Running head: PERSONAL PERSPECTIVE OF EDUCATIONAL LEADERSHIP

Personal Perspective of Educational Leadership Samia Lahib Western University

PERSONAL PERSPECTVE OF EDUCATIONAL LEADERSHIP

At this stage in my life I find it very difficult to define my role as an educational leader. Unlike many of my colleagues, I do not posses a leadership role. My purpose for enrolling in this program has not only been to help develop my leadership skills, but more importantly it is to help define and structure myself as an educational leader. Throughout this journey I have begun to envision where I want to be in my future and the type of educational leader I would like to be. Although it is often difficult as I do not have a specific position I would like to hold within the education system by which to employ my leadership, I have begun to develop an understanding of the type of leader I wish to be and have begun strengthening and building on my values and beliefs. Regardless of whether I end up as a classroom teacher, curriculum specialist, learning facilitator, resource coordinator or instructional specialist, I would define my role as an education leader as someone who works from the bottom up, who is caring, supportive and encouraging. I want to approach each issue by first thinking about who the decisions made will impact. In most educational leadership roles, the students are the last people these decisions will impact but they will likely be impacted in the largest way. I want to understand the impact my decision will have on the furthest person away from my leadership role, and work my way up to the executives who will put these changes and decisions into practice. For example, when implementing curriculum changes, leaders need to be concerned first and foremost with how this will impact student education. We cannot first think about the people closest to the position we hold (the top) but we must consider the students education (bottom). The recent push toward skill development in the curriculum is beneficial for student education. If we instead thought about how someone higher, such as a teacher, may be effected by this change, we may be discouraged by the thought of creating more work or taking away time from specific content. In addition to my desire to always work from the bottom up and more importantly, I aim to be a leader that encourages others to become leaders. I believe that the best leaders are the leaders that can create relationships. We need to know more about our constituents then what their job title is and how well they perform. We need to know what it is that drives them to perform in their role, why they have chosen this type of work, and we need to know whom they aim to help through the work they are involved in. Our constituents should be given the confidence to continue to learn and develop their skills. They should be encouraged to become leaders within our area and develop skills to help them reach their goals. My personal leadership perspective is comprised of support, encouragement and understanding. The ideas intertwined within my leadership perspective are linked closely to the values and beliefs that have shaped my purpose of education. As a leader, I want to encourage others to become leaders themselves. In order to do this, I need to allow my constituents the space to use their lifelong learning skills to reach their own goals. As a leader, I want to help facilitate the use of skills that formal education should have instilled. Since I am still developing my role as an educational leader, I would say that my purpose of education has directed my personal leadership perspective. I can reflect back on my past and pinpoint the exact moment that I knew my perspective of education had changed forever. Growing up I always talked about

PERSONAL PERSPECTVE OF EDUCATIONAL LEADERSHIP

how I wanted to be a teacher. When I was young I would force my younger sister to play school but I always had to be the teacher. I would love when students in my class would ask me for help and I got to share with them what I knew. I found it very interesting how you could tell exactly what a student understood by the look on their face. It was at the specific moment that you said something that may have not been fundamental to your understanding, that you saw a light go on and them finally understand. At a very young age I understood that everyone learns differently and I loved trying to figure out how to make someone learn best. In grade 10 I had a science teacher who changed all of this. Although I knew I wanted to be a teacher, it was in this class that I went from wanting to teach students content material to wanting to inspire students and develop an intrinsic want for learning. It is reflecting back on this stage of my life that I understand how this very influential aspect of my life has shaped my personal leadership perspective. Another very influential aspect of my life is my constant affinity toward high school education. Although I remember many of my elementary school teachers and was very close to some of my professors in university, I still keep in contact with some of my high school teachers and continually turn to them for guidance. Some of my closest high school teachers even attended my wedding a year and a half ago. Although I am no longer their student and they treat me like their colleague, they have not stopped teaching me since I left high school. This connection has inspired me to be a leader just like they are. I want to have a strong relationship with my constituents and I want them to feel comfortable approaching me with any issues. I want to treat them as equals and always help them learn through their own experiences. Throughout our discussions these past two weeks many different focuses have been taken toward our personal purpose of education and in turn our personal leadership perspectives. We have touched upon cognitivism with our emphasis of reaching each student as each student learns and processes information in a different way. We have discussed the importance of social learning theory through our examination of problem-based learning which is a teaching method that strongly supports learning through social interaction. More influential to my personal views has been out discussions of constructivism. Goodyear (2002) points out that some assert that knowledge transfer is impossible: pedagogy needs to support the individual construction of meaning (p.1). He goes on to explain how in order to provide students with lifelong learning, we must build on their already existing knowledge and provide them with new experiences to build from if we want the knowledge and the skills we teach to be evoked for future development. If I were to identify the single most important element of my purpose of education and leadership perspective, it would be the ability to recall what we have learned in order to continue learning and building upon this information. In order to do this I believe we must take into consideration cognitive theory and reach every student, but more importantly we must construct education, both in schools and as leaders of society. We must aim to do this in a way that allows students to make personal connections in order to recall and use what has been developed through their education. On a practical level, we need to select the appropriate instructional strategies while being cognizant of the relationship we are developing between

PERSONAL PERSPECTVE OF EDUCATIONAL LEADERSHIP

learning and the environment, as it is this interaction, which creates knowledge (Ertmer & Newby, 1993). We need to step away from teaching student straight facts to helping students understand how to use them. Ertmer & Newby (1993) review the importance that constructivism has on instructional design and recommend that strategies such as situating tasks in real world context, use of cognitive modeling and coaching, presenting multiple perspectives, social negotiation, use of real life example, reflective awareness and providing guidance through the constructive process, will all help students create their own knowledge and understanding. All of these strategies can be used in any subject and to teach nearly any content, both in school and as a social leader. If we as educators and leaders have the ability to allow our students and constituents to create their own understanding, why would we neglect this? How often is it that we do not fully understand a concept in our current positions until we are able to understand it in practice? We make connections to the knowledge we previously have and its like something clicks. Problem solving is a very large part of lifelong learning. Once you leave the world of formal education, the majority of the constructive learning we receive is through problem solving. If we are not able to recall and make connections between the problem we face and the knowledge we already have we would not be able to solve any problems and therefore never build on our understanding. The way we define learning and what we believe about the way learning occurs has important implication for situations in which we want to facilitate changes in what people know and/or do (Ertmer & Newby, 1993). By reflecting and understanding where our values and beliefs have come from and projecting onto where we see our future, we are able to define what we believe to be learning and understand how we believe learning occurs. These past two weeks have been about reflection and self-realization both of which are essential if we plan on become educational leaders. We cannot strive to lead if we do not yet know where we are leading.

PERSONAL PERSPECTVE OF EDUCATIONAL LEADERSHIP

References Ertmer, P. A., & Newby, T. J. (1993). Behaviorism, cognitivism, constructivism: Comparing critical features from an instructional design perspective. Performance Improvement Quarterly, 6(4), 50-72. Goodyear, P. (2000). Environments for lifelong learning. In J. M. Spector & T. M. Anderson (Eds.), Integrated and Holistic Perspectives on Learning, Instruction and Technology(pp. 1-18). Dordrecht, NL: Kluwer Academic Publishers.