Thinking Clearly: metaphor as an aid to complex reasoning

These notes were prepared for a discussion about future leadership development. They will be incorporated into a forthcoming article. The notes suggest that a new metaphor is needed to replace "organisation" and "community" if a focus on evidence of practice is desired. Concentrating on an examination of interactions is suggested.

I have decided to make this material more readily available. As a consequence the Conceptual Job Description, complete with standards and a goals page is here as a booklet, printer ready, for download. The printed pages are arranged for back-to-back photocopying into a eight page booklet. The CJD supports the view that teaching and learning is predominately, an intellectual process. It was the index and the organiser for the original Digital Portfolio Program. It has now been replaced with templates based around Interactions.

How to school leaders know that policy is put into practice? This paper describes how Digital Teacher Portfolio can encapsulate the double purpose of a learning tool and a form of communication within the learning community.

If principals were to use the Digital Portfolio process then it would also be possible to link aspects of professional development and accreditation to this concept. This paper describes a small study where groups of principals experimented in this way and enjoyed high quality professional interchange at the same time. Implications of this kind of collaboration are explored.

This short paper asks the question, Can you develop a principal? It was an address to APPA June 10 2004 as part of a seminar to debate recent initiatives in the field. The proposition is argued that principals need to take conrol over their own development if a critical reflective perspective is valued.