Larry Machi—Analyzing and Synthesizing Research—Making Leadership Theory Apply to the Real World

[00:01] Justin Baeder:

Welcome to Principal Center Radio, bringing you the best in professional practice.

[00:06] Announcer:

Here's your host, Director of the Principal Center and Champion of High Performance Instructional Leadership, Justin Baeder. Welcome everyone to Principal Center Radio.

[00:15] Larry Machi:

I'm your host, Justin Baeder, and I'm honored to be joined today by my guest, Dr. Larry Mackey. Dr. Mackey is a Professor Emeritus of Organizational Leadership at the University of La Verne in California. and is the author of The Literature Review, Six Steps to Success. He currently serves as a Fulbright specialist and has done consulting work on organizational change and leadership in the U.S. as well as in Taiwan and Vietnam and with school districts around the state of California.

[00:43] Announcer:

And now, our feature presentation.

[00:46] Larry Machi:

Larry, welcome to Principal Center Radio.

[00:47] Larry Machi:

Justin, thanks for having me.

[00:48] Larry Machi:

At the time we're recording this, I am a doc student and am myself working on my dissertation. So I have ordered your book and will be using that to put together my literature review for my dissertation. But we thought since many of our listeners either have already done that or are not working on that at this particular time, we thought rather than talk about literature reviews particularly, we would talk about research more broadly and how we can apply research in our professional work as school leaders. So thanks very much for joining me today.

[01:18] Larry Machi:

You're welcome. I think I'd like to start by something we talked about a bit earlier, and that's the idea of the use of buzzwords or catchphrases. You know, today's principles are being deluged by numerous initiatives, more than ever before in my 50-year history. some of these are policy-based, some emanate from the profession itself. These ideas like evidence-based research or personalized instruction, authentic leadership, transformational change, higher level thinking skills, the list goes on and on. And these buzzwords really become a marquee for their intent and meaning, but they lose their sense of meaning in the translation.

[01:56]

I think there's a huge problem with them. And This becomes part and parcel of what I think our topic was about because you've got to delve much deeper into the marketing of these buzzwords to get their real meaning and their true application. It seems to me that as these catchphrases come into vogue and they're used more frequently, they often have little or any of their original meaning left to the point where we ask the question, what the heck do they mean and what do they mean to me? So I think part and parcel of the discussion this morning should be about how we react to those, and how we might be able to gain meaning from them. In some cases, it's an important issue for a principal to be able to translate these because they, in many cases today, are mandates.

[02:41] Larry Machi:

Absolutely. And I think often what happens is a great idea comes from a researcher or a big thinker. I think probably aside from specific researchers with a very focused expertise, probably our big picture source tends to be Michael Follin. We get Michael Follin ideas and then we turn them into buzzwords five years later that have no resemblance to what Michael Follin was actually talking about. And I've come across this idea on multiple fronts recently. My friend Annie Murphy-Paul, who is a science writer, linked to an article that I sent out to my email list and had some kind of pointed thoughts on this myself.

[03:16]

But Benjamin Riley, who writes for EdSurge and is the executive director of Deans for Impact, had an article a number of years back critical of the idea of personalized learning, if we mean by personalized learning, the idea of sitting kids at computers and having them teach themselves. And he said, you know, what started out as a good idea and what I think still is a good idea, when it gets turned into a buzzword or turned into a catchphrase, and I'm quoting here, he says, ìWhat's really happening is that the idea is being treated as an empty vessel.î into which one may pour any number of competing theories of learning or favorite education policies. A term that can mean anything often signifies nothing, end quote.

[04:00] Larry Machi:

Right. I think that my point would be we were doing some work on critical thinking. There's another term that if you want to try to unpack that one, you're going to find a lot of different interpretations. We're starting to write a book on that issue as well. I think it reminds me of the quote that Voltaire had, that common sense is not so common. And I think buzzwords are very much like that.

[04:22]

Everybody seems to know what they mean, but nobody has a common understanding of what their definition is.

[04:28] Larry Machi:

Absolutely. And, and, you know, I can think of so many examples recently. And often, if you go to some of the bigger education conferences, like ASCD, you'll hear people like Carol Dweck respond to the the reception of her work, obviously, Carol Dweck from Stanford, who came up with the, you know, the concept of growth mindset versus fixed mindset, which we've been applying in education for years, in many cases, without actually having read Dr. Dweck's actual research. And, you Just hearing the ways that that gets misinterpreted or gets turned into slogans, I think, really does make us pause and say, hey, we've really got to get into this. One that, in addition to personalized learning, one that I've been thinking about a lot lately is the idea of grit.

[05:12]

We've had this kind of... interest in grit and other, you know, what we've called non-cognitive skills for a number of years. And recently on Principal Center Radio, I spoke with Paul Tuff, who produced a few stories for This American Life about Harlem Children's Zone and some of the work that's being done by Joffrey Canada to help students develop resilience. And he's visited many, many schools and really kind of unpack this idea of grit that explains why some students are able to kind of persevere and, you know, finish their education and work hard when other students who seem to have similar resources, who seem to have similar background characteristics, you know, aren't making that same level of progress.

[05:51]

And he's identified grit as one of the kind of – distinguishing characteristics. But in education, what's really interesting to me is that even before reading any of the research, we've decided that it's a great idea to teach grit and to evaluate schools. I know there's a California consortium that was recently trying to evaluate schools and teachers and students based on grit and other non-cognitive factors that were measured through self-assessments. And Angela Duckworth saw that and said, no, you can't use a self-assessment for accountability purposes. That doesn't make any sense. So we're constantly having to kind of backpedal and return to the source and say, wait, what are we doing here?

[06:32]

But I'm struck by the importance and the power of getting into that original research and And in doing a literature review, obviously that's something that we actually have to do. You know, you can't just read textbooks and figure out what sources they cite and then do a literature review. You have to actually go to those sources. So I wonder if you could give me some fodder here for how we do that as a profession, because I feel like we've kind of outsourced that a little bit and it's not working for us.

[07:00] Larry Machi:

Right. I think you're correct. And I think there's many reasons for that, maybe for another time to talk about it. But there is a a fundamental issue here for the principal and that is that, uh, you have to ask the question, do you want to be proactive or reactive? Do you have the reason to learn? Uh, and I, I think for me, uh, there, there are, um, uh, some assumptions here.

[07:25]

I think the principals who are listening to this program see themselves as leaders and want to become better at it. So there's that sense about, I need to know, uh, And old John Dewey called it apprehension, that there's a certain need that I need to know, and I need to know for a reason. I want to create a change, and I need to know how to make that happen. So this is a very proactive thing that I'm doing. It is very proactive for myself and for others. Having said that, without that kind of an idea, then I can be an empty vessel, because if I have no particular reason or direction to go anywhere, anywhere is fine, as Yogi Berra used to say.

[08:06]

So consequently, the idea of digging into it, unpacking, as you suggested, the idea of being able to analyze what is really being said and take that and synthesize what that means. And I want to talk about those two terms, too, because those are buzzwords. And I think you've said it correctly. Unless you define something and are able to see it, you don't know it. And all theory is abstract. And in its abstraction, I have one view.

[08:35]

And in its concrete form, I have another. And that's the issue that a principal, a leader in the field has got to make that translation, has got to make that conversion. Because taking an abstract notion, as you suggested, grit, great idea. And we can describe it in some ways. But the question is, when I'm looking at it, how does it play on my main street? No one size fits all.

[09:02]

We are human beings, and each one of us has our own unique style, our own unique capability, our own DNA. Why do we believe that it's so easy just to blanket something and expect that we're going to get a result that is going to be satisfactory? So the real issue for the principal is to be able to analyze to be able to synthesize in such a way that the application can be made to their particular corner of the world. It's not a nice thing to do. It's a requirement. Having said that, let's take a look at the term analysis.

[09:38]

What that really means is that I've got to unpack something, like you said. I've got to see each part. I've got to see how each part works and how it functions and how it might play out, how I can image it, imagine it, work together. terms of where I am the term synthesis does not mean summary it means cause and effect if in fact I am going to do this thing this principle then what is the effect of that as it plays out in the work that I'm doing so synthesis is not a summary Synthesis is taking a look at if this, then this. That's what synthesis means in a logical way. And so if you take a look at Bloom's taxonomy, that's what it means there.

[10:27]

Having said that, if a principle is going to take a catch word or a buzz phrase, the first question is, what the heck does that mean? Now, I got to go find that out. Michael Fullan is going to give me a definition as he sees it. Larry Maki is going to give you a definition as I see it. For the principle is proactive, all of that's good information, but I've got to translate it into how I see it and be able to translate it in such a way that I can allow others to see what I see.

[11:01]

So analysis is about being able to see it so clearly that I understand it to the ability that I can explain it to another and actually can act on it. And synthesis is the ability to Understand it in such a way that I can understand its implications, how it's actually going to play out on my main street. So analysis and synthesis are really about those two things. These are not things that I just do in the hollow halls of university. These are things that I employ in my everyday life. That's what critical thinking and critical decision making is about.

[11:35]

So it's not the old age. And I know that there'll be principals listening and saying, you know, it'd be great if I had the hours necessary to be able to go do a literature review on everything. If I could do that, that would be great. I don't have the time. Well, there's a whole bunch about how to make time or how to be able to do this in such a way that you can expedite it. But I can't say this much.

[12:03]

As my old friend Bill Beerly used to say, We never have enough time to do it right the first time, but we have always enough time to do it over and over again. So I guess where I'm coming from is principles have to be able to understand that if they're trying to create theory to practice, they've got to take the time to do the analysis and synthesis that's necessary to be able to translate it to their unique circumstance. They're the only ones that can do that. I want to say this, that when you take a look at innovation and change in schools, it happens from the bottom up. It doesn't happen from the top down. And if you take a look at the research about who makes that happen, the principle is the key element to successful change and successful innovation in schools.

[12:54]

Now, we can argue about how their leadership styles and all that work, and that's for another time. But the fact is, what they do ignites the capability to create those changes. So it is incumbent upon principals who have that noble task to be able to do the homework necessary in terms of analysis and synthesis to figure out What in the wide world do I look at in such a way that I can find a direction? Because theory really is a predictor. It's to say, if you do this and this happens, what theory out there will help me understand how I can make something successful work? The only other course is that I say to myself, I'll do what I've experienced or I'll do what I've always known.

[13:41] Larry Machi:

I love your definition of analysis and synthesis there, and especially thinking about synthesis as putting together and understanding the cause and effect relationships. One thing that I work with schools on doing is helping them in their strategic planning, not just set goals, not just write a strategic plan that says we're going to implement best practices A, B, C, and D, but to actually connect them together in what I call an improvement map and that specifies, you know, what do we actually believe are the cause and effect relationships? Because what I see happening, Larry, too often is we're aware of what has been found by our profession generally, or maybe by some research that we're aware of, to be a best practice. And then we take that phrase of best practice and we say, okay, that's basically all we need to know. If this is the best practice, we should do it.

[14:32]

And I think the reality is in organizations as complex as schools, it doesn't work that way. We have to actually understand how something is going to play out. And if I think of any best practice, quote unquote, that has backfired, it's often because we haven't looked at those cause and effect relationships in the context of our specific school. So I totally agree with you that principals do play an absolutely critical role in in making application to you know to our specific organizational context and looking at the the literature looking at the the research that's been done and figuring out what are those relationships what is going to work in our school and you know another layer that I like to add on to that is under what conditions Because I think it's very frustrating for educators to be told that something works, and then they do something that they think is that thing, and then it doesn't work.

[15:24]

And we get frustrated, and then we move on to something else, roll on to the next initiative, and don't take the time to consider what worked and why, and what didn't work and why, and what are the actual conditions under which this practice is supposed to work, regardless of which practice we're talking about.

[15:40] Larry Machi:

I think you make a very good point there. If you take a look at what we have done as a nation over the last 50 years, you watch us do initiative. We're very big on initiating them and executing them. We're terrible at asking the question, why didn't they work? And gaining knowledge from that. There is more knowledge and innovation about what didn't work than there is knowledge about what does work, particularly at the beginning of any innovation.

[16:04]

I worry about our ability to be innovative because we do not have the grit, if you want to use your term, necessary, the resilience necessary to plunge through issues of failure in order to get to success. And if you take a look at innovations that have been sustained, it's about that. And so consequently, the idea of what I call learning to act and from action to learn. becomes a critical loop and the learning loops are not new. They have not been used very well in education. They've been used in a lot of other fields extremely well, but not in education.

[16:42]

We don't take the time to evaluate what did we do? How did it work and what do we do next? You do not get success in an innovation the first try. I just don't believe that. But by trying over and over again, eventually you find that one loop leads to another to the point where it takes you to the direction where this change can, in fact, be successful. So the idea that a principal just does analysis and synthesis is good enough to get you in the game.

[17:15]

But the idea of being able to do a synthesis and analysis of what I did is also required in order to understand, well, You know, first thing is, what am I going to do versus what did I do? Most times, those two things are different. And so you need to know, well, I thought I was going to count six red pens, but instead I counted five blue ones. Well, that's not what you said you were going to do. So you've got to think through that. What did I do?

[17:48]

And how did it work? What worked? What didn't work? Do the comparisons and contrasts about that. And ask the question, if I see all of this, what's my next best bet? This gives us the ability to constantly change.

[18:00]

It gives us permission to say, what do we do next? I've been involved in a number of major initiatives in my career, initiatives that I won't bore you with, ones that were somewhat spectacular in some cases as a youngster. And it was always about the play of being able to say, well, God, that didn't work. Let's try this. Eventually, we come up with something. You go, I don't know how I got here.

[18:24]

But unless I kept on thinking through these loops and saying that didn't work, let's do something else. We would have never had it. I would accuse the education field today of not being resilient, of not being persistent, not being resilient and persistent, as well as not being analytical and skeptical about what you're going to do. Those things are those higher level thinking skills you're talking about. And maybe perhaps we as professionals have to become a bit more critical in our own work rather than just picking up, as you said before, you know, the next best thing. The education industry has made a fortune over the last 70 years developing these next best things.

[19:11]

I'm not saying that they're wrong. And I'm not saying that they don't have capability. What I am saying is it's taken the critical thinking away from the people in the field that actually have to execute it. And until the people in the field, those teachers and those principals in every one of those schools out there, are able to think on their own and be able to translate these concepts to their particular context, I'm not sure we're going to get the change we want.

[19:40] Larry Machi:

I think that's a critical responsibility. I'm reminded of going to a conference a couple years ago, not too many years ago, but after Common Core had been kind of rolled out nationally, and all the textbook publishers had new stickers on their textbooks. that said Common Core Aligned. And I actually heard some of the publishers making fun of the other publishers for just putting stickers on their books that said Common Core Aligned. But yeah, I think we've got to take responsibility for looking at what that means in context, for looking at what we've tried that has worked as well as what haven't worked. And I wanted to jump back to that idea of kind of learning from failure.

[20:19]

One of the best books I've read so far this year on improvement is called Learning to Improve How America's Schools Can Get Better at Getting Better by Anthony Brick and his colleagues. And they talk about improvement science. And a lot of this research comes out of Toyota and the Toyota manufacturing system and how they learn from failure. When they have a problem, they not only fix the problem, they learn how to prevent problems like that from happening in the future. And it really creates an organizational learning loop. as you mentioned, that is incredibly powerful.

[20:53]

But they say that variation in performance, especially at the beginning, as you highlighted a moment ago, is one of our best resources for organizational learning and for improvement. If we look at a quote-unquote best practice and we find that in some classrooms it's working fabulously well and in other classrooms it's counterproductive, Well, that's not a reason to say, well, everybody, you go decide on your own whether you want to do this or not. We're moving on to the next initiative. That's a reason to say, let's look at what's working in the classroom where it's working and what's different in the classrooms where it's not working. And one of my favorite examples of that that I've come across is about the newer math curriculum. We've got this kind of ongoing war about math curriculum and whether it's better to teach traditional algorithms and computational fluency or whether we should be teaching these Alternate algorithms and deeper problem-solving strategies that are confusing to parents, and then they post on Facebook that they hate our new Common Core math.

[21:51]

And one of the things that I recall from my days as a principal was kind of a struggle for us was, Figuring out which model we were executing. So we had the old textbooks that we were no longer using, and we had the new curriculum that was kind of a spiral curriculum teaching all these different algorithms, less teaching to mastery. And we kept the old textbooks around, you know, because we didn't have anything better to do with them. And we found that in a lot of classrooms, the lessons were going great, the new materials were very engaging, teachers liked them, students liked them, and yet students weren't mastering the concepts in each lesson because they weren't really supposed to. It was a spiral curriculum. They'd have multiple introductions to each topic.

[22:36]

And what we found in classrooms where it was really creating kind of a pacing problem and really just, you know, the new curriculum was being seen as kind of a disaster. So we realized that they were still using the old textbook as well as the new curriculum. So we had to look at that variation and say, what we're really doing here is two competing models that can't live side by side. You know, we've got to actually get clear on our plan here. We've got to get clear on why this is supposed to work. Why, if we're teaching math in this new way, what is it about that that makes it work?

[23:09]

And let's make sure we're not undermining that by keeping a foot in the old model as well.

[23:14] Larry Machi:

There are a couple of things that I pick up from your conversation. The first is you have people who are not reacting but are proacting. You have, in my understanding, in my own experience as a principal, as well as watching others in both informal and formal research kinds of situations, principals who allow their teachers the opportunity to be co-creating with them, analyzing everything together, As an objective issue rather than a subjective issue and trying to be able to say, what are we learning from this thing? Again, those three questions, what did we do? How did it work? And what do we want to do next?

[23:54]

And really doing that kind of analysis, that is the secret to innovation. That is the secret to innovation, and those are the learning loops required to be able to make it happen. The other thing, too, is that we shouldn't lose sight of the idea that John Dewey spent a tremendous amount of time suggesting to teachers. A teacher, in order to be successful, as I said, has to be able to get the apprehension of the students in order before they can get anything done. What he meant by apprehension was the ability to connect to the student, to their personal capability, their ability to want to know something. their need to want to know.

[24:31]

And Dewey's position was, unless you connect to that individual's need to want to know something, you're going to miss the mark. So part and parcel of all of this is going back to, so what do the students, you know, what's going to get those students to be able to want to know this? We often, particularly over the last 20 years, have lost the sight of the fact that I believe that every one of us has a free will. We can choose to learn or not to. If that's true, that particular variable is the mediating variable that will, in fact, ultimately determine whether an initiative is going to be successful or not. So, you know, the real work that's being done in schools is not being done by the teachers.

[25:15]

The teachers are managing that work. The real work that's being done in the school is being done by the students. And so I guess what I'm trying to suggest is in all of this conversation, we have to ask the question, and how are the students reacting to this? Are they wanting to need to know? There's a whole magic about teachers that are able to create that. And I've seen three or four in my life, and I wish that I could be even close to what they were able to do to get at that concept of apprehension where students would follow them anywhere and do amazing things.

[25:47]

So I think all of those things, as you said, schools are very complicated. They're complex. And to suggest that there's some general elixir or panacea by which we just whip down on the schools and if you do these five things, everything's going to be fine, I think it's a bit simplistic.

[26:04] Larry Machi:

And what it comes down to, to me, is respecting teaching as intellectual work. You know, that if we just tell teachers, okay, here's the new best practice, here's the new standard, here's the new thing you're supposed to do because research says so and it's best practice. You know, what we're doing is we're taking away that thinking. We're taking away that responsibility for guiding students in doing that work that really is at the core of schooling. And I want to again quote Benjamin Riley. He's got an article that I'll link to on EdSurge recently about personalized learning and kind of that whole topic that we've been discussing of turning something into a buzzword.

[26:42]

And he talks about cognitive science and his fanship of Daniel Willingham's writing and research. And he's actually quoting someone else here about... bringing intellectualism back to the profession, a return to teaching as an intellectual endeavor. And I think for a variety of reasons, we've not done a great job of that as a profession.

[27:05]

But I think one of the great things about the time we live in is that it's easier to fix that now than it's ever been before. So what are some of your thoughts on how we can bring back that intellectual aspect of teaching, you know, as kind of a core element of professionalism, a core way of how we work as leaders with the teachers who are responsible for working with our students?

[27:29] Larry Machi:

OK, well, you know, I'm old enough to be able to understand what you said and practiced it and know what it looks like. And it's been a good half century. And I worry about that because what we're doing today is treating teachers to accept whatever comes from the top rather than to engage in their self-understanding of something. Again, analysis and synthesis. The idea of me as a teacher going into a classroom suggesting to myself, I am responsible for how students the conduct that this room's going to act and whether or not I have done what is necessary to help students learn. And it's not I'm following the 10 points from the best practices that I went to a workshop and was told to do.

[28:15]

Again, I'm not suggesting those best practices are bad, but The idea of intellectualism by its definition is a certain skepticism on the part of the individual, which I am not skeptical of yes or no, but skeptical on how it works. The discerning eye. Intellectualism is about that. That I just don't take things at their face value. That I say, I have a responsibility to this. I want to add another piece to this.

[28:42]

There's a theory called the social construction of reality, which suggests that that life isn't linear or cyclical. The fact of the matter is we're creating it all the time by what we do and say. If that's true, then there is a certain kind of an outcome that we're almost predestining. If in fact, I say have no control of something, then I don't. And so I guess when you get at the word intellectualism, there is that certain first thing is that I am responsible and I take responsibility. The second part of it is, How do we process that in a way that we together, because teachers work together, they tend not to want to be isolated.

[29:25]

And if they're isolated, that's a whole separate problem because that's not a normal fact for teachers in schools. I think when you look at the idea of how we work together in such a way that we're creating that change, we go back to the concept of what Chris Argyris and Don Schoen talked about, doing a learning loop. And a learning loop isn't something outside. It's like a strategic plan. A strategic plan isn't something I do over here, and then I leave it over there and I go do something else. The fact is that strategic planning and developing what are called learning loops, which is called action learning, are ways by which teachers can intellectually pursue in a scientifically based way, if you want to use that term, intellectually pursue their own work in the field, in their school, on a regular basis as a way of being able to create innovation and create change.

[30:21]

And it's done by simply doing what we talked about before. You sit down and ask the question, what have we been doing? What do we want to do next? And then we lay out exactly what that is And from that point, we do it, and then we are asking on a regular basis, not once a year, for good God's sakes. We'll talk about that in a second. But we're doing on a regular basis.

[30:45]

When I, as a principal, was doing it, it was once a week. What do we do? How did it work? What do we want to do next? We are keeping ourselves informed about what's going on because we're creating that future as we go and we want to be able to direct it. The idea that we're going to do an assessment to be accountable once a year to determine what we're going to do next is laughable.

[31:07]

It's been laughable since 1965 when it was first initiated. there's no formative aspect of that at all. You can say, what did I do and how did it work? But what do I do next? I have no idea because the people that I have tested are no longer there. There's a whole new group of people that have come in.

[31:26]

So I think what I've learned, even from the beginning as a young high school teacher, we ask these questions on a regular basis and we become the control of our destiny, right? Because we now know what's going on. We now know what we want to do next. And we're constantly working on improvement. It can only get better. So I think the intellectualism, as you suggest...

[31:55]

of bringing that back into schools and giving the teachers and principals power to make mistakes in order to create success is critically important. And once we're able to find a way to do that in such a way that many, many people are doing it, we'll find our way back to innovation.

[32:12] Larry Machi:

Well, and I think just making that the task, making what we might call organizational learning more central to the work, rather than implementing initiatives, rather than raising test scores, rather than just doing whatever is on hand. But really, I think making the improvement of the organization and the organizational learning the kind of ongoing centerpiece of our work, I think gives us that perspective that we need to persist through those experiments, through those failures. you know, and really allow that learning to accumulate.

[32:43] Larry Machi:

Yeah, I think there's an important part of this. The reason why we probably lost it the first place is we didn't bring our partners into the situation. I think you have to keep parents and your community involved with this to a degree where you can, what I learned as a superintendent, I also learned in other positions, you have to maintain the confidence of your community in order to be able to become competent. So it's not simply just going out and doing this whole scale, but you've got to bring people along That's a tough task. It's easier to define it and to say what it is than actually to do it. And the success in that really is something that will take some time.

[33:21]

Having said that, You start small and you build those from those baby steps and you keep on building that. And as you get success, success breeds success and it breeds confidence too. I learned a long time ago that you're a winner until you're a loser. And then you're a loser until you're a winner and you got to build on both of those situations. So there is, there is something on the outside. I wouldn't want to just keep this from the internal side of the situation.

[33:46]

But having said that, those learning loops are critically important. I think that, Bringing the professionalism, the ability of a teacher to be able to make decisions about the learning of children is critical. Bringing that back into the profession rather than being kind of apparatchiks to whatever the next policy is from wherever it comes from. We haven't been successful at top-down approaches in education in the United States yet. I think you can take a look at that with the exception of some programs, early childhood education comes to mind, where we've added on and we've built something, but top-down approaches have not been successful, and they haven't been successful in the last 10 years. They haven't been successful in the last 20 years.

[34:37]

They haven't been successful in the last 30 years. The fact is top-down approaches do not create a systemic change unless they're draconian. And top-down approaches are anathema to trying to create innovation and positive change in each of the schools. I think it's required from the bottom up.

[34:57] Larry Machi:

Yeah. Well, and I think that's a great place to end up, that we are the leaders we're looking for. The best place to solve this problem at the profession is – At our level, you know, when we look at what we're doing at the school level, what we're doing at the district level, you know, we might not be able to control the next federal policy to roll out. We might not be able to control the larger context. But what we can do is we can look at what we're doing as a school. We can look at the strategies that we're implementing, the research that we're coming to understand.

[35:28]

and engage in that intellectual work and really protect that work that teachers and students are doing from some of those outside forces. I think that's such a critical role for us to play as school-level leaders. Well, Larry, it has been a blast to talk with you about research and to kind of geek out a little bit about policy and how we actually implement policy in school. So, so great to talk to someone who lives in the academic world, but also in the practitioner world. And I really appreciate the way you've drawn on your experience as a school leader, as a district leader. as well as a researcher.

[36:04]

So again, the third edition of the Literature Review, Six Steps to Success is out now. It's in the mail on its way to me. And I just want to thank you again for joining me on Principal Center Radio. Been a pleasure to speak with you.

[36:16] Larry Machi:

It has been a grand time. I really appreciate you having me on. Thank you.

[36:20] Justin Baeder:

And now, Justin Baeder on high-performance instructional leadership.

[36:25] Larry Machi:

So high-performance instructional leaders, what did you take away from my conversation about research with Dr. Larry Mackey? One thing that stands out to me is the nature of teaching as intellectual work and how we've kind of gotten away from respecting that as a profession, that we've seen teaching in recent decades as something that is kind of a low-level task where people who are not paid particularly well do what people who are paid more than them and know more than them tell them to do. And I think we've gotten used to that idea as a profession to the point that we have created a vocabulary around doing things like implementing best practice and implementing with fidelity. I think sometimes when we use those important phrases, which have a place, sometimes what we're doing is we're removing that intellectual work from teachers.

[37:18]

And we're saying, you don't need to do that. Someone else has already thought about this for you. And I believe that that is fundamentally wrong. I believe that fundamentally, teaching is intellectual work. And we have to do that process of analysis and synthesis, as Larry and I discussed, of breaking down a strategy or a program or something. A bit of research that's been done and been popularized and figuring out what that actually looks like, what it actually means, and then synthesizing it, putting it back together and looking at the cause and effect relationships that we're seeing, that we're hypothesizing that we'll see so that we can actually figure out what to do in schools.

[37:55]

And I think if we don't do that, what we get instead is churn. We get initiative churn. We get initiative fatigue. We do one new thing and it kind of works. It kind of doesn't work. And then instead of figuring out how to learn from that variation, to learn from what's not working, and to get more of what's working, we just move on to something else.

[38:14]

So I really want to challenge us as a profession to take teaching seriously as intellectual work, to take the research seriously, to actually get into it, to actually read it, to share it with our teachers, to give them the homework of understanding that research, including in some cases primary sources. I want to refer you to especially Daniel Willingham's blog, and he's got some terrific books on cognitive science and how that applies in the work of teaching. We've got to understand this research. And I'll give you one more reference, one more resource that's incredibly helpful is the Marshall Memo by my friend Kim Marshall. And for 10 years now, he has been summarizing the best research, the best articles, and really getting into some of those issues that often we kind of turn into buzzwords. So I want to encourage you to subscribe to the Marshall Memo, to check out Daniel Willingham's work on cognitive science and education.

[39:06]

And don't be afraid of the research. Don't be afraid to get your teachers thinking and arguing about and analyzing and synthesizing that research because we've got to understand what we're doing. It's not enough to say, we know this is a best practice, therefore we're going to do it, therefore it should work. We have to understand it. We have to see how it all fits together. Thanks so much for joining me on Principal Center Radio.

[39:28]

Have a great day.

[39:29] Announcer:

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