Delving Deeper - Collaboration and Innovation in Schools.

Jane Gilbert presented at the Delving Deeper conference at the beginning of our day. She talked about Collaboration and Innovation in schools. Many points she made about collaboration raised questions, ideas, thoughts in my head about how collaboration is working in our junior team and how I could better myself as a teacher in the junior team and/or how our team could collaborate better also.

Strong collaboration is "not just sharing, pooling or exchanging existing ideas - this just reproduces existing ideas". I love this!! We as teachers are creative and forward thinkers but yet so many of us get trapped and collect and use ideas developed by others. I feel it's important that I remember to process the ideas raised, change ideas and make that idea better if possible. It's important as we travel along the collaboration journey that we create not best practice but next practice. This world is forever changing around us and it's so easy to hear or see an idea that is being used collaboratively and use it but how can we make that idea better.

Jane mentioned that productive collaboration requires deep engagement with ideas, with colleagues, with difference. It's important that if I don't understand the context about something that is being said, instead of going along with the flow, I need to think how can i get something from this person? ask questions. I need to always pay attention to my own learning and development needs and to my own on-going cognitive growth and ask myself....what am I getting out of this? How can I get more out of this to make me a better teacher.