Personalized Learning | Education Elements | Classrooms
Last week, I got the opportunity to get out in the field and participate in one of our teaching trainings with the inspiring educators at Uinta School District 1 in Evanston, WY. As I was driving through the beautiful rolling hills and mountains of Utah and Wyoming with my colleague Keara, we turned to the radio for some inspirational road trip jams.
First stop was a 90s-themed Sirius radio station that kind of fit my needs and sort of addressed Keara’s musical taste but was not perfect for either of us. Second stop was a streaming radio station based on my Spotify preferences - it came close to fitting all my needs since it was personalized to my tastes but, again, missed the mark for Keara. Third stop was my road trip playlist - the most time consuming to make and most personalized to my needs (sorry, Keara). This spectrum of personalization in music mirrors the spectrum of personalization in our classrooms and even our work organizations.
As you might have guessed, music is a key part of who I am and how I understand the world around me. If I were a student creating a Personalized Learning Plan in your classroom, music would be my guiding theme, just as it is for my work fostering culture and people at Education Elements.
As Education Elements’ people and culture manager, I spend most of my time bolstering our in-house team, making sure we have the structure and supports in place so our team can thrive in an environment that fosters the same responsive and innovative practices we ask of our schools. Education Elements truly is the sum of its parts, and each of our team members builds who we are as a responsive, evolving organism that is partnering with districts to tackle a huge task of implementing personalized learning.
This work is so satisfying but it can be daunting. Sometimes I feel like a teacher trying to personalize learning for 45 students at once! How can I use my limited bandwidth to create a work environment that fits the needs of each employee and allows them to grow and develop? There’s not enough time in the day to make a personal playlist to address the needs of every employee in our organization. So, like our teachers, I rely on tools and best practices to create an environment where our team can be active participants in their own journey at Education Elements.
Check out my personalized learning mixed tape (playlist) that reflects how I use personalized learning practices to help build a vibrant work environment at EE:
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Theme of my personalized learning journey today - Heard it on the radio - The bird and the bee (Hall and Oates)
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Experience and Project Based Learning - Dream on - Depeche Mode
At Education Elements, we create opportunities for team members to learn in the field and gain a cross functional perspective on their work. My trip to Uinta was one of these valuable experiences. If you work on Highlight, then you should go to a school site and see our work in action!
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Learning Organization - Teacher - Nick Jonas
Our team is full of former educators and life-long learners, so we create environments and opportunities to learn new tools, skills, and even take different roles outside our daily workload to keep our educational mindset first.
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Collaborative Work Stations - Team - Lorde
Our work environment mirrors our collaborative culture. We sit in a big open office and have many different places around the office for people to meet in small groups or spend time away from their desks.
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Self Direction - Maps - Yeah Yeah Yeahs
Team members have a large amount of agency to guide their work based on their skills and interests. A role on our Client Services team, for example, might look different from person to person based on whether you are interested in research, customer support or technical work.
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Employee Initiated Projects - Just Say Yes - The Cure
We encourage our team to identify their interests and run with them. If you want to start a running club or discussion group on competency based learning, go for it!
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Data Driven Decision Making - Transmission - Joy Division
We check in with our team using exit tickets, surveys and lots of open communication to make sure we have the right data points to see if what we are doing is satisfying our goals.
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Adaptive - Elastic Heart - Sia
We change things up! If the data shows we need to adapt and iterate, we do. We are constantly learning and evolving as individuals and an organization.
If you want to talk more about our vibrant culture at Education Elements or just talk about music, reach out to me on Twitter @lizzkopp or email me at liz@edelements.com.
