The Forest
Does your school leader sound like the unwilling friend in the horror movie who gets asked to go into the forest, at night, without a flashlight, and says,
“Why would we do that?”
Does your leader question everything in a negative light, making it sound like it was walking over broken glass barefoot? Does your co-teacher? How about your grade level meetings? Or you?
“Why?” is such a great question, but it has been abused by the reticent school leader, who through low skill or low will, is an administrator using the question as a cover for the lack of courage or vision.
Here’s a few twists to consider if you are the one stuck in a “why” cycle. Start asking yourself some of these questions:
“If we do this, what’s the benefit for students?”
“If we don’t do this, what’s the drawback for students?”
“When we do this, how can we make this meaningful for families?”
“How does this align to our site and district vision?”
According to a professor of mine, George Giokaris, we need to:
Realize that school leaders must (learn to) work or thrive in surprising, chaotic, ambiguous, deceptive, and complex situations.
While I’m not willing to characterize working in schools like it’s a horror movie, the quote above — school work is surprising, chaotic, ambiguous, deceptive and complex — suggests that working in schools is like a walking into a forest in which you cannot see the way forward, backward, or to the side for very many paces. You get glimpses of the path but you have to rely on yourself, your vision and your resources in order to move forward and find the way through.
In Joseph Campbell’s explanation of the hero’s journey, the forest is often a part of the journey where individuals are tested and grow. In other classic literature, from Shakespeare on back in time, the forest is a place where the mundane meets the magical, and the extraordinary may occur.
Embrace these forest experiences because not only are you going to grow, but you are modeling how to grow in difficult times for your team.
How are you using your “why” questions at a deep moral and ethical level to drive yourself and others through the difficult patches toward better instruction and outcomes for students?
