TM4T Techniques 4.1.2.1 - Location Awareness - Sources Example

This stuff about sources, processes and buckets may seem a bit abstract to a working teacher, so let's take an example, in fact a couple of examples:

Mr Bigrush goes into the staffroom, and finds in his pigeonhole a memo from the Head, asking him if he - Mr Bigrush - would like to go on the school ski-ing trip and, if so, to return the enclosed form to the Head's office. Mr B completes the form - it only takes five minutes. He then toddles down to the Head's office and pops the form into the In-tray. The memo has useful information about the ski trip, so Mr Bigrush decides not to bin it.

Also in Mr Bigrush's pigeonhole is a letter from a concerned parent. The parent is threatening to complain to the governors and write to the newspapers unless his son is entered into a particular examination. Mr Bigrush decides that the Head should deal with this - the debate about examinations has been going on for too long. Mr B hand-writes a few briefing notes on the letter, ending 'can we discuss?'.  He takes a photocopy of the letter for himself, then pops the letter in the Head's in-tray.

Two very different pieces of paper: one is routine, the other not-so-routine. However, in physical terms, Mr Bigrush does almost exactly the same thing for both: he takes a piece of paper out of his pigeonhole, writes on it, and puts them in the in-tray in the Head's office. 

You could represent these two examples as follows:

This representation is really not abstract at all - in fact it is a purely physical representation of what is going on.  The reason that these diagrams may appear abstract is that all emotional details have been removed. The parental letter may have been contentious, difficult to handle, even stressful, but that does not affect the process used to handle it.

This notion - of standardising a process - is frequently missing in schools. Mr Bigrush may very well have scribbled down his details on the Ski-Trip form in the Staff Room coffee area, but felt obliged to go to the department office to write his briefing notes regarding the irate parent - because it's more important, isn't it? More serious, more teacherly, demands a certain ritual.

The idea that some administrative work is status-laden, and needs to be treated differently, is alien to TM4T. There is really no reason to hold important meetings in the Boardroom, if the facilities in the regular meeting room are adequate. There is no reason to treat a letter from the Head of Governors any differently to a note from Harry Potts in 8B: they are just pieces of paper to process, and you need to find the best place, and the best way, to do it.