TM4T Techniques 2.1.5 - Planning - JIT

Two of the most frustrating questions facing an efficient teacher are these: how much advance planning and preparation should I do, and how far in advance should I do it?

I warn you now that there is no cut-and-dried answer to this, but you will have a much better chance of dealing with this issue if you understand it clearly. We're going to wander off into theory now, but we will answer the question, I promise.

To gain a clearer understanding, look at this graphic:

This startlingly realistic and lovingly executed graphic (self-deprecating irony) depicts a ship in a canal. The ship is negotiating hidden underwater rocks. Yes, you've guessed it; it's another of those pesky metaphors.

In this drawing, the water represents time, and the hidden rocks represent unforeseen disruptions which could delay or derail our progress. I realise that you can't derail a ship, but you get the idea. The representation highlights that we frequently use time - advance preparation - to insulate us from problems. If you know that the printer is unreliable, you will avoid doing any last minute printing, and try to get it done well in advance.

The question being asked here is this: how does the water level affect this problem?  The water-level represents lead-time - the amount of time before a lesson being planned and prepared, and a lesson being delivered.

In this illustration, the water level has been increased:

Rock B, it would seem, is no longer a problem. This solution represents 'increasing lead time'; doing work well in advance so that as much as possible is decided and prepared early. There is one big issue with this approach: Rock A is now even more completely hidden by the additional water. This means that we are not aware of issues, delays, and disruptions, and consequently we do not remove them, or address their causes.

In this illustration, the water level has been reduced:

This changes things dramatically. The ship is quite close to the bottom of the river (this means wrecked lessons), and Rock B is still a problem. There is, though a big benefit: Rock A is now clearly visible. If the canal is well-managed, it could even be removed. Moving away from the metaphor, if you plan things at the last minute, you will become very clearly aware of delays and disruptions. If you had time, you could fix some of these. If a plan is too vulnerable to delays and disruptions, we say it is 'fragile'

This illustrates one of the key Quality Improvement concepts underpinning Japanese manufacturing techniques: Just In Time.  If we remove all the lead time from our operations, this pretty much guarantees to reveal all the rocks - the unforeseen problems which jeopardise production. An efficient organisation can then tackle those problems.

This is all a bit theoretical: let's look at a real example. I used to work in a school which provided photocopying facilities in the staffroom. Unfortunately, the equipment was woefully unreliable: it broke down frequently, took days to repair, and then frequently broke down again. The management, however, were not particularly aware or worried about this problem. Why? Because the teaching staff had adjusted their working practices - never doing any last-minute copying. The more unreliable the machine got, they just did their work further and further in advance. If, however, the staff had decided that they would only do copying at the last minute, then the ruined lessons might have ensured that the copier, or the maintenance company, were dealt with much sooner.

In teaching, there is some merit in the JIT approach, but it must be balanced by advance preparation. The reason that JIT principles are not more generally applicable in education is that our organisations are not - alas - that efficient, and the rocks do not get removed. The photo-copier remains jammed, the projector doesn't get fixed and the radiators in the chemistry lab are still broken.

Therefore in practical terms we should prepare in advance, but not too much in advance. Firstly, because it may be wasted effort, and secondly because it hides from us the disruptions in our life which need to be tackled. The ideal situation is that we are constantly aware of disruptions (at the risk of sounding too motivational: every problem is an opportunity) but that our teaching is not unduly impacted by it.

Contingency planning remains a much more reliable protection against rocks in teaching - a technique that involves a lot of preparation as well as than planning (read about Best-Bad-Lessons in FT2T here).