About 8 more weeks of work left in the school year—sounds excellent
to me!
About this time of year I start wondering, “What have I left
undone? What should I do differently
between now and when that happy, final bell rings?”
So, I look at my students’ goals and objectives once more,
to see how I can help them be more independent with what they need to do in
school. My calendar gets a thorough
review, to find things I have left undone, and then schedule when I will do
them. I ponder whether or not I’ve recently
helped my fellow therapists on staff, to share ideas for summer home programs
or great resources for therapeutic activities.
There’s another area I don’t consider very often but it does
come to mind during our staff meetings when we discuss continuing education or
policies and procedures—how much am I contributing to our group
discussions? This may seem like small
change in the big picture of working in public schools, but it has a lot to do
with being a good team player. Frequently
I look around and notice that several therapists share information in almost
every staff meeting yet many other therapists rarely say a word. The latter folks are the very ones I go to
when I have a question about how to help a particularly needy student, and they
always have good advice. They are also
the ones who produce top-quality, relevant classroom and home programs. Why don’t they participate more in our group
discussions?
I think there are many reasons for their silence. First of all, they are using some of the time
to write their progress notes. In any
discussion there is some down time, and that’s when I see them hard at work finishing
up their notes. Second, they tend to not
be the type of person who anxiously waits to interject their comments into a
discussion. They’re happy to let others do
the driving. Finally, they want to help
our boss keep the discussion down to a reasonable length of time and they know
that by offering their thoughts, it may send the more loquacious members of our
staff into new tangents.
So, am I offering too much input into staff meetings, too
little or is it “just right?” Am I doing
my fair share or perhaps taking turns away from others who have something to
contribute? There’s a simple way I’ve
used during meetings to find out.
When the meeting gets underway, I wait for the first comment
and write down that person’s initials.
Later on, when they make their next comment—even a brief one--I start a
tally next to their initials. This
continues with each person, except my boss, who speaks during the meeting. I figure my boss can have as many turns as
she needs.
At the end of the meeting I tally up how many turns I’ve had
and compare the sum to the average number of comments made by everyone present
at the meeting, including the folks who made zero comments. That way I can see if I’ve been a little too
talkative or if I might have contributed more.
Not every meeting topic is the same so it would be crazy to think a
person would offer the same amount of comments at every meeting, right?
Where would you fall if your number of comments was ranked this
way? Are you speaking up and sharing
your experiences and concerns? Are you
dominating the discussion?
There are all kinds of ways for us to continue developing
our teams and our professionalism. I
challenge you to count your “turns” in a meeting you frequently attend and
analyze your input—not just frequency but quality. Your colleagues just might appreciate it.
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