OER4Schools/LfL/Introduction

Leadership for Learning - Introduction

Leadership for Learning (LfL) is a programme of school leadership/headship developed at the University of Cambridge over a period of 10 years, originating from the international Carpe Vitam Leadership for Learning project.

Leadership for Learning is a way of thinking, doing, communicating, working, and reflecting about educational leadership in schools for the singular purpose of promoting the activity of learning. [[Image:]]

Five principles of Leadership for Learning are as follows:

1. Focus on learning
2. Conditions for learning
3. Learning Dialogue
4. Shared Leadership
5. Shared Accountability

In this unit you will explore the five LfL principles in practice with a view to contributing your own ideas about Leadership for Learning through interactive learning opportunities.

This unit adopts the principles of LfL within its curriculum and pedagogy: creating the conditions for learning at a pace, time, and level of interaction of your own choosing.

You will have opportunities for discussing/sharing ideas about your learning and the learning experience.

LfL is not something that can be implemented or done-to a school or imposed on a person. LfL provides a framework that creates an opportunity for change; for expanding leadership capacity in schools and improving the quality of learning.

LfL is operates in an ‘assessment-free’ setting where both the unit itself and you, the learner, will share the successes.

This unit is presented in 7 sections or sessions. You can work through each at your own pace.

What is LfL?

Introduction to LfL: Its all around

Leadership for learning is happening all around you.

If you know what to look for you will see elements of LfL in schools and classrooms in your own community, and even in the university where you might be doing this unit!

The first question you might have could very well be something like, “If Leadership for Learning is all around me already, why am I doing this unit?” Well…the short answer is that even though the LfL principles are common attributes of many classrooms and whole schools, they are not present, coordinated or sustained at levels that support consistently positive learning effects.

The aims of this session (5.1) are to:

Explore a metaphor for describing how we can start to ‘see’ Leadership for Learning in classrooms and schools

Identify and explore the 5 LfL principles

Watch a teacher in action, and identify if some or all of the 5 LfL principles can been seen/are present.

Practical: Seeing is believing

Practical

Let’s start by consider a few ideas about LfL, its 5 principles, and how we might observe and identify these in classrooms and schools.

We like to think about ‘seeing’ the LfL principles by using what we have come to call an ‘LfL Lens’ or set of ‘LfL Lenses’. What do we mean by lens? Figure 5A depicts a familiar image of spectacles or glasses that we can use to depict or stand in as a metaphor for what we mean by an LfL Lens.

Stimulus (11 min). What do you think we mean by an LfL lens as illustrated in Figure 5A.

Practical

Let’s take our metaphor of the LfL lens a step further, and suggest that there are 5 different LfL lenses (spectacles) needed in order to ‘see’ all 5 LfL principles:

1. Focus on learning
2. Conditions for learning
3. Learning Dialogue
4. Shared Leadership
5. Shared Accountability

Consider Figure 5B.

• What are the kinds of things you might see in a classroom if you were looking through the LfL lens ‘Focus on Learning’?
• What are the kinds of things you might see in a classroom if you were looking through the LfL lens ‘Conditions for Learning’?
• What are the kinds of things you might see in a classroom if you were looking through the LfL lens ‘Learning Dialogue’?
• What are the kinds of things you might see in a classroom if you were looking through the LfL lens ‘Shared Leadership?
• What are the kinds of things you might see in a classroom if you were looking through the LfL lens ‘Shared Accountability’?

Practical

Thinking ahead, you are probably already wondering why we don’t simply put all the LfL lenses together, in one! This way we could see all the 5 LfL principles at once in classrooms and schools.

Consider Figure 5C

What do you think might be the benefits of combining all LfL lenses into one?

What do you think could be the drawbacks of looking at classrooms and schools with a single, combined lens?

Practical

Let’s try putting this idea of looking at classroom teaching and learning through an LfL lens into practice.

We are going to watch a short teaching/classroom video.

Before we do, choose only 1 LfL lens that you will use as your ‘critical lens’ to ‘see’ the practices in this classroom. By choosing your 1 LfL lens, you should only ‘see’ and note down those things that your lens helps you to focus on.

For example, if you choose, ‘Conditions for Learning’, then try looking only for those things that you believe contribute to promoting conditions for learning in the video.

OK, watch the video now, with your chosen LfL spectacles on!

Watch the video.

VIDEO

Is a bat a bird?

Is a bat a bird?

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Reflecting and Sharing your Learning

Congratulations. You have successfully completed the first LfL session.

You now understand that LfL is all about learning. But also it is about seeing the component parts that contribute to creating learning opportunities in schools and classrooms.

By seeing things differently, through the 5 LfL lenses (or all at once with a combined lens when you are ready to give it try) we are better able to understand what it is we do as practitioners in support of the activity of learning.

It is only through insights and knowledge of the contributing factors to learning that we are able to reflect upon and share our experiences and understandings with our colleagues.

Practice using the LfL lenses when you are in your own schools, or even when you are watching others in the act of teaching and learning.