Teaching Practices

Consider this quote that I came across on Twitter;

My 5 yr-old RE:coloring book.”Why are there all these lines everywhere? They just get in my way.” @tom8williams

I had never thought of the lines getting in the way, but instead serving as a guide to make an unfinished product complete.  But, even when it’s complete with all the right colors in the right places, within the lines, isn’t the  creativity limited to the design of the creator?

Now, replace “RE: coloring book” with RE: worksheets, or RE: textbooks.  In a lot of ways these things are very much similar to the idea of a coloring book in the eyes of the five year old. Merely filling in the blank on a worksheet gets in the way of allowing challenging  a student to think beyond that line, to explain their understanding and form their own opinions.  It keeps them within the lines of the creator’s thinking.  Restricting students to only textbooks to acquire information gets in the way of letting them explore a variety of perspectives and form questions and initiate the exploration of additional resources.  Aren’t we in the 21st century?  Don’t we need to be creating critical thinkers?  Why are we giving students resources and tools that create lines that get in their way?

Think a little deeper and consider the lines that are drawn within the four walls of classrooms.  What lines do teachers draw in their classrooms that get in the way of a student learning?  One way is by limiting the way students are allowed to demonstrate their understanding and learning.  We also know that humans are social creatures.  Peer interactions are a powerful way for students to learn from and teach each other within their own lines.  Do they need structure?  Yes!  But, not rigid lines that keep them within the boundaries of someone else’s thinking.

Dissolving the lines

What would the quote sound like from that 5 year if he had been given a sketch pad, or access to a computer drawing application?  Better yet, an online interactive drawing application!  Let’s say his father then said create something that represents what you hope to learn today.  The completed product truly becomes his own and often times will reveal much more than what was expected – misconceptions, understandings beyond the intended learning, prior experience and knowledge.  In turn, this product can serve as a powerful learning tool and feedback for the facilitator.

Replace worksheets with authentic assessments, use textbooks as supplements instead of the primary source of information, cooperative learning instead of lecture, inquiry based lesson plans instead of traditional teacher directed lesson plans. There are a multitude of simple adjustments that can be made to dissolve the lines, but it’s up to the facilitator to let it happen.

The following exert was taken from a post on The Edurati Review; Learning?  Diving Required written by By Kevin D. Washburn, Ed.D.  (To read the full article, click here.)

As teachers, we often organize material as we prepare to present it to students. However, the research claims that the students must label and sort new material themselves to increase the likelihood of retaining it…………Learning is somewhat like medicine. If the teacher takes the medicine, it does the student little good. But when the student takes the medicine, when the student thinks deeply about new material, the medicine can work as intended.

Who’s taking the medicine and creating the lines in your classroom?

Many changes happened for me professionally in 2009-  the biggest being a change from a classroom teacher to an instructional coach.  I have gained a lot of knowledge from my new position, and I have gained a lot of knowledge from classes I have taken, but I think the biggest impact on my behavior for the new year will come not from new knowledge,  but rather from the realizations that I gained in 2009.  Below are the probably biggest 3, in no particular order.

Realization #1:  Teaching adults is much like teaching students:

Differentiation, differentiation, differentiation.  When it comes to new ideas, whether it be instructional strategies, technology, or brain-based learning, adults come to you with their own prior knowledge and experiences just like students.  And yet, they may come to you with no prior knowledge whatsoever.  It’s important to find where they are and start from there.  Moving forward will be extremely difficult if you don’t and may just increase the learning gap.  Anytime I feel like I’m beating my head against the wall, I now realize I need to step back and determine just where this learner is in their beliefs, values, and understandings and take myself to where they are in order to move them forward, or be willing to continue to fight their resistance.

Which feeds into the next realization,

Realization #2:  Resistance doesn’t always mean disagreement

I realized that sometimes my enthusiasm when working with adults can mistakenly be translated as an insult to their current practice.  When in fact, I just hadn’t taken the time to notice how or where their current practice matched with the new idea, strategy, etc. that I was presenting to them.  It’s not that they disagree with the new idea I am presenting, they just don’t understand how it matches or enhances their current practice and beliefs.  Which holds truth to Theodore Roosevelt’s quote,  “People don’t care how much you know until they know how much you care.”  By listening to the hopes and concerns of the learner first, I can then match my enthusiasm to their needs.  In turn, they don’t feel insulted and are more open to suggestions and collaboration in the teacher-to-teacher manner that was intended.

Realization #3:  Having a colleague that you can reflect with is invaluable.

If you don’t have a colleague that you can have honest dialogue, feedback, and discussion with, find someone!  Find someone that holds the same educational beliefs as you, you have deep respect for, and trust.  Question each other, challenge and encourage one another.  I realized it’s difficult to keep yourself challenged and motivated if you don’t have someone to reflect with, at least once a week (daily if possible), who is on the same level of understanding as you on most things and above your level of understanding on others.  And just as important, is your higher level of understanding for the things they need challenged with.  It’s a reciprocal relationship of honest dialogue, feedback, and discussion that is grounded in the belief that each is capable of great things.

What are some of your biggest realizations of the year past?  How will you apply those realizations in 2010?

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I discovered tonight while sitting at my daughter’s volleyball practice that I could learn a lot as a teacher just by paying attention to her coach.  I’m currently reading, “Never Work Harder Than Your Students” – The book focuses on 5 principles that master teachers apply everyday in their classroom that make them master teachers.

1.  Start Where Your Students Are

2.  Know Where Your Students Are Going

3.  Expect to Get Your Students There

4.  Support Your Students

5.  Use Effective Feedback.

Have you ever noticed that coaches do every single one of these things with their players during practice?

For example-

Start Where Your Students Are;  What good would it do the team if the coach only made the players who had the fundamentals down do all the practice?  A master coach knows that not all students come to the game with the desired skills needed to play effectively and win games.  Therefore, he/she helps each player develop those skills by letting them make mistakes but also capitalize on their strengths.  The coach knows where the players are going and breaks down the fundamentals in individual, sequential steps that they need to master in order to apply the objective in different situations and under pressure.  He tells them they have to learn, unlearn, and relearn.  If a player is practicing something wrong, he stops them immediately and gives them effective feedback and has them do it again until they get it right.  I witnessed a young lady struggling with her serve, she attempted 5 or 6 times to get it over the net.  The coach watched, he let her continue to try, he stopped her, showed (not just told) her which step she was doing wrong and showed her how to correct it, had the other players begin to clap for her (support your students) and without fail she hit it over.  Then he had her do it again, and again.  He expects to get the players there and the players know he will stop everything until they can do it – and continue doing it until they have it mastered.  Incredible!

Coaches know this stuff!  They do it, they apply it and their players respect them for it.

Below you can view a clip from last night’s practice.   These girls just began practicing together just over a week ago.  In this short time, the coach has been able to take them from where they were- basic bump, set, bump (free ball) over the net in isolation, to pass, set, attack (learn, unlearn, relearn) and putting the isolated skills together in a bigger picture.  Not until they have this step mastered will he take them to the next step of working as a team of 6 (where he expects them to get).  You will hear him talking them through the steps (effective feedback) and then supporting them with encouragement.

Volleyball Clip

A close friend and colleague recommended that I read  this book over a year ago.  This Christmas break I vowed to read it and now I would like to pass the gift of his recommendation on to you.  I would also challenge you to go watch a practice and see the principles being effortlessly applied.

“Scandal of education; every time you teach something you deprive a child the pleasure and benefit of discovery.” ~Seymour Papert

I had no idea who Seymour Papert was before seeing the afore mentioned quote, but the quote made me curious enough to explore deeper and find more. What I found is that “people laughed at Seymour Papert in the sixties when he talked about children using computers as instruments for learning and for enhancing creativity” (http://www.papert.org/). Which made me also wonder, were people laughing at him because of his foresight of the use of technology in education, or his philosophy that children can and should be encouraged to be curious?

My point here is that a single quote piqued my curiosity enough to begin learning and exploring on my own. Because of that curiosity the information I found will be retained longer and in fact, I am finding additional ways to apply this new knowledge (i.e. this blog). Why do we presume that our students wouldn’t do the same? Why do we feel the need to provide facts, figures, and opinions to students that reflect our own values and beliefs instead of letting them explore on their own and synthesize their own knowledge, and form their own opinions?  My experience has been that kids are more curious creatures than most adults and with emerging technology have become the most social generation in history. However, traditional ways of teaching stifle their creativity and send the message “because I say so”. It is a scandal that we continue to “teach” instead of promoting inquiry.  In fact, it should be a crime!  If we want students to be productive members of society that think for themselves, “teaching” can no longer be an option.  Give students the environment and tools they need to inquire, rather than “teach” and then we will begin to develop the life long learners that teachers have always dreamed of!

Sitting at dinner tonight I listened to my daughter and her friend discuss how much they felt a couple of their teachers hated them. Well, not so much anymore they felt, they don’t yell as them quite as much these days and don’t single them out for things they were never doing in the first place. They offered up specific examples of what they were talking about and laughed them off thankful this school year was just about over. While listening to this conversation I began wondering if any of my students had ever had this conversation while having dinner with their parents. I certainly hope not. I hope the conversations that involve a child’s time in my classroom include the words like support, community, challenge, engaging, maybe even cool or awesome. And, I hope it would be the idea that school is almost over that would bring the feeling of disappointment. Isn’t that what working with students is supposed to be all about? Lighting the fire within them to become life long learners. Not to light the fire under them to be compliant. I want my kids walking out of the door of my classroom everyday with a spring in their step and a smile on their face, facing the world with new confidence because of something they’ve attempted, accomplished, or felt successful about while spending time with me. To me, that is what makes the difference between teaching being a thankless job and being thankful for being a teacher. Do I think my daughter’s teachers “hate” her in the same sense my daughter perceives them to hate her? No. But, I do think as teachers we need to be mindful of the way we interact with our students and the message we want them leaving our classroom with.

I had a short conversation with a colleague between classes today that left me saying to myself, “Hmmmm, she doesn’t get it.” The conversation went like this;

“Man my kids are wound up today. Are yours?”
“No,” I replied. “In fact, they are totally engaged in what they are doing. We are creating podcasts on some poetry they wrote that was influenced by a piece of abstract art, glogging about literary devices and making stop motion movies that illustrate the devices. In social studies, they are finishing up a webquest I wrote that has them taking on the perspective of a citizen in an eastern hemisphere country and producing a newscast as if they are reporting from that country.”
“Well, mine are busy too,” she said not offended, but matter of factly.
She continued on to tell me she had just spent the last hour talking to them about the powerpoint they would begin doing in the coming days that would require them to look up demographical information about an eastern hemisphere country.

Really? “Talking to” them? For an entire class hour?

Then I was in my assistant principal’s office this afternoon after school and spotted a stack of discipline referrals sitting on his desk.
“Holy cow!” I said.
“Yeah, this is just from today, he replied, I cleared the stack from last week on Friday.”

These are just a couple of reminders how important it is, especially this time of year, to keep kids engaged. Not “busy”, but engaged. Kids are smart enough to know when they are just being kept busy and their behavior will adjust accordingly. If you find that your kids are wound up or you’re writing more discipline referrals than normal, perhaps it’s a good time to reflect on how much effort you are putting into the delivery of your lesson(s). Are the kids engaged with meaningful lessons that are challenging them with knowledge they still need, promoting inquiry, and reflective in their own sense for the students? Or, are you kidding yourself by thinking that keeping them “busy” is going to keep them out of trouble and keep you from anxiously watching the clock waiting for their time with you to be over so they can exert their energy elsewhere? There is a effective difference in keeping kids busy vs. keeping kids engaged.

10 Ways, and Counting, To Use Twitter for Teaching……….

1.  140 character summary-Grades 3 and up

After reading a selection have students log on to Twitter and write a summary in 140 characters or less.  This forces students to focus on the important elements of the story.

2.  Create a class story-Grades 3 and up

This can be an ongoing project for the year. The teacher can create the prompt and then let the students have at it. You could even set boundaries. Assign students their element of fiction (setting, character, plot, conflict, etc.) and they can only contribute when their element is appropriate. Also a great way for students to practice dialogue.

3.  Collaborate with other classrooms

I am collaborating with a 4th grade teacher in my district to let her students ask my students about their middle school experiences. This is a great reflection opportunity for my students and an opportunity for the 4th grade students to practice their questioning skills.

4.  Summer reading recommendations through the summer for students.

Along with this idea I plan to use TinyChat throughout the summer to hold book talks.

5.  Post daily assignments for students and parents.

Keep parents and absent students up to date on what is happening in the classroom.  You could even assign one student to post a daily reflection.

6.  Question of the day, challenge of the day/week, or warm-up/bell ringers.

7.  Have students Tweet current events and provide a link for further reading.

Or, follow a major news broadcaster such as CNN and have students follow up to the news they tweet.

8.  Book recommendations between peers.

Students will have to be creative in “hooking” their peers into reading since they are limited to 140 characters.

9.  Build classroom community

Allow students to brag on themselves and other students for random acts of kindness.  Be sure to do some bragging yourself, especially for those students who need some extra confidence.

10.  Use TweetStats to randomly compare and contrast Tweeters.

This is especially useful for math.  Students can get practice reading different types of graphs, make predictions based on passed stats and follow up on their predictions.

Please feel free to additional ideas through comments to keep the list growing.

Worried or have reservations about students setting up their own accounts?  Set up a class account where all students use the same username and password.  Stress that students need to provide their name (first name only, or initials) with all posts and posts without names will be deleted. This allows you to maintain the security and privacy of the account.  Set the security settings so you have to approve anyone who wants to follow you.  If you feel the students are not using the account appropriately, you can always delete it.