In Kouzes and Posner, the authors assert that leadership has five traits: Those traits are modeling the process, inspiring a shared vision, challenging the process, enabling others to act, and encouraging the heart. These all are pretty straightforward except, perhaps, for the notion of “encouraging the heart.” What this means is that a leader must celebrate successes of the followers and encourage them to keep going even when circumstances become difficult.
As educators, we must become leaders for our students to succeed in a world where technology is becoming more present by the second. Sheninger claims that “...even though today’s active learners have grown up with technology, it does not always follow that they know how to use it effectively for learning. This is the responsibility of the schools” (17). We must, as Kouzes posits, model the right way to use these tools for our students and inspire them to use these tools as a force for their benefit.
I believe that we as educators can all be leaders, and that role begins by checking our behaviors to see if they are in-line with being leaders for our students. I also belive that the most important of Kouzes five traits is the thought of encouraging the heart. Many of our students will feel inadequate at times, and it is our duty to assure them that they can power through the difficulties of life and the system of education. Though we as technological educators have grand visions of what learning will become, the system itself is still crawling to evolve into the entity we know it can be.
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