Lying in bed on a Saturday morning, attempting to sleep in but annoyed with my automatic body clock, I resorted to my phone and checked out what was happening on twitter. Before I knew it, I was immersed into a chat, nothing of which I had planned, and let me tell you, on an iphone is not ideal. The chat however, was excellent! Full of questions, ideas, answers, and opinions about what educational leadership looks like in today’s schools. Here is a mini storify of some of the comments that had the discussion going:
All of these questions and thoughts had me wondering, what is a leader? What defines one? I think often we look to our admin as ways to lead to our school, but being a teacher, we are leaders as well. We are role models to our students, which is an important role. So where do we learn to become a leader? Who attributes to your leadership skills?
The dictionary defines a leaders as “someone who leads.” Someone who shows the way down a path. Clearly, this definition is vague, and after this #satchatwc it became clear to me as to what most educators define a leader as. A leader is someone who:
– takes risks
– is fearless
– steps outside their comfort zone
– has a willingness to learn
– communicates and praises others
– models excellence
– develops a strong PLN
– listens
– shows empathy and understanding
These are the characteristics that we would want in our admin, and what we should strive to be as teachers. Maybe we all need to reevaluate and ask ourselves, “Am I a leader?”
Out With Erin 