CONNECTIONS: We Create the Culture and The Culture Creates Us
“Our success is driven by such an incredible culture with this team—culture on the floor, preparing, attention to detail, how we conduct ourselves off the court.”
Bill Behrns, Loyola (Chicago) Assistant Athletic Director
We are huge college basketball fans and still reflect fondly on the March Madness runs of tiny Loyola University this past season (making it to the Sweet 16) and especially the Final Four season of 2018. Recently, the head coach for both tourney teams, Porter Moser, decided to accept the head coaching job at Oklahoma. His run as head coach at Loyola may be over, but we still revel in the 2018 Cinderella run of the Loyola University Ramblers. The performance of this team, led not only by Coach Porter Moser, but also team leaders, inspired everyone in the Chicago area, if not the entire nation, throughout their miraculous season. Living in Chicago at the time, we took a special interest in watching these young men compete on the court. We were equally impressed by their words and actions off the court. A great deal of the team’s success can be attributed to the culture they created and, in turn, what they became by that culture. In fact, if you watched any of their tourney games in either year, you likely noticed the team’s “Created By Culture” T-shirts.
What they became, as individuals and as a team, resulted from the culture that they created. We first create the culture and then, the culture creates us, influencing our attitudes, behaviors, commitments, and overall level of success. The more we watched and read about this team, the more we realized that the culture needed for success as a basketball team is not unlike the culture necessary for success in the schoolhouse.
To keep the team’s culture constantly in the forefront of the minds of team members, Moser installed a “Wall of Culture” in the locker room with dozens of words and phrases that are cornerstones of the team’s philosophy. These ever-present textual reminders are not only posted prominently, but also reviewed regularly by coaches and team members as a way to reinforce the daily habits, techniques, and mindsets that lead to the team’s long-term success.
Successful schools are similar; they have a strong culture in place, and are led by individuals who regularly remind each other what is important, why it matters, and how they must behave to fulfill the school’s mission and achieve the school’s vision. Such schools even make the time to prominently display the school’s values throughout the campus, including each individual classroom. During meetings, team members hold each other accountable for group norms and adhering to commonly shared values while always keeping their eye on the prize: student success.
During Loyola’s magical run, we would monitor their games by reading the latest features on the team in the Chicago Tribune. After their buzzer-beating victory over Miami in the opening round of the 2018 tourney, columnist David Haugh mentioned that this was no accident, stating that, “At Loyola, they rehearse success.” When Jeff coached high school basketball years ago, his teams also rehearsed success--in every aspect of the game. Prior to the opening game each season, they even practiced how they handled time outs during games. Many teams would simply call time out, whereupon players would saunter over to the bench and gather somewhat haphazardly to discuss strategy. On Jeff’s teams, they actually practiced each step of the process, including what a player should say if they needed a time out, how they should protect the ball if they were in possession of it when calling a timeout, how fast they should move to the bench (faster than other teams), where players in the game should sit (facing the coach, away from the stands), and where players not in the game should stand (behind the coach, facing the stands). There was a reason for everything they did as a team, including small details like how to manage timeouts. At the end of the practice, one parent commented, “Wow, I have never seen a team practice timeouts before. You guys are really ready for everything.” The observation was gratifying and validated how important it was as coaches to prepare our athletes for every single event that occurs in a game. We suspect part of Loyola’s “rehearsing for success” includes practicing every possible event that can arise during an actual game.
Successful schools rehearse for success also and there is a reason for everything they do and a way they go about doing it as they prepare for every classroom lesson and every staff meeting. Every administrator paints a vivid picture of what success for the school looks like for every staff member and outlines actions steps for achieving the vision. In the classroom, every teacher does the same, pointing and guiding students to an ultimate outcome while celebrating small wins along the way. Both invest intentional time to consistently getting better by reviewing where they are going, where they are now, and what they need to do next to close the gap while often reminding those they lead about cultural keys to success, holding all individuals on the “team”--in this case, staff members at the school or students in the classroom--accountable for adhering to commonly-shared values, norms, and behaviors necessary for achieving the vision.
Whether talking about successful schools or successful basketball teams, a critical key to success is creating an “incredible” culture. First, we create the culture and, if we maintain and reinforce it consistently, eventually the culture creates us. By creating a successful culture, we ensure that our culture will create success--for athletes on our basketball teams or for the students at our schools. Of course, it doesn’t hurt to have someone like Sister Jean watching over you and cheering you on! Paying attention to the many small details that make up a school or classroom culture is another way we create a positive and productive culture in our schools.
Thanks to all educators reading this for the amazing work you are doing during these challenging times. As always, Teach and Lead with Passion...
Jeff and Jimmy
DAILY INSPIRATION EDUCATOR
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NEW RELEASE!
(Kindle ebook Edition) - Disruptive Thinking in Our Classrooms: Preparing Learners for Their Future by Eric Sheninger
This bestselling book is now available in an ebook version. The premise of this book is simple, yet powerful. It’s time to future-proof learning for ALL kids. Broken into four parts, this book combines stories, insight from thousands of school visits, practical strategies, research, lessons from the pandemic, and examples from classrooms to assist educators transform their practice. The parts:
Re-thinking “normal”
Re-thinking learning
Re-thinking the learner
Re-thinking our mindset
Each chapter ends with a “Disruptive Challenge” designed to do just that: Challenge educators to disrupt in some way their current thinking or professional practices.
Critical Components of the Book:
Disruptive change is the new normal. As such, our mindset and practices must evolve to future-proof learning in ways that help students develop meaningful competencies critical for success in an unpredictable world.
Comfort is the enemy of growth. We must critically evaluate if the way things have always been done in the classroom sets learners up for success now and in the future. Improvement in all we do is a never-ended journey.
Learning is a process, not an event. It requires educators to develop and use instructional practices and pedagogical techniques that meet the unique needs of all students.
Outlier practices play a key role in the development of disruptive thinking. Some practices add value while others do not. It is up to educators to find the right blend of these strategies to empower learners.
Packed with ready to use ideas and embedded resources including the latest digital tools, templates, and artifacts from real classrooms, readers will learn:
Why a mindset shift is essential in order to prepare learners for an unpredictable world.
How to implement strategies that focus on developing critical competencies.
How to ensure equity through personalization.
What to reflect on to improve and build powerful relationships.
We are excited to announce that Eric’s book was listed as a #1 Bestseller on Amazon after its first week in print and are proud to now offer an ebook version! Learn more here.
FEATURED BOOKS
Culturize and Live Your Excellence Action Guides by Jimmy Casas.
Our Action Guides are tools to accompany best selling books by Jimmy Casas: Culturize: Every Student. Every Day. Whatever It Takes and Live Your Excellence: Bring Your Best Self to School Every Day. These Action Guides are road maps to taking action steps based on the ideas found in Culturize and Live Your Excellence so that our schools can best serve the students of today. If you are conducting a book study group, seminar, class, or professional development event based on either book, these Action Guides will serve as a resource to help you organize your sessions and work with your group. They provide assistance to staff developers, superintendents, principals, team leaders, college professors, and other educational leaders who are working with teachers to develop their professional skills. To help you plan and organize your study sessions, the Action Guides are divided into the following six sections:
Reflections: These are short thoughts on key sections of the chapters from each book.
Critical Concepts: These are simply bullet-point summaries from each section of the books and are presented here to help you review and focus your thoughts.
Questions to Consider: These questions are designed to reinforce your understanding of critical concepts and will promote constructive conversation among those participating in the study group, workshop, or class.
Writing to Reflect: These reflective journal prompts help you consider what you have read as well as discussions in which you have engaged to independently work through essential issues, recording what you have learned and what you are thinking about in writing.
Team Activities: These activities allow you to further explore concepts and ideas found in the books by interacting with others in your study group, workshop, or course.
Putting It to Work: This section provides specific actions for applying what you have learned through your reading as well as work undertaken in the book study back in your own classroom, school, or district.
Check out more here and contact us for bulk order discounts!
CONNECTEDD’S TAKEAWAYS
Thought for the Day: “Positive thoughts and feelings are not the result of positive outcomes in your life. They are the cause.” Unknown
Teaching Technique to Try: Give One, Get One. Use this strategy to stimulate students’ thinking as they investigate an essential question or search for evidence in response to an essay prompt over the course of a unit of study. In this strategy, students formulate initial positions and arguments in response to a question or prompt and then share them with each other through a structured procedure. That way they can test, refine, and strengthen their ideas as they share their ideas and hear the ideas of others. Students will practice being active listeners or readers—an essential skill for learning new information. Check out this link from Facing History and Ourselves for a step-by-step process for using this technique.
Eyes On Culture: We believe that culture is a true difference maker in any classroom, school, district, or organization. As a result, we focus much of the work we do on creating and maintaining positive and productive cultures. Culture Focus: Change. High performing schools with strong cultures are places in which adults are not only open to change, but actually embrace change when they discover a better way of doing some aspect of the work. We have all heard “insanity” defined as doing the same thing over again but expecting different results. In schools with productive cultures, adults in the building are careful to resist change merely for the sake of change but fervently adhere to the mantra made famous by Maya Angelou: “Do the best you know how until you know better. Then, when you know better, do better.” When they find a better way, they change and adopt the better way. Almost everyone we know wants better results as they move forward in their personal and professional lives. However, not everyone is willing to actually do anything different to achieve better results. Sticking with the status quo is easy and almost always the path of least resistance. However, the path of least resistance is rarely the road to improved outcomes. In schools with high-performing cultures, educators within the school consistently strive for better outcomes and are willing to change what they do in order to achieve them.
Please share your thoughts about culture via Twitter: @ConnectEDDBooks We would love to hear from you!