SamTastic Weekly Tip: 1/16/23 - Take the First Step

This week’s tip: Take the First Step

Faith is taking the first step even when you don’t see the whole staircase. – Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

Being a school leader requires faith. Improving a teacher’s work requires that you recognizing good performance and then build on success. This allows the leader to model and build the kind of learning culture we all desire.

Some leaders worry that saying something positive about a teacher’s work communicates that there are no areas in need of improvement. This won’t happen if the observations, and subsequent conversations, are frequent.

Try this in your SAM Daily Meeting today. Talk about a teacher who is struggling. Start with the graph from the dashboard showing the leader’s time with the teacher so far this year.

Ask: “What are two things this teacher is doing well?

Then, schedule a Feedback Celebration meeting with the teacher.

If the leader can’t identify anything the teacher is doing well....schedule a 15 observation and ask the leader to intentionally look for good practice. Making sure good performance is recognized, and used as a lever for further improvement, is a key feature of your TimeTrack.

Recognizing good practice takes practice. Keep the faith.

You can use your TimeTrack to make sure this happens.

SamTastic Weekly Tip: 1/9/23 - Consider your Three Target Descriptors and Time Spent in Meetings

Today’s Tip: Consider your Three Target Descriptors and Time Spent in Meetings

When principals first start the SAM process they select three target descriptors—things they believe that if they did more of teachers would benefit—improve their practice faster.

Most principals select a combination of feedback and seeing instruction descriptors. Most SAM principals increase the amount of time they spend doing this key work with teachers. Great!

Most SAM principals, however, still spend more time in group meetings that any other activity. Good SAMs help the principal reflect on the relative value of each group meeting they engage. When a SAM is successful getting a leader to schedule follow-up after a group meeting there is a good chance others will benefit. When the leader can’t think of any logical follow-up activity it raises an important question concerning the value of the time spent.

Some meetings, of course, are outside the control of the school or district leader. Focusing on the intended outcome of a meeting will likely increase the chance the leader, and others, will find the time valuable.

It is fashionable in the business/corporate world to significantly limit the number of meetings scheduled. Some prohibit all meetings on selected days of the week. For example: Meeting free Tuesdays and Thursdays. Some advocates of this approach claim an increase in productivity.

Stand-up meetings are popular in a number of SAM districts. These meetings are just what the name implies and are short, to the point and relevant to the vision and mission of the school and district. The SAM Daily Meeting works as it is time-limited with very specific and expected outcomes that are easy to quantify and achieve.

Giving thought to the amount of time you spend in meetings might be valuable in your next SAM Daily Meeting. Revisiting your target descriptors is a good idea, too. (Orange TimeTrack logo ~ Settings ~ General Options ~ Target Descriptors.)

SamTastic Weekly Tip: 12/19/22 - Time to Check Your TimeTrack

Today’s Tip: Time To check your TimeTrack

Christmas/Winter Break has started Friday afternoon for some SAM teams and will begin for everyone else later this week. Now is a great time to be sure your TimeTrack is counting correctly.

Correctly? Yes. TimeTrack will only accurately count and calculate your instructional time if it knows the days you are working. At the top if each day you’ll see the Contact Checkmark. If the checkmark is present, TimeTrack counts the day. You can click the checkmark to let TimeTrack know that you are not working and the day will not be counted. This will make your data more accurate.

You can do this day by day to go to the settings menu to do it by the month: TimeTrack logo ~ Settings ~ Contact Day Set-up.

This is also a good time to revisit your FOCUS staff, the people you want to spend more time with this year. Start by looking at the time you’ve spent with each person so far this year and determine if you’ve made progress. Then decide you want to make changes in who you will spend more time with for the rest of the school year.

TimeTrack logo ~ Settings ~ Individual/Group Set-up: Click the Focus square for each person you elect to spend more time with for the remainder of the year. Go to your dashboard and click the Focus link on the Instructional Top 5 chart, upper right, to see time spent with each of you Focus staff members.

Click any graph bar to see the breakout of time spend with any Focus staff member:

Enjoy your Christmas/holiday and New Year. You’ve worked hard for your school, staff, students, parents and community. Now its time to take care of you.

You can still register for the conference. We have six rooms available at the secondary hotel. To register: https://bit.ly/3cO5q0z