Skip to content Ontario.ca Français

Inspire

Unleash Informal Leaders Throughout Schools: Katz

By Roderick Benns
Editor

Unleashing informal leaders throughout individual schools and whole school systems is an effective strategy for widespread student success, according to an expert in cognition and learning, Dr. Steven Katz.

"Formal leaders can't do everything," Dr. Katz told an assembly of hundreds of principals, supervisory officers and teachers recently in Toronto. The day was hosted by the Literacy and Numeracy Secretariat, with a focus on Building and Connecting Learning Networks.

If a school has informal leaders in such areas as Reading Recovery, he said as an example, "then they need to be unleashed for the good of the school."

The expert in cognition and learning says the power of learning communities is profound when it goes from vertical to lateral capacity building, whereby teachers are learning from one another, with one another and finally on behalf of one another.

"Then it's not just about 'my kids in my class' but a feeling responsibility for the whole school and community. It's schools working on behalf of one another."

In order to get to this point, Dr. Katz points out that it must involve learning time for teachers, too. He says sometimes teachers have not always understood that in order to achieve meaningful student learning, teachers themselves must also choose to embark on a learning journey.

Katz says that now he believes Ontario is making great strides in understanding the importance of professional learning communities as a way for teachers to connect, creating their own learning through shared initiatives with their colleagues.

"A teacher doesn't wake up one morning and begin to teach differently – they are probably already doing the best job they can do."

That's why, Dr. Katz points out, that "student learning is a proxy for teacher learning."

Although effective learning communities are integral to student success, larger networks can't involve any missed steps. Networks work by making schools stronger, but not by bypassing schools altogether to reach the larger community, Dr. Katz points out.

"You can't be successful with such a missed step."

When professional learning communities get together, it's important they have student work in front of them. Dr. Katz says this is the most meaningful way for instructors to spark a rich dialogue.

That's not to say that learning communities do not have some red flags associated with them, he points out. For instance, maintaining 'quality control' of the group is paramount, because a poor learning community can simply spread poor information.

Engaging in 'group think' is another concern, as is 'diffusion of responsibility' – what Katz also calls "social loafing."

"You run the risk of everyone agreeing with each other because it's comfortable to talk about what you agree on," he said. "Or, you run the risk of everyone assuming someone else will be responsible for something, simply because there are plenty of people there."

Katz notes that 'deindividation' is also a concern, the temporary loss of personal identity because of being involved in a group.

However, there are four countermeasures to these concerns which allow learning communities to be successful, too.

Katz says these four areas – diversity of opinion, independence, decentralization and aggregation all have the potential to contribute to strong learning communities. He says that bringing a diverse group of teachers together and empowering them goes a long way to making the communities truly professional learning organizations.

"And the outcome then has immediate relevance for students."

Katz, who has a background in human development and applied psychology, says teachers and principals both have to give themselves permission to "not know" things when it comes to quality instruction.

"That is the only way to create the conditions for learning. If the change isn't uncomfortable, then you haven't made a change," he explains.

When it comes to monitoring initiatives that are started in the classroom, Katz said it is here where things often break down.

"So often we lose our focus in implementation. We must get better at monitoring our initiatives to make sure they are working."

He notes that learning from a failed initiative is a better predictor than simply not monitoring at all. "If you've failed, at least you know you've failed," he says.

Katz said it is has long been established that classroom instruction is the single greatest predictor of success, with principal leadership coming in second.

"We control these two elements," he reminded the crowd. "That's the good news we need to remember."

Dr. Steven Katz is a director with the research and evaluation firm Aporia Consulting Ltd. and a permanent faculty member at the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education of the University of Toronto in human development and applied psychology. He hold a doctorate in human development and applied psychology, with a specialization in applied cognitive science. His areas of expertise include cognition and learning, teacher education and the design of data-driven systems for organizational accountability, planning and improvement. He has received a Governor General's medal for excellence in his field and has been involved in research and evaluation, professional development and consulting with a host of educational organizations around the world.