Reflection and Flexibility

A friend once told me that I think so far outside of the box, it's difficult for other people to see what I'm talking about because they can't see that far--the sides of the box are in the way. I think she was joking but I understand her point. Sometimes it is difficult to execute a plan when others can't always envision what we are talking about.  This late in the year, it is often easy to say, "I'll wait and change that next year."  My question to you is, "Why? If something isn't working, why would you wait to change it?  Change it now." In education, we are always asked to be flexible and we do a really good job of bending all sorts of ways to accommodate lots of people--students, parents, other teachers, administrators.  Are you being this flexible with yourself?  Here are some questions to ask yourself. If you take time to reflect on the answers to these questions, you might just find yourself way outside of the box as well.
1. What is working in my classroom?
2. What evidence is there to support the fact that it is working?
3. What is it about the way this process is executed that makes it work?
4.  Do I need to do any tweaking to make it even better?
5. What is not working in my classroom?
6. How do I know it isn't working?
7. Why isn't it working?
8. What would it look like if it was working?
9. Whose responsibility is it to change it so that it works?
10. What is preventing me from making those changes now?

What side of the box are you on?

These questions don't come from any leadership guru or educational genius. They come from me.  They are not a sure-fire, researched-based, be-all-and-end-all way to ensure your classroom becomes the Utopia we all strive for.  They are simply some reflective questions which may or may not get you a little closer to sanity, I mean,  a highly-functional, productive classroom.
I find myself often hemmed in by thinking things have to be a certain way, until I stop to question why things were  set up that way to begin with. If you really start tearing down walls and the restraints we have set around ourselves, you start to realize we are missing the solutions to a lot of problems that could potentially save us a lot of stress and problems if we could just see past the barriers.  I can give you an example of this. I worked at a campus where every year there was a struggle with what should come first, lunch or recess.  "Well, if they go to lunch first, they'll hurry through so they can play. But if they go to recess first, their hands will be dirty, etc."  The campus I am at now doesn't have a recess/lunch block at all.  Recess is scheduled at a completely different time. Someone along the way asked the question, "Why do these two things have to go together?  Because they always have?  Nah, let's do it differently."  Now, apply that same thinking to all of the other things we do a certain way just because that's how we do it and you'll see that much of what we do can be done differently--smarter, faster, better.
What areas would you like to improve?  Can you see any barriers you will need to get down?  Are you willing to be more flexible with yourself? Please leave a comment and thanks for reading!