Adam Grant’s book Think Again (The Power of Knowing What You Don’t Know) provided me with lots of elements to ponder. A starting point was identifying when I am thinking like a preacher, prosecutor, politician, or scientist.

Preacher: In preacher mode, we’re convinced we’re right. In this style, we’re trying to persuade others to our way of thinking.

Prosecutor: In prosecutor mode, we’re trying to prove someone else wrong.

Politician: In the politician mode, we’re trying to win the approval of others.

Scientist: When thinking like a scientist, we are looking for reasons why we might be wrong not just reasons for why we are right. (Grant identifies that scientist thinking requires favoring humility over pride and curiosity over conviction)

I can imagine all four thinking styles being present as a high school staff opens a PD session around changing grading practices.

Preachers- “It’s clear that to support our students’ acceptance into higher education our current grading process is working well.” “Most teachers are opposed to administrators grading our teaching why would students see being graded differently?”

Prosecutors- “I am teaching many students whose past grades have communicated to them that giving up is their best option.” “Have you noticed that since the middle school changed to standards-based -grading, we have had to deal with decreasing student effort?”

Politicians- “The vast majority of parents are going to demand grades so that they know how students are doing?” “With technology, we can give parents a much better understanding of their students’ learning progress than our old grades and report cards ever did.”

Scientists- “How could we identify which students our current grading practices are motivating, demotivating, or having little or no effect.”

A sign of intellect is the ability to change your mind in the face of new facts.

A mark of wisdom is refusing to let the fear of admitting you were wrong stop you from getting it right.

The joy of learning something new eventually exceeds the pain of unlearning something old.

(Adam Grant)

Scientist thinking fits with the modifications I have been proposing for professional growth plans (PGPs): designed around a hypothesis rather than a goal. Jean Ross, writing in Sloan Management Review from MIT, “Why Hypotheses Beat Goals,” suggests that instead of asking “What is Your Goal?” we ask, “What is Your Hypothesis?” She states, “Hypotheses can force individuals to articulate in advance why they believe a given course of action will succeed. A failure that exposes an incorrect hypothesis can more readily convert into organizational learning.”

This approach to PGPs is strengthened by coaching support from colleagues, instructional coaches, or administrators. Coaching provides the collection of evidence that a plan is progressing or not progressing as expected and sets the stage for reflection that leads to learning from the evidence. (insights) Learning is our goal. When goals are the focus, one tends to miss important evidence along the way, staying focused only on the final outcome.

Consider a scenario where a teacher has a hypothesis that changing her grading to A, B, and Not Yet would increase the percentage of students meeting her course standards. If I were providing coaching, I would begin by having the teacher identify all the behaviors/actions she would need to implement to initiate and support such a change. The next step would be to identify the student learning behaviors/actions that she believes would change and cause the improved learning outcomes. We would probably consider which students already had the desired actions and who might be most likely and perhaps most challenging to change from current behaviors/mindsets.

My coaching questions would hopefully extend the teacher’s sense of “science thinking.” An approach based less on implementing what we “know is the right thing to do” and more on “discovering what generates the greatest success for learners.” The idea of scientist thinking is critical in teaching as it is rare for a strategy or practice to be best for all learners. Tweaking is almost always necessary. Now is a great time for teachers to see the coach as a support for scientist thinking. Gathering evidence about what is happening and reflecting on what it might mean. Currently, coaches are hearing from some teachers that they don’t have time or energy for coaching. The phrase is often, “Not one more thing.” Actually, most teachers are in full “tweaking” mode as they address students’ issues and needs that they haven’t faced previously. It is a time for scientist thinking and a supportive coach can help build teacher confidence.

On the topic of confidence, Grant writes, “Confidence is a measure of how much you believe in yourself. Evidence shows that’s distinct from how much you believe in your methods. You can be confident in your ability to achieve a goal in the future while maintaining the humility to question whether you have the right tools in the present. That’s the sweet spot of confidence.” (Think Again, pg 46)

I have written blogs and posted podcasts on building teachers’ professional growth plans and professional learning community goals around hypotheses and evidence collection.

I was initially pointed in that direction from an article by Jean Ross, in the Sloan Management review from MIT, “Why Hypotheses Beat Goals.” She suggests that instead of asking “What is Your Goal?” we ask, “What is Your Hypothesis?” She states, “Hypotheses can force individuals to articulate in advance why they believe a given course of action will succeed. A failure that exposes an incorrect hypothesis can more readily convert into organizational learning.”

Learning. That was the word that I knew should be our focus. Organizational learning; even better. My experiences illustrated that too often goals that were met or not met, didn’t produce individual or organizational learning. Ross described an example from 7-11 stores in Japan. Sales clerks were asked to form a hypothesis about what to place for sale on their shelves that would increase sales and profits. Counselors checking back asked three questions:

• What did you hypothesize?
• How did you do?
• How will you do better? (In effect, what do you think you learned)

Data was important for the clerks to learn from their process.

As I explored hypotheses in professional growth plans, I realized that the collection of evidence was critical for reflection that would lead to learning. Learning, even if the hypothesis didn’t achieve the desired outcome.

Here is a teacher’s hypothesis:

I think that students persevering and attempting to solve a problem when it appears to be “something they don’t know how to do” would result in increased math results. Providing increased experiences in solving problems collaboratively and independently should create this mindset.

Her plan:

I will create some time each week to engage in a “problem-solving event.” I’ll look to create a game-like/fun-challenging atmosphere around the activity. Students will be encouraged to find or create challenges for classmates.

The evidence she is planning to gather:

• Sample challenge problems
• I will record my observations and conscious decisions twice a month throughout the year
• Student math scores on year-end assessments
• My conclusion of insights gained from the process

I have been encouraged that the collection of evidence throughout this process creates the reflection that will promote teacher learning and growth. These experiences being shared among staff provides continuous professional learning. Too often in the past, the only evidence collected tended to be whether or not the outcome goal was achieved. That limited reflection and insights. Collecting evidence on changes the teacher implemented and how students’ learning behaviors changed promotes reflection and learning. It also sets the process for modifying the plan along the way as insights emerged.

While I have been sharing and describing the possibilities of those modifications along the way, I think a new insight is emerging for me. Iterations! Professional growth plans for individual educators as well as PLC teams should probably build in the expectation that the plan is an initial iteration. There is an expectation that learning, from success or failure experiences, leads to the next iteration that uses the initial learning to create increased success.

In the first 3 minutes of this video, Simon Sinek illustrates why innovation or progress requires failing. “If you aren’t failing, you probably not pushing very hard.” In other words, there isn’t much challenge to what you are looking to make happen.

Sinek suggests that we might replace the word failure, since some people relate it to catastrophe, with falling. When learning to ride a bike, you don’t fail but rather fall. And get back up and go again. Next iteration. In their book Empower: What Happens When Students Own Their Own Learning, Spencer and Juliani suggest replacing failure (noun) with failing (verb). Failure is permanent and failing is temporary… part of a process.

I think I am ready for the next iteration of a professional growth plan design. Up to this point, I have been sharing that as one gathers evidence while implementing the plan based on the hypothesis, there may be discoveries that lead to modification. I am now thinking that an expectation for iterations is built into the plan. As teachers shared iterations with their colleagues, they would be exchanging their insights and triggering shared learning. Teachers engaged in the process would be experiencing a learning approach that we want for students.

I recently facilitated, virtually, a high school leadership team that was exploring their goals at the start of a new year. Before the meeting, they had sent me information that their focus points for the year were:

• establishing relationships with students,
• creating meaningful and challenging lessons, and
• making connections with students.

They stated that their goals for the year were:

• to improve students’ academic performance, and
• make learning meaningful and purposeful.

My plan was to have the team agree upon hypotheses that would drive the formation of the leadership team’s actions.

Jean Ross, in Why Hypotheses Beat Goals suggested that instead of asking, what is your goal? We should be asking, what is your hypothesis? By forming a hypothesis, we articulate in advance, why we believe a given course of action will lead to the success that we seek.

I took the information that the school had shared with me and formed two hypotheses to offer to the team for their discussion, reframing, and rewording if necessary.

Teachers building strong student relationships increases students being known and knowing that they are known. This creates students’ willingness to be vulnerable in setting goals and working to achieve them.

This proposed hypothesis was discussed, and personal examples were shared by members of the team. Individually and collectively, they agreed with the hypothesis as it was stated.

Teachers using knowledge about individual students to guide the selection of challenging learning tasks would increase students’ investments in learning, producing improved academic performance.

Again, team conversation reinforced agreement around this hypothesis.

These hypotheses can now be shared and explored with the staff, uncovering the degree of agreement that exists around the validity of the statements. The hypotheses being made public creates a form of transparency. The staff can now be looking for the leadership team to have continuous alignment between the hypotheses and their leadership behaviors.

With agreement on these hypotheses, the team now explored actions that the leadership team would take. Regarding building relationships, we examined:

• What is already in place to encourage and support teachers in how they begin this year with a focus on student relationships?
• What expectations does the team have for teachers?
• How should leaders communicate those expectations?

The team began exploring the support that the staff would need to take action on building student relationships virtually. Each leader was able to identify some teachers who have historically excelled at relationship building and discussed how these “expert relationship builders” could become a resource for other members of the staff. They examined a recommendation from CASEL about using a five-minute chat  with students held early in the year to increase teachers’ knowledge about students, especially uncovering what students’ experiences had been in the pandemic. In this community, COVID-19 had a severe impact on many and therefore a negative impact on many students. The possibility emerged that the administrators might use a similar model of the five- minute chat with teachers within their departments.

The team then explored the second hypothesis concerning teachers’ selection of challenging, personalized learning tasks that were influenced by their knowledge of students.

They began by identifying where challenging, personalized learning tasks had been present for students both before Covid-19 and during the quarantine and where these personalized challenging tasks had historically been missing. To identify expectations, these leaders discussed what challenging personalized learning might look like during virtual learning and what possibilities would exist as the district moves from virtual to a hybrid model and eventually to all students back at the school.

As the team reached consensus on the hypotheses behind their goals and the pictures of what implementation would sound like and look like, they were ready to focus on their needed leadership actions. Each member of the team was asked to bring their responses to the following questions to the next leadership team meeting:

• What are the most important leadership behaviors for us to be implementing in the coming weeks, individually and collectively?
• What should our leadership focus be during the time that the district is working in a virtual model?
• What expectations should we have of each other?
• What commitments are we prepared to make to each other?

Consider how your leadership team might gain from formalizing and sharing two or three hypotheses that are driving your team’s actions and decisions. Feel free to contact me if you’d like to discuss your team’s hypotheses. Often, someone listening to your explanation can assist in clarifying the message. I’d be happy to listen and to help facilitate your thinking.

Photo by Allison Shelley for American Education: Images of Teachers and Students in Action