Norms at KSTF

At summer meeting this year, our cohort spent some time checking in with our cohort norms.  I don't know exactly what our norms are, I would have to look them up, but I do know that the norms work.  Another fellow mentioned that when he imagines his "ideal" interactions at his school, those interactions look very similar to the interactions he has at KSTF.  Norms are what help determine how these interactions develop.  For my #MTBoSBlaugust post over the next few days, I am going to share a bit about norms at KSTF, norms in my classroom, and consider how norms impact my educational communities.

Norms at KSTF were not determined over night.  In fact, I believe our first summer meeting was entirely devoted to developing norms.  Think about that... we were all flown in and spent 8 hours wrestling with norms.  I'll admit, there were one or two times I was a little "over" the norm discussion.  I felt good about them and didn't see the need to change them, or I felt indifferent to the changes proposed.  The fact that others felt the need to further discuss was indicative that more time was necessary to get everyone on board with norms.

Our norms officially are:

• Strive for equitable participation and sharing.
  
• Hold ourselves (individually and others) accountable to tasks and people.
• Seek meaningfulness in our work.

One fellow mentioned that, while she couldn't recite the norms herself, she felt like norms had been internalized by our cohort - we didn't need to know the "list of norms" to be able to participate in discussions because we had internalized them.

This was brilliant. This made me wonder, how can I get norms to be internalized by my students? Also, what norms are already internalized in my educational communities that perhaps aren't stated in a list of norms?

Additionally, while we had internalized these norms, re-visiting them each meeting was important to explicitly state the norms.

While I had to look these up, they were important for us to revisit and consider the impact of these norms. Specifically, we thought about how our norms helped us to work together successfully as a cohort and what areas do we want to strengthen our norms this year.

Being able to have scheduled time for these discussions are essential to the work we do at KSTF but I think it falls under the "important, but not urgent" work that teachers do. Moving forward, I am wondering how my school's meetings focus on "important" topics versus "urgent" topics. Is there a space to discuss norms in our department? OR how do PLC norms impact department norms?

Next up:

• Norms in my classroom
• Norms in my educational communities (MS)

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