It probably stands to reason that, after a couple of decades of outcomes-based education, that we’ve become a little fixated on outcomes?
But what if we weren’t? What if we completely detached from the outcome of every single key action that Teachers and School Leaders deploy? What would happen if we cut the ties that bind us and chose to move more freely?
What do you think would happen if you didn’t worry about how many of your students reached a certain benchmark, but instead just paid attention to how possible your classroom/s made that possible?
What would happen if you didn’t worry about what the outcome of a conversation with an angry parent would be and instead just wondered how you’d need to conduct yourself for that person to feel heard?
What would happen if you ran the quirkiest, silliest lesson in your imagination, even though you’ve been running a reasonably successful alternative for years … just to see what happens?
What would happen if you didn’t blame yourself or anyone else for a student outburst and just reflected on how well your practice gave that student a decent chance to succeed?
What would happen if you didn’t worry about your NAPLAN or ATAR scores quite so much and just trusted, even empowered, your colleagues to focus with intent on building inspiring learning experiences?
My contention – nothing particularly terrible would happen.
Perhaps it’s time that we started answering these “What would happen?” questions instead of just asking them.
What we might find out!