I believe this one sentence has the
power to change the world I invite you
to consider the possibilities an
invitation can be that spark to ignite
purposeful and positive change and today
I’d like to share a story with you where
I experienced this and encourage you to
look for opportunities in your own life
where an invitation just might be the
start to a significant shift so I don’t
know about you but I’m not a fan of
being told what to do and I think that’s
why the idea of an invitation resonates
with me so strongly when I hear things
like you should you can’t we can’t and
my most dreaded it’s just the way it is
we’ve always done it this way I
literally feel a cringe inside my body
and how does it feel when we’re given
important information with no
opportunity for discussion no questions
it’s just the way it is how does that
make us feel maybe a little bit shut
down powerless not exactly a positive
start when you’re trying to enroll
someone in an idea or start a
conversation towards meaningful change
now let’s consider an invitation an
invitation offers choice possibility and
most importantly an invitation includes
others and when we warmly welcome the
thoughts feelings and experiences of
others then we could move from
possibility to doable – yeah this is
happening change is happening so my
story today comes from my grade 1
classroom in 2014 when I had the
opportunity to meet a young boy named
Hayden and his grandparents who were his
new legal guardians and working with
Hayden and his family touched my heart
in a in a really profound way and it
forever changed the way I look at not
only teaching and learning but
challenges so this is a young boy who
was rescued and I do use that word
purposely along with his two brothers
from a life that no one here wants to
imagine children live a life that no
parent ever plans for their child but
due to circumstances he and his two
brothers were in need of a new
safe home so his grandparents took in
all three boys and moved them across the
country so a pretty big changes for this
family and I was working in a school at
the time and I heard about this family
well before I met them because typically
when a child comes to a new school
especially coming from a circumstance
such as Hayden they would have a pretty
thick file maybe some report cards maybe
some assessments maybe even doctor notes
but due to the sudden nature of the
change and going across the country
Hayden arrived with nothing just Hayden
and so I had heard about this story and
I was walking down the hallway one day
and I heard a bit of a commotion and I
came around the corner and I saw a
little boy scrooch down visibly very
upset crying and a lady standing next to
him very patiently and I knew this must
be Hayden so I walked up to him and I
knelt down and we did some blowing out
of imaginary birthday candles do you
ever do that just to help calm your mind
in your body and then we had a little
chat while we’re down there doing that
but actually the whole time in my head
I’m thinking okay so what needs to
happen here because the way we do it is
not gonna work for this child he has a
new opportunity and we have a
responsibility to make that a successful
one so in this instance I actually
invited myself into the situation by
putting up my hand and saying I will
take him into my grade one classroom
because typically you’re admitted to a
school based on your age alone date of
birth not a lot of wiggle room and his
grandmother had been advocating strongly
for him to go into grade one and
experience the highly social and just a
really rich play based learning that we
have in a grade one classroom so she had
been at the school advocating is there
anything we can do how can we get him
into grade 1 he deserves that
opportunity but we have a problem
because no know the way we do it is
because of his age he goes into grade 2
so I meet him put my hand up no no I’ll
take him but what was cool is I found
myself in a conversation with a lot of
different people myself
uess grandmother the school principal
someone from the district level and we
were all working towards okay what could
we do differently what might be possible
and we moved from possibility to reality
and thankfully he was welcomed into our
grade one classroom even though he
should have been in grade two so meet
Hayden and I found myself up against our
next challenge quite quickly because
although there had been some in and out
for Hayden it really was never stability
for him so this truly was his first
school experience so the first goal we
had was going to be for him to either
use or remember my name because I have
many memories of maybe working with a
small group of kids or writing something
on the board and I would see this flurry
of excitement like rushing towards me
very unsettling yelling teacher teacher
would be like waving something coming
right into my space and I said okay Bert
this is gonna take some baby steps like
how am I gonna meet his needs but let’s
not forget about the 21 other five and
six year olds I have in my room because
when Hayden comes with no paperwork he
also comes with no additional supports
so it’s it’s us and Hayden and a lot of
diverse learning that we need to try to
tend to so what I did know for certain
is that a lot of the way we usually do
things in school we’re definitely not
going to work in this case in particular
I saw no room for something like a
traditional report card to communicate
with Hayden’s parents a checklist type
report that goes home a few times a year
that was not going to be at all
effective and it’s not that Hayden
didn’t have a lot of learning to share I
had tons to share he was learning
something new every day so something
that he did that just it was okay this
is this picture is one of my favorite
pictures of all time it’s a bridge yes
and the reason I love this picture is
because in grade one we have a lot of
opportunity for creative play and we had
all these buckets with stuff so we’d
have like Lego
we’d have little pieces of paper just
buckets and secretly I my goal was
always to see when will the kids start
really getting into it and mix up the
buckets like no one said you have to
just take the paper and go and sit down
and start gluing paper and no one said
you have to take the Lego and just sit
down and play with Lego and I was
finding that it would take encouragement
from me to get the kids to start really
getting into their play and so Hayden
comes walking in and he picks up the
train and he picks up the blocks and he
builds this bridge and these his
classmates mean their five and their six
like their mind blown right now they’re
like why’d he mix the buckets yes he
mixed the buckets and what he did though
is he inspired his classmates and
forever after the buckets were mixed and
the communication and the creativity
that flowed from that it’s like a
teacher’s dream and Hayden sparked that
so how do I capture that kind of
learning not just to share with his
parents how do I capture that so that
his next teacher that he has working
with him can see how he’s progressed
what his strengths are what his
interests are so I actually started with
an invitation and I invited his family
into our classroom so we could have a
conversation about the learning and I
did that through a digital portfolio so
I could capture pictures or notes or
videos and even Hayden’s own voice
through voice memos in the moment like
during that day and they could have
access to that right away not just that
I could relay information to them but so
that they could join in the conversation
focused on the learning so this is an
example from a digital portfolio of
Hayden’s so I might do something like
take a picture and then offer a
suggestion of how they could continue
that learning at home and a really
amazing artifact was when I recognized
that he was finally open to at least
even talking about what letters are
because Hayden’s not reading Hayden’s
not writing Hayden’s not interested in
anything academic at all at this point
but when he first started to play with
letters it was on the GarageBand
and so I shared that with his family not
just to say this is what he’s doing
today but to say perhaps this would be a
good way that we could start connecting
him to words and reading and then below
my comment is his grandmother’s comment
in a conversation with me saying yeah
you know we’re gonna add karaoke onto
his iPad at home and see how that might
work and that did turn out to be the
spark for us to get him to start wanting
to read a little bit more so I used
digital portfolios that year from my
entire grade one class and not just for
Hayden for Hayden what was really
significant for me is one day through
all this great communication and
conversation I realized he finally felt
safe and supported and free to learn
free to be curious and that day was a
day when I could feel his energy bonds
behind me but he wasn’t running up to me
right in my space waving something in my
face he was waiting very patiently and I
turned around and he calmly said look
what I made mrs. Fadem and it was the
first time you use my name and you know
it might seem like a small thing but
this was profound for this child
I could I could recognize his success
his family could see his success and
then we can move forward so every year
from that year that I was a classroom
teacher I used digital portfolios
instead of traditional report cards
pretty big leap and today there are
thousands of classrooms across the globe
where teachers are exploring new ways to
bring people into the conversation
ongoing about the learning and not just
telling families how their child did so
here’s my thinking on this if we can in
education go from reaching for a
possibility an education is like
entrenched in policy and procedure if we
can go from that to change in motion
then I’m really excited to see what else
we might shift all of us you and so my
invitation to you today is to look for
opportunities in your life where
it just doesn’t feel like right the way
things have always been done and I I
really do mean everything from the way
you celebrate family holiday holidays
with your family or big system change
and then allow yourself to think about
what could it look like what might be
possible and I encourage you to do that
without thinking about potential
roadblocks without thinking about how it
might be perceived just take that first
step and then tap into the collective
wisdom of others because it with it is
within our diverse perspectives and
experiences that we can really create
the conditions for meaningful change so
I thank you for your time for your
energy today wish you a fabulous day and
I invite you to always consider the
possibilities thank you thank you [Applause]