idea, that it's okay to let go of the paradigm or saying, “we've always done it that way”. If you're new to this way of thinking, and you're scared of falling, I just want to reward you or congratulate you, because that's normal. It's normal to feel clumsy when you're trying something new. And it's normal to feel like you're not the expert in that moment when you're trying something new.

Innovation allows us to take what we have that is working and expand upon it to make things better. But we can't do that if we're holding so tightly. On to every aspect of what we have. It's okay to let the things go that are no longer serving us. The primary focus of education, innovation should be on teaching and learning theory and practice as well as on learner parents, community, society and its culture. That's from an article on emerald.com. And I think it really just goes to show that innovation is everywhere. And we can focus educational innovation on specific aspects in order to turn that wheel faster.

There was another article on Kaltura that says embracing innovation in education promotes critical thinking, a sense of adventure, and an openness to adapt, that will serve our students in the classroom, it will provide them the necessary tools to tackle the challenges of their future workplace and give them the confidence and skills to continue to adapt. So let's think about that. Innovation gives them the confidence and skills to continue to adapt. If we want our learners to be able to have the skills to continue to adapt. We need to be demonstrating those exact skills. Our learners are growing up mostly in two household families. They have to adapt their whole life according to the house that they’re in at that day. There are more freelancers now than ever before. And I think that that's going to continue. Their life and their livelihood hinges upon their ability to adapt to new environments very quickly. And we as their leaders can lean into that by learning new strategies, taking on the things that we can see are working for other people and allowing ourselves to take that step, lean into the unbalanced feeling and know that we're going to actually make that next step.

Overall, I hope that this was inspiring for you to actually just look at where are you stepping into innovation and where are you holding yourself back? Come on to Instagram and let me know how you're going to use this to take a step forward. And talk to you guys in two weeks.