The Beginnings of Leadership!

Today was the third day of school and we decided it was time to start walking through classrooms to see how the classroom cultures were building, using the 7 habits as a lense. In the small amount of time that we visited classrooms, it was amazing to see already how the habits and leadership were already seamless being integrated!

Many classrooms have posted their classroom rules, often referred to as a "class contract" and the language in their rules was so proactive! Some examples were, "We take responsibility for our learning", "We listen and try to understand while others are talking", and "We always laugh with each other, never at each other."

When we visited one class, the teacher was explaining the possible leadership roles and encouraging students to consider what would fit their strengths. We were amazed that the teacher mentioned needing safety patrol students for the afternoon and that another teacher would visit them later in the day to explain the role. Our teachers took initiative to arrange this after signing up for their teacher leadership roles. Not only are our students stepping into meaningful roles based on their strengths, but our teachers are modeling it too!

In another class, some students were doing a spelling activity where they need to calculate a word's worth and 2 students disagreed about the total value of the word. They discussed that they could use the Habit, "See First to Understand" to see how they both came to the answer that they did and find out where they went wrong.

The librarian introduced routines and procedures with the Habits in mind. For example, in the library we put first things first by placing our books in the return cart before we shop for new ones.

Another teacher was using kid-friendly language to help her students create a vision for their lives. She modeled thinking through her 2 goals: 1) Getting her masters degree and 2) Becoming a super teacher. She then asked the students to think, "What would it look like if I met these goals" and modeled this by drawing a graduation hat and a super teacher on a pair of sunglasses, representing "Vision." Above is a picture of 2 students hard at work drawing pictures of themselves achieving their goals. These students are beginning with the end in mind.

The reason that the teachers are able to seamless integrate these habits into their classroom so quickly is because they have been focused on living them first. It has been common recently to overhear teachers talking about how they are progressing on their goals, planning to meet with their accountability partner, or smiling when talking about how they "sharpened the saw" the day before. This is creating an overall climate of not just effectiveness, but joy in everyone. If this is what is possible in 3 days, just imagine what is to come....