A community is a social unit with commonality such as norms, religion, values, customs, or identity. Communities may share a sense of place situated in a given geographical area or in virtual space through communication platforms.

One of the #SilverLinings of #Covid19 for me is to witness the strengthening of community identity through connectivity and collaboration. There is a real sense that we are in this together, and that we have collective responsibility to stay at home and a shared vision to stay safe and reduce the death toll. Some of the community initiatives that have arisen have really pulled at my heart strings, good people doing good things for good reasons to help others.

We have two hands, one for helping ourselves, one for helping others.

My Real-time Community:

I was brought up in North Devon, in a semi-rural community. Mum owned and ran a massive nursery school and Dad is in farming. They are fully embedded in the local community – in fact Mum changed the nappies of most of the 30 somethings in our home town! As a family we are good with names and faces, so we are constantly bumping into people who we know when we are out and about. Going to university in Canterbury, I lived and worked in local bars and restaurants for 6 years, so I not only got to know the student community but I also became embedded in the local community of this lovely city. Moving to London was a shock. For over a decade I didn’t really know my neighbours, I didn’t have a local pub nor a local shop – I didn’t really see people I recognised as I went about my daily life. Moving to Oxfordshire, buying a house and growing roots, I have consciously planted seeds and nurtured relationships in the local community. Co-founding the Oxon MH & WB network with Lucinda, and co-founding the Oxfordshire Women Leader’s network with the wonderful OWLs has forged new friendships regionally, and out of education. I also am now friends with some of my neighbours. Being part of a community is an anchor during this strange shared experience.

My Virtual Communities:

Co-founding #WomenEd 5 years ago at Easter, we didn’t quite anticipate the scale of the community we were going to grow, nor the power of the connections and relationships that the community would form. Through my work in establishing and growing that community, I have then also been involved in #BAMEed and #LGBTed which led to me founding #DiverseEd following a conversation with my friend and former DHT, Bennie Kara. I have then fallen into the #LeanIn community too, which is a whole different scale of global connections for me! For me what is special about virtual communities is when they spill into real-time and these friendships are nurtured offline.

My Education Community:

Teaching is a special vocation as we bond in the collective endeavour. People go into teaching with purpose and heart, committed to doing their bit for others, driven by their values. I feel that #Covid19 has elevated the profession in many ways and spotlighted how important educators are. There has been less competition and more collaboration across the system. It has felt like we are a united community, when it can often feel quite divided. I hope that we can hold on to being one community moving forwards.

My Overseas Communities:

Over the last 20 years I have spent time volunteering overseas on educational and community projects in my summer breaks. I have had the privilege of living in and working alongside remote communities in Ghana, Tanzania, Mozambique and I was due to go to Rwanda this summer. I like to travel this way, so that I am giving back, rather than staying in a hotel, in luxury, and not meeting people from the local community. Through social media we stay in touch with the other volunteers, both home and international. Volunteering is a bonding experience for everyone involved as you have a sense of collective purpose and shared values.

My Lock Down Communities:

During lock down I have started, unintentionally, two new communities: we have 30 women in our peer support community, and we have 70 bloggers in our #DailyWritingChallenge community – both groups have kept me anchored and uplifted throughout the last month. Along with Angie’s burgeoning community in The NourishEd Collective which on reflection is a hybrid of them both – a community on mighty network, of women in education who are sharing their personal stories on identity. I owe a lot to my virtual communities for the strength, energy and inspiration I get from them – Twitter especially. This weekend I am part of the #BrewEdIsolation community – we have 30+ contributors connecting ideas and people all day on a range of themes.

A sense of community, a sense of connection, a sense of belonging is a sense of hope for many of us right now. It is reassuring to know that we are in this together and that we are stronger together.

A ritual is a ceremony or action performed in a customary way. … We also call the ceremony itself a ritual. Although it comes from religious ceremonies, ritual can also be used for any time-honored tradition, like the Superbowl, or Mardi Gras, or Sunday morning pancake breakfast.

What is the difference between a routine and a ritual?

For me a routine are those daily habits that we perform unconsciously, the things we are programmed like robots to do: we shower, we brush our teeth, we dress, we brush our hair, we eat breakfast, we put our shoes on, we travel to work. We do these things on auto-pilot, we hit each repeat each day.

By contrast a ritual involves the things we do to nourish our soul. The things we choose to do: meditation, mindfulness, yoga, journalling, massages, baths and gratitude logs. We do these things mindfully, we do these things consciously.

Before-Covid my rituals were my monthly self-care activities like going for an acupuncture session, for a massage, for a spa day, for a hair cut. A mid-week G&T and a bath if I had a bad day. Most of these rituals have a price tag.

Mid-Covid my rituals are my daily self-care practices. My morning starts early each day with a glass of water, a coffee and sitting contemplating the theme of the day. I open all of the doors and the windows and let the outside in. I love the fresh air and the sound of nature filling my lounge. My brain wakes up as I tap on my key board and reflect.

I make my own lunch, fresh each day – I have cooked more in the last 4 weeks than I have in the last 4 years. After lunch I lie on my Shakti mat and feel my spine align. At the end of each day in the home office I go for a walk in the sunshine.

Each night I speak to one of my peer support circles and connect with phenomenal women. We talk about life, how we are feeling, how we are coping, what we are exploring.

I go to bed religiously at 10pm each night, normally after a G&T, sometimes after a bath.

Weekly I go to the local farm shop and fill my fridge up with vibrant colours. I go to the Post Office and post the cards I have written to loved ones that week.

Each Saturday I clean my house (when I was promoted to AHT 10 years ago I started paying for a weekly cleaner) and there is something quite satisfying in that.

On the weekends I read, I garden and I listen too music. I light candles and I sit and think. I pass time idly away. I potter.

My days and my weeks have found a new rhythm. I feel calm. I enjoy the stillness and the quietness. In some ways it feels like we are on a spiritual or a meditative retreat, but this one is free.

Post-Covid, I am hopeful that these new habits and intentional rituals will be embedded and will remain to punctuate my day, replacing the exclamation marks of before with the ellipses of today.

noun. a particular attitude towards or way of regarding something; a point of view.

Reframing is a technique used in therapy to help create a different way of looking at a situation, person, or relationship by changing its meaning. Also referred to as cognitive reframing, it’s a strategy therapists often used to help clients look at situations from a slightly different perspective.

Perspectives have shifted, will shift and need to shift. We are experiencing a shift in everything we know, and everything we thought was constant. So how we see things, how we think and feel about things need to change too.

This storm has come to disrupt our lives, to teach us a lesson about humanity, it is clearing a path for us. We need to listen to and learn from this experience.

I am not someone who feels fear very often, things do not tend to hold me back, but I am afraid that humanity will just go back to how it was, that we will resume our lives as they were BC (before Covid) when PC (Post Covid) could be a very different world.

If we reframe how we view the current crisis, we can then consciously reset it. In the last few weeks, we as humans have gone back to ‘factory settings’ so to speak. We have removed all of the apps, all of the notifications and we have removed the white noise from our lives.

If we change the way we look at things, then the things we look at change.

We are not being punished, we are receiving a gift.

We have been given an opportunity – an opportunity to do things differently, an opportunity to be different.

I am a cup half-full rather than a cup half-empty person. My cup is filling up with Time, Stillness, Slowness, Space – the things I do not prioritise in my normally busy, fast, full life.

I don’t know how or when I started to reframe things as a habit, perhaps as a friend said this week it is because I have been involved in a lot of coaching conversations throughout my career. It is a technique we use to shift how we see things. We go below the surface and delve deep into what is really going on, rather than what we think is going on.

Through coaching I have identified, articulated and strengthened my core values and my sense of self. I have found that authentic sweet spot.

I don’t allow negative self-talk to affect me, I am secure in who I am. I no longer allow negative external talk to affect me either as I used to take it personally. Especially when the criticism seemed unjust.

As a young leader I was given a pearl of wisdom in my formative years by a line manager:

You receive a lot of criticism from your peers because you are a disruptor, you are challenging the equilibrium. You are ruffling their feathers and (unintentionally) showing them up, so they are criticising you. You are prepared to put your head above the parapet, so you will get more shots aimed at you. Reframe the criticism as praise, each time they criticise you, they are celebrating the change you are leading.

This was a game changer for me. A penny suddenly dropped. This advice also became my shield, my protective outer layer.

Reframing – what we think… what we feel… what we say… is a powerful process. It empowers us to take control back.

Consider some of these reframes and see if there are negative statements you hear yourself saying or thinking which you can consciously reframe through a more positive lens:

• I can’t do it – I can’t do it, yet.
• I am a mess – I am human.
• I am a failure – I am a work in progress.
• Why is this happening? – What is this teaching me?
• I’m scared – I’m scared but I will try.
• This is too much – One thing at a time.
• I can’t handle this – I don’t have to do this alone.

A positive, can-do attitude is powerful. I have worked with many colleagues who preach a growth mindset approach for our children, but they do not practise it for themselves.

A good way to start feeling more positive is to actively celebrate each night everything you have achieved that day, everything you are grateful for, instead of punishing yourself for everything you have not done. This gratitude practice will serve you better.

Another healthy daily ritual is a morning affirmation, a mantra that you repeat to yourself in the mirror to frame your day.

We also need to find our #SilverLinings in each situation we experience, we need to find the joy in those micro moments and hold on to our #RainbowsOfHope. I have mentioned in earlier blogs that I have reframed the pain of gardening leave, as my once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to travel in South America for 2 months, in term time, on a salary.

To be happy, we either need to change our situation, or we need to change our mindset about our situation – which links us back to our theme of Change yesterday.

Things I am consciously reframing in lockdown:

• What brings me Joy?
• How will I serve my Purpose?
• What nourishes my Soul?
• Who has been there for me?
• How much money do I actually need to survive?
• Am I a Teacher or an Educator?
• What impact can I have from outside rather within the system?

Consider the intentions you will you put out to the Universe moving forwards. Consider how you will hold yourself, and others able and accountable.

Everything we hear is an opinion, not a fact. Everything we see is a perspective, not the truth.

Marcus Aurelis

• 

verb. make or become different.

noun. an act or process through which something becomes different.

I change my clothes every day… I changed a light bulb today… The spring is changing my garden day by day… Some people in my life never change…But I change how I feel about them… I am changing direction in my career… I am not someone to change my mind…

Change is a constant.

So why do we fear it? Why do we fight it?

C:

Change needs courage. Change is about relinquishing control. Change evokes compassion.

H:

Change is full of hope. Change brings happiness.

A:

Change is about adapting. Change needs to be accepted with a positive attitude.

N:

Change is letting in the new and saying goodbye to the negatives.

G:

Change is an opportunity to grow. Change is often listening to your gut.

E:

Change is something to explore, to experiment with and to embrace.

We need to reset and reframe how we see and how we experience change.

We need to seek change we can create, rather than to react to change we cannot control.

We need to change how we feel internally, so we that we can respond to change externally.

noun: wellbeing. the state of being comfortable, healthy, or happy.

Well-being, wellbeing, or wellness is the condition of an individual or group. A high level of well-being means that in some sense the individual’s or group’s condition is positive. 

Being forced to stop, pause, reflect is highlighting that a lot of our well-intended well-being initiatives are about well-doing and not well-being.

We have all seen the 5 ways to well-being, based on scientific evidence from the Government funded New Economics Foundation with the 5 simple action to improve well-being in every day life.

Connecting:

I am speaking to friends and family more regularly than ever before. I have reconnected with friends who live that bit further away or overseas. I have met some lovely new people through my giving.

Am I over-connecting? Do I have zoom-fatigue?

Giving:

I am gifting my mornings to help connect and grow a community of writers. I am giving my evenings to support a number of women through my facilitation of peer circles. I am off to hospital tomorrow to give as a volunteer in the vaccine trials.

Am I giving too much? I am depleting my energy reserves?

Learning:

I am learning lots about myself, about others and about content I will be delivering. I have completed several online courses for work that I will be doing in the summer term – the British Council’s Connecting Classrooms, NPQ online facilitation and Resilient Leadership.

Am I allowing my brain to have a break? What will the impact of this learning be?

Noticing:

I am noticing the birds in the mornings, the spring flowers on my walks and my garden coming into blossom. My senses seem to be heightened and I am even more sound and smell sensitive than before. I am enjoying my daily ritual of writing each morning. I am also noticing my feelings, the fatigue and the body aches.

Will I continue my daily rituals? Will I listen to my body as well as my mind?

Being Active:

I am walking regularly, exploring the local area. I am a high energy person but I do not really enjoy solo exercise, I am a team sport kind of person. A mobile mechanic has come and fixed my bike…. I really should start that online yoga class…

Will I finally join a sports team? Or return to weekly dance lessons?

I don’t want for anything, I have a roof over my head, food in my fridge, a garden to escape to, loved ones checking in on me. I am eating well, I am sleeping well – I am physically, mentally and emotionally well. But I am craving real time human connecting and physical touch.

I am wondering if there is an action missing now we are experiencing physical distancing? In theory you could do all 5 ways to well-being in social isolation, but that omits the human need for social relationships.

For me it is the social capital, the human connectivity, which makes me feel well – I prefer doing all 5 ways to well-being with others, not by myself. So I would encourage you to be mindful as you build lots of well-doing into your new routines and reflect on what it truly means to be well.

Flexible: adjective. capable of bending easily without breaking.

Flexibility: noun. willingness to change or compromise.

Flexible working: noun. Flexible working is a way of working that suits an employee’s needs, for example having flexible start and finish times, or working from home.

Flexibility is a core expectation of teachers. Schools, parents, colleagues and students expect us to be flexible. Flexibility is the foundation of effectively working with others. Relationships and partnerships cannot be nurtured, cannot thrive without some give and take.

As teachers we are flexible in changing how we think, how we plan, teach and assess as our profession is reformed. As professionals we are flexible in changing our responsibilities, our timetables and our duties to the needs of our school. As humans we are flexible in personalising, individualising and bespoking what we do to meet the specific needs of children.

So why is the system so inflexible for us?

The data on flexible working in schools says it all:

The UK has in excess of 250,000 qualified teachers, who are not working in our schools. They are qualified to teach but they have ‘chosen’ to leave the system. When you scrutinise the data further, the main demographic are women, women between 30-39, women who have had children.

In fact, they have not ‘chosen’ to leave, they have instead ‘chosen’ their families. They have ‘chosen’ to be a human, a parent, first and a teacher second. Choice suggests there was some freedom in the decision-making, when in fact their hands were tied. They were handcuffed into making a choice between the conflict of their heads and their hearts.

The dominant rhetoric is that on returning from MAT leave, lots of parents and carers are given the ultimatum – come back full time or you lose your TLR. Or yes you can go part-time but your TLR will be split to reflect this as if you are on a 0.6 FTE contract then you will only be doing 60% of your leadership responsibility. Neither seem very fair to me.

Another interesting piece of data is that if you mention in a job advert that you will consider flexible working relationships in your school, then you receive 74% more applications. Just by mentioning flexibility you attract a different talent pool.

One of the most thought-provoking professional learning opportunities I have attended was a #WomenEd event I co-arranged with EdVal. On a Saturday a few Junes ago, they trained 100 women on the principles of timetabling. The Timetabler in a school is often from a certain demographic, and to stereotype, also from a particular subject suite. This training empowered women in leadership who perhaps had not considered timetabling as a career route to understand the principles. More importantly it empowered them to know how to challenge The Timetabler and make a timetable work for flexible working requests.

Being inflexible forces people to choose. Being inflexible forces teachers to leave.

We need to stop saying our ‘recruitment crisis’ in teaching and we need to reframe it and call it what it is, a ‘retention crisis’. We recruit and train teachers, but our attrition rates for early career teachers are embarrassingly poor, and this is further compounded by our shocking retention rates for established, committed professionals.

Last month, in 9 minutes our profession was changed. In 9 minutes everyone was expected to work remotely, to work flexibly. In 9 minutes the business cases for why schools cannot enable flexible teaching arrangements also exploded.

Another good thing that has come out of this crisis, is that there is more appreciation for how hard teachers work, but another is that there is a spotlight shining on the impact school closures are having on women. Women are shouldering the bulk of the additional workload, women are being more flexible than ever before. We know that a high proportion of key workers are female, we know that schools are staffed by 2/3 women.

There is concern that the pandemic will further exasperate gender inequalities. With presenteeism and visibility being part of the unconscious bias of who is being the most productive, how can women be present and visible when they are picking up the additional responsibilities of home schooling and the increased domestic demands being placed on families?

I am wondering what allowances schools are making for their staff-parents and carers, for parent-teachers, for single-parent teachers? I am also wondering if schools have re-written HR documents such as flexible working/ remote working policies?

If one good thing comes out of this pandemic, it is that schools have embraced flexible teaching and remote working arrangements. The workforce has shown that it is doable. If teachers can be flexible and flip their thinking and their delivery overnight, then we need the system to be as flexible for them in exchange.

I am very hopeful that when we return to school that school leaders, school governors and school timetablers will bring their new learning about how they flexed their schools in a crisis to the forefront of innovating our profession. It would be such a shame and real a missed opportunity for change, if when the pandemic is over, we resume to our traditional practices and inflexible mindsets.

Flexible working in schools, flexible teaching, is not just for a crisis, it is for life.

If we committed to enabling flexible working in our schools we potentially have a talent pool of 250,000 who may be encouraged to return to do what they are trained to do, teach our children, but to do so on their terms. So let’s take advantage of this opportunity to flip the narrative, to rewrite the script and to model that flexible working is wholly possible as a teaching workforce.

Teachers are capable of bending easily without breaking, but we need to fix the leaky talent pipeline in our schools. Teachers are willing to change or compromise, but are our schools? Flexible working is a way of working that suits an employee’s needs, we need to stop putting school’s’ needs ahead of teachers’ needs.

Follow the @womened @sltchat #slowchat on #flexibleworking this week: #WomenEd #FlexAppeal #SLTchat