Everyday Leadership

 Everyday Leadership

Leadership can be a tricky thing, whether in the classroom or in an administrative role. It comes naturally to some while others have to work at it more. However, everyone has to work to get better at it whether there are natural leadership qualities or not. Let’s talk about three things that will help an educator of any role as it pertains to not only leadership but to student and educator success. 

Have a Plan (Be Organized)

Being organized is vitally important. I’m going to be honest, I struggle with organization. The days where I struggle and don’t go into the day with a plan, I’m on the struggle bus the entire day. The strategy of being organized also applies to anything you do in life. For now let's keep our scope narrowed to the school environment. Chances are that plan will get blown up or sidetracked at some point during your day. We all know this when we are dealing with kids. It is inevitable. The plan allows us to have something to fall back on and get back on track. 

It is imperative to not only have lesson plans which we all know but it is vitally important to have a behavior plan as well. Knowing your students and their abilities and behavioral characteristics is essential. Make sure you have answers to these questions: What am I going to do if a kid explodes? What makes this particular kid or kids explode? How will I handle disruptions? What am I going to allow from a student communication standpoint with each other? What modifications are in place for individual students? This seems very common sense but doesn’t always happen. There could be much more written on organization, so obviously it is not an exhaustive list. 

Communication

It is vital to have good communication skills and to have a plan for how you are going to communicate. It is extremely important to have communication plans with students, parents and administration regardless of your position. 

Outside of your classroom how do you communicate with your students? School email is an obvious answer and should be utilized. Get students in the habit of checking their email daily. If you have an advisory type period this is a great time for them to check for reminders from teachers. Google Classroom is an excellent tool to communicate with students outside of the classroom. Assignments missed when a student is absent can be posted here and if the student doesn’t need help can be done before they get back to class the next day. 

Parent communication is so important. I know they have the resources to check grades at any time. Parents don’t always do that. Within this communication line it is important to have grades updated in Eschool or whatever your online grade system is weekly so parents and students can see where they are at. It is not fair for a student to think they have an A and then you catch up on three weeks and now they have an F. It is their responsibility to do their work and turn it in but it is our responsibility to make sure they have accurate information. Parent phone calls should happen weekly. This part is the unpleasant part if you are delivering bad news. That is why it is important to deliver good news as well. A teacher or administrator can’t call every student every week but we can pick at least a couple of students to tell teachers about how good their child is acting, how kind they are, how they are excelling in the classroom, etc. 

Relationships

Last but certainly not least and the most important piece is developing relationships. Success in any organization boils down to this. I’m not saying anything new here. People know this. There are degrees of this. Some people will be great friends they work with while some will just develop a good working relationship. When it comes to students it is so important to develop appropriate relationships with our students. If we don’t there are many problems that will grow out of that issue. 

First of all, students need to understand that adults are there for their well being. Two things are important in the educator-student relationship: accountability and empathy. Some get confused and think that you can’t have both, but you can. As educators whether you are the classroom teacher, administrator or somewhere in between these two attributes will come into play. 

Kids are more independent for various reasons that we don’t have time to address in this article. All the more reason we as adults have to hold them accountable academically and behaviorally. Students need to understand that teachers, administrators and support staff are not there to be their friends. I think that line has been blurred in recent years and can be a very slippery slope. 

While holding them accountable it is paramount that we have empathy as well. We need to know where they come from, what their homelife is like, what they are going through each day. All of these pieces factor into their behavior and academic performance. It doesn’t mean they are any less accountable. If a student has academic supports in place, it stands to reason that some students need those supports for behavior as well. 

Having systems in place is vital. MTSS for both academic and behavioral success has to be done. Putting a behavior matrix in place that students understand what is appropriate in each area of building and district. 

Conclusion

Being in education is hard. The three items discussed will help greatly and by far not everything that we need for success. Academic and behavioral success is vital. It can’t happen just by chance. If we are organized, communicate effectively and develop appropriate relationships with both students and colleagues it will go a long way in not only helping us as individuals but most importantly, our why which is the students we serve.